In Myanmar or Burma or Birmanie or Birmania or Mian-Dian or Phama or … you just change names. You don’t change the actors, you change their roles. Names are like smoke, roles are like mirrors. A lot of smoke and mirrors in Naypyitaw (or Naypyidaw) the “abode of the rulers”. Burmese are very fond of the theatre of the marionettes!
Burma has always been ruled by an oligarchy since the days of the monarchy operating on the medieval principles of intrigues, coercion, nepotism, patronage and “appanage”,… Connections (guanxi in Chinese) are the key to the web of power. Suu Kyi (most Burmese don’t put their father’s name in front of your name, unless he is famous!) might be considered a “Burmese idol” or a “human rights icon” for many people in the West like Bono (the U2 guy), but in Burma (or Mianma, whatever) her fame and her power (“awza” in Burmese, she doesn’t have “ana” yet) comes from the fact that her father Aung San was a national(istic) hero worshiped by the majority of the populace. He died early so we would never know if Burma would be very different now if he wasn’t assassinated in 1947 (the year I was born in Rangoon or Yangone?).
What Burma needs is a French Revolution of sorts (you know the kind that says: Liberté, ├Йgalité, Fraternité) before Suu Kyi gives another (in my opinion rather boring) lecture about democracy and “rule of law” (so what’s the citizenship law in Burma?)
Anyway, a brief subjective response to the two comments above:
1. The old cronies of Than Shwe are definitely still “hanging around” (definitely not hanged!}
2. The average citizen in Burma is very poor and is looking for a “saviour” or “messiah”. For some it’s Suu Kyi, for some it’s the 88 generation, for some it’s the Chinese, for some it’s the third force (Burma Egress or whatever they call themselves), for each of the “legally designated 165 ethnic groups” it might be 165 different “local(tribal?) war-lords(gods)?”. I don’t know.
Quo vadis Birmania?
paul,
there’s an interesting assessment of the likely fate of the cronies in the most recent ICG report on myanmar: “the politics of economic reform.”
regards,
a red ant in yangon
Unfortunately absolutely nothing has changed in Governments, every is now back to the status quo. Its as it was when the coup occurred in 2006. A puppet prime minister, part of the Shinawatra clan. Corruption is rife and probably has worsened, there is no end in sight for this major problem. Will there be another coup? Unlikely, will there be another mass up rising causing political chaos and further unnecessary deaths with warnings issued for tourists to avoid Thailand? Yes very likely. Its just a matter of time and will it happen.
The question is how Myanmar could make the move from reform initiated by the President to one initiated by the average citizen. This reshuffle might not be a move towards it though. Only time will tell.
Excellent stuff Soe Lin Myint – Commercial and corporate analysis is often a missing link on these pages.
Equally, “offshore” political nous may be the weak point of ITD’s plans for expansion. While the ITD-Shinawatra bond may have reaped large dividends in Thailand, it seems the company is unable to get the political relationships right in a post-2010 Myanmar.
President Thein Sein’s apparent down-playing of the Dawei project when meeting with Japanese investment banks in May was followed by one of his adviser’s down-playing ITD “experience” in this scale of project. And if they couldn’t get it going with Max Myanmar, you really have to wonder.
The original MOU was hurriedly put together in the last days of the previous government in Naypyidaw. The terms have never been seen as favourable to Myanmar by those in the incoming government, who are equally riled by the personal cheques that lubricated its signing. Applying the lens of Shinawatra-invincibility to politics on the other side of the Tanintaharyi hills (or in Bangladesh) may have sunk ITD’s plans to be more than a construction contractor.
Reuters yesterday quoted the “chairman of the Dawei SEZ” as saying the Thai government has effectively taken over the project. The most recent commentary suggests that the outcomes of the Yingluck-Thein Sein meeting in July is a bridging loan of $325m by a consortium of Thai banks, and renewed negotiations with JBIC to finance the port and road infrastructure.
Eventually the terms of the 2010 MOU will have to be renegotiated with Naypyidaw, but with whom? On their current form, ITD will not be at that table.
“Cambodia and Cronyism; Phnom Penh’s foreign donors are enabling abuses of human rights.”
– Anonymous.
Wall Street Journal (Online) [New York, N.Y]
21 Sep 2012: 9.
Abstract
Absent meaningful pressure to protect property rights, foreign aid and investment will bring limited benefits.
On Sept. 11, the body of Cambodian journalist Hang Serei Oudom was found stuffed into the trunk of his car with his head bashed in. At the time of his death, Mr. Oudom was writing about collusion between local businessmen and officials in the mountainous northwest. There as elsewhere in the country politicians, officials and logging companies have conspired to clear-cut virgin forests that are supposedly protected by the government.
The murder of Mr. Oudom is hardly an aberration in Cambodia. At least 10 journalists have been killed in Cambodiasince 1996. Social activists have fared no better: In April, a military policeman shot and killed environmentalist Chhut Vuthy as he investigated illegal logging in southwestern Koh Kong province. Dozens more have been summarily imprisoned for protesting illegal land seizures.
In 2011, Transparency International ranked Cambodia 164th out of 182 countries in its annual Corruption Perception Index. Rampant cronyism also suits Cambodia’s one true foreign friend, China, which has poured billions of dollars of aid and soft loans into the country. In the process it has secured economic concessions and diplomatic fealty. At the July 11-12 summit of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations in Phnom Penh, Cambodian diplomats scuppered a collective response to Beijing’s encroachment in the South China Sea. Coincidentally, Beijing this month announced another $2.5 billion in investment and soft loans.
Trade between America and Cambodia is also on the rise, with the U.S. accounting for 41% of Cambodia’s garment-driven exports. Yet the Obama Administration has remained largely silent about Cambodia’s recent malfeasance, most notably at the Asean summit. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton made no public mention of Cambodia’s rights record. Two days after Mrs. Clinton left the country, the authorities imprisoned one of the country’s leading opposition figures on dubious charges of secessionism.
Cambodia’s ongoing genocide tribunal still receives a lion’s share of Western attention when it comes to human rights. But the most pressing issue for most Cambodians is land use. In the past decade, hundreds of thousands of Cambodians have endured land grabs and evictions. They have suffered further when they dared to protest these abuses.
Phnom Penh’s international donors might stop to consider that Cambodia’s oppressive cronyism is ultimately a manifestation of its disregard for the human right of private property. Absent meaningful pressure to protect property rights, foreign aid and investment will bring limited benefits.
“Critics Press Cambodia to Fight Violence on its Forest Frontier”
By ANDREW C. REVKIN
I was heartened to see an editorial in The Wall Street Journal push Cambodia (and its supporters, including the United States and international donors) to fight rampant corruption under which “hundreds of thousands of Cambodians have endured land grabs and evictions.”* The editorial added, “They have suffered further when they dared to protest these abuses,” noting the murders of the journalist Hang Serei Oudom (covered here) and land-rights campaigner Chut Wutty.
I also encourage you to read “‘Blood Wood’ Killings in Cambodia Deserve U.S. Rebuke,” by Olesia Plokhii, a journalist who was a few feet from Chut Wutty when he was shot on April 26 (she was covering the land and timber fight for Cambodia Daily. Here’s an excerpt from her piece that makes some important points:
It is heartening to see that when a reporter is killed in the forest, people hear about it. The same must go for the activists and others who risk their lives daily, like the Prey Long People’s Network in one of last great ancient forests in Cambodia. The loss of Wutty removed a vital voice speaking up for powerless villagers and indigenous minorities.
The deforestation crisis in Cambodia is unique only because it is relatively new. While 130-foot trees in tropical jungles have been gutted for the last two decades in Cambodia, neighboring Malaysia, Indonesia and Vietnam began exporting illicit timber long before. In Cambodia, the forests may still have a chance – if change takes root.
Mu Sochua, Cambodia’s leading in-country opposition figure, commented in her blog that she hoped the issue would be on the agenda for an upcoming meeting of international donors and the Cambodian government.
Despite Cambodia’s increasing reliance on Chinese money, the United States still carries weight there. But will President Obama exercise his power and address the deforestation crisis and this rash of killings at an upcoming Asean summit in Phnom Penh in November?
I hope the Obama administration is taking this issue seriously, at the very least in behind-the-scenes interactions with Cambodian officials, and – if necessary – publicly.
Addendum: I belatedly noticed that Unesco has also condemned the killing.
[3:55 p.m. | Clarification |* I cleaned up some turgid prose in the opening sentence.]
Thanks for the interesting update Trevor. I would be interested in hearing how many (if any) cronies of the former Than Shwe govt are still hanging around, or if they are being marginalised.
The last coup in the year 2006 was because a Shinawatra (Thaksin) was Prime Minister and his government was riddled with corruption and the Thai people was demanding his ouster. This year 2012 Thailand has another Shinawatra running the government and corruption once again is running rampant in just about all major projects – flood control, rice price subsidies, infrastructures etc. And the bombings go on with even more ferocity and terror at the South while the Shinawatras and their gang flourishes in the graft booty.
Yeah . . . it will be sad but perhaps that’s the way the Shinawatra’s corruption ways will crumble . . . via coups.
Hla Oo’s comment (#2) two years ago was absolutely right. What is happening in Burma right now with the reformist Thein Sein as President and young Min Aung Hlain as the Commander-in-Chief was exactly what Hla Oo predicted in December 2010, almost 2 years ago.
Who is Hla Oo and what exactly is Hla Oo? Can two Doctors Walker and Farrelli answer that question?
They must know him well as they had promoted him for quite a few years to become a well-known writer about Burma on the Internet through New Mandala.
The rumours in Yangon are that he might be Min Aung Haling who is well known to have been a scholar and officer as he once served as the Rector of DSA for many years.
One part of the report shows that Google has restricted or partly restricted at least 149 YouTube videos that the Thai government claimed was insulting to the monarchy
Google, censorship and Thailand’s monarchy…
As reported in Siam Voices this week, Google has released its 2012 Transparency Report, which chronicles requests that Google receives, mostly from governments, to block material online. As Lisa Gardner notes on Siam Voices, “Google bucked international trends in 2011 by blocking access to hundreds of web pages at the behest of the Thai Ministry of Information, Communication, and Technology [MICT].” One part of the report shows that Google has restricted or partly restricted at least 149 YouTube videos that the Thai government claimed was insulting to the monarchy. Unlike in many other countries, where Google supposedly makes its decisions to take down material after a local court issues an order (not that courts are infallible, but at least there is a court order), in Thailand it took down material even without court orders being issued, simply at the request of the authorities.
The statement that says, “It is easy to overlook Thaksin’s own royalist views and the fact that he has worked very closely with the palace and the military in the past,” cannot be proved to be true, especially Thaksin’s relationship to the palace. There has been a lot of evidence that Thaksin has been disloyal to the Thai monarch. If anyone understands the Thai language well enough (not snake snake fish fish 555)s/he would know that while he is talking ‘yes’ to the the monarch he means ‘no’.
That’s a really well done, thoughtful review. Thank you. You have made a much more concise presentation of McDaniel’s arguments than he managed in the book. I see the arguments more clearly for having read the review, and I think you have represented him accurately. I think it may well be a worthy undertaking to try to create a description and explanation of Thai Buddhism — or my Ohio Italian Catholicism — inductively from scratch. I’m not sure that there is an obligation to doctrinal and larger social contexts, and if that is undertaking, then good. But I agree with you that he does not seem to have put as much discipline into deriving his summary points and demonstrating their sufficiency as they might need. Still, what a remarkable breadth of experience and what a great set of stories, observations and insights. I read it and I think, oh, crap, I was there, why didn’t I notice that, and why didn’t I take this stuff more seriously, why did I let myself elide it out of awareness with the explanation, “This isn’t Buddhism”? Lo, it’s Buddhism. It’s cool to be told that so forcefully and with such detail.
Just saw from the Frontpage of Thairath this Sunday that at the Redshirt gathering past weekend, some of them wear the new shirts with the text “We Love Crown Prince”. You bet there are two designs one is red shirt with white text, the other white shirt with red text.
Very late in the day but another piece of evidence to support my oddball theory(though supported by anecdotal evidence – see Thai Visa passim) that foreign sympathisers of the redshirt movement tend to be of middle class or patrician background and/or well educated while foreigners hostile to it tend to be slightly dim and/or of plebeian background.Among Thais that position is generally reversed.Lots of exceptions of course on both sides.
Anyone notice the new t-shirt that the red shirt people wear? It featured the word “р╣Ар╕гр╕▓р╕гр╕▒р╕Бр╕Юр╕гр╕░р╕Ър╕гр╕б” or “We Love Crown Prince”. I saw two versions – red shirt with the white text and white shirt with the red text. Saw it the first time on the Frontpage of Thairath yesterday as at least two people in the rally to commenmorate 6th anniversary of the 2006 coup wear them.
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я╗┐Myanmar reshuffle: the reform agenda
In Myanmar or Burma or Birmanie or Birmania or Mian-Dian or Phama or … you just change names. You don’t change the actors, you change their roles. Names are like smoke, roles are like mirrors. A lot of smoke and mirrors in Naypyitaw (or Naypyidaw) the “abode of the rulers”. Burmese are very fond of the theatre of the marionettes!
Burma has always been ruled by an oligarchy since the days of the monarchy operating on the medieval principles of intrigues, coercion, nepotism, patronage and “appanage”,… Connections (guanxi in Chinese) are the key to the web of power. Suu Kyi (most Burmese don’t put their father’s name in front of your name, unless he is famous!) might be considered a “Burmese idol” or a “human rights icon” for many people in the West like Bono (the U2 guy), but in Burma (or Mianma, whatever) her fame and her power (“awza” in Burmese, she doesn’t have “ana” yet) comes from the fact that her father Aung San was a national(istic) hero worshiped by the majority of the populace. He died early so we would never know if Burma would be very different now if he wasn’t assassinated in 1947 (the year I was born in Rangoon or Yangone?).
What Burma needs is a French Revolution of sorts (you know the kind that says: Liberté, ├Йgalité, Fraternité) before Suu Kyi gives another (in my opinion rather boring) lecture about democracy and “rule of law” (so what’s the citizenship law in Burma?)
Anyway, a brief subjective response to the two comments above:
1. The old cronies of Than Shwe are definitely still “hanging around” (definitely not hanged!}
2. The average citizen in Burma is very poor and is looking for a “saviour” or “messiah”. For some it’s Suu Kyi, for some it’s the 88 generation, for some it’s the Chinese, for some it’s the third force (Burma Egress or whatever they call themselves), for each of the “legally designated 165 ethnic groups” it might be 165 different “local(tribal?) war-lords(gods)?”. I don’t know.
Quo vadis Birmania?
я╗┐Myanmar reshuffle: the reform agenda
paul,
there’s an interesting assessment of the likely fate of the cronies in the most recent ICG report on myanmar: “the politics of economic reform.”
regards,
a red ant in yangon
Flashback to the coup
Unfortunately absolutely nothing has changed in Governments, every is now back to the status quo. Its as it was when the coup occurred in 2006. A puppet prime minister, part of the Shinawatra clan. Corruption is rife and probably has worsened, there is no end in sight for this major problem. Will there be another coup? Unlikely, will there be another mass up rising causing political chaos and further unnecessary deaths with warnings issued for tourists to avoid Thailand? Yes very likely. Its just a matter of time and will it happen.
я╗┐Myanmar reshuffle: the reform agenda
The question is how Myanmar could make the move from reform initiated by the President to one initiated by the average citizen. This reshuffle might not be a move towards it though. Only time will tell.
The Company in Dawei
Excellent stuff Soe Lin Myint – Commercial and corporate analysis is often a missing link on these pages.
Equally, “offshore” political nous may be the weak point of ITD’s plans for expansion. While the ITD-Shinawatra bond may have reaped large dividends in Thailand, it seems the company is unable to get the political relationships right in a post-2010 Myanmar.
President Thein Sein’s apparent down-playing of the Dawei project when meeting with Japanese investment banks in May was followed by one of his adviser’s down-playing ITD “experience” in this scale of project. And if they couldn’t get it going with Max Myanmar, you really have to wonder.
The original MOU was hurriedly put together in the last days of the previous government in Naypyidaw. The terms have never been seen as favourable to Myanmar by those in the incoming government, who are equally riled by the personal cheques that lubricated its signing. Applying the lens of Shinawatra-invincibility to politics on the other side of the Tanintaharyi hills (or in Bangladesh) may have sunk ITD’s plans to be more than a construction contractor.
Reuters yesterday quoted the “chairman of the Dawei SEZ” as saying the Thai government has effectively taken over the project. The most recent commentary suggests that the outcomes of the Yingluck-Thein Sein meeting in July is a bridging loan of $325m by a consortium of Thai banks, and renewed negotiations with JBIC to finance the port and road infrastructure.
Eventually the terms of the 2010 MOU will have to be renegotiated with Naypyidaw, but with whom? On their current form, ITD will not be at that table.
Chut Wutty: Tragic casualty of Cambodia’s dirty war to save forests
New op-ed from the Wall Street Journal.
————————-
“Cambodia and Cronyism; Phnom Penh’s foreign donors are enabling abuses of human rights.”
– Anonymous.
Wall Street Journal (Online) [New York, N.Y]
21 Sep 2012: 9.
Abstract
Absent meaningful pressure to protect property rights, foreign aid and investment will bring limited benefits.
On Sept. 11, the body of Cambodian journalist Hang Serei Oudom was found stuffed into the trunk of his car with his head bashed in. At the time of his death, Mr. Oudom was writing about collusion between local businessmen and officials in the mountainous northwest. There as elsewhere in the country politicians, officials and logging companies have conspired to clear-cut virgin forests that are supposedly protected by the government.
The murder of Mr. Oudom is hardly an aberration in Cambodia. At least 10 journalists have been killed in Cambodiasince 1996. Social activists have fared no better: In April, a military policeman shot and killed environmentalist Chhut Vuthy as he investigated illegal logging in southwestern Koh Kong province. Dozens more have been summarily imprisoned for protesting illegal land seizures.
In 2011, Transparency International ranked Cambodia 164th out of 182 countries in its annual Corruption Perception Index. Rampant cronyism also suits Cambodia’s one true foreign friend, China, which has poured billions of dollars of aid and soft loans into the country. In the process it has secured economic concessions and diplomatic fealty. At the July 11-12 summit of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations in Phnom Penh, Cambodian diplomats scuppered a collective response to Beijing’s encroachment in the South China Sea. Coincidentally, Beijing this month announced another $2.5 billion in investment and soft loans.
Trade between America and Cambodia is also on the rise, with the U.S. accounting for 41% of Cambodia’s garment-driven exports. Yet the Obama Administration has remained largely silent about Cambodia’s recent malfeasance, most notably at the Asean summit. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton made no public mention of Cambodia’s rights record. Two days after Mrs. Clinton left the country, the authorities imprisoned one of the country’s leading opposition figures on dubious charges of secessionism.
Cambodia’s ongoing genocide tribunal still receives a lion’s share of Western attention when it comes to human rights. But the most pressing issue for most Cambodians is land use. In the past decade, hundreds of thousands of Cambodians have endured land grabs and evictions. They have suffered further when they dared to protest these abuses.
Phnom Penh’s international donors might stop to consider that Cambodia’s oppressive cronyism is ultimately a manifestation of its disregard for the human right of private property. Absent meaningful pressure to protect property rights, foreign aid and investment will bring limited benefits.
——————
See also:
New York Times
http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/09/22/critics-press-cambodia-to-fight-violence-on-its-forest-frontier/
ASIA September 22, 2012
“Critics Press Cambodia to Fight Violence on its Forest Frontier”
By ANDREW C. REVKIN
I was heartened to see an editorial in The Wall Street Journal push Cambodia (and its supporters, including the United States and international donors) to fight rampant corruption under which “hundreds of thousands of Cambodians have endured land grabs and evictions.”* The editorial added, “They have suffered further when they dared to protest these abuses,” noting the murders of the journalist Hang Serei Oudom (covered here) and land-rights campaigner Chut Wutty.
I also encourage you to read “‘Blood Wood’ Killings in Cambodia Deserve U.S. Rebuke,” by Olesia Plokhii, a journalist who was a few feet from Chut Wutty when he was shot on April 26 (she was covering the land and timber fight for Cambodia Daily. Here’s an excerpt from her piece that makes some important points:
It is heartening to see that when a reporter is killed in the forest, people hear about it. The same must go for the activists and others who risk their lives daily, like the Prey Long People’s Network in one of last great ancient forests in Cambodia. The loss of Wutty removed a vital voice speaking up for powerless villagers and indigenous minorities.
The deforestation crisis in Cambodia is unique only because it is relatively new. While 130-foot trees in tropical jungles have been gutted for the last two decades in Cambodia, neighboring Malaysia, Indonesia and Vietnam began exporting illicit timber long before. In Cambodia, the forests may still have a chance – if change takes root.
Mu Sochua, Cambodia’s leading in-country opposition figure, commented in her blog that she hoped the issue would be on the agenda for an upcoming meeting of international donors and the Cambodian government.
Despite Cambodia’s increasing reliance on Chinese money, the United States still carries weight there. But will President Obama exercise his power and address the deforestation crisis and this rash of killings at an upcoming Asean summit in Phnom Penh in November?
I hope the Obama administration is taking this issue seriously, at the very least in behind-the-scenes interactions with Cambodian officials, and – if necessary – publicly.
Addendum: I belatedly noticed that Unesco has also condemned the killing.
[3:55 p.m. | Clarification |* I cleaned up some turgid prose in the opening sentence.]
========
я╗┐Myanmar reshuffle: the reform agenda
Thanks for the interesting update Trevor. I would be interested in hearing how many (if any) cronies of the former Than Shwe govt are still hanging around, or if they are being marginalised.
Thanks,
Paul
Flashback to the coup
The last coup in the year 2006 was because a Shinawatra (Thaksin) was Prime Minister and his government was riddled with corruption and the Thai people was demanding his ouster. This year 2012 Thailand has another Shinawatra running the government and corruption once again is running rampant in just about all major projects – flood control, rice price subsidies, infrastructures etc. And the bombings go on with even more ferocity and terror at the South while the Shinawatras and their gang flourishes in the graft booty.
Yeah . . . it will be sad but perhaps that’s the way the Shinawatra’s corruption ways will crumble . . . via coups.
UMNO’s last mohican?
Can UMNO reform, and will UMNO reform. Saifuddin Abdullah believes UMNO can.
http://www.radioaustralia.net.au/international/radio/program/asia-pacific/umno-and-its-place-in-malaysias-new-politics/1018568
Southeast Asia’s illiberal regimes
UMNO and its place in Malaysia’s “New Politics” – The only genuine democrat in UMNO talks about his party’s ability to reform on Radio Australia.
http://www.radioaustralia.net.au/international/radio/program/asia-pacific/umno-and-its-place-in-malaysias-new-politics/1018568
Gradual political change in Burma
Hla Oo’s comment (#2) two years ago was absolutely right. What is happening in Burma right now with the reformist Thein Sein as President and young Min Aung Hlain as the Commander-in-Chief was exactly what Hla Oo predicted in December 2010, almost 2 years ago.
Who is Hla Oo and what exactly is Hla Oo? Can two Doctors Walker and Farrelli answer that question?
They must know him well as they had promoted him for quite a few years to become a well-known writer about Burma on the Internet through New Mandala.
The rumours in Yangon are that he might be Min Aung Haling who is well known to have been a scholar and officer as he once served as the Rector of DSA for many years.
Thailand’s silver snatched?
One part of the report shows that Google has restricted or partly restricted at least 149 YouTube videos that the Thai government claimed was insulting to the monarchy
Thailand’s silver snatched?
Google, censorship and Thailand’s monarchy…
As reported in Siam Voices this week, Google has released its 2012 Transparency Report, which chronicles requests that Google receives, mostly from governments, to block material online. As Lisa Gardner notes on Siam Voices, “Google bucked international trends in 2011 by blocking access to hundreds of web pages at the behest of the Thai Ministry of Information, Communication, and Technology [MICT].” One part of the report shows that Google has restricted or partly restricted at least 149 YouTube videos that the Thai government claimed was insulting to the monarchy. Unlike in many other countries, where Google supposedly makes its decisions to take down material after a local court issues an order (not that courts are infallible, but at least there is a court order), in Thailand it took down material even without court orders being issued, simply at the request of the authorities.
Thaksin and the palace
The statement that says, “It is easy to overlook Thaksin’s own royalist views and the fact that he has worked very closely with the palace and the military in the past,” cannot be proved to be true, especially Thaksin’s relationship to the palace. There has been a lot of evidence that Thaksin has been disloyal to the Thai monarch. If anyone understands the Thai language well enough (not snake snake fish fish 555)s/he would know that while he is talking ‘yes’ to the the monarch he means ‘no’.
Not so Happy Birthdays
Thailand is yet to emerge from its troglodytic stage.
UMNO’s last mohican?
Looking forward to it
Review of The Lovelorn Ghost and the Magical Monk
That’s a really well done, thoughtful review. Thank you. You have made a much more concise presentation of McDaniel’s arguments than he managed in the book. I see the arguments more clearly for having read the review, and I think you have represented him accurately. I think it may well be a worthy undertaking to try to create a description and explanation of Thai Buddhism — or my Ohio Italian Catholicism — inductively from scratch. I’m not sure that there is an obligation to doctrinal and larger social contexts, and if that is undertaking, then good. But I agree with you that he does not seem to have put as much discipline into deriving his summary points and demonstrating their sufficiency as they might need. Still, what a remarkable breadth of experience and what a great set of stories, observations and insights. I read it and I think, oh, crap, I was there, why didn’t I notice that, and why didn’t I take this stuff more seriously, why did I let myself elide it out of awareness with the explanation, “This isn’t Buddhism”? Lo, it’s Buddhism. It’s cool to be told that so forcefully and with such detail.
Not so Happy Birthdays
Just saw from the Frontpage of Thairath this Sunday that at the Redshirt gathering past weekend, some of them wear the new shirts with the text “We Love Crown Prince”. You bet there are two designs one is red shirt with white text, the other white shirt with red text.
Nick Nostitz interviewed by Matichon
Very late in the day but another piece of evidence to support my oddball theory(though supported by anecdotal evidence – see Thai Visa passim) that foreign sympathisers of the redshirt movement tend to be of middle class or patrician background and/or well educated while foreigners hostile to it tend to be slightly dim and/or of plebeian background.Among Thais that position is generally reversed.Lots of exceptions of course on both sides.
Not so Happy Birthdays
Anyone notice the new t-shirt that the red shirt people wear? It featured the word “р╣Ар╕гр╕▓р╕гр╕▒р╕Бр╕Юр╕гр╕░р╕Ър╕гр╕б” or “We Love Crown Prince”. I saw two versions – red shirt with the white text and white shirt with the red text. Saw it the first time on the Frontpage of Thairath yesterday as at least two people in the rally to commenmorate 6th anniversary of the 2006 coup wear them.