Yes, sure we believe you. Fucking nutter. Now, try addressing the real issue as highlighted in the last few pages.Quote:
Originally Posted by Calgary the Nugget Ferret
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Yes, sure we believe you. Fucking nutter. Now, try addressing the real issue as highlighted in the last few pages.Quote:
Originally Posted by Calgary the Nugget Ferret
Good point!Quote:
Originally Posted by Dan
Agenda doesn't need proof Dan.
I did. If calgary can make the monumental effort of posting something relatively coherent, the least you can do is read it.Quote:
Originally Posted by Butterfly
All I can say is kudos for going out and getting your hands dirty.
I've been doing what I can in the neighbourhood, nothing as grand as your stuff. but then I extremely weary of all politicised civic movements. make sure you take good care of your health if your going anywhere near the water.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dan
Congratulations on a truly atrocious analogy. How about this one: I know my neighbour's a murderer because he owns a gun.Quote:
Originally Posted by hazz
So, that aside, where are the complaints of all the people who've been denied aid? If those nasty redshirts are only handing out aid to their fellow murderers/republicans/criminals/communists/Thaksinites, then presumably some people have been refused. I've not seen any reports from them. Have you? If you've got a bunch of people with credible reports about not getting food and water because of their political affiliation, then great but in the absence of any proof that it's actually happened, I will, shockingly enough, not condemn the redshirts for not doing something bad. Is that really such a strange thing to say?
You are trying to deny a policy that they have displayed clearly for everybody else to see. Nobody made them do that, they did it of their own accord. It is not for anybody to prove it isn't happening because irrefutable evidence of that particular policy has been provided.
If you want to refute a policy that they are seemingly so proud to display, show us the evidence to the contrary. And don't ask people to prove a false negative and sound victorious when they can't, it doesn't make you look nearly as smart as you may think.
And you seemed to have ignored the question of why they would even bother with the stickers in the first place if they have no intention of adhering to it. Why bother with such an inflammatory thing for absolutely no fucking reason whatsoever?
Do you not think there is a huge gap in logic here?
I don't know why they did it but unless there's proof that people have been denied aid, it's crazy to think that this has happened. Really. Unless you go in for extremely elaborate conspiracy theories, it just doesn't make sense to think that non-redshirts have not been getting food and water when their redshirt neighbours have. If good evidence turns up I'll believe that it happened but until that evidence arrives, I won't. That seems like an eminently rational thing to do. The converse of this is that if you want to believe that people haven't been getting aid, you need to come up with a convincing reason for why reports of this haven't surfaced. I don't think any sane person can deny the media bias in Thailand so one would have to wonder why journalists from neither the English-language nor Thai-language media have been able to track down these people who aren't getting feed and watered, when they clearly have a strong motivation to find them. That seems hard to explain.
---
Since this is the redshirts we're talking about and not an army regiment, it doesn't seem that unlikely that someone, somewhere, put the stickers on a few boats (so far I've seen a couple of pictures and if this were a 'policy', I think we might have seen rather more) and that these were then ignored. That might not be what happened but it seems slightly more plausible than local Mr Bigs threatening recalcitrant Democrats who dared breath a word of the reds' nefarious national plan to swag all the mama.
Sorry guys but its very reasonable to believe that when someone puts a sticker on a boat that says "only for redshirts"; they do it for a reason. Why else would they put it there and if the boat operators didn't agree with the message, why not tape over it?Quote:
Originally Posted by Calgary
All you are doing is the classic denial "move the goal posts" preferably to ask for unobtainable evidence.
- first we have the picture is fake, prove its real
- now we have ok the pictures real, prove they acted on the message and refused help to non red shirts
Try a little introspection lads.
^
So an aid boat clearly labelled "for red shirts only" is not evidence of malfeasance
Right, gothca.
:rolleyes:
and the next step will be, "ah, but they were fake non-red shirts and the whole thing was a media setup". :rolleyes:Quote:
Originally Posted by hazz
wouldn't that be a real redshirt or thinking about it a real redshirt in a yellow shirtQuote:
Originally Posted by Gerbil
Ah, that would be too straightforward. The Amart Media is cunning you see and we poor farangs are too gullible to see truth apparently. :rolleyes:Quote:
Originally Posted by hazz
Floods in the old days were much more fun - The Nation
GUEST COLUMN
Floods in the old days were much more fun
David Lyman
Bangkok October 29, 2011
How did we deal with the floods in the "old days"?
Well, for the most part Bangkokians drove or waded through them. The floods were usually localised and with some exceptions, were drained through Bangkok's then many functioning and clear klongs (canals) into the Chao Phraya River and thence to the sea and were gone in a matter of days. As the heavy rains from monsoons and typhoons fell and the tides became high, filling the streets with water, awaiting the rains to stop and tides to subside, kids swam and played in the water. The population accepted the floods as inevitable and a nuisance, though not too disruptive. In a manner of speaking, they were fun times, full of opportunities to complain, to laugh, were good gambits for conversation. After all, floods and droughts have been a way of life for centuries in Thailand. The causes and cures thereof were rarely addressed with any sustained interest.
When in the 1950s my family was looking for a change of residence from Krung Kasem Road to a place nearer to my father's office on Hong Kong Bank Lane, off New Road, my father refused to move to Sukhumvit Road because the sois leading off Sukhumvit and Rama IV roads weren't paved. In the rainy season these sois were seas of mud. So we ended up on Soi Polo, near the Polo Club, for 32 years until both my parents had passed on.
Some of the low-lying parts of Bangkok, with the city already built on a flood plain, especially in the eastern suburbs, in the 1960s and 1970s and on into the 1980s, were quickly inundated and remained underwater for many weeks. The water table there was being depleted by drawing fresh water from some 14,000 artesian wells. The area was measured as sinking at about the same rate that a child grows. After the initial calamity of a new flood, the suburbs' plight was not really deemed newsworthy.
And so was then born the concept of protecting Bangkok at the expense of sacrificing the surrounding provinces to absorb the floodwaters.
Where the floods hit upcountry - that's any direction away from Bangkok - that was agricultural land and the flooded-out farmers were essentially ignored and suffered usually stoically. Farmers whose crops were devastated were given token compensation by the authorities. Not fair, of course, but the governments of the day were not really disaster prevention or mitigation conscious. Lip service was paid, yes, after the fact and until memories faded.
I have a March 1994 UNDP and Asian Institute of Technology (AIT) report prepared by the Asian Disaster Preparedness Centre, which then identified some three dozen laws, nine ministries, 20 departments and 10 committees that were tasked to deal with disaster management in the Kingdom. This meant, obviously, that "disaster management" was then, and remains today, an oxymoron. In the intervening 18 years to the present, little has changed except that there are now more laws and more assigned agencies and more uninformed and unqualified interfering politicians involved.
I recall reading another report that focused on the management of the Chao Phraya River - at least some 40 different government units had varying degrees of jurisdiction and responsibility for what happened on and to the river. Hence no one was in charge and no one was responsible.
I'm probably being cynical, but I have a feeling that there are file rooms full of studies on disaster management risks, policies, strategies, structures and coordination that were commissioned but the recommendations embodied therein were not implemented with any sincerity or sustainability. Too bad, as I also suspect that there are many fine people assigned to concerned agencies who have long been frustrated by lack of commitment and political will to make the system work effectively and efficiently.
One of my secretaries once told me long ago that Thais are not known for being good planners but they are fabulous at coping. Experience has proven the validity of this axiom. But the trend today by the politicians is really neither, rather being addressed to maintaining an untarnished image of Thailand in the rest of the world.
The scale, scope and volume of this year's deluge far exceed the floods of the past. The damages sustained during the past floods pale in comparison to the calamity of this current event. And the floods of today are far from over. They have so far covered about a third of the country and are still flowing south towards the sea. I won't discuss the ever-evolving extent of the current floods, which are well reported by the local and international press.
David Lyman is CEO of the law firm Tilleke & Gibbons.
Thai anger at government flood response - FT.com
Last updated: October 28, 2011 6:34 pm
Thai anger at government flood response
By Ben Bland in Nonthaburi province
The once-rich fields in the provinces outside Bangkok have been turned into vast murky lakes by the worst floods in half a century.
Nonthaburi and other provinces north of Thailand’s capital have become a grim swampland, with the waters more than two metres high in some places. People live in makeshift raised shelters. Shops and factories are inundated with water and roads resemble rivers.
“We urgently need food, drinking water and medicine as many people are suffering from skin diseases,” says Hathairat Kongdun, a 38-year-old office worker from a now-submerged village called Pruksa 33, as she picks up relief supplies from the Thai Red Cross by boat. “The government hasn’t given us much help and most people cannot get out.”
Thailand is already reeling from the humanitarian and economic impact of the floods, in which almost 400 people have died. Now fears exist that worse flooding will be seen in the days to come in Bangkok, the crowded capital which has 12m inhabitants and accounts for about 40 per cent of the nation’s economic output.
Already the floods, which were preceded by heavy monsoon rains since July, have destroyed a quarter of the latest crop in the world’s biggest rice-exporting nation.
More than 1,000 factories are submerged. From the US to Japan, companies with regional manufacturing bases in Thailand’s now flooded industrial core have seen their supply chains seize up.
On Friday, the personal computer makers Acer and Samsung Electronic followed Ford, Sony and Toyota and warned of the likely impact on their business of the floods.
The Thai central bank slashed its gross domestic product growth forecast for this year to 2.6 per cent from 4.1 per cent and gave warning that output could be downgraded again.
This weekend, high tides in Bangkok’s Chao Phraya river are likely to prove a severe test of the ability of the city’s flood defences to cope with the massive run-off flowing down from the north.
Yingluck Shinawatra’s has announced an extended holiday for the duration of the high tide and tens of thousands of people have fled the city as the Chao Phraya has already risen to record levels.
Key commercial areas of Bangkok are at risk from the floods. From gleaming office towers and glitzy shopping malls to independent retailers, many in the city centre have put up sandbags or hastily constructed concrete walls to protect them from the water.
Anger and frustration at the response of Ms Yingluck, a political novice who became Thailand’s first woman prime minister in August, is on the rise, coalescing around the government’s lack of co-ordination and the failure to call for international assistance.
The situation in Nonthaburi, about 40km north of the capital, is a bleak portent of what may be to come farther south in Bangkok, where the mass of water will have to drain through before reaching the sea in the Gulf of Thailand.
Here, many have been without electricity, running water or easy access to food for weeks. Reluctant to move to cramped, far-away evacuation centres, many have remained in these desolated areas, reliant on help from their neighbours and wary of the thousands of crocodiles roaming these waters after escaping from farms.
“These people are increasingly isolated and face growing health risks such as dysentery, skin infections and vector-borne diseases like malaria and dengue fever when the waters stagnate,” says Matthew Cochrane, south-east Asia communication manager for the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies.
In Bangkok, businesses are preparing for the worst. “I’m very worried,” says Thamsathit Chamsri, managing director of the River City retail mall, in the heart of Bangkok’s riverside commercial district, as workers put the finishing touches to flood defences.
“There are 50 shops on the first floor that will be damaged if the river breaks its banks and market sentiment has already suffered badly, with tourism down sharply and about Bt200m ($6.5m) of lost sales [in the mall].”
He blames the government for not taking more preventive measures and for releasing confusing information. “The government has failed to protect anything or anyone from the floods, from Ayutthaya to Pathum Thani and down,” says Mr Thamsathit.
Aid workers have also complained about the government’s failure to call for international assistance. A US aircraft carrier was docked off the coast earlier this week. But the Thai government made no formal request for help, so it left.
International aid agencies have prepared relief supplies and financial support, but they have not received the call either. “Thailand needs international help, but the government has refused it,” says one Thai aid worker. “I don’t know why – whether it’s pride or politics.”
Deforestation, neglected canals and a sinking city
“The highways of Bangkok are not streets or roads but the river and the canals,” wrote Sir John Browning, UK envoy to Siam, in 1855, reports Clive Cookson in London.
He has been quoted frequently this month to illustrate one of the reasons the city faces catastrophic flooding.
A vast network of water channels, lined with traditional Thai houses on stilts, used to carry the monsoon floods safely through old Bangkok and into the Gulf of Thailand. But intensive urbanisation during the 20th century – and particularly during the past 30 years – has led to many of the old canals being neglected or filled in.
Outside the city centre, a huge metropolitan area has covered what used to be farmland.
Of course the immediate cause of the flooding is unusually heavy rainfall. Since June, five tropical storms have deluged Thailand and all that water has drained south into the Chao Phraya river. But the rainfall totals – about 50 per cent above the average for the monsoon season – are not high enough on their own to explain the disaster.
Other changes in land use, particularly deforestation, mean that rural Thailand cannot hold back the monsoon floods as well as it used to.
Another issue is the possible mismanagement of Thailand’s dams. Critics have said that too much water was retained in the dams early in the wet season, because managers wanted to collect enough to use for irrigation in the next dry season and they were not sensitive enough to the threat of flooding.
As a result, the reservoirs filled up and they are now discharging water at the worst possible time. To make matters worse, Bangkok itself is sinking by about 2cm a year.
Govt must talk to public, rights chief advises - The Nation
Govt must talk to public, rights chief advises
Pravit Rojanaphruk
The Nation October 29, 2011 12:43 pm
https://teakdoor.com/images/smilies1/You_Rock_Emoticon.gif
In order to prevent further destruction of floodwalls in the days ahead, the government needs to communicate clearly with disgruntled residents and offer them tangible compensation, Nirand Pitakwatchara, National Human Rights Commissioner, said.
"They need to talk as to how the compensation will be provided," Nirand told The Nation yesterday, adding that failure to do so might lead to more conflicts and clashes. The rights commissioner said many affected communities did not have access to government leaders, unlike the businessmen who met the premier on Thursday to suggest that some roads be blasted through to create waterways.
Nirand said this conflict was just a symptom of a deeper human-rights issue involving the lack of public participation in the direction rural and national development takes.
"Development begins with the violation of rights," he said, explaining that local communities have practically no say as to where dams, industrial estates and roads will be built and this has resulted in homes and factories being submerged and the capital facing inundation.
He added that villagers who have been affected in 26 provinces have little or no access to information, so they are unable to prepare for floods.
"They have no access to information, so their right to data is also being violated," he said, adding that another issue was how blue-collar workers, both Thai and non-Thai, were being cared for.
"How will the government deal with the impact of the floods?" he asked.
Not making a political point here, but that is my first hand observation up here in Ubon.Quote:
Originally Posted by SteveCM
Annual flooding is a way of life, some years (such as this) worse than others, and people handle it stoically.
We are a long way from the seat of government, and people just plain don't expect much in the way of government assistance, or interference for that matter.
Bangkok Post : Missing from the action: Thaksin, Chalerm, Banharn and Sanan
Missing from the action: Thaksin, Chalerm, Banharn and SananThe flooding has now reached as far as Don Mueang, Charoen Krung and even Sukhumvit. Many Bangkokians have either moved into hotels or temporary shelters. Those with the means have fled the capital, mostly to Hua Hin and Pattaya.
- Published: 29/10/2011 at 12:00 AM
- Newspaper section: News
Those who remain continue to work and panic, or work and not panic, depending on who you talk to. Regardless, everyone is confused.
Even Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra seems confused. There is a Youtube clip that shows her tripping over her words. Instead of saying that she had been "inspecting a giant tunnel for flushing out water", she says: "I have just been to a tunnel that flushes out giant water." That was just one of many mistakes. In fact there are Thai subtitles on the video. Perhaps she was confused?
Please don't take these comments as a slight against PM Yingluck. I appreciate the tough job she is doing. And tripping over words is not a big deal. There isn't a prime minister or president in the world that could resolve this situation and please everyone.
So she only has two options. Stay and do the best that she can, knowing that when it is over so might her career be. Or step down and let somebody else take the blame.
So far she has chosen to soldier on, left to fend for herself as those who pushed her to power are looking the other way. For that I commend her.
But while Ms Yingluck has been at the receiving end of much criticism, what has everyone else been doing? There are more than a few people that the public should know about.
Let's start with big brother Thaksin. Online there has been much speculation over a recent video clip. Taken at the Flood Relief Operations Command's Don Mueang headquarters, it shows volunteers preparing relief aid and packing it into the back of a truck. The camera filming the scene then pans across to a sign on the side of the truck which reads, "Relief aid sent with love and great concern from Thaksin Shinawatra."
Of course the army of Thaksin-haters are disgusted by this. "How can he take credit for this!"
"That food was donated by the public!"
"He is Satan, I don't like his square face!"
However, Thaksin's legal adviser Noppadon Pattama says it is not Thaksin's policy to put his name or picture on flood relief bags and trucks. Mr Noppadon said it might have been the work of some of Thaksin's supporters. He added that relief supplies from Froc should not be connected to any one politician.
While he may or may not have intentionally taken the credit for a few packets of Mama and bottled water, Thaksin will certainly be taking credit for the water pumps that he has ordered from South Korea.
On Tuesday the INN news agency quoted Kwanchai Priaphana, the chairman of Udon Thani Loving Club, as saying that Thaksin had ordered many pumps and they should be delivered to Thailand by Wednesday.
According to the Department of Drainage and Sewage under the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration, they haven't received any pumps yet, and weren't expecting any. Froc doesn't know anything either. Maybe the pumps went somewhere else?
Former prime minister Thaksin isn't the only big name that has been missing from the news headlines. Last week I commented on the usually outspoken Deputy Prime Minister Chalerm Yubamrung's absence. But it seems he has indeed been busy working.
Chalerm has been getting tough on crime, ordering newly appointed police chief Pol Gen Priewpan Damapong to dispatch police to safeguard the properties and ensure the safety of residents in flooded areas. While his plan seems to be working as there haven't been any reports of crime, there has been some criticism that there are no reports of crime because there are no police around.
Chalerm's response to this non-presence (on the flood scene) was that there were other people more suited to helping. "The army has more potential [to handle floods] than the police. The police's main duties are crimes suppression, investigation and general public services. We have to admit that the army has more equipment, manpower, and experts than the police."
And what of Banharn Silpa-archa, the man some have blamed for the severity of the flooding in Bangkok? The de-facto leader of the coalition member Chart Thai Pattana and "owner" of Suphan Buri (or Banharn Buri as it is sometimes referred to) has been mysteriously quiet ever since he took flak for not opening his flood gates in order to keep Suphan dry.
Well, Suphan is now flooded and on Oct 23 Channel 3 news reported that Banharn was asking for 1.2 billion baht from the government to help protect business areas in his province. Obviously this hasn't been approved yet, but it's good to see that Banharn is now willing to work with the government.
Finally, there's Deputy Prime Minister Sanan Kachornprasart. Last we heard he was in his hometown of Phichit. While there he gave out relief bags to flood victims and suggested that investors invest in Phichit's Northern Industrial Estate as it is located on higher ground and has facilities to prevent flooding.
Useful advice, and wonderful to see a politician out there with the people. But I am a little surprised that a man who was once chairman of the National Water Resources Committee doesn't have more useful thoughts. There must be more pressing issues for someone who is presumably a water resources expert, for example: what to do about the city's yellow water supply.
So let's get this straight. Thaksin is claiming that aid that says it is from him is not, in fact, from him. While aid which he says is from him, hasn't yet arrived. Chalerm is saying he has ordered police to help, but police can't help because they are not as well equipped as the army.
A couple of weeks ago, Banharn didn't want to help, but now he wants the government's help. And Sanan, well, the last time he was seen in public was a photo of him in Thai Rath newspaper when he attended a wedding on Oct 19.
I called the Chart Thai Pattana party headquarters to find him. They said they hadn't seen him, and could I please call back on Tuesday?
How can there be so much criticism of the government when it's clear that even the top guys _ guys who just a few months ago were saying they could rescue Thailand from the brink _ are making no excuses, working hard, working to the best of their abilities and, most of all, working together?
Arglit Boonyai is Multimedia Editor, Bangkok Post.
^ nice Editorial, from a surprising source.
Nice summaryQuote:
Originally Posted by StrontiumDog
:rofl:Quote:
Originally Posted by StrontiumDog
Maldives? Some high level flood control discussions have been happening there, allegedly. :rolleyes:Quote:
Originally Posted by Gerbil
One of points made by this piece is that the police have been strangely absent...and that is indeed very true. A lot of comments on twitter about this over the last few days.....
Where did they go?
Even the fat one who waits for tea money is missing along Phahonyothin....
I've seen hundreds of army trucks full of people and soldiers, heading towards the flooded areas. Some of my Thai friends were rescued by the army today too.
But the police...?
In Thailand, we know full well which way that is slanted.Quote:
Originally Posted by StrontiumDog
I'm not down there (no sympathy required), but I have heard accounts of cops in less than dress clothes directing traffic in less than optimal conditions, as in knee deep and more. This in the mainstream media.
It would presage a particular mindset if one takes one's cue from Bangkok Twitter sources, aka the twittering class. Twits.
In no particular order, or political preference-
Police absent
Red districts inundated to benefit Yellow
Army 'watery coup'
Flood relief 'efforts' designed to discredit elected government
Thaksinite's charity directed solely to fellow Red's
Maldive's vacations
Banharn has flooded the south
Burberry wellies
I cannot really help the fact that so many Thai descend to such petulance and idiocy, but I could reasonably hope we could expect something better here.
I can certainly attest to the fact that, in my part of the country that is also flood affected, there is no such childishness manifesting itself. In fact I have little but admiration for people's response, and responsibility. Incidentally, like Bangkok, Ubon is quite electorally diverse.
^ Agreed, there are photos of some police directing traffic in the floods...but it is also true that a lot of them appear to have found other things to do of late....I just want to know what that is....
CenturionQuote:
Originally Posted by sabang
Why do they, twitter so?
(Sorry, couldn't resist)
^ Hardeehar. :)
P.S :- it's pronounced Centuwwion
I have to say I feel sorry for the PM, this is real baptism of fire and she really does look like she's on her own.
Its looking more and more like the dem's, quite possibly with the governors help, want to damage her as much as possible. Maybe they believe if they damage PT enough they can buy enough MP's again and become the running party. it worked once, why not have a second try
The army probably don't want to do a coup now, as they will want to save that option for future unfortunate events. But I am sure that they would like to see the PM damaged.
Then you have her friends, I would have expected chalerm to be going around as her enforcer dealing with the people she says are not co-operating with her. Its something he would be good at. But I'm kind of wondering he's thinking, If I stay well away from this and she screws up badly... then brothers going to have to choose me as the replacement PM. Its not like chalerm's ever kept his desire to be PM a secret.
It would be good to her see survive this mess. She's going to be seriously damaged, but the route to recovery is simple. follow through with the promises of compensation and help. And make flood management at least the second most important issue for her administration, be the first PM in thailands history to make a serious go at reforming water management in thailand. It would also be nice to keep the idea that chalerm as PM a sick joke; rather than a reality.
You are talking to a man with a wossy.Quote:
Originally Posted by sabang
I know. :)