"Wall Street "Populism" Tramples Thailand's Poor
And how to pick them back up...
The West has praised Thaksin
Shinawatra and his "populist" policies for years as an example of very
best of modern progressive principles in practice. Cheap loans, free
computers, and rice subsidies were hailed as democracy in action by the
Western media - and those who questioned the unsustainable, corruption
and scandal fraught policies were swiftly condemned as "elitists" who
rejected equality. The goal of these policies were never to lift up the
poor, but rather install Thaksin Shinawatra into power long enough to
uproot Thailand's indigenous institutions and open the nation up to foreign corporate-financier and geopolitical exploitation.
However, this myth of a "populist" "pro-rural poor" government, has been finally laid to rest. The ill-conceived vote-buying scams the regime had propelled itself into power with, have now fully unraveled in a spectacular display of vindication for the regime's opposition. However, as it has unraveled, it has left farmers across the nation robbed of both their rice and their promised subsidies, along with a devastated rice industry that may take years to recover in terms of quality, exports, and reputation.
Farmers have been gathering in increasing numbers across the country in protest of the regime - blocking roads across the rural countryside, and mobilizing in the capital city of Bangkok along side ongoing anti-regime protests. The growing anger amongst the rural poor could perhaps be best seen during the recent February 2, 2014 general elections in which voter turnout failed to reach even 50% (as opposed to over 70% in 2011) - a devastating indictment against the regime's credibility and legitimacy.
However, this myth of a "populist" "pro-rural poor" government, has been finally laid to rest. The ill-conceived vote-buying scams the regime had propelled itself into power with, have now fully unraveled in a spectacular display of vindication for the regime's opposition. However, as it has unraveled, it has left farmers across the nation robbed of both their rice and their promised subsidies, along with a devastated rice industry that may take years to recover in terms of quality, exports, and reputation.
Farmers have been gathering in increasing numbers across the country in protest of the regime - blocking roads across the rural countryside, and mobilizing in the capital city of Bangkok along side ongoing anti-regime protests. The growing anger amongst the rural poor could perhaps be best seen during the recent February 2, 2014 general elections in which voter turnout failed to reach even 50% (as opposed to over 70% in 2011) - a devastating indictment against the regime's credibility and legitimacy.
Protest leader Suthep Thaugsuban has mobilized several marches to gather donations for rice farmers who have sought, but failed to receive promised compensation for contracts they signed with the Thaksin Shinawatra regime. These marches, however, cannot even begin to dent the debt and damage incurred by the regime's reckless vote-buying scam. The protesters have also been formulating policies to help rice farmers, should the regime collapse and the opposition find itself in power....
--MORE--"
Related:
"Thailand’s policy to aid rice growers backfires; Farmers protest lack of payment, assail government" by Thanyarat Doksone | Associated Press, February 07, 2014
BANGKOK — An ambitious rice-buying program that Thailand’s ruling party hoped would aid millions of its poor rural supporters may instead help bring down the increasingly cornered government.
The $ympathy with the government oo$es from my propaganda pre$$.
Hundreds of farmers from more than 10 provinces converged Thursday on the capital to demand rice payments that are several months overdue after the policy caused ruinous losses.
Uh-oh.
Some have blocked three main highways in the north and the west, while a few hundred in the ruling party’s northeastern heartland protested at a provincial government hall.
With the help of populist policies such as the rice pledging scheme, Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra’s party won a landslide election victory in 2011. But it suffered a self-inflicted and crushing setback late last year by attempting to give amnesty to Yingluck’s elder brother, Thaksin Shinawatra, so he could return to the kingdom without serving prison time for a corruption conviction.
I'm starting to think that the Thaksin angle is a red (shirt) herring!
It's the economy in$tead!
Ousted as prime minister in a 2006 coup, Thaksin is a highly polarizing figure, beloved in the countryside and loathed in the capital, Bangkok, where military, palace, and old money cliques have traditionally held sway over the nation.
I can't stand this rank rot anymore!!!!
The rice crisis comes at a difficult time for the government, which is reduced to a caretaker administration after street protests sparked by the amnesty bill forced new elections. Official results of the Feb. 2 vote may not be announced for months after protesters in Bangkok prevented some polling places from functioning, requiring by-elections. The government is also facing numerous court cases and investigations that could result in it being deposed judicially.
Now the ruling party faces the risk that the bedrock of its support, farmers, will turn against it.
‘‘We are going on the streets because we’re facing a dead end,’’ said Sombat Roek-anan, a farmer from Ayutthaya province, a stronghold of the ruling Pheu Thai party. ‘‘The farmers used to be 100 percent behind the government before the rice scheme, but now it’s 50-50.’’
Meaning it is a 75-25 split nationwide, if not worse, against the government! That's the way the propaganda pre$$ has reported the protests. It's a split country right down the middle. Now we find out is has not been from the very start. Farmers haven't been paid for months; that's why protests sprang up!
Rice is Thailand’s staple grain and one of its main exports.
I'm wondering if their is hunger in Thailand, too.
In hopes of boosting rice prices and increasing rural incomes, the government bought harvests from farmers at about twice the price prevailing in global markets. The program backfired when the Commerce Ministry had difficulties selling the grain overseas as rival exporters such as Vietnam undercut it.
Losses from rice pledging have swelled to $4.46 billion since the policy was started in 2011, and in a blow to national pride, Thailand lost its spot as the world’s top rice exporter in 2012, surpassed by India and Vietnam. The policy also underlined a deep division in Thai society, with Bangkok’s white collar classes resenting the largesse directed at the rural poor.
Seems to be a characteristic of the greedy upper crust, doesn't it?
Subsidizing rice has caused ‘‘tremendous losses’’ to the Thai economy, said Somkiat Tangkitvanich, president of Thailand Development Research Institute, a Bangkok think tank. ‘‘Most importantly, this scheme cannot help the farmers in a sustainable way.’’
They undercut their own support by trying to buy them off!
Critics also say the policy lacks transparency, has been dogged by corruption and smugglers, and benefits farmers with large land holdings rather than poor small farmers. The International Monetary Fund last year called on Thailand to drop the subsidies.
But it is the icky protesters in the street that represent the monied elite, yup!!
The government’s caretaker status restricts its options for raising funds and it is struggling to find $3.9 billion to pay farmers for the current crop year. It is not selling enough of the grain overseas and Thai banks have refused to lend to the Finance Ministry, which oversees the Commerce Ministry’s funding for rice purchases.
Hundreds of employees at Krung Thai Bank protested earlier this week, urging executives to veto loans to the government.
In another blow, a Chinese state enterprise this week canceled a deal to buy 1.2 million tons of Thai rice due to a probe by Thailand’s graft police.
The Thailand Development Research Institute says the only solution is for the government to dump the rice on the world market to pay more than a million farmers.
Such a move could invite the ire of neighbors such as Vietnam and risk a battle at the World Trade Organization as other rice exporting nations seek remedies for damage to their trade. But the political risks of letting the late payment situation fester might force the government’s hand.
--more--"
That was the last time I saw anything in my Globe about Thailand, folks, after those rotten protesters that disrupted the rigged vote by shutting down polling stations and now want it nullified and annulled by judicial coup took much attention.
"Thai court rules delay of election is allowed under Constitution" by Thomas Fuller | New York Times, January 25, 2014
BANGKOK — A Thai court ruled Friday that a postponement of the country’s coming elections, which protesters have worked feverishly to block, is lawful under the country’s Constitution.
The decision by the country’s Constitutional Court was a blow to Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra and surprised many legal scholars, who say there are no provisions under Thai law for a delay.
Some constitutional specialists described the decision as a form of judicial coup d’état because it would leave a potential power vacuum if elections were not held.
The court’s decision heightens the complex and debilitating power struggle between Yingluck’s governing party, which is almost sure to win the elections if they proceed, and protesters who have spent the past two months on the streets of Bangkok vowing to stop them.
Really?
The protesters’ goal is to purge from politics Yingluck and her brother Thaksin Shinawatra, a billionaire tycoon and former prime minister who left the country in 2008 to escape a two-year prison sentence for abuse of power.
I'm tired of the inflammatory slant on the situation from my new$paper.
An aide to Yingluck said on television that the government would study the decision. But he also seemed to leave the door open for negotiations with opposition forces, especially the Democrat Party, which is boycotting the elections....
The protest leader, Suthep Thaugsuban, has pledged to obstruct the elections at all costs....
Advance voting begins Sunday....
The protest movement, which says it is fighting the dominance and corruption of Yingluck and her family, draws the bulk of its support from Bangkok and southern Thailand, while the governing party, which has won every election since 2001, has the backing of voters in the north and northeast. Government supporters say there has always been corruption and the protesters simply want to seize power.
A nationwide opinion poll released Friday appeared to show that protesters hold a minority view in their desire to block elections. Nearly 80 percent of respondents to the poll said they intended to vote if an election is held on Feb. 2.
Released by who?
In answer to a separate question, just over 28 percent said there should be “reforms before elections,” one of the main slogans of protesters, who say they want the country ruled by an unelected “people’s council” while largely unspecified changes are carried out.
Oh.
Yingluck’s government faces not only the wrath of protesters but also hostile government agencies. The Election Commission, which requested the judgment that the court issued Friday, has repeatedly sought to postpone the elections. Somchai Srisutthiyakorn, one of the commissioners, has argued that the elections could lead to violence and a military coup.
The Constitutional Court has ruled against the government on several key decisions in recent weeks and is perceived by government supporters as highly political.
Related: Bunking With Yingluck
The AmeriKan ma$$ media and propaganda pre$$ are in bed with her.
Time to put this post to rest:
"Tufts graduate, 24, dies in Thailand" by Matt Rocheleau and Jennifer Smith | Globe Staff | Globe Correspondent, January 25, 2014
The Tufts University community is mourning the loss of a 2012 graduate who authorities believe was trampled to death by elephants during her vacation in Thailand.
Lily Glidden, a 24-year-old native of Freeville, N.Y., likely was killed in a reserve in Thailand while trying to photograph the animals, authorities said Friday.
Her body was found by park rangers in a wooded area of a reserve outside Bangkok on Saturday, after being missing for five days, according to news reports.
She earned a degree in biology from Tufts in 2012 and had long been committed to her passion for wildlife and the outdoors. At one point, she was a member of a wilderness-training group based in Ithaca, N.Y., called Primitive Pursuits, according to a Tufts Daily article.
After leaving Tufts, Glidden worked as a researcher in a series of jobs. She trapped Mexican wolves in the West and handled venomous cobras and other exotic reptiles in Hong Kong.
On social media, she documented an active life of hiking and exploration in parks such as Yellowstone and Moab, Utah.
Family and friends described her as fearless. While attending Tufts, she was president of the college’s mountain club....
--more--"
NEXT DAY UPDATE:
You understand what a blank space means, right?
UPDATE:
"Thai court rejects two government overthrow claims" by Thanyarat Doksone | Associated Press, February 13, 2014
BANGKOK — If the case against the government had been accepted and the Cabinet found guilty, the government could have been forced out of office.
No judicial coup then.
The decision not to accept the cases only slightly narrows the battlefield on which the two sides are fighting for power.
Antigovernment protesters barged into the headquarters of the Forestry Department on Wednesday in what they said was an effort to keep employees from working. Disrupting state offices, by siege or occupation, is a hallmark of the People’s Democratic Reform Committee protest group, which has been active for three months....
As opposed to those wonderful and brave protesters in the Ukraine taking over government!
Instructive only as far as seeing the blatant agenda-pushing from the propaganda pre$$. Otherwise, this is all, all garbage.
Of course, Occupy Wall Street never resorted to such lengths and they were $hit on even worse by my whoreporate pre$$.
Thaksin’s supporters say the courts are biased against them as part of a conservative ruling class that feels threatened by the former prime minister’s mass appeal, reflected in impressive election victories.
Considering what I have put above, as well as the other articles following the situation in Thailand, the brazenness and boldness of the distortion and outright lie contained in that sentence is saddening.
This is f***ing useless, folks. The Boston Globe is nothing but a whoreporate piece of $hit.
Yingluck’s party had said that efforts by the protesters to interfere in the Feb. 2 elections violated a constitutional provision against illegal seizure of power. The Democrats said the elections, called by Yingluck in response to weeks of anti-government protests, were an unconstitutional attempt to hold on to power.
The Democrats boycotted the elections, insisting that reforms had to be instituted before the polls could be considered fair. They are closely linked to the street protesters, whose leaders are primarily former party executives who stepped down to lead the demonstrations....
Whatever, pos pre$$.
--more--"
Related:
"Thailand’s policy to aid rice growers backfires; Farmers protest lack of payment, assail government" by Thanyarat Doksone | Associated Press, February 07, 2014
BANGKOK — An ambitious rice-buying program that Thailand’s ruling party hoped would aid millions of its poor rural supporters may instead help bring down the increasingly cornered government.
The $ympathy with the government oo$es from my propaganda pre$$.
Hundreds of farmers from more than 10 provinces converged Thursday on the capital to demand rice payments that are several months overdue after the policy caused ruinous losses.
Uh-oh.
Some have blocked three main highways in the north and the west, while a few hundred in the ruling party’s northeastern heartland protested at a provincial government hall.
With the help of populist policies such as the rice pledging scheme, Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra’s party won a landslide election victory in 2011. But it suffered a self-inflicted and crushing setback late last year by attempting to give amnesty to Yingluck’s elder brother, Thaksin Shinawatra, so he could return to the kingdom without serving prison time for a corruption conviction.
I'm starting to think that the Thaksin angle is a red (shirt) herring!
It's the economy in$tead!
Ousted as prime minister in a 2006 coup, Thaksin is a highly polarizing figure, beloved in the countryside and loathed in the capital, Bangkok, where military, palace, and old money cliques have traditionally held sway over the nation.
I can't stand this rank rot anymore!!!!
The rice crisis comes at a difficult time for the government, which is reduced to a caretaker administration after street protests sparked by the amnesty bill forced new elections. Official results of the Feb. 2 vote may not be announced for months after protesters in Bangkok prevented some polling places from functioning, requiring by-elections. The government is also facing numerous court cases and investigations that could result in it being deposed judicially.
Now the ruling party faces the risk that the bedrock of its support, farmers, will turn against it.
‘‘We are going on the streets because we’re facing a dead end,’’ said Sombat Roek-anan, a farmer from Ayutthaya province, a stronghold of the ruling Pheu Thai party. ‘‘The farmers used to be 100 percent behind the government before the rice scheme, but now it’s 50-50.’’
Meaning it is a 75-25 split nationwide, if not worse, against the government! That's the way the propaganda pre$$ has reported the protests. It's a split country right down the middle. Now we find out is has not been from the very start. Farmers haven't been paid for months; that's why protests sprang up!
Rice is Thailand’s staple grain and one of its main exports.
I'm wondering if their is hunger in Thailand, too.
In hopes of boosting rice prices and increasing rural incomes, the government bought harvests from farmers at about twice the price prevailing in global markets. The program backfired when the Commerce Ministry had difficulties selling the grain overseas as rival exporters such as Vietnam undercut it.
Losses from rice pledging have swelled to $4.46 billion since the policy was started in 2011, and in a blow to national pride, Thailand lost its spot as the world’s top rice exporter in 2012, surpassed by India and Vietnam. The policy also underlined a deep division in Thai society, with Bangkok’s white collar classes resenting the largesse directed at the rural poor.
Seems to be a characteristic of the greedy upper crust, doesn't it?
Subsidizing rice has caused ‘‘tremendous losses’’ to the Thai economy, said Somkiat Tangkitvanich, president of Thailand Development Research Institute, a Bangkok think tank. ‘‘Most importantly, this scheme cannot help the farmers in a sustainable way.’’
They undercut their own support by trying to buy them off!
Critics also say the policy lacks transparency, has been dogged by corruption and smugglers, and benefits farmers with large land holdings rather than poor small farmers. The International Monetary Fund last year called on Thailand to drop the subsidies.
But it is the icky protesters in the street that represent the monied elite, yup!!
The government’s caretaker status restricts its options for raising funds and it is struggling to find $3.9 billion to pay farmers for the current crop year. It is not selling enough of the grain overseas and Thai banks have refused to lend to the Finance Ministry, which oversees the Commerce Ministry’s funding for rice purchases.
Hundreds of employees at Krung Thai Bank protested earlier this week, urging executives to veto loans to the government.
In another blow, a Chinese state enterprise this week canceled a deal to buy 1.2 million tons of Thai rice due to a probe by Thailand’s graft police.
The Thailand Development Research Institute says the only solution is for the government to dump the rice on the world market to pay more than a million farmers.
Such a move could invite the ire of neighbors such as Vietnam and risk a battle at the World Trade Organization as other rice exporting nations seek remedies for damage to their trade. But the political risks of letting the late payment situation fester might force the government’s hand.
--more--"
That was the last time I saw anything in my Globe about Thailand, folks, after those rotten protesters that disrupted the rigged vote by shutting down polling stations and now want it nullified and annulled by judicial coup took much attention.
"Thai court rules delay of election is allowed under Constitution" by Thomas Fuller | New York Times, January 25, 2014
BANGKOK — A Thai court ruled Friday that a postponement of the country’s coming elections, which protesters have worked feverishly to block, is lawful under the country’s Constitution.
The decision by the country’s Constitutional Court was a blow to Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra and surprised many legal scholars, who say there are no provisions under Thai law for a delay.
Some constitutional specialists described the decision as a form of judicial coup d’état because it would leave a potential power vacuum if elections were not held.
The court’s decision heightens the complex and debilitating power struggle between Yingluck’s governing party, which is almost sure to win the elections if they proceed, and protesters who have spent the past two months on the streets of Bangkok vowing to stop them.
Really?
The protesters’ goal is to purge from politics Yingluck and her brother Thaksin Shinawatra, a billionaire tycoon and former prime minister who left the country in 2008 to escape a two-year prison sentence for abuse of power.
I'm tired of the inflammatory slant on the situation from my new$paper.
An aide to Yingluck said on television that the government would study the decision. But he also seemed to leave the door open for negotiations with opposition forces, especially the Democrat Party, which is boycotting the elections....
The protest leader, Suthep Thaugsuban, has pledged to obstruct the elections at all costs....
Advance voting begins Sunday....
The protest movement, which says it is fighting the dominance and corruption of Yingluck and her family, draws the bulk of its support from Bangkok and southern Thailand, while the governing party, which has won every election since 2001, has the backing of voters in the north and northeast. Government supporters say there has always been corruption and the protesters simply want to seize power.
A nationwide opinion poll released Friday appeared to show that protesters hold a minority view in their desire to block elections. Nearly 80 percent of respondents to the poll said they intended to vote if an election is held on Feb. 2.
Released by who?
In answer to a separate question, just over 28 percent said there should be “reforms before elections,” one of the main slogans of protesters, who say they want the country ruled by an unelected “people’s council” while largely unspecified changes are carried out.
Oh.
Yingluck’s government faces not only the wrath of protesters but also hostile government agencies. The Election Commission, which requested the judgment that the court issued Friday, has repeatedly sought to postpone the elections. Somchai Srisutthiyakorn, one of the commissioners, has argued that the elections could lead to violence and a military coup.
The Constitutional Court has ruled against the government on several key decisions in recent weeks and is perceived by government supporters as highly political.
--more--"
Related: Bunking With Yingluck
The AmeriKan ma$$ media and propaganda pre$$ are in bed with her.
Time to put this post to rest:
"Tufts graduate, 24, dies in Thailand" by Matt Rocheleau and Jennifer Smith | Globe Staff | Globe Correspondent, January 25, 2014
The Tufts University community is mourning the loss of a 2012 graduate who authorities believe was trampled to death by elephants during her vacation in Thailand.
Lily Glidden, a 24-year-old native of Freeville, N.Y., likely was killed in a reserve in Thailand while trying to photograph the animals, authorities said Friday.
Her body was found by park rangers in a wooded area of a reserve outside Bangkok on Saturday, after being missing for five days, according to news reports.
She earned a degree in biology from Tufts in 2012 and had long been committed to her passion for wildlife and the outdoors. At one point, she was a member of a wilderness-training group based in Ithaca, N.Y., called Primitive Pursuits, according to a Tufts Daily article.
After leaving Tufts, Glidden worked as a researcher in a series of jobs. She trapped Mexican wolves in the West and handled venomous cobras and other exotic reptiles in Hong Kong.
On social media, she documented an active life of hiking and exploration in parks such as Yellowstone and Moab, Utah.
Family and friends described her as fearless. While attending Tufts, she was president of the college’s mountain club....
--more--"
NEXT DAY UPDATE:
You understand what a blank space means, right?
UPDATE:
"Thai court rejects two government overthrow claims" by Thanyarat Doksone | Associated Press, February 13, 2014
BANGKOK — If the case against the government had been accepted and the Cabinet found guilty, the government could have been forced out of office.
No judicial coup then.
The decision not to accept the cases only slightly narrows the battlefield on which the two sides are fighting for power.
Antigovernment protesters barged into the headquarters of the Forestry Department on Wednesday in what they said was an effort to keep employees from working. Disrupting state offices, by siege or occupation, is a hallmark of the People’s Democratic Reform Committee protest group, which has been active for three months....
As opposed to those wonderful and brave protesters in the Ukraine taking over government!
Instructive only as far as seeing the blatant agenda-pushing from the propaganda pre$$. Otherwise, this is all, all garbage.
Of course, Occupy Wall Street never resorted to such lengths and they were $hit on even worse by my whoreporate pre$$.
Thaksin’s supporters say the courts are biased against them as part of a conservative ruling class that feels threatened by the former prime minister’s mass appeal, reflected in impressive election victories.
Considering what I have put above, as well as the other articles following the situation in Thailand, the brazenness and boldness of the distortion and outright lie contained in that sentence is saddening.
This is f***ing useless, folks. The Boston Globe is nothing but a whoreporate piece of $hit.
Yingluck’s party had said that efforts by the protesters to interfere in the Feb. 2 elections violated a constitutional provision against illegal seizure of power. The Democrats said the elections, called by Yingluck in response to weeks of anti-government protests, were an unconstitutional attempt to hold on to power.
The Democrats boycotted the elections, insisting that reforms had to be instituted before the polls could be considered fair. They are closely linked to the street protesters, whose leaders are primarily former party executives who stepped down to lead the demonstrations....
Whatever, pos pre$$.
--more--"
