"Former Left-Right Alliance against Globalization and America
28 July 2008
Article
Almost all Thai rightists I interviewed for my recent research perceived that the threats to Thailand today are capitalism and America. Even lifelong anti-communist ‘Phor’, an alias used for this research, who has tenaciously held the idea of national security being under threat from two strands of communism, sees that Thailand has to be cautious of the CIA interfering and agitating groups of Thai people to the point of being a threat to security. Of course, they were well aware that the threats from capitalism and America are not one and the same as the communist threat.
The rightists’ discourse of capitalist threat obviously differs from the leftists’ Maoist anti-capitalist discourse of 30 years ago. These rightists speak pretty much the same anti-neo-liberalism and anti-globalization language which Thai intellectuals and activists have adopted since after Oct 6, 1976.
Although all the interviews were done years after the 1997 economic crisis, the pain caused by the capitalist crisis was still alive in their memories. Their discourse on the cause of the crisis turned out to be nationalist and against ‘farang’ or western capitalism, pointing to western capitalist giants led by the US bullying emergent smaller capitalist nations. For the ease of digestion and propagation, it was made a story of conspiracy among a handful of global political and financial figures, often including George Soros in particular. The ‘Washington Consensus’ was understood simply as a plot by western capitalist neo-conservatives to destroy smaller states. With the calamity besetting Thai nationalist capital which had eagerly embraced globalization over a decade earlier, globalization has become undesirable. Their discourse against western capitalism was therefore not of a socialist bent, but was outright nationalist, against those ugly farangs abusing decent Thais.
Most of the interviews were done during the years of Thaksin administration which was seen as representing the evil western capitalism, subsequently labelled as ‘vicious or immoral capital’. The exasperation against Thaksin and globalization and the global anti-American sentiment fed into one another. Among the rightists I interviewed then, only one person liked the Thaksin government, and the rest were suspicious of Thaksin because he was pushing the agenda of globalization.
--MORE--"Now read the AmeriKan MSM's coverage:
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BANGKOK — In a day of street battles that left one person dead and nearly 400 people injured, anti-government protesters surrounded the Parliament building on Tuesday, trapping hundreds of lawmakers inside throughout the afternoon.
I guess the Globe wouldn't want to give Americans any ideas, huh?
Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat escaped over a back fence in the morning after delivering a policy address.
I say "same treatment for Bush and Pelosi!!!!"
But other members were unable to leave for more than five hours, when the police dispersed the massed protesters with volleys of tear gas and cleared the way for them. The Thai military announced that it would deploy unarmed troops to help the police keep peace in the days to come.
The crowd outside the Parliament building had a sometimes lighthearted air, with middle-class men and women and even a few children joining the crowd.
“I’m here to chase out the government,” said Piyanuch Klangrach, 19, a computer science student who was wearing a Mickey Mouse hat. --more--"
We could really learn something from the Thais -- other than how to make good food!!!!
