Deconstructing Thanong Khanthong: First the stars, now the voices inside his head

The Nation:

Thanee has made significant progress in his investigation into the assassination attempt but his investigation is about to hit an iceberg. He will have until the end of October to complete this sensational assassination case - which has further widened the political divide - before going into mandatory retirement.


What progress? Two non-commissioned officers taking the fall. Geez, how many months does Thanee need to investigate this stuff? There is no iceberg except the one playing on Thanong's DVD player while watching a replay of Titanic.


The job of the police chief, Patcharawat Wongsuwan, is at stake. Over the next two weeks the National Counter-Corruption Commission (NCCC) will determine whether Patcharawat was involved in the October 7, 2008 incident in which the authorities used excessive force against yellow-shirted PAD protesters. If the NCCC finds evidence against Patcharawat, he will automatically be suspended from office.


Look at Thanong's sick and twisted logic: The PAD thugs illegally took over government house. The PAD thugs would not allow the police to restore order. The PAD thugs refused to give up their illegal occupation of government house. The police tried to take back government house. The PAD thugs resisted. The PAD got hurt for their criminal behavior. The police get blamed. Chief Patcharawat is a criminal conspirator against the PAD thugs for doing his job. Ergo, Patcharawat shouldn't be allowed anywhere the Sondhi Lim case. ( It could be argued that General Patacharawat is obstructing the case for whatever nefarious reason, but I don't think it has to with the previous crackdown on the PAD.)


So far, Thanee is reporting the progress of the Sondhi case directly to the prime minister rather than to Patcharawat. The police chief forms a formidable trio with his elder brother General Prawit Patcharawat, the defence minister, and General Anupong Paochinda, the Army chief. You might know already that most police officers wear red shirts under their uniforms. The matter became more complicated after it emerged that Suthep has been backing Patcharawat all along. There have been rumours that Patcharawat could be sacked to allow Thanee a freer hand to investigate the case.


More of Thanong's sick and twisted logic: Suthep, Prawit, Patcharawat and Anupong are secret red-shirted Thaksin cronies out to get the PAD while Abhisit and Thanee are independent lovely people out for peace, justice and granola for the peace loving, non-violent PAD and their leader/messiah, Sondhi Lim.


Abhisit's memory will not be short, because during the Songkran festival, when red-shirted protesters attempted to stage a "people's revolution", he narrowly escaped an attempt on his life that could have paved the way for a coup. The assassination attempt against Sondhi followed a similar plot because his death would have created turmoil to justify a coup. You do not have to guess too hard to realise who would benefit most from the coup. The police, the military and the red shirts have packed together and they are ready to take on Abhisit and the Democrats any time.


Who has been arrested and prosecuted for this assasination against Abhisit's life? Thanong, in all his entire journalistic glory, has never provided one shred of evidence that there is a connection between Sondhi's assasination attempt and am attempted coup. And Thanong has never provided one shred of evidence that Thaksin-- in cahoots with the military and police-- was behind any supposed assasination attempts.

Thanong lives in the stars with his astrologer, because now he stretches the imagination and all logic to dream up coup conspiracy theories that have no basis in reality, no basis in any investigative journalistic work, and no basis in any solid criminal investigation.

Put simply, Thanong is listening to the voices inside his head and is just making things up as he goes along.