I don’t see the majority of Isaan people participating in an armed secession attempt. You’re really dreaming if you think that’s going to happen.
And if they seceded, who would their support come from: Laos, Cambodia? Wow, what a future. Two Least Developed Nations, one run by thugs, the other by decrepit communists. I’m sorry if calling Hun Sen and his cronies thugs offends some of the ivory tower academics here, but that’s exactly what he is.
The red shirts in your soi can thoroughly reject being paid all they want, but they’ve already been caught on video being paid. And I personally have been told by coworkers from northeast, who are not sympathetic to his government, that people in their villages were being offered money to attend.
Having been out at the protest twice, I’ve never seen numbers approaching 150,000.
On Sunday early afternoon there were about 50,000 there, and I walked from Sanam Luang to the Royal Plaza. Red leaders announced from the stage that half a million were there. Absolute nonsense.
By evening, my guess is it was somewhere between 80,000 and 100,000, perhaps slightly more.
People should stop inflating the figures to fantastical levels that simply don’t match the reality. Wishful thinking doesn’t make it real.
The mainstream media has done a woeful job on this rally. But a question: there was almost no direct reporting from the rally showing the crowd – forget trying to understand the participants – but today, the move to the military barracks is given a huge amount of live coverage including shots that showed the truly huge procession. Why is this? Were the media looking for a clash and thought it wouldn’t happen at the rally site? Or is something else at work?
Within this condition, demanding the House to be dissolved is the only probable option for the Red, otherwise they’ll go home empty handed (and that might very well be the case).
Let’s say if the UDD leaders can dramatically increase the number of protesters (currently estimated between 90,000-130,0000) and the Red can bring about House dissolution or resignation of PM, what then? If there’ll be a new election, the Red’s ad hoc party, Peua Thai, might be able to win, but it won’t be a landslide, and once again, a coalition government has to be formed. Peua Thai, in fact, may not entirely be able to form the government; parliamentarian voting has a chance of swinging back to the Democrats.
Sorry to be cruel to UDD leaders; but it’s probably a good idea to accept now that time is not yet on your side. The social conditions of Thai society are not yet ready for the overthrow of the exisiting regime. Bangkok is not so far, the Red folks can always come back. In the near future, Red leaders should concentrate in reaching out to the middle/educated class. Winning the middle class war must become one of their priorities. UDD leaders must ask themselves whether they have thought about a long term plan for the Red– can the Red govern in case they happen to win in, say, 6 -10 years from now? It all depends on vision. Radical land reform, tax reform, a mechanism for funding of the welfare state– these three ‘giants of reform’ alone will take every government elected in a country like Thailand decades to formulate. Do the Red movement have the vision for them? Do the Red have a capability in bringing this alternative? Without thinking seriously about the road ahead, the Red movement is meaningless in terms of political purpose.
“Patience is sweet” – I once wrote this to cheer up a man. He has later become Thailand’s 27th Prime Minister. I’ll say it again here, the Red must be patient. Your time has only begun.
And unless Chris Beale hadn’t noticed, Thaksin is pretty much a fascist construct into the bargain. Hence all those 100os of dead people who were delivered summary justice. Hence also the tendency of his clan to murder anyone who gets in their way. Some of us live near enough to the real action to know these things. Tell me one thing he did, has done or is doing that is really in the interests of the poor. All I see is measures to keep the poor permanently indebted to his businesses and his political apparatus. In that respect, he has a great deal in common with his trough-space enemies in the Democrat-led govt. Let’s hope the future has something better in store than the current crop of dunderheads in Thai politics and political punditry
Benny: While lecturing Thaksin face to face on TV about the need to accept mistakes and take responsibility, Bhumibol explained that “The King can do wrong”, yet Thaksin has never admitted any wrong-doing EVER – except to turn it around and say that he (Thaksin) once made the mistake of being too nice to people.
hrk : Those yellow shirts have been charged and are out on bail AND they haven’t jumped bail and fled the law like Thaksin.
BTW: All the dozens of MODERATE Red Shirts and their sympathizers I know in my soi here in Bangkhen would be satisfied with a compromise offer by Abhisit to hold early elections before the end of this year. Right now though (5.15pm Monday) it’s the usual high-stakes poker game and of course no one is about to show their cards.
Is there a Joker in the pack, I wonder?
“I wonder if the Ozzie social science teachers like Jim Taylor et al would be so enthusiastic about having a crook like Thaksin as PM of Australia.”
SRITHANONCHAI>> How about trying to analyze the Thaksin phenomenon within the Thai context?”
By which I suppose you are trying to tell us that we should always placate those parasites who seem to regard the rest of us as an easy host. The Thai context tells me that many Thais are far from happy with Thaksin. Which is why this is not going away in any hurry. Even a redshirt will eventually own up to the fact that Thaksin was and still is a deeply corrupt person. Indeed, it is precisely his membership of the elite that seems to allow him to continually get away with murder. Just remember this. He is an ex-policeman who attended a military academy that is renowned for its arrogance and greed. That tells me that he is definitely not the saviour of the poor. Rather he is locked in a power struggle with other greedy elites. The rest of us will gain nothing substantial from this power struggle except cracked heads and huge medical bills.
The way to greater social justice will only come through hard work and slow attrition. These fast-track routes to greater social justice will never work. Indeed, they are not even designed to work. They are just the means through which Thaksin hopes to leverage himself into a very strong position for the eventual arrival of the NEXT man.
GeGee@# 4 : I don’t think many of “these people” as you call them, consider themselves “Thai” anymore.
They’re giving the fascist construct “Thailand” one last chance to offer them the same opportunities, the same justice, as the amatiya.
If they’re rejected – I think they’re going to break away from your amatiya country, the fascist construct “Thailand”.
Stoic, Abhisit is in trouble — but not just because fruit vendors on Sukhumvit don’t like him. He’s in trouble because he was a consensus candidate of a weak, army-cobbled coalition, and because his coalition partners are opportunist snakes — Newin and Barnharn.
I happen to like Abhisit, but it’s clear the man is not in charge of his own destiny. There’s no such thing as a strong PM in Thailand. You’re either a pawn of the big players, or you get coup’ed.
Chris Beale is right. Thaksin’s ‘secret’ power base is in Laos. Most people here are spontaneously sympathetic to their ‘phi nong’ just over the river, and people have asked me quite a few times whether I think Isaan might secede from Thailand if the red shirts demands are not met. An old Lao irredentist dream.
What is less commented on, however, has been the impact of both the yellow and the red shirts demonstrations on politics in Laos. The ‘chaos’ has been used by the Lao People’s Revolutionary Party to show the weakness of multi-party politics, and the virtues of the one-party state that produces stability. Indeed, the evolving events in Thailand seem to have dampened any discussion of broader democracy in Laos.
There’s a rather cruel irony in there somewhere.
Marc that is an interesting “on ground” report and valuable material.
One point which concerns me greatly is not the “end game” of this particular event, but what the movement is hoping to achieve.
I notice in your commentary, where you re-tell the reasons giving for supporting the red movement, don’t seem to have much to say about the future, beyond dissolving parliament.
Did these people tell you what they would like to achieve by way of a “better” life for themselves and Thailand ?
While there are obvious reasons as to why they think the Thai media is biased against them, it would be worthwhile knowing where they get their information that the International Media “understands”?
Thanks
WHL, keep your eye on the ball and don’t worry about botched idioms. It doesn’t really matter what the red shirts’ motives are as long as they count on Thaksin to get what they want.
They don’t stand a chance in hell for the simple reason of credibility.
A movement that marches for true democracy, fair distribution of wealth and blabla.. with Thaksin at the head is about as credible as Adolf Hitler advocating multiculturalism in a gay bar in Tel Aviv.
Portman, re-read my post. OF COURSE the wise and infallible Supreme Court judges made the correct ruling – saying anything otherwise would be land me in jail!
What The Five said was that IT DOESN’T MATTER if the 3 PAD investigatory sub-committee collected completely accurate evidence of corruption. It doesn’t matter if these legal officers “did justice” (which they of course did – because if if I said they didn’t, I would be guilty of slandering the Court). What matters is that these legal officers should have manifestly and undoubtedly have been seen to have done justice.
Some unwise and fallible people seem to think that just because these PAD mouthpieces publicly displayed such strong antagonism to Thaksin both before and after their appointment as legal officers, that they were possibly prejudiced against Thaksin and couldn’t guarantee Thaksin impartial due process of law. Not me, of course.
Srithanonchai @14 re Bangkok Post photo coverage of UDD rally.
Yes, I thought that would happen, which is why I went and took photos. It seems to me this is a deliberate effort to underplay the size of the rally to undermine its legitimacy (popular support) and low ball the crowd estimates. Here is my crowd estimate as an eyewitness to this and many other political protests (e.g. in Bangkok in ’73 and 2008, and the USA 2000-2003): 150,000 to 200,000 protestors. I base this on the original crowd estimate of 100,000 at noon on Sunday, and the fact that the crowd nearly doubled in size as the afternoon wore on. I am including in this estimate all the red shirts I saw just wandering around the streets of Bangkok.
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Red soi, Red city: A brief commentary from the streets
I don’t see the majority of Isaan people participating in an armed secession attempt. You’re really dreaming if you think that’s going to happen.
And if they seceded, who would their support come from: Laos, Cambodia? Wow, what a future. Two Least Developed Nations, one run by thugs, the other by decrepit communists. I’m sorry if calling Hun Sen and his cronies thugs offends some of the ivory tower academics here, but that’s exactly what he is.
The red shirts in your soi can thoroughly reject being paid all they want, but they’ve already been caught on video being paid. And I personally have been told by coworkers from northeast, who are not sympathetic to his government, that people in their villages were being offered money to attend.
A red show of strength, but then what?
Having been out at the protest twice, I’ve never seen numbers approaching 150,000.
On Sunday early afternoon there were about 50,000 there, and I walked from Sanam Luang to the Royal Plaza. Red leaders announced from the stage that half a million were there. Absolute nonsense.
By evening, my guess is it was somewhere between 80,000 and 100,000, perhaps slightly more.
People should stop inflating the figures to fantastical levels that simply don’t match the reality. Wishful thinking doesn’t make it real.
Bangkok Post introduces “UDD rural hordes”
The mainstream media has done a woeful job on this rally. But a question: there was almost no direct reporting from the rally showing the crowd – forget trying to understand the participants – but today, the move to the military barracks is given a huge amount of live coverage including shots that showed the truly huge procession. Why is this? Were the media looking for a clash and thought it wouldn’t happen at the rally site? Or is something else at work?
A red show of strength, but then what?
Within this condition, demanding the House to be dissolved is the only probable option for the Red, otherwise they’ll go home empty handed (and that might very well be the case).
Let’s say if the UDD leaders can dramatically increase the number of protesters (currently estimated between 90,000-130,0000) and the Red can bring about House dissolution or resignation of PM, what then? If there’ll be a new election, the Red’s ad hoc party, Peua Thai, might be able to win, but it won’t be a landslide, and once again, a coalition government has to be formed. Peua Thai, in fact, may not entirely be able to form the government; parliamentarian voting has a chance of swinging back to the Democrats.
Sorry to be cruel to UDD leaders; but it’s probably a good idea to accept now that time is not yet on your side. The social conditions of Thai society are not yet ready for the overthrow of the exisiting regime. Bangkok is not so far, the Red folks can always come back. In the near future, Red leaders should concentrate in reaching out to the middle/educated class. Winning the middle class war must become one of their priorities. UDD leaders must ask themselves whether they have thought about a long term plan for the Red– can the Red govern in case they happen to win in, say, 6 -10 years from now? It all depends on vision. Radical land reform, tax reform, a mechanism for funding of the welfare state– these three ‘giants of reform’ alone will take every government elected in a country like Thailand decades to formulate. Do the Red movement have the vision for them? Do the Red have a capability in bringing this alternative? Without thinking seriously about the road ahead, the Red movement is meaningless in terms of political purpose.
“Patience is sweet” – I once wrote this to cheer up a man. He has later become Thailand’s 27th Prime Minister. I’ll say it again here, the Red must be patient. Your time has only begun.
Red soi, Red city: A brief commentary from the streets
And unless Chris Beale hadn’t noticed, Thaksin is pretty much a fascist construct into the bargain. Hence all those 100os of dead people who were delivered summary justice. Hence also the tendency of his clan to murder anyone who gets in their way. Some of us live near enough to the real action to know these things. Tell me one thing he did, has done or is doing that is really in the interests of the poor. All I see is measures to keep the poor permanently indebted to his businesses and his political apparatus. In that respect, he has a great deal in common with his trough-space enemies in the Democrat-led govt. Let’s hope the future has something better in store than the current crop of dunderheads in Thai politics and political punditry
Thai style democracy?
Benny: While lecturing Thaksin face to face on TV about the need to accept mistakes and take responsibility, Bhumibol explained that “The King can do wrong”, yet Thaksin has never admitted any wrong-doing EVER – except to turn it around and say that he (Thaksin) once made the mistake of being too nice to people.
hrk : Those yellow shirts have been charged and are out on bail AND they haven’t jumped bail and fled the law like Thaksin.
BTW: All the dozens of MODERATE Red Shirts and their sympathizers I know in my soi here in Bangkhen would be satisfied with a compromise offer by Abhisit to hold early elections before the end of this year. Right now though (5.15pm Monday) it’s the usual high-stakes poker game and of course no one is about to show their cards.
Is there a Joker in the pack, I wonder?
Sunday in Bangkok, reds in the city
“I wonder if the Ozzie social science teachers like Jim Taylor et al would be so enthusiastic about having a crook like Thaksin as PM of Australia.”
SRITHANONCHAI>> How about trying to analyze the Thaksin phenomenon within the Thai context?”
By which I suppose you are trying to tell us that we should always placate those parasites who seem to regard the rest of us as an easy host. The Thai context tells me that many Thais are far from happy with Thaksin. Which is why this is not going away in any hurry. Even a redshirt will eventually own up to the fact that Thaksin was and still is a deeply corrupt person. Indeed, it is precisely his membership of the elite that seems to allow him to continually get away with murder. Just remember this. He is an ex-policeman who attended a military academy that is renowned for its arrogance and greed. That tells me that he is definitely not the saviour of the poor. Rather he is locked in a power struggle with other greedy elites. The rest of us will gain nothing substantial from this power struggle except cracked heads and huge medical bills.
The way to greater social justice will only come through hard work and slow attrition. These fast-track routes to greater social justice will never work. Indeed, they are not even designed to work. They are just the means through which Thaksin hopes to leverage himself into a very strong position for the eventual arrival of the NEXT man.
Red soi, Red city: A brief commentary from the streets
GeGee@# 4 : I don’t think many of “these people” as you call them, consider themselves “Thai” anymore.
They’re giving the fascist construct “Thailand” one last chance to offer them the same opportunities, the same justice, as the amatiya.
If they’re rejected – I think they’re going to break away from your amatiya country, the fascist construct “Thailand”.
Red soi, Red city: A brief commentary from the streets
Stoic, Abhisit is in trouble — but not just because fruit vendors on Sukhumvit don’t like him. He’s in trouble because he was a consensus candidate of a weak, army-cobbled coalition, and because his coalition partners are opportunist snakes — Newin and Barnharn.
I happen to like Abhisit, but it’s clear the man is not in charge of his own destiny. There’s no such thing as a strong PM in Thailand. You’re either a pawn of the big players, or you get coup’ed.
Red soi, Red city: A brief commentary from the streets
Chris Beale is right. Thaksin’s ‘secret’ power base is in Laos. Most people here are spontaneously sympathetic to their ‘phi nong’ just over the river, and people have asked me quite a few times whether I think Isaan might secede from Thailand if the red shirts demands are not met. An old Lao irredentist dream.
What is less commented on, however, has been the impact of both the yellow and the red shirts demonstrations on politics in Laos. The ‘chaos’ has been used by the Lao People’s Revolutionary Party to show the weakness of multi-party politics, and the virtues of the one-party state that produces stability. Indeed, the evolving events in Thailand seem to have dampened any discussion of broader democracy in Laos.
There’s a rather cruel irony in there somewhere.
Red soi, Red city: A brief commentary from the streets
Stoic – I told you “how come” – namely :
because Abhisit is now dependent for his own security on, among others, the pro-Thaksin Third Army.
Red soi, Red city: A brief commentary from the streets
See Bird Eye View of the protest
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LGukyJ_sQC0&feature=player_embedded#
Red soi, Red city: A brief commentary from the streets
Marc that is an interesting “on ground” report and valuable material.
One point which concerns me greatly is not the “end game” of this particular event, but what the movement is hoping to achieve.
I notice in your commentary, where you re-tell the reasons giving for supporting the red movement, don’t seem to have much to say about the future, beyond dissolving parliament.
Did these people tell you what they would like to achieve by way of a “better” life for themselves and Thailand ?
While there are obvious reasons as to why they think the Thai media is biased against them, it would be worthwhile knowing where they get their information that the International Media “understands”?
Thanks
Open thread on red protests
WHL, keep your eye on the ball and don’t worry about botched idioms. It doesn’t really matter what the red shirts’ motives are as long as they count on Thaksin to get what they want.
They don’t stand a chance in hell for the simple reason of credibility.
A movement that marches for true democracy, fair distribution of wealth and blabla.. with Thaksin at the head is about as credible as Adolf Hitler advocating multiculturalism in a gay bar in Tel Aviv.
Red soi, Red city: A brief commentary from the streets
“Abhisit almost finished” ?!?!
How come?
Are we following the same events?
Red soi, Red city: A brief commentary from the streets
As my own statistics shows, the clash would start on the 3rd day of protest.
I think it’s because, normally the military wants to examine the protesters health. That’s the tactics, weak, exhaust, then boom…
Thank you for your report. Amazing.
Red soi, Red city: A brief commentary from the streets
Marc – you’re certainly not being boring!!!!
My experiences in the soi I was long living, during Songkran riots, etc, in were the same – but I decided to get out several months ago.
The rising temperature between Red Shirts and Yellow Shirts, in the soi, was something I’d had enough of.
So – up to Laos : where I’ve never, in plenty of visits, met a single Abhisit supporter !!
So heavily dependent on the army – even the pro-Thaksin Third Army – Abhisit is now almost finished.
Making sense of the verdict
Portman, re-read my post. OF COURSE the wise and infallible Supreme Court judges made the correct ruling – saying anything otherwise would be land me in jail!
What The Five said was that IT DOESN’T MATTER if the 3 PAD investigatory sub-committee collected completely accurate evidence of corruption. It doesn’t matter if these legal officers “did justice” (which they of course did – because if if I said they didn’t, I would be guilty of slandering the Court). What matters is that these legal officers should have manifestly and undoubtedly have been seen to have done justice.
Some unwise and fallible people seem to think that just because these PAD mouthpieces publicly displayed such strong antagonism to Thaksin both before and after their appointment as legal officers, that they were possibly prejudiced against Thaksin and couldn’t guarantee Thaksin impartial due process of law. Not me, of course.
Bangkok Post introduces “UDD rural hordes”
Srithanonchai @14 re Bangkok Post photo coverage of UDD rally.
Yes, I thought that would happen, which is why I went and took photos. It seems to me this is a deliberate effort to underplay the size of the rally to undermine its legitimacy (popular support) and low ball the crowd estimates. Here is my crowd estimate as an eyewitness to this and many other political protests (e.g. in Bangkok in ’73 and 2008, and the USA 2000-2003): 150,000 to 200,000 protestors. I base this on the original crowd estimate of 100,000 at noon on Sunday, and the fact that the crowd nearly doubled in size as the afternoon wore on. I am including in this estimate all the red shirts I saw just wandering around the streets of Bangkok.
Thai style democracy?
Was I mistaken? Didn’t Obama, with the greatest humility anti-racist avowal of being a hybrid, once describe himself as a ‘mut’? Mongrel dogs rule!