The Connors paper is great but he did not do deep research into the legal system or police. The way the police operate has a history. The closed and secretive nature of the Thai police and the existence of money making activities and wealth can be traced back to the days of CIA involvement and the police chief/tycoon Phao Sriyanon (as ANU’s Desmond Ball talks about in the Nation piece “Inside the Tor Chor Dor”). Research into how the legal system actually works and its history is sorely needed.
I am not naive. I once lived in Chiang Rai family and learned firsthand of how the police operate and their abuse of power directly and through word of mouth, not through newspapers.
Once had a Swiss friend found hanging from the rafters of Chiang Rai prison after rounds of police extortion.
Once chased down a thief in Mae Sai, a work gang with shovels stopped him and we brought him to the police station, and what did the police do? They asked me did I want them to beat the thief? Don’t you have a procedure for dealing with thieves, I thought. Is personal retribution the only thing that these police can conceive of ? You don’t discover these things from existent books or academic papers.
To solve a problem, acknowledge it exists, describe it and take first steps to solving it, i.e. reform, any reform, traffic laws that don’t require “structural changes in the Thai state” would be a good place to start.
In Bangkok, police are unable to carry out basic duties like enforcing basic traffic laws such as stopping people running red lights en masse or motorcycles and Tuk Tuks driving around without lights on, occasionally hitting people. I personally witnessed a negligent speeding motorcycle taxi rip the skin off of someone’s face one night. Stood their and gawked with the crowd.
Even basic equity is lacking in the impromptu police traffic courts, provincial people in traffic accidents in Bangkok are hard-pressed to come up with the guarantor/character witnesses they need to defend themselves and how much is given to the police and the record of their decisions is not available to the public, so any powerful Pu Yai can intervene and no one will know about it. Again, not in books, articles or the newspaper.
As for police reform, it has to happen one day to become a modern state. And that includes demilitarization, breaking up of policing functions, decentralization, increased oversight, breaking up control over and secrecy of promotions.
Police reform is 180 degrees opposed to the Duterte rhetoric (or the Thaksin red shirt war on drugs rhetoric) that says police functions have be carried out by secret death squads and bullets in the head at night, like the Thaksin era 2003 extrajudicial killings… which I saw with my own eyes BTW 🙂
And again, you build up another strawman. Where on earth have i given the indication that Thaksin does not carry his part of responsibility for the drug war killings, and should not be legally held responsible? I haven’t. If i may remind you – at the time i have taken pictures of the drug war killings, and not in support of them.
I am realistic enough though to know that any prosecution or honest investigation into what has taken place is never going to happen due to the fact that if Thaksin has to answer to the courts for his part, others, such as the military, etc. would automatically have to answer for theirs. Why do you think in all those years nothing about the drug war has been done other than meaningless blather?
And accusing me of being a proponent of “Thainess” and “Thai-style Democracy” is quite insane, my dear emjay. Have you actually read anything i have written over the years? Can you point out where i have defended these ultra-conservative notions?
Me and my cronies… are you sure you are not Michael Yon or Tony Cartalucci/Michael Pirsch in disguise?
So long as the powers that be remain part of the problem and only ostensibly part of the solution people are condemned to lives of extreme coercion, poverty, and above all, hopelessness.
The poppy growers, drug traffickers, middlemen, users and addicts with the attendant rising crime, health and social problems are all byproducts and symptoms of the prevailing global order. Sadly the majority of evidently intelligent people will continue to remain in denial and never see the wood for the trees.
It’s the 21st century but some things never change, just carry on at a more sophisticated and hitech level.
Nice article Nich. While I agree that the NLD has equivocated on the issues you’ve mentioned above, I think it’s worth noting that the NLD voted against the four race and religion laws in Naypyidaw.
I do wonder about the NLD’s strategy when it comes to nationalist voters–at this point I don’t think it’s so much about keeping them onside as it is giving Ma Ba Tha enough rope. I can only vouch for this anecdotally and off public FB pages, but it seems that some of the esteem has come off Ma Ba Tha and its leaders since the movement’s two year anniversary conference and the fortnight long celebrations over the race and religion laws’ passage, I could well be wrong though…
Need to realize, that the “Horse is out of the barn” as far as illicit drug production/supply and usage/demand go.
As such the 2 arms of the economic problems need to be tackle. Successful model is Singapore. A model that has not been repeated successfully due to civil liberty issues and HR group making hay out of every turn when the demand side is tackled.
Shut down institution like Hollywood which in the west that glorified participates and profited unscathed from BOTH sides of this Drug economy, instead of tackling only Afghanistan, Myanmar, Pakistan and India the producing countries is akin to closing the barn door after letting the horse out.
This is fascinating–I know effectively nothing about the politics of hooliganism/regionalism in Thai soccer fandom, so you’re right to call out this gap in my analysis. Thanks for your comment.
Let me see if I understand the point you’re making. You’re arguing that the folks who started this mess in Vientiane are not Thai nationalists, but rather are known football troublemakers in Thailand who have crossed the river for some reason, right?
I definitely don’t know the dynamics of football hooliganism within Thailand. However, I’m skeptical that the red shirts (which, as far as I can tell, have the Thai national team logo on them, not the MTU logo) and the use of the term “ultras” mean that this violence was mainly an issue of tribalism within Thailand. As I’m sure you’re aware, the term “ultras” has long been used by a massive array of militant/violent soccer supporters groups–as a youth, I sometimes would cheer with the so-called “98 Ultras” at Chicago matches, a notoriously loud and unruly (but fun) bunch. Thus, I was assuming the “Thailand Ultras” signs and shirts were showing ardent support for Thailand in general, not for a specific team within Thailand. Please correct me if this is wrong.
Am I still missing something? Is Muangthong United famously anti-Lao or anti-Vietnamese? If this is about intra-Thai factionalism as much as nationalism, what’s the opposing faction (in addition to the MTU supporters)?
Yes–as a matter of fact, I wrote the following sentences in the above piece to make exactly the point that you’re telling me I should have made:
“A team of Lao police went into the stands, presumably to make sure that nobody got hurt, and were met with a violent backlash from the Thai supporters.”
“By damaging a flag, the Lao police in their communist regalia damaged the sanctity of one of the most powerful symbols of the Thai state, thereby affronting the Thai nationalist cause–perhaps, in the eyes of the Thai soccer fans, aligning Lao nationalism with Vietnamese nationalism against Thailand.”
Hope that clarifies things! I don’t mean to sound cheeky, but there’s no other way to address this.
Most ordinary folk do not choose growing poppy or selling illicit substances provided they have a viable alternative.
The political will to deal with the problem by improving the lot of those at the bottom of the heap is conspicuous in its absence. The authorities have been far too busy looking for lucrative deals, legal or no (RoL still malleable as ever in their grubby hands), over the wasted decades at the expense of our lost generations.
The Wa tried by an enforced march down south away from their poppy fields to the Thai border but ended up making yaba (methamphetamine), an even more profitable alternative for the same drug trade involving corrupt Thai officials like their Burmese counterparts and the old KMT remnants as usual.
It doesn’t really matter as long as The Thai King is still breathing, because everything is done under his name by royalists. Thus he should be responsible.
The Opium War of our times like in the past cannot be untangled from the prevailing global socioeconomic order. There’s supply and demand, and for the sons of the soil a living to make, thus with all the good will in the world will remain an even harder uphill struggle for the foreseeable future notwithstanding helos and flamethrowers.
A successful programme of an alternative cash crop may still not come up to expectations for the narcotraffickers who already have methamphetamine as a viable alternative mentioned in the article.
Drug IS integral part of every countries ECONOMY where tax is the bribes and all he associated and related cost for the production/SUPPLY.
on the DEMAND side of which Human cause is the least concern of most government, only when the addicts become a problem in the west i.e ‘when heroine is cheap on the streets of EU and USA’, that the discussion of interdiction become an urgent topic.
Another west useless careless approach to problem of supply side country.
Having read the Connors paper a couple of times before now, I am nevertheless of the opinion that a duly elected Prime Minister of Thailand who oversees what in essence is a series of gangland or death-squad style extrajudicial executions is legally responsible for those deaths. Others may belong in the dock with him, but if anyone is to be held most responsible IN A LEGAL SENSE for these obvious crimes against humanity it would be the DULY ELECTED PRIME MINISTER who initiated and oversaw the program.
That would follow from my support of rule of law in democratic governance.
Your refusal to admit to this rather obvious fact is due to your convenient belief that because the traditional practices of the Thai state tend in that direction, Thaksin is not responsible. This of course is consistent with any number of arguments and feints put up by defenders of “Thainess” and “Thai-style democracy”, i.e. that normal liberal democratic strictures do not apply in Thailand because Thailand is special.
The other “argument” that you allude to is what I like to think of as the “hearing voices” argument. You and I both know that Thaksin heard whispers of encouragement and consent both before and during the killings.
Unlike you, who believes that this works as a successful Nuremberg Defense and Thaksin was “just following orders”, I could care less whose voice he heard, whether that of Joan of Arc relaying orders from God himself or that of one of the many Arhats who attended the Lotus Sermon first time around.
Thaksin was the constitutionally established and duly elected Prime Minister of Thailand at the time and as such is responsible legally for the crimes.
Like all aficionados of the “Thainess”, “Thai-style democracy” school of obscurantist BS, you, Nick, also promote the “culture of impunity” that folks occasionally point to as a problem that Thai society has with rule of law.
One step in the direction of liberalism you and your cronies could take would be to admit that TS is guilty of crimes against humanity and ought to be brought to justice for them whether or not it is ever likely to happen.
But no. I must be dreaming. I haven’t taken part in your internal discourse so there is something somehow that I just don’t understand. Because Thailand is different from other countries and you and your friends are good people.
“In February 2003, the Thai government, under then Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, launched a ‘war on drugs’, purportedly aimed at the suppression of drug trafficking and the prevention of drug use. In fact, a major outcome of this policy was arbitrary killings. In the first three months of the campaign there were some 2800 extrajudicial killings. In 2007, an official investigation found that more than half of those killed had no connection whatsoever to drugs. Apart from the thousands who lost their lives, thousands more were forced into coercive “treatment” for drug addiction.”
jonfernquest makes a good point about support for the war on drugs, from many groups. Many in the middle class and several of the privy council were also supportive of these extrajudicial killings and also opposed Thaksin. One might ask what it was that provided so much public support to murderous actions.
As someone who has spent quite a lot of time in and out of Vietnam over the past few years, it’s hard to disagree with anything Zachary says and describes.
Yet in HCMC, one notices immediately how young the demographic is, how energetic, determined, intelligent, and even a bit wild the new generation appears to be.
They are fed up with living at a 3rd world income level, fed up with endless state interference and attempts at state control. In short, there is a huge suppressed “rebelliousness” just beneath the surface.
Not so much a desire for violent “revolution” as just an overwhelming desire to break free of their low income/low opportunity shackles and to join a more prosperous world. To study, work, travel wherever they please. To make enough money to buy a house/apt/car/mid-level lifestyle. To have opportunity to realize their potentials.
They seem to be waiting for the elderly generation that “won the war” to retire or die, for Hanoi to ease the reins.
I think we saw a little of this suppressed feeling surface in the “anti-China” riots a year or two ago (which became ant-Taiwan, anti-government as well).
To me, especially urban Vietnamese, especially urban Vietnamese in HCMC, in 2015 want to be living at the same level as Taiwan, Korea, Japan, Shanghai, Dalian.
And all of the above makes the guys in Hanoi uneasy. Can they keep it bottled up?
Maybe yes in the short term. But it seems that there is an inevitable momentum that at some point will win the day.
The question is will Hanoi accept it and work with it, install a new generation of leaders with more experience of the world, more open to a less-controlled society?
Or will the guys in Hanoi try to battle to the last man to defend the present structure and their present level of control, power and yes, even wealth.
Much like the Thai Royalists are trying to do in Thailand these days. No openess to compromise. We are the Owners and Rulers. Everyone else belongs to us and must do as we say.
And of course, i would not have expected you to answer reasonably on subject of the drug war killings, but personalize the debate yet again by building up a strawman of me, and then arguing as if i would resemble that strawman. I don’t. I have no idea what gives you the mistaken notion that i may have adopted the “Thai style democracy” approach, or where i have ever written anything in support of that idea. Are you maybe arguing here with me as a place holder for some other group of people you have a beef with?
And i am sorry, i am tired of repeating myself again why i believe that the Yingluck government was less authoritarian than Thaksin’s administration. Just refer to our previous exchanges.
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Governing by the gun
The Connors paper is great but he did not do deep research into the legal system or police. The way the police operate has a history. The closed and secretive nature of the Thai police and the existence of money making activities and wealth can be traced back to the days of CIA involvement and the police chief/tycoon Phao Sriyanon (as ANU’s Desmond Ball talks about in the Nation piece “Inside the Tor Chor Dor”). Research into how the legal system actually works and its history is sorely needed.
I am not naive. I once lived in Chiang Rai family and learned firsthand of how the police operate and their abuse of power directly and through word of mouth, not through newspapers.
Once had a Swiss friend found hanging from the rafters of Chiang Rai prison after rounds of police extortion.
Once chased down a thief in Mae Sai, a work gang with shovels stopped him and we brought him to the police station, and what did the police do? They asked me did I want them to beat the thief? Don’t you have a procedure for dealing with thieves, I thought. Is personal retribution the only thing that these police can conceive of ? You don’t discover these things from existent books or academic papers.
To solve a problem, acknowledge it exists, describe it and take first steps to solving it, i.e. reform, any reform, traffic laws that don’t require “structural changes in the Thai state” would be a good place to start.
In Bangkok, police are unable to carry out basic duties like enforcing basic traffic laws such as stopping people running red lights en masse or motorcycles and Tuk Tuks driving around without lights on, occasionally hitting people. I personally witnessed a negligent speeding motorcycle taxi rip the skin off of someone’s face one night. Stood their and gawked with the crowd.
Even basic equity is lacking in the impromptu police traffic courts, provincial people in traffic accidents in Bangkok are hard-pressed to come up with the guarantor/character witnesses they need to defend themselves and how much is given to the police and the record of their decisions is not available to the public, so any powerful Pu Yai can intervene and no one will know about it. Again, not in books, articles or the newspaper.
As for police reform, it has to happen one day to become a modern state. And that includes demilitarization, breaking up of policing functions, decentralization, increased oversight, breaking up control over and secrecy of promotions.
Police reform is 180 degrees opposed to the Duterte rhetoric (or the Thaksin red shirt war on drugs rhetoric) that says police functions have be carried out by secret death squads and bullets in the head at night, like the Thaksin era 2003 extrajudicial killings… which I saw with my own eyes BTW 🙂
“The educated middle class vs democracy”
Nothing has really changed has it since Y2007 Andrew Walker? The middle class vs. democracy …. hmmmmm.
What are your puke limits people? anyone?
Governing by the gun
And again, you build up another strawman. Where on earth have i given the indication that Thaksin does not carry his part of responsibility for the drug war killings, and should not be legally held responsible? I haven’t. If i may remind you – at the time i have taken pictures of the drug war killings, and not in support of them.
I am realistic enough though to know that any prosecution or honest investigation into what has taken place is never going to happen due to the fact that if Thaksin has to answer to the courts for his part, others, such as the military, etc. would automatically have to answer for theirs. Why do you think in all those years nothing about the drug war has been done other than meaningless blather?
And accusing me of being a proponent of “Thainess” and “Thai-style Democracy” is quite insane, my dear emjay. Have you actually read anything i have written over the years? Can you point out where i have defended these ultra-conservative notions?
Me and my cronies… are you sure you are not Michael Yon or Tony Cartalucci/Michael Pirsch in disguise?
NLD needs to lift the standard
Thanks Sean,
Very interesting points. That would be a strategy worth watching.
Best wishes to all,
Nich
Tackling Myanmar’s opium trade
So long as the powers that be remain part of the problem and only ostensibly part of the solution people are condemned to lives of extreme coercion, poverty, and above all, hopelessness.
The poppy growers, drug traffickers, middlemen, users and addicts with the attendant rising crime, health and social problems are all byproducts and symptoms of the prevailing global order. Sadly the majority of evidently intelligent people will continue to remain in denial and never see the wood for the trees.
It’s the 21st century but some things never change, just carry on at a more sophisticated and hitech level.
NLD needs to lift the standard
Nice article Nich. While I agree that the NLD has equivocated on the issues you’ve mentioned above, I think it’s worth noting that the NLD voted against the four race and religion laws in Naypyidaw.
I do wonder about the NLD’s strategy when it comes to nationalist voters–at this point I don’t think it’s so much about keeping them onside as it is giving Ma Ba Tha enough rope. I can only vouch for this anecdotally and off public FB pages, but it seems that some of the esteem has come off Ma Ba Tha and its leaders since the movement’s two year anniversary conference and the fortnight long celebrations over the race and religion laws’ passage, I could well be wrong though…
Tackling Myanmar’s opium trade
Mr C Artingstoll
Need to realize, that the “Horse is out of the barn” as far as illicit drug production/supply and usage/demand go.
As such the 2 arms of the economic problems need to be tackle. Successful model is Singapore. A model that has not been repeated successfully due to civil liberty issues and HR group making hay out of every turn when the demand side is tackled.
Shut down institution like Hollywood which in the west that glorified participates and profited unscathed from BOTH sides of this Drug economy, instead of tackling only Afghanistan, Myanmar, Pakistan and India the producing countries is akin to closing the barn door after letting the horse out.
Royal power in Thai politics
Are you serious Chris? Or, you’re being sarcastic.
Soccer wars in Southeast Asia
This is fascinating–I know effectively nothing about the politics of hooliganism/regionalism in Thai soccer fandom, so you’re right to call out this gap in my analysis. Thanks for your comment.
Let me see if I understand the point you’re making. You’re arguing that the folks who started this mess in Vientiane are not Thai nationalists, but rather are known football troublemakers in Thailand who have crossed the river for some reason, right?
I definitely don’t know the dynamics of football hooliganism within Thailand. However, I’m skeptical that the red shirts (which, as far as I can tell, have the Thai national team logo on them, not the MTU logo) and the use of the term “ultras” mean that this violence was mainly an issue of tribalism within Thailand. As I’m sure you’re aware, the term “ultras” has long been used by a massive array of militant/violent soccer supporters groups–as a youth, I sometimes would cheer with the so-called “98 Ultras” at Chicago matches, a notoriously loud and unruly (but fun) bunch. Thus, I was assuming the “Thailand Ultras” signs and shirts were showing ardent support for Thailand in general, not for a specific team within Thailand. Please correct me if this is wrong.
Am I still missing something? Is Muangthong United famously anti-Lao or anti-Vietnamese? If this is about intra-Thai factionalism as much as nationalism, what’s the opposing faction (in addition to the MTU supporters)?
Soccer wars in Southeast Asia
Yes–as a matter of fact, I wrote the following sentences in the above piece to make exactly the point that you’re telling me I should have made:
“A team of Lao police went into the stands, presumably to make sure that nobody got hurt, and were met with a violent backlash from the Thai supporters.”
“By damaging a flag, the Lao police in their communist regalia damaged the sanctity of one of the most powerful symbols of the Thai state, thereby affronting the Thai nationalist cause–perhaps, in the eyes of the Thai soccer fans, aligning Lao nationalism with Vietnamese nationalism against Thailand.”
Hope that clarifies things! I don’t mean to sound cheeky, but there’s no other way to address this.
Development and drugs in Myanmar
Most ordinary folk do not choose growing poppy or selling illicit substances provided they have a viable alternative.
The political will to deal with the problem by improving the lot of those at the bottom of the heap is conspicuous in its absence. The authorities have been far too busy looking for lucrative deals, legal or no (RoL still malleable as ever in their grubby hands), over the wasted decades at the expense of our lost generations.
The Wa tried by an enforced march down south away from their poppy fields to the Thai border but ended up making yaba (methamphetamine), an even more profitable alternative for the same drug trade involving corrupt Thai officials like their Burmese counterparts and the old KMT remnants as usual.
Royal power in Thai politics
It doesn’t really matter as long as The Thai King is still breathing, because everything is done under his name by royalists. Thus he should be responsible.
Reassessing Myanmar’s poppy problem
The Opium War of our times like in the past cannot be untangled from the prevailing global socioeconomic order. There’s supply and demand, and for the sons of the soil a living to make, thus with all the good will in the world will remain an even harder uphill struggle for the foreseeable future notwithstanding helos and flamethrowers.
A successful programme of an alternative cash crop may still not come up to expectations for the narcotraffickers who already have methamphetamine as a viable alternative mentioned in the article.
Reassessing Myanmar’s poppy problem
Drug IS integral part of every countries ECONOMY where tax is the bribes and all he associated and related cost for the production/SUPPLY.
on the DEMAND side of which Human cause is the least concern of most government, only when the addicts become a problem in the west i.e ‘when heroine is cheap on the streets of EU and USA’, that the discussion of interdiction become an urgent topic.
Another west useless careless approach to problem of supply side country.
Governing by the gun
Having read the Connors paper a couple of times before now, I am nevertheless of the opinion that a duly elected Prime Minister of Thailand who oversees what in essence is a series of gangland or death-squad style extrajudicial executions is legally responsible for those deaths. Others may belong in the dock with him, but if anyone is to be held most responsible IN A LEGAL SENSE for these obvious crimes against humanity it would be the DULY ELECTED PRIME MINISTER who initiated and oversaw the program.
That would follow from my support of rule of law in democratic governance.
Your refusal to admit to this rather obvious fact is due to your convenient belief that because the traditional practices of the Thai state tend in that direction, Thaksin is not responsible. This of course is consistent with any number of arguments and feints put up by defenders of “Thainess” and “Thai-style democracy”, i.e. that normal liberal democratic strictures do not apply in Thailand because Thailand is special.
The other “argument” that you allude to is what I like to think of as the “hearing voices” argument. You and I both know that Thaksin heard whispers of encouragement and consent both before and during the killings.
Unlike you, who believes that this works as a successful Nuremberg Defense and Thaksin was “just following orders”, I could care less whose voice he heard, whether that of Joan of Arc relaying orders from God himself or that of one of the many Arhats who attended the Lotus Sermon first time around.
Thaksin was the constitutionally established and duly elected Prime Minister of Thailand at the time and as such is responsible legally for the crimes.
Like all aficionados of the “Thainess”, “Thai-style democracy” school of obscurantist BS, you, Nick, also promote the “culture of impunity” that folks occasionally point to as a problem that Thai society has with rule of law.
One step in the direction of liberalism you and your cronies could take would be to admit that TS is guilty of crimes against humanity and ought to be brought to justice for them whether or not it is ever likely to happen.
But no. I must be dreaming. I haven’t taken part in your internal discourse so there is something somehow that I just don’t understand. Because Thailand is different from other countries and you and your friends are good people.
Bollocks.
Governing by the gun
From https://www.hrw.org/news/2008/03/12/thailands-war-drugs:
“In February 2003, the Thai government, under then Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, launched a ‘war on drugs’, purportedly aimed at the suppression of drug trafficking and the prevention of drug use. In fact, a major outcome of this policy was arbitrary killings. In the first three months of the campaign there were some 2800 extrajudicial killings. In 2007, an official investigation found that more than half of those killed had no connection whatsoever to drugs. Apart from the thousands who lost their lives, thousands more were forced into coercive “treatment” for drug addiction.”
Governing by the gun
jonfernquest makes a good point about support for the war on drugs, from many groups. Many in the middle class and several of the privy council were also supportive of these extrajudicial killings and also opposed Thaksin. One might ask what it was that provided so much public support to murderous actions.
Vietnam’s rising repression
As someone who has spent quite a lot of time in and out of Vietnam over the past few years, it’s hard to disagree with anything Zachary says and describes.
Yet in HCMC, one notices immediately how young the demographic is, how energetic, determined, intelligent, and even a bit wild the new generation appears to be.
They are fed up with living at a 3rd world income level, fed up with endless state interference and attempts at state control. In short, there is a huge suppressed “rebelliousness” just beneath the surface.
Not so much a desire for violent “revolution” as just an overwhelming desire to break free of their low income/low opportunity shackles and to join a more prosperous world. To study, work, travel wherever they please. To make enough money to buy a house/apt/car/mid-level lifestyle. To have opportunity to realize their potentials.
They seem to be waiting for the elderly generation that “won the war” to retire or die, for Hanoi to ease the reins.
I think we saw a little of this suppressed feeling surface in the “anti-China” riots a year or two ago (which became ant-Taiwan, anti-government as well).
To me, especially urban Vietnamese, especially urban Vietnamese in HCMC, in 2015 want to be living at the same level as Taiwan, Korea, Japan, Shanghai, Dalian.
And all of the above makes the guys in Hanoi uneasy. Can they keep it bottled up?
Maybe yes in the short term. But it seems that there is an inevitable momentum that at some point will win the day.
The question is will Hanoi accept it and work with it, install a new generation of leaders with more experience of the world, more open to a less-controlled society?
Or will the guys in Hanoi try to battle to the last man to defend the present structure and their present level of control, power and yes, even wealth.
Much like the Thai Royalists are trying to do in Thailand these days. No openess to compromise. We are the Owners and Rulers. Everyone else belongs to us and must do as we say.
Royal power in Thai politics
Chris Beale: Re the death of King Ananda. Please click this link:
https://facthai.wordpress.com/2012/03/17/the-death-of-king-ananda-andrew-macgregor-marshall/
Governing by the gun
And of course, i would not have expected you to answer reasonably on subject of the drug war killings, but personalize the debate yet again by building up a strawman of me, and then arguing as if i would resemble that strawman. I don’t. I have no idea what gives you the mistaken notion that i may have adopted the “Thai style democracy” approach, or where i have ever written anything in support of that idea. Are you maybe arguing here with me as a place holder for some other group of people you have a beef with?
And i am sorry, i am tired of repeating myself again why i believe that the Yingluck government was less authoritarian than Thaksin’s administration. Just refer to our previous exchanges.