Um, in Thailand its the working class who believe in democracy. Thaksin and his sister win election several times, and pools indicate they will win again. Its the upper class who oppose democracy.
It's actually mostly the middle class that are strongly anti-democratic, along with a power clique in the military and judiciary. The middle classes have the money and security to be able to afford to give a damn about corruption, and they know that the Reds know that their voters don't care about corruption so long as some of it goes their way. Thus, to quote a joke I once had in a chat, "what's the point of democracy if it doesn't always go my way?"
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That's what i mean, though. Radical elements amongst the Reds don't trust that the Yellows won't overthrow the democracy, and so essentially run pre-emptive terror campaigns on a small scale. Such happens with the Chavistas in Venezuela against the MUD-folks (how i wished that party made a better acronym in English, even if they are the center-right, makes me feel like i'm mocking them every time i type it out)
Taksin and his group need to be thrown out of politics before democracy can happen properly. Not least because methinks a man whose name sounds like "toxin" (yes, that's how it's pronounced over there) and whose reputation matches it, is not exactly the best choice of candidate. : P
"He could not know it. For it was not all a joke."
Thaksin probably not best choice of candidate, but its the people right to decide who is or is not best choice of candidate. if democracy start to be limited by various criteria, it will become fake democracy.
it very easy to add various rules once you start, first ban criminal from running; then you require candidate at least college graduate; then he must be veteran; eventually only general eligible as candidate.
@Colonial: See, that's the trick. You may be right, but you can't have "real democracy" if you throw out a popular, popularly-elected leader by undemocratic means. The Thaksinocracy has the support of the majority, so saying that you want a democracy but that you want to ban Thaksin and co. from running is somewhat hypocritical.
Of course they care about corruption. It is almost mathematically impossible for the majority of a population to experience net benefit from corruption. They would make it go away if they weren't afraid that the opposition party wasn't trying to hurt them even worse than their own corrupt leaders.
I'm done trying to sound smart. "Clear" is the new smart.@demarquis: "Benefit from" and "not care about" are different things.
What it looks like to me is that the Red is capable of providing effective government services to the rural poor, which the Yellow is not trusted to do. So long as this state of affairs continues, said rural poor are not going to object to some of the money that's being taxed for their benefit ending up in the boss' hands.
Now, this does have an element of "democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting on dinner" to it. Part of why the Yellow are complaining is that they're the ones whose income is being redistributed to the Thaksinocrats' pocketbooks.
Well, if that's the only problem they have with political corruption, I wouldnt think it's a decisive barrier against any further progress. Now, if the elections are somehow rigged, or if most of the tax money were going to plutocrats, that's a different issue. Low level corruption can be managed.
I'm done trying to sound smart. "Clear" is the new smart.Yeah, that's the main thing I'm seeing. It doesn't appear that the Red are actually rigging the votes (though they are very good at getting people to the polls), or they wouldn't have the kind of actual support that they do.
Thus, economic populism combined with some rather blatant graft, which is what pisses off the middle class, the monarchists and the Thaksinocracy's rival elite groups (who have a lot of power in a very independent military and judiciary, and Thailand doesn't exactly have a firm belief in the rule of law and constitutional methods).
That's why "the people" and "the majority" are flung around by the Yellows. They're being very Personal Dictionary about the whole thing.
Mind you, stripes, an argument can be made that good governance is simply at odds with democracy in Thailand. I haven't seen an actual platform of governance for the Yellows, though, so I personally doubt it; I think this is pure power struggle.
"Mind you, stripes, an argument can be made that good governance is simply at odds with democracy in Thailand"
I don't believe that something is right just because the majority wants it, but the opposition platform isn't for 'good governance' (whatever anyone thinks that means), it's for governance that's in their favour and no one else's. If the majority is benefiting from the economic decisions being made, and that majority supports the government making them, then I'm not particularly concerned if those decisions offend some sensibilities.
edited 26th Jan '14 9:05:10 PM by stripes-the-zebra
Things are coming to a head, it seems
. Can't say I'm surprised - the judicial branch have been ruling pretty firmly on the sides of the PDRC and other old powers.
Hopefully it won't end in a blood bath.
The Thai army has unilaterally declared martial law, though they say it is not a coup in progress.
http://www.cnn.com/2014/05/19/world/asia/thailand-martial-law/index.html?hpt=hp_t1
edited 19th May '14 9:00:26 PM by Rationalinsanity
Politics is the skilled use of blunt objects.
