MORE ON THE THAILAND CRISIS

I was pretty hard on The Bangkok Post a couple of days ago but they deserved it for their partisan reporting and editorials.

Here are the front page headers for “news” stories on Feb. 26:

“April 2 snap poll seen as a government tactic to whitewash misconduct allegations against Thaksin.”

“Corruption questions still unanswered, says Prawase.”

“High school students join campaign to oust ‘Satan’ from office.”

(That student power thing that made the front page was about an organization of 20 students.)

Those are all the front page stories.

In addition these are quotes printed in a prominent blue box on the front page:

“The charter was once the people’s charter. Now it has been hijacked.”

“The election will take place quickly, which leaves political parties no time to prepare.”

“If this had happened in the old days (the offender) and his family would have had their heads cut off.”

On Monday, the 27th, they published 3 letters to the editor on the subject. Here are the headings:

“PM has taken coward’s course.”

“Thaksin has lost people of conscience.”

“Opposition must stand united.”

But the editors are reading my criticisms and listening to other critics. On the 28th they have pulled back a little (although the top right front page headline reads: “Sanoh labels PM ‘a thief and a cheat.’”)

They have printed a couple of reasonable opinion pieces on their op-ed pages and even 2 letters to the editor that didn’t skewer the PM (one was favorable).

The opposition has announced they will boycott the election. This is probably because Prime Minister Thaksin is probably an easy winner and the opposition doesn’t want to appear as losers, so they won’t play.

While this is going on the Thai currency has strengthened even more and the exchange rate is killing me.