Deconstructing Thanong Khanthong: Seeing Evil Conspiracies Everywhere that He Can't Prove

The Nation

The foreign media, particularly the British ones, have been planted with information from Jakrapob Penkhair and other cronies from the Red Shirt camp over the past three years. They despised the coup. They had doubts with the Thai Palace and accused the Palace of acting behind the 2006 without ever producing any evidence. They did not like the military. They had some reservations over Thaksin Shinawatra. But they believed that at least Thaksin was democratically elected and represented a popular surge in Thailand against the Establishment. So Thaksin was better than them all. That's the pathetic editorial line of the foreign media, some of whom I believe have been bought.

No evidence of plants. No evidence of anybody being bought. The military is corrupt to the core, but the The Nation is always defending the generals for some sick reason.

More than a year ago, Jakrapob had been bragging privately and publicly that one day he would be the chosen one to lead a people's revolution. He is now being charged under the lese majeste law for libelling the Monarchy in his speech to the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Thailand. Jakrapob had painted himself as the leading intellectual force of the Red Movement, presenting Thaksin and the popular support he had mustered from the rural Northeast and North as new politics for Thailand.

Thanong, proving that he is always the crap journalist, doesn't provide when, where, how, why about his charges of Jakrapob claiming to be this great revolutionary leader like Fidel or George Washington. Jakrapob didn't libel the monarchy at FCCT. Anybody can listen to him on video at youtube.

Jakrapob bragged further than one day when the people's revolution would take place, he would stand in front of the people's revolution in a class struggle to bring down the Elite. The Red Shirts played up this theme in a more subtle way by attacking Gen Prem Tinsulanonda, the president of the Privy Council and other privy councillors. They also rallied to quell the bureaucratic policy (amataya thipatai) from Thailand once and for all.

Thanong doesn't provide time, date or place. No quote. No nothing.

“Now that they have tanks on the streets, it is time for the people to come out in revolution,” he told the crowd of supporters from the United Front for Democracy Against Dictatorship (UDD). “And when it is necessary, I will come back to the country

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“The troops who have already come out can come and join the Red Shirts to help us to get democracy for the people. This is a golden minute. We will make history and there will be no more coups in Thailand.”

What does this prove? Nothing. Thanong thinks rhetoric is the same thing as a coup plot.

Thaksin's troops for a coup did not show up because they were subdued. He had thought that he could uproot the Thai system for good.

Not one shred of evidence that Thaksin was calling for a coup. No evidence that Thaksin military people were subdued. Thanong doesn't offer one shred of evidence of a conspiracy.

The international press, including IHT, Economist and Independent, Times had been writing editorials on a distinct theme that our Monarchy was about to face an end like Nepal.

How many stories comparing Thailand to Nepal? He only cites one story.

I had followed their editorial line closely. I was surprised that they jumped ahead to compare Thailand with Nepal. Conditions between Thailand and Nepal differ sharply. In Thailand, we are blessed with His Majesty the King, whose popularity is unanimously overwhelming. A popular revolt against the Monarchy is out of the question. If the Monarchy were to be removed, it could only occur by a coup from the Military and the Bangkok elite.

Then Thanong shouldn't be worried about Jakrapob and the Red Shirts.

Thailand is not characterised by a class system like Jakrapob has been trying to portray. It is more of a status conscious system. Any Thais, from whatever backgrounds or race, can rise to the cream of the society. Yet the Red Shirt movement has been trying to paint the current crisis as a struggle of a class system to rid of the social injustice that the rural Thais in the North and Northeast have been suffering at the hands of the Establishment.

Thanong is clueless. Informal Sakdina exists in Thailand. If Thanong thinks a rice farmer has the same opportunities and choices in life as a royal blue blood, he is delusional. There is no equal justice, no equal opportunity. People who have money and/or have connections to the palace, military and bureaucracy have carte blanche to do what they, go where they want, get educated where they want want while your average Somchai has no immunity or privileges whatsoever.

I can only say that the foreign media are duped!!!!!

He thinks they are duped because they don't agree with Thanong, and that is the only reason.

They are not observers or reporters of Thai politics, but they are part of the scheme in which their editorials got planted in advance. All the Reddish commentators, who disguise themselves as academics, are also part of the scheme. They are party to this distortion.

I think Thanong makes this type of accusation against the foreign press because he is describing how corrupt the Thai media operates and he thinks every media operation is the same. As far as academics go, he hasn't refuted one Red academic in print about anything they have said or written.

The foreign media have been attacking the 2006 coup, so has Giles Ungphakorn and other self-proclaimed democracy lovers. Yet knowingly or unknowingly, they had become a party to Thaksin's attempted coup on Songran Day to return to power in the people's revolution.

Yes, the foreign media attacked the 06 coup while he and his buddies were defending it from its inception. The Nation is still angry that the international media didn't goose step behind them over the 06 coup. What Thaksin coup? The Nation didn't report any coup attempt on Songkran.

This is double standard because if they did not approve violence or a coup in the first place, they must not be writing in support of another violent and coup plot afterward.

Is Thanong really this stupid? I haven't read anywhere foreign support for any type of coup, whether it be in the past or the present. Thanong can't provide one shred of evidence that the foreign press supported his imaginary Songkran coup.

When the foreign media write about the elite, they don't know who is who in the elite. When they write about the military, they do not differentiate who's who in the military. When they write about the politicians, they do not know who's who among them. They aren't aware about the political realignment that is shifting all the time in Thai politics.

Neither does Thanong. He hasn't never done one piece of investigative journalism explaining all the politicians, elite factions, and players in the police and military. All he does is write cryptically about vague conspiracies that make sense only to himself.

Thaksin had whisked his family out of Thailand well before Songkran Day. Jakrapob was the first to run away on April 13 well before the attempted coup failed. The Reds on the streets got confused. Their leaders never showed up. Thailand one was step away of being pushed off the cliff, not by a class system struggle but by sheer crude power play.

This is a meaningless paragraph and proves what exactly.