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Frank G Anderson
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Editorial Archives (audio editorials) Archive 1 Arthive 2


9 May 2008

Where are Burma's Neighbors?


Flickr Photo

The events now unfurling inside the dictatorship of Burma are shocking and impossible for even the most callus to ignore. In a country enjoying the benefits of friendly relations with its neighbors - especially, perhaps, Thailand whose own generals and politicians and border business barons are bearing the fruit of sleeping with the Burmese devil – one would think that prosperity and privilege accomplished by the powerful might be enough to entice them in cases like the latest cyclone tragedy to for once relax their iron grip and allow international aid and volunteers into the country. But Burma’s government has been so secretive and repressive over its incumbency that it knows that allowing such aid to enter the country will not only save lives, but certainly provide more graphic photographic material to the outside world that the people of Burma are being treated worse than rats in a cage. This is the government that Thailand has constantly supported, the government now making a farce out of a constitutional drafting process, and that laughs in the face of human rights violations it and neighbors perpetrate.


23 April 2008
the Korat Post Online

Is Skype a liberator for freedom or of hate speech?

"Nigger!"
"F... you!"
"Go to hell! Fag!"

For sure these examples are individual hate speech, and can quickly be found on one Skype cast or another almost on a daily basis. As well, many Skype users find it amusing to crowd casts with interruptions in the form of noise and music or gibberish just to be a pain in the bottom. Skype is being used to air all kinds of speech, polite, controversial, easy-going and serious, confrontational and nasty. Some of it, in fact, is similar or the same as Howard Stern puts up on Sirius satellite after the United States government stopped him from using garbage on the public media. There are serious questions about what many deem to be a lack of censorship on Skype, while on the other hand such lack of censorship does provide an avenue for the rest of us to see exactly what people are willing to try to get away with once they become anonymous and irresponsible – that is, once they have the opportunity to say whatever they wish in a public forum, knowing they face nothing in the way of serious consequences, how far will Skype users go to abuse their privileges, violate all kinds of moral and ethical standards – and possibly many laws – just to demonstrate a new kind of freedom that millions of users around the world have now learned to depend on for live call-ins and online free video among registered Skype subscribers? Apparently, people will go and have gone a long way. Abusive speech is common on Skype, with the offending hosts or speakers telling those offended to drop dead or buzz off! What they say and how they say it mans, apparently, nothing – because there are no consequences. Freedom lovers need not be jerks, abusing profanity nuts or ignorant uncaring sleazy people to run a Skypecast or be on one. But asking people to be decent and respectful, and as a result honorable and themselves respected, today is often like whistling upwind.


 

20 April 2008
the Korat Post Online

Bias Against Israel or Open Forum For Facts and Opinions?



2 April 2008
theKorat Post
See Youtube video editorial soon at this link.

Another Kick For Thaksin Fans, Another 'Plus' For Thailand's Image

With Thailand always seeming to worry about foreigners and other irresponsible Thais damaging the country's image (Takbai, Octobers 6 and 14 notwithstanding), one would think that perhaps Thailand's nominee People Power Party members of Palriament might have enough common sense to conduct themselves peacefully and with a certain degree of decorum. Ah, such is apparently not to be. Today in Parliament's lunch room, a pro-Thaksin MP by the name of Karun Hosakul up and kicked fellow MP Ajarn Somkiet Phongpaiboon of the Democrat Party (also member of Thailand's People's Alliance for Democracy). Fortunately the former Korat Rachabhat University professor suffered onlya glancing blow. The incident was much less severe than an earlier instance when his fellow government servant, Dr. Kraisak Choonhavan (formerly Thailand's Senate Foreign Relations Committee head) who was caught offguard at an anti-Thaksin gathering and was kicked full-force by a pro-Thaksin fan who felt kicking the older much less imposing gentleman was the way to conduct politics in the Land of Smiles. One wonders who is smiling. Certainly Samak. Certainly Thaksin. Certainly Newin. The ilk all. Yes, they are enjoying the fruit of their labors, an undermining of Thailand's weakened democracy and replacing it with self-serving violent interests. Foreigner confidence? Why?


28 March 2008
the Korat Post Online

Barbarians in Parliament?

With Thaksin's carbon copy party People's Power now in Parliament, it has already set Gusiness records in sheer scope and depth of corruption and stupidity. Wait a minute. No, perhaps records WERE NOT set. AFter all, in Thaksin's first year in office, his Parliament President was also found guilty by the Supreme Court... read...
" BANGKOK, Jul 30, 2001 Thailand's Supreme Court ruled on Monday that Parliament President Uthai Pimchaichon committed misconduct when he was commerce minister, upholding the verdict of the Criminal and Appeal Courts, according to a report of the Thai News Agency (TNA) The Supreme Court upheld the Criminal and Appeal Courts' verdict that the Parliament President and House Speaker would serve an one-year jail term and a fine of 20,000 baht (444 U.S. dollars) with a suspension period of two years, as he had served the nation well as Parliament President, said the report."

This incident was closely replicated in February 2008 under the Amazing Samak government when its own Parliament President Yongyuth Tiyapairat overwhelmingly entering office, in a 307-167 vote split right along party lines, was declared guilty of buying votes in the 23 December 2007 national elections. Yongyuth got red-carded, but despite this was still made Parliament Speakre. Now his entire party finds itself facing down the muzzle of a long barrel because the latest Thai constitution calls for party dissolution if any of its exucites si found guilty of election fraud. While party officials and membes are, of course, protesting possible dissolution, opposition critics are pointing out the fact that PPP quickly rushed to appoint the crook knowing that he was already found guilty by investigators. Opposition critics also indicated in a televised program on 27 Mrch 2008 that they would welcome one party dissolution after another, thirty or more, to get rid of the cheats.


23 March 2008
the Korat Post Online

It's easy to be condescending from time to time and dismiss people because of what they do or say. But it's tough to appreciate their better qualities when they go ahead and start talking seriously about changing their country's entire constitution beause its provisinos on electoral fraud threaten their party's very existence.

The current Thai charter calls for party dissolution if its executives are found guilty of voting fraud - such as the PPP's recently ousted Parliament President because there is quite some evidence that he and his wife paid off local officials in Chiangmai/Chiangrai to canvass votes on behalf of the PPP. Probably the most surprising element in this case is not that the official got caught, but why ten or twenty others did not. Surely there was other cheating. But in Thailand, sadly perhaps in most other countries as well, there is a great deal of cheating, rigged in favor of those seeking to safeguard their own interests. If they are part of the ruling elite, so to speak, then they will rig the elections - the way they are held, counted and ratified - to make sure no one rocks their boat.

That the Thai government treats its charter with such distain as to draft a new one any time a political party or the ruling elite feels it needs to underscore the fact that it is in power and intends to remain in power is a tragedy. Under this kind of constitutional protection, the Thai people face only continued enslavement and lies. Tourists and foreign/Thai investors may have a heyday, but itis over the graves of those seeking freedom.


20 March 2008
The Korat Post Online

Tibet, China, Burma and Thailand

Today Thai prime minister Samak Sundaravej is invited to present himself and the Thai government, its policies and proposed future at the American Chamber of Commerce luncheon at the Conrad Hotel. It will be an event largely devoid of much use for the business community since Samak has shown himself, as more than one academichas said, to bea "bare-faced liar." Samak's predessor in the liar department - Thaksoin Shinawatra - some time ago, while still PM, was invited by the Foreign Correspondents Club of Thailand (FCCT) to speak. That even had to be held without this editor because there is no ned to ingratiate yourself to liars, cheats, even killers in some aspects. Kissing up to this type of character is hardly the way to improve yourself. That's theoverall opinion, anyhow.

Today's Samak speech is likely to follow a well-wheeled rut. No transparency into what is really going on, no facts about the southern insurgency, no apologies for insultling all westeners as Samak did recently,l no regrets for his havnig played a pivotal role in the 6 October 1996 massacre at Thammasat University in Bangkok. As well, there is likely to be no useful insight provided by Samak except perhaps the impression that he is likely to leave in the minds of most of those who attend that this guy is a carbon copy of George W. Bush.

There seems to be a dumbing-down of world leaders these days, in all too many countries and in far too many situations. The world community at large is being manipulated and used and that long-ago promised Nirvana, Englightenment, Second Coming and Liberation sort of seems to have bene put on the back burner. Can mankin save himself from himself?

Not with people like Samak, Chalerm and others at the helm. Or George W. Bush, the Burmese junta, Chinese anti-Tibetan autonomy rulers and characters around the world who are finding that they can generally do what they want without much ni the way of meannigful consequences falling on them. We can blame part of this on the American example under the Bush administration, but even well before that. The Iraq War is a farce, a very sick one, and it seems as if the Bush-Cheney duo (Wanted in Vermont for crimes against humanity!), will get off the hook - unlike the 500,000 +/- Iraqis who have paid the price.

Much of what happened can be blamed on Israel, Americna policies in the Middle East, lack of real moral compass on Bil Ladin's part and that of his supporters and other Muslims around the world. I use the general term Muslims rahter than "fascist Muslims" because for a moral compass to be working you have to act when injustices are carried out - act not just against thost you traditionally have differences with, but against those in your own grouping who do the wrong thing, who take innocent lives, who persist in labeling others evil when they do their own evil but attempt to absolve themselves in the name of whatever god they claim, falsely, to be worshipping.


18 March 2008
The korat Post Online

See our YouTube video below on that 'F' word on Skype.

 


17 March 2008
the Koratpost Online

The Samak Sundaravej-Thaksin nominee government has been making a fine art of issuing some of the most unbelievably stupid comments one could possibly imagine that really belong in a comic book rather than in real life - but that's Samak.
Today's Bangkok Post, for example, carried to such idioticisms, to coin a new word. the first was Samak's kudos to the Burmese military junta for keeping the country peaceful. Not a bad understatementfor a fellow like-minded bunch of crooks that kill off the opposition, literally, and thus the peace and quiet Samak relishes. He has shown himself not to be above inciting others to take a life or two, and when it grows into forty six, then he can only remember "one unlucky guy." Detestable does not do this primate justice.

The same issue also carried another silly report credited to Thland's no. 2 police chief Adul Saengsingkaew. He indicates that the probable reason - the Thai police really have to be astute to figure THIS out - is that the Thai media don't have much to report on so to accommodate their need for headlines, southern terrorists are bombing cars and making troubleand carrying out attacks so that they will appear on frontpages, etc. Hogwash? Nah, that hardly describes the depth of absence of human decency and innate personal character of the curren tgovernment in the Land of Smiles. Total discregard for human life, decency, no respect for anyone, ah...didn't the people vote these clowns into office? Just when we thought no one in the world could possibly eclipse Geore W. Bush, Samak pops up again from a bloody history he helped create and now finds himself mocking those who thought he would have met his just deserts by now. But apparntly not. Wonder ewhat tomorrow's headlines will bring?


5 March 2008
the Korat Post Online

Samak Sundaravej, host of inciteful "Armored Car" radio ultra-rightist program during the 6 October 1976 massacre of students and citizens at Thammasat University who brazenly told both Al-Jazeera and CNN that only one student and not 46 were killed that fateful-for-democracy-in-Thailand day, now finds himself about to sit down with an ousted police chief, a genuine "Mr. Clean," who doesn't take a lot of silly false charges without answering back.
That the Bangkok Post chose to use the word "rant" in regard to General Seri wasn't the wrong meaning of the word so much as it was the connotation of the word. Ranting often implies wild unthought words, and Seri without a doubt knows a lot more of what he is talking about than Samak. So when the two sit down together, it was be someone with a tarnished personal history talking with someone who is above the kind of things that will allow such tarnishing. But this kind of confontation in the past has not stopped corrupt governments from staying in power. It will no doubt rock the PPP until enough people wake up to what really happened on 23 Decembr 2007, and what Samak had really been involved in on 6 October 1976 and events that led up to it.


27 February 2008
the Korat Post Online

Human Rights Violator Returns - Unbowed?

Thaksin Shinawatra, the man who made prime minister Samak Sundaravej possible and who brought a Thai Rak Thai clone back into power with the 23 December 2007 elections, is heading back to Bangkok on a Thai flight from Hong Kong tomorrow morning. While he says that he is steering clear of politics (a big pile of BS if there ever was one), a planeload of politicians is today flyig into Hong Khon just to make sure Thaksin is not lonely when he flies into Bangkok tomorrow. Talk about people who are grateful for their jobs! Buying loyalty does work.

There is more than one opinion about this secretive egomaniac among foreigners. Some even think Thaksin was and will be good for the country. It proves anyone can have an opinion. But if you dig below the surface at all, you will discover an uncaring demagogue who will do anything to anyone to get his way. He must also be gloating, not just at his return to a sea full of welcome arms, but because an old political ally turned foe is back in the paddock - Barnharn Silapacha. Thailand's future is not looking very peaceful. The difference between former field marshal Thanom Kittikajorn and Thaksin is that one has been a military dictator while the other a selectively benevolent one.


26 February 2008
Minister to the Prime Minister’s Office
Mr. Jakraphob Penkair
Fax: 02-2823497
Copy: Manager - 02-629-4470/4475
Copy: Files                  
People’s Alliance for Democracy

Mr. Jakraphob:
In a report cited in The Nation, you were quoted,
"The People's Alliance for Democracy is known for causing social divisions and my job as the PM's Office minister is to foster reconciliation and unity in society.”
"Some PAD leaders have exploited the media to propagate their political beliefs, hence impacting on the reputation of the local press," he said.
Your referral to the PAD as being known for causing social divisions is unfortunate, inaccurate and unwise. I know many people involved in the PAD. At rallies against Thaksin it was easily noted that the people assembled were not paid to attend and that they were indeed fighting for legitimate political expression – a fight that has been going on here in Thailand against one successive oppression after another.
Even under the just-departed military coup leadership, there was more press freedom here in Thailand than under the Thaksin administration. It seems as if you are attempting to replicate the former TRT motif of muzzling the press, begging the question, and proceeding through the entire litany of logical argument errors that make any illegitimate regime last longer than it should, killing off political expression while blaming others for so-called “divisiveness”  - which in fact is not divisiveness so much as it is open and free expression of opinion.

Current PM Samak Sundaravej and MinyInt may wish to lie to the public about the massacres of 6 and 14 October and 17 May, but do not expect the foreign media, the PAD or informed persons to be so easily manipulated by lies and deceptions. When “only one unlucky guy died” was heard around the world, this Thai government statement stirred up far more divisiveness than anything the PAD could have done. Despite the PM’s claim to the otherwise about no damage being done by these expressions of ignorance and disregard for those innocents killed, it made Thailand look foolish and stupid. As well, more extrajudicial killings (Let’s stop the lying about drug dealings killing themselves – do you have evidence?) only indicate to the world that Thailand’s administration is determined to subvert human rights and to remain unanswerable for these wrongdoings. However, you may rest assured that there are people watching, and that they are contacting their own lawmakers to try to remove impediments to legitimate freedom in Thailand, including many Thai people who will not act as ignorant prey to political demagogues. These efforts involve such things as bilateral agreements, weapons sales, academic exchanges and tourism industry sectors that are influenced one way or another by positive or negative images – reports about which are vital under repressive political regimes. 
Sincerely,
Frank G Anderson
Personal Comments


23 February 2008
the Korat Post Online

Now that the Samak government has indeed stepped into Parliament, the sulking no longer needs to be maintained but a high degree of care does. Neither Samak nor Chalerm, the Interior Minister, are exactly famous for human rights concerns. In the latter's case he is known for being violent anyhow and has raised his children the same way. In Samak's case, his penchant for expousing ignorace during interview with the foreign media and then trying to claim "No damage was done. I have a right to say what I believe." This was his infamous quote to both al-Jazeera and CNN that only one person died on 6 October 1976 when in fact there was a massacre and dozens were killed by government-instigated protectors of Thailand's values. The Red Gaur and Village Scouts were given training and weapons and told to kill. With Thaksin's record 2,500 killed [notwithstanding his BS story and the same for Samak that the victims were merely killing each other off - when in fact the police had a much more credible motive to kill them]. But will the Thai authorities ever lead a just investigation? Not on your life!

Let's wait and see whose family members get killed in the coming new drug war. Let's see how Burmese Thai authorities act in carrying out the dictates of who many view as heartless dictators.


22 February 2008
the Korat Post Online

Will Samak Apologize? [No.]

From: http://www.egs.edu/resources/hegel.html

Hegel followed the Greek philosopher Parmenides in believing that what is rational is real, and what is real is rational. This is his rational structure of the Absolute, and must be regarded in conjunction with his idea that the Absolute must be seen as pure Thought, Spirit, or Mind, in a process of self-development, governed by the logic of dialectic. The dialectical method is the notion that the conflict of opposites creates movement or progress. The dialectical method is often studied in terms of thesis, antithesis, and synthesis, although Hegel seldom used this teminology. The thesis is a primary idea, whose incompleteness gives rise to an opposite or conflicting idea, or antithesis. The synthesis is a third term which arrises from the conflict between the first two, overcoming the opposition by reconciling the truth found in both the thesis and antithesis. This synthesis becomes a new thesis, inspiring a new antithesis and synthesis, and continuing an evolution of intellectual or historical development. Hegel argues that this dialectical develpment describes the movement of Absolute Spirit toward an ultimate goal. Reality is the Absolute in a process of dialectical unfolding, manifesting itself in nature and history as it develops. In The Phenomenololgy of Mind Hegel traces the manifestation of the Absolute through the stages of consciousness, self-consciousness, and reason.

The issue at hand in Thailand seems still to be the relentless need by right-wing power groups, controlled by greedy individuals, to oversee how things in Thailand are run, how they are perceived, and how they are commented upon. In short, there appears to be a promise of more of the same in terms of violence, oppression, vested interests, double standards, temperamental outbursts, political police-backed kidnappings as in the Somchai case, and in regard to the announced new battle of the war against drugs, more extrajudicial killings – this time supervised by an Interior Minister known for being violent and for protecting his violent children – most noteworthy of whom, by the  way, has recently been sneaked into government coffers as a secretary to a deputy health minister.
Samak and Chalerm have both stuck their proverbial feet in their mouths by making early and stupid comments that have quickly become history for the world to read. Samak himself has said, in regard to Thaksin’s huge tax-free stock sell-off, that “if someone does something and they do not think it was wrong, then it is not wrong!” Samak is also on record as insulting basic intelligence by declaring as fact that only one person, an “unlucky guy” died during the 6 October 1976 Thammasat University massacre. As deputy Interior Minister and then as Interior Minister at the time, he had access to information beforehand and afterward that proved his 2008 comments to be a horrid lie. As to Chalerm, he lied when he said he would not use his position to obtain coveted jobs for his children in government, but then went ahead with getting Wan into the Health Ministry.  Although Thailand’s revered monarch has implored Thailand’s leaders, in times past and today, to work for the people and not for themselves, it is a futile entreaty to people who have no intention of doing much other than helping themselves to hard-earned billions they are bilking the poor out of. The tale is not unique and is replicated in many countries, but here in Thailand it is more tragic given the relentless plight of the poor, especially in northeast Thailand, who have always been subject to wrongful governance and corrupt practices. In return, the Isaan electorate has one time and another constantly voted to bring back the most corrupt and vile leadership anyone can imagine.

There are those who cite Thaksin in a way that makes it appear that he was a savior of sorts, a boon to Thailand. Listening to Thaksin’s propaganda and being given little access to opposing viewpoints, most observers might feel some sympathy for Thaksin, the TRT and the Thai people who worship the former premier. But keep in mind that the people of Germany also loved Hitler, and the people of Italy loved Mussolini, and that the people of Thailand once loved one corrupt politician after another who literally bilked them dry.


17 February 2008
the Korat Post Online

Empty threat to Bangkok visitors?

One of the things that Thai people in general have been famous for is a certain lack of regard for public safety. This can be seen in the way Thais park vehicles, obstruct supermarket aisles with carts while they talk to friends or dream of the future, in the crowded sidewalks throughout the country that should be permitting pedestrians by but only allow vendors – with appropriate payments to local police.
Thus it should not be considered a complete surprise to hear that Suvannabhumi airport vicinity residents are now threatening to unleash rockets and balloons to disrupt airport operations because they have not been paid compensation promised by airport authorities. Again, there should be no surprise. Thai authorities are also well-known for making empty promises just to shut the mouths of protestors who do have a right not only to protest but also a right to compensation when state agencies mess up – as they often do here.
Whether the threats will actually be carried out or not is a question. Given the very real threat that such action could have against lives and property literally hanging in the air, it is logical that the protestors will really not proceed. But they might. Or some of them might. So what is to prevent a horrible air tragedy?
The Thai government, from its inception in ancient history to the present, has generally been unobservant of people’s real needs and the further need to publicly air projects and proposals that affect the public welfare. Most often this lack of observance is due to vested interests – generally financial but also political and status – that demand adherence to not rocking the boat. A land of contrasts in the extreme, Thailand presents the image of tolerance, meditation, charitable works and understanding, but beneath most of this is a roiling proclivity toward undermining the rights of anyone who gets in the way, even to the extent of killing them. This ethic (sic) may be one of the underlying mechanisms that the Thai police used to carry out well over 2,500 extrajudicial killings as part of former premier Thaksin Shinawatra’s anti-drug war. Police may have rationalized that those killed would get in the way of police corruption that certainly had to involve knowledge of drug traffic and supply, but to safeguard the existing hierarchy, police were given the green light to eliminate anyone who could talk.


12 February 2008
the Korat Post Online

Money Doesn't Always Take First Place

Vitoon Chatipatimapongse, former Nakhonratchasima provincial administrator, found himself in second place on 10 February in provincial administrator elections and temporarily out of a job that he had earlier resigned from to run in the election. With what appeared to be a well-funded campaign, Vitoon had basically occupied Lady Mo rotunda and many of the streets of downtown Korat with posters and speaker-blasting announcer trucks, to no avai - or at least not enough. Known for grandstanding and for being politically ambitious, Vitoon now will have to revamp his strategies and map out a new approach to a job he no longer has.


10 February 2008
the Korat Post Online

One wonders why police in Thailand don’t migrate to the easy-to-use-computerized traffic ticket systems found in many other countries. Relatively inexpensive and simple, they save a lot of time all around and move drivers on while their wrongdoings are settled via payment of an official fine or an appearance in court where things are then settled. Yet, one may not wonder so much as such a system would skirt around the ability of police to go on ‘fishing’ expeditions and bilk motorists out of money, or otherwise cause huge inconveniences in forcing drivers to get their licenses back at a local police station after paying a fine there or bribing someone off.
Computer use in Thailand, however, may be the victim of entrenched attitudes that call for more personal approaches to situations of all kinds. There’s the information search function, for example. Several times here in Korat this writer has attempted to find personal information from UBC, TT&T, and other companies with my personal data stored somewhere. But somehow unless these outfits have your precise identification number, despite the fact that a computer database is supposed to be searchable with a wide range of search criteria, they can’t find you or who you are or what you bought or where you live or any other information. If you go back home, however, and bring back THE receipt, or THE guarantee card, etc., THEN they can find you.
As well, in Thailand agencies also have a problem with email. The email system works fine – it’s just that people don’t use it. Government agencies keep sending late hardcopy materials through the mail and fax God-awful looking darkened notices hardly legible, then state that they haven’t yet been approved to use email to send such information.


9 February 2008
the Korat Post Online

Multi-Talented Or Ignoring Their Assigned Portfolio?

Reports today from the Thai Public Relations Department indicate that the new Foreign Minister Noppadon Pattama has indicated how the unrest in the south of the country will be dealt with. As well, Suwit Khunkitti, the new deputy prime minister and industry minister, has said that he and his party will propose how the government should handle the events in the south. If common sense is employed, one may wonder why the Industry Minister and Foreign Minister both have spoken out very clearly about the south and how it should be handled, and yet Thailand’s Interior Minister, Chalerm Yubamrung – the man who has expressed regret for his family’s bad public image but strangely not for his family’s bad behavior – and who has responsible for internal security of the nation, has not been heard of regarding the unrest in the Muslim-populated region. Surely this minister has some ideas of his own. One wonders why they have not been heard, except through the mouths of other ministers. A sign of divisiveness?
Official Thai government statements over the last couple of days have begun to scare those of us who expect logic and openness. Samak said that a new policy in the south would involve disarming civilians and believe it or not, also junior ranked defense staff would also be left unarmed. Fortunately one of Thailand’s more aware generals spoke up and condemned the foolishness for what it was. It is doubtful he was one of those who fought hard for Thailand's aircraft carrier.
That the government we have now seems far more intent on restoring the honor of Thaksin and the 111 TRT politicians banned from politics for five years, than in appearing to be consistent and know what it is doing, is mind-boggling only to those who expect common sense and logic. But if you have been here in Thailand long enough, you can see and hear almost anything. Samak as prime minister! Who would have thought????


9 February 2008
the Korat Post Online

Why No ASTV on State-Run Media?

Although it is amazing, on the one hand, to see how so many, Thais and foreigners alike, pay homage, in effect, to the corrupt Thaksin administration and its fledgling clone the PPP, on the other hand not being exposed to opposing viewpoints in the media, except perhaps for an occasional Bangkok Post or the Nation Group article, it is really no wonder that lack of information exists in the analytical mind and a great deal of sympathy for Thaksin and the former TRT party and its officials exists. After all, if you are being spoon-fed propaganda for such a long time and haven't seen much else in the way of some 'bones' with 'meat' on them, then you can only get a favorable impression of a corrupt regime that has yes, helped some of the poor in the past but if Pak Mun is any example whatsoever, also ignored the interests of the poor and local villagers in northeast Thailand and proceeded with hugely expensive and environmentally damaging projects. And what has new Thai Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej said of such large infrastructure projects? "I don't care what the environmentalists say." And this is from a quasi-democratically elected national leader who claims to be independant from Thaksin but who could not even have gotten close to the nation's top job unless he could be used by Thaksin to once again seize the reins of power in the Land of Smiles.
It is true that Samak is his own man - to an extent. But when it comes to running Thailand, there were only two parties that really ran the country - Thaksin and the opposing military/military-backer groups. It was conflict between those that led to Thaksin's ouster. He was being slapped on the wrist more than anything else. Having to remain outside of Thailand was insulting and it was the insult that was more important to the coup makers than any real, sincere efforts at bringing a workable democracy into the kingdom was. Democracy wasn't really the issue back prior to the 19 September 2006 coup that ousted Thaksin. What was the issue was that Thaksin was getting too big for his britches on the one hand, and that his machinations into change were beginning to threaten the influence of a - as one observer saw - revered institution in the country. Thaksin was prancing around during his prime minister days, many will attest to, in ways that called for the people of Thailand to worship him. Another Mussolini? Count the 2,500 dead in the streets as a result of a failed drug war, Samak's current government ministers saying that they can resolve the drug problem here within 90 days, and you will get some idea of the way of things to come - more illusion, more dispute, this time around probably some open mortality before the military steps in again. The Thai military, as we cited earlier, was not stupid back in December when it passed a measure that is now in effect prohibiting the civilian government from transfer of senior military officials. The military, and the forces behind it, knew what they were doing. This aspect of Thailand's underlying ruling infrastructure is what complicates any semblance of reform in nearby Burma's political system: the military is such a part of the way power is shared that any serious moves toward democracy threaten those vested interests and will not be tolerated.

 


8 February 2008
the Korat Post Online

Several comments about US President George W. Bush's telephone call to newly elected (23 December 2007) Thai prime minister Samak Sundaravej have appeared online and in the press, generally in the tone of chastising both of them. A few comments were in suport of the president and the prime minister, and the call, but one wonders just what prompted it. The Treaty of Amity, US arms sales to Thailand, American commercial interests and the self-declared War on Terror obviously dominate US-Thai interests, and any thought that Bush was phoning Samak to urge Thailand to begin paying attention to human rights concerns, for once, would be wishful thinking at best. Thai society, if anything, is comprised of an overall ethic of non-involvement, or getting things over with and on to the next thing without raising a fuss, rocking the boat or pissing anyone off. It's a nice way of looking at things - if it worked. But it doesn't more often than it does. A well-known American academic in Bangkok decades ago once observed, "Thailand has the best philosophy of life, and the worst practice." Those words have not lost much of their accuracy in today's Thai society.
Of course everyone who feels that former Thai prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra was the best thing that could ever have happened to Thailand will rant and rave about how he helped the poor here in Thailand. That he helped SOME of the poor while not helping MOST of the poor isn’t up for discussion, apparently. Anyone who has “been around” and seen things on his or her own knows that the poor in Thailand HAVE NOT been generally helped by the Thaksin or any other administration. Their plight has gotten worse and they have been in the same straits over the decades that they are in today – only worse. The cost of living has gone up and incomes have not. Whether pro-Thaksin readers have learned of poor northeast farmers having to hunt paddies for rats so they can eat is a question – and would it sway opinion if it were widely known? Northeast Thailand, the veritable breadbasket electorate of corrupt Thai politicians, helped put Thaksin in power and have helped bring about his return through the back door guise of the People Power Party. So it is the poor of the northeast that will also have to bear the brunt of the coming economic and other woes, including social, that are endemic to a give-away-for-free populist government that will take Thailand into the depths of debt it never imagined.

Will protests begin once again? Will Thailand’s streets once more become the scene of one group of Thais confronting another? The answer is invariably yes. The reconciliation or national unity principles being bandied about under nationalist guises are merely appeals to sing off the same sheet and forget the larger issues of greed and corruption. Those new ministers in the Samak/Thaksin government are hardly “good and innocent” as Samak has recently said. When you consider the current plight of Thailand’s poor, forgiving Thaksin and other corrupt politicians seems a grave error indeed. Another is not to watch ASTV News 1 to get another view of reality here in the Land of Smiles.

 


3 February 2008

Poor Samak!

Looking considerably the worse for wear, newly-elected Thai prim eminister Samak Sundaravej has been looking a bit haggard recently as he leads Thailand into 2008, pending, of course, on His Majesty's conferral of position as head of government - which is not expected to be delayed any further unless Samak does a fourth, fifth or sixth reshuffle of the new cabinet, over which he really has very little control. Imagine being relected premier and having to wait for the OK of a former prime minister before any cabinet choices are approved. Not a great way to lead the country, riding the coattails of a former premier that one of Thaksin's old coalition partners Banharn Silapacha swore up and down he would never parter with again. Apparently having egg all over your face in the LOS does not mean much.
That Thai Rak Thahi is back in power there is no doubt. But the military pulled a fast one last December 20, just three days before the post-2006 coup parliamentary elections, by resolving to pass a law that went into effect yesterday, that does not allow the Thai civilian government to reshuttle senior military officers without going through a coalition committee comprising, guess what - yes, senior military officials from all branches of the service.
Initially when Samak began looking like he was actually going to become PM this writer envisioned the idea that perhaps, as Thaksin was preparing to do anyhow before he was ousted, it was possible to make inroads into the military hierarchy and ensure that it was castrated quickly to help along the civilian government's independance. While not a friend of the TRT/PPP, this writer was ambivalent between the alternatives of either having a corrupt civilian government that finally pulled the military tiger's teeth, or having the military retain its role in government - and thus its forever present capability to stage another coup. Unfortunately, the military won another one, and the 20 December 2007 resolution will have serious consequences for furuter generations here in Thailand.


 


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