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Today's Stories October 6, 2006 Tiffany Ten
Eyck / Mark Brenner October 5, 2006 John Walsh Carol Norris Paul Craig Roberts Ricardo Alarcón James Abourezk Nicola Nasser Kirkpatrick Sale Uri Avnery Website of the Day
Elizabeth Terzakis Paul Wolf Sean Penn Dave Lindorff Diane Farsetta Sharon Smith Felice Pace Sara Roy Website of
the Day
Jennifer Van
Bergen Greg Moses Stan Cox Niranjan Ramakrishnan Evelyn Pringle Fred Wilhelms Michael Abelman Gary Leupp Website of the Day
October 2, 2006 Eric Hazan Mike Whitney Norman Solomon Assaf Kfoury Missy Beattie Arthur Neslen Paula J. Caplan Website of the Day
Sept. 30 /
0ct. 1, 2006 Paul Craig
Roberts Marjorie Cohn Ben Tripp Ron Jacobs Ralph Nader Mike Whitney Christopher Reed Seth Sandronsky Fred Gardner Mokhiber /
Weissman Michael Dickinson Alan Gregory Poets' Basement
September 29, 2006 Bruce Jackson Michael J.
Smith Emira Woods William S.
Lind David Swanson Jonathan Cook Website of the Day
Sen. Russ Feingold Ron Jacobs Mokhiber /
Weissman Lee Sustar Robert Jensen John Chuckman Evelyn Pringle Nicola Nasser Uri Avnery Website of the Day
Patrick Cockburn Camilo Mejia Ben Terrall Ridgeway /
Ng Joe Allen Andrew Wimmer Franklin C. Spinney Website of
the Day
Hani Shukrallah William Blum Niranjan Ramakrishnan Barbara Becnel Paul Rockwell Dave Lindorff Rich Gibson Anthony Papa Nate Mezmer Uri Avnery Website of the Day
Patrick Cockburn Jonathan Cook Joshua Frank Paul Craig
Roberts Robert Jensen Dave Lindorff Norman Solomon Dr. Charles
Jonkel Michael Dickinson Alexander Cockburn Website of
the Day
September 23
/ 24, 2006 Jonathan Cook Jeffrey St.
Clair Dr. Anon Tom Barry Carl G. Estabrook Laura Carlsen Todd Chretien Dr. Charles
Jonkel Debbie Nathan Fred Gardner Fred Wilhelms Seth Sandronsky Ralph Nader Rev. William
Alberts Jon Van Camp Heather Gray David Vest Jeffrey St.
Clair Poets' Basement Website of
the Weekend Video of the Weekend
September 22, 2006 Patrick Cockburn Michael Donnelly Ramzy Baroud Evo Morales Stanley Howard Sarah Leah
Whitson JoAnn Wypijewski Website of the Day
Mahmoud Ahmadi-Nejad Justin E. H.
Smith Mike Roselle Amira Hass Deborah Rich Mickey Z. Saul Landau Website of
the Day
Sharon Smith Christopher
Reed John Ross Joshua Frank Arthur Neslen Norman Solomon Michael Carmichael Evelyn Pringle Hugo Chavez Website of the Day
Patrick Cockburn Jeff Leys Brian M. Downing Col. Dan Smith Liaquat Ali
Khan Ron Jacobs Nik Barry-Shaw
/ Yves Engler Lucinda Marshall Saul Landau Photo of the Day Website of
the Day
Carl Boggs Uri Avnery Mike Stark / Jim Bullington Joshua Frank John Murphy Ramzy Baroud Dave Lindorff Bill Quigley Website of the Day
Tariq Ali Eliza Ernshire Jeffrey St.
Clair Mairead Corrigan Maguire Brian Cloughley Ben Tripp Laura Carlsen Ralph Nader Ron Jacobs John Chuckman Robert Fisk Gary Leupp Lawrence R.
Velvel Missy Comley Beattie Adrienne Johnstone Mickey Z. Jeffrey St.
Clair Poets' Basement Website of
the Weekend
Diana Johnstone Diane Christian William S. Lind Lee Sustar Dave Lindorff Ramzy Baroud Mokhiber / Weissman Jeffrey St.
Clair Website of the Day
Franklin Lamb Tim Wilkinson Dick J. Reavis Sam Husseini Doug Giebel Bill Berkowitz Diane Farsetta Mary Turck Patrick Cockburn J.L. Chestnut,
Jr. Website of
the Day
Jack Bratich John Ross Christopher
Brauchli Dave Lindorff Antony Loewenstein Al Krebs Leonard Peltier Jim Bensman Website of the Day
Norman Finkelstein Seth Sandronsky John Walsh Alan Maass David Krieger Nate Mezmer Kathleen Christison
Uri Avnery Patrick Cockburn Col Dan Smith Dr. Susan Block Anthony Alessandrini Dave Lindorff Niranjan Ramakrishnan Joshua Frank Jean Bricmont Sprague / Emesberger Website of
the Day
September 9/10,
2006 Alexander Cockburn Jeffrey St.
Clair Greg Grandin Peter
Stone Brown Ralph
Nader Brian
Cloughley Col.
Chet Richards David
Model Dave
Himmelstein Ron
Jacobs Fred
Gardner Mike
Whitney Josh
Gryniewicz Daniel
Gross / Joe
Bageant Nicole
Colson Alexander
Billet Poets'
Basement
September 8, 2006 Uri
Avnery Paul
Craig Roberts Bill
Quigley Robert
Jensen Norman
Solomon Keith
Bolin
September 8, 2006 Uri
Avnery Paul
Craig Roberts Bill
Quigley Robert
Jensen Norman
Solomon Keith
Bolin Kristin
S. Schafer Jeffrey
St. Clair Patrick
Cockburn Website
of the Day
Marjorie
Cohn Sharon
Smith René
Drucker Colín Michael
Donnelly John
Borowski Lucinda
Marshall Charles
Sullivan Jeffrey
St. Clair Jonathan
Cook Website
of the Day
September 6, 2006 Stephen
Soldz Dave
Zirin Ramzy
Baroud Noel
Ignatiev Dave
Lindorff Norman
Solomon Binoy
Kampmark Jeffrey
St. Clair John
Ross Website
of the Day
September 5, 2006 Jonathan Cook Patrick Cockburn Mike Whitney
Roland Sheppard James Petras Alexander Cockburn
September 4, 2006 Clancy Sigal Jeffrey St.
Clair Anthony Alessandrini Dennis Perrin
Daniel Cassidy
Paul Craig
Roberts
September 2 / 3, 2006 Uri Avnery Jeffrey St.
Clair Ralph Nader Noam Chomsky Allan Lichtman Stanley Heller Rana el-Khatib Peter Montague Laura Carlsen Dr. Susan Block Joe Bageant Scott Stedjan / Matt Schaaf Gary Leupp Stephen Fleischman Paul Balles Ingmar Lee Jane Stillwater Ron Jacobs St. Clair /
Bossert Poets' Basement Website of
the Weekend
September 1, 2006 Uri Avnery Paul Craig
Roberts Bill Ayers Kevin Zeese Xochitl Bervera Norman Solomon Alexander Cockburn Richard Neville Website of the Day
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October 6, 2006 The Crisis in ThailandA Siamese TragedyBy WALDEN BELLO The military coup in Thailand is the second high-profile collapse of a democracy in the developing world in the last seven years. The first was the coup in Pakistan in October 1999 that brought General Pervez Musharraf to power. There are some disturbing parallels between the two events. Both coups have been popular with the middle class, and in both countries the military promised to soon vacate power. Six years after ousting Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, Musharaff and the army are still in power in Pakistan. This precedent does not bode well for Thailand. The coup is the latest in a series of setbacks for Thailand since a "people power" movement toppled the authoritarian leaders in 1992. Even before Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra was ousted on September 19, Thai democracy was in severe crisis because of a succession of elected but do-nothing or exceedingly corrupt regimes of which the Thaksin government was the worst. The International Monetary Fund (IMF), which for all intents and purposes ran the country with no accountability from 1997 to 2001, further eroded the legitimacy of Thai democracy by imposing a program that brought great hardship to the majority. Thaksin stoked this disaffection with the IMF and the political system to create a majority coalition that allowed him to violate constitutional constraints and infringe on democratic freedoms, while using the state as a mechanism of private capital accumulation in an unparalleled fashion. A politically diverse opposition
with a middle-class base sought to oust Thaksin by relying not
on electoral democracy but on the democracy of the street. In
the last few months, the prime minister not only lost moral legitimacy
but a great deal of political power. The democracy movement was
about to launch the final phase to drive Thaksin out when the
military intervened. Though it is now popular among Bangkokians,
the coup will eventually prove to be a cure worse than the disease.
Democracy on the Ropes Although Thaksin Shinawatra undermined the Thailand's democratic regime democracy in the country was in bad shape before he came to power in January 2001. The first Chuan Leekpai government from 1992 to 1995 did not make even the slightest effort at social reform. The government of former provincial businessman Banharn Silipa-Archa, from 1995 to 1996, has been described as "a semi-kleptocratic administration where coalition partners were paid to stay sweet, just like he used to buy public works contracts." The successor government of Chavalit Yongchaiyudh, a former general, was based on an alliance among big business elites, provincial bosses, and local godfathers. Relatively free elections were held, but they served mainly to determine which coalition of elites would have its turn at using government as a mechanism for private capital accumulation. Not surprisingly, the massive corruption, especially under Banharn and Chavalit, repelled the Bangkok middle class, and the urban and rural poor did not see the advent of democracy marking a change in their lives. Democracy suffered a further blow in 1997-2001 following the Asian financial crisis. This time the local elites were not the culprit. The IMF pressured the Chavalit government, then the second Chuan government to adopt a very severe reform program that consisted of radically cutting expenditures, decreeing many corporations bankrupt, liberalizing foreign investment laws, and privatizing state enterprises. The IMF's $72 billion rescue fund was spent not on saving the local economy but on enabling the government to pay off the country's foreign creditors. When the Chavalit government hesitated to adopt these measures, the IMF pressed for a change in government. The second Chuan government complied fully with the Fund, and for the next three years Thailand had a government accountable not to the people but to a foreign institution. Not surprisingly, the government lost much of its credibility as the country plunged into recession and one million Thais fell below the poverty line. Meanwhile the U.S. Trade Representative told the U.S. Congress that the Thai government's "commitments to restructure public enterprises and accelerate privatization of certain key sectors-including energy, transportation, utilities, and communications-[are expected] to create new business opportunities for U.S. firms." The IMF, in short, contributed
greatly to sapping the legitimacy of Thailand's fledgling democracy.
This was not the only instance where the Fund contributed to
eroding the credibility of a government, especially among the
poor. If there is today a pattern reversing the so-called "Third
Wave" of democratization that took off as a trend in the
developing world since the mid-seventies, the IMF-supported by
the U.S. government-is part of the reason. Such IMF-inspired
democratic reversals could be found in Venezuela in 1989, where
a hike in transportation costs provoked an urban uprising against
a weak democracy; in the Philippines, where the Fund squandered
the legitimacy of the post-Marcos democracy by forcing it to
make debt repayment instead of development its economic priority;
and in Pakistan, where IMF and World Bank programs did much to
undermine the legitimacy of the civilian governments of Benazir
Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif. Monopoly Capitalism cum Populism After running and winning on an anti-IMF platform, Thaksin inherited a severely compromised democracy when he took office in 2001. In his first year, he inaugurated three heavy spending programs that directly contradicted the IMF: a moratorium on farmers' existing debt along with facilitating new credit for them, medical treatment for all at only 30 baht or less than a dollar per illness, and a one million baht fund for every district to invest as it saw fit. These policies did not bring on the inflationary crisis that the IMF and conservative local economists expected. Instead they buoyed the economy and cemented Thaksin's massive support among the rural and urban poor. This was the "good" side of Thaksin. However, having secured majority support with these and other practices that analysts Alec and Chanida Bamford call "neofeudal patronage," he began to subvert the freedom of the press and to use government power to add to his wealth. He eased restrictions on his businesses and those of his cronies, and used his position to buy allies and buy off opponents. His war on drugs, which resulted in the loss of over 2,500 lives, bothered human rights activists but was popular with the majority. His hard-line, purely punitive policy toward the Muslim insurgency in three southern provinces simply worsened the situation there. Just as Thaksin appeared to have created the formula for a long stay in power supported by an electoral majority, he overreached. In January 2006, his family sold their controlling stake in telecoms conglomerate Shin Corporation for $1.87 billion to a Singapore government front called Temasek Holdings. Before the sale, Thaksin had made sure the Revenue Department would interpret or modify the rules to exempt him from paying taxes. This brought the Bangkok middle class to the streets to demand his ouster in a movement that bore a striking resemblance to the "People Power Uprising" that overthrew Joseph Estrada in the Philippines in January 2001. To resolve the polarization, Thaksin dissolved Parliament and called for elections, knowing that he would win elections handily, as his coalition had in 2001 and in 2005. Indeed, Thaksin's coalition won 57% of the vote in the April elections. But the opposition boycotted, producing an opposition-less parliament. After a not-too-veiled suggestion by the revered King Bhumibol, the Supreme Court found the elections in violation of the Constitution and ordered them held once more. Thaksin resigned as prime minister and said he would be a caretaker until after new elections were held.
Polarization But Not Gridlock The Thai conflict, in broad terms, pitted the urban and rural lower classes-the majority-against the middle classes, mainly the Bangkok middle class. The system of liberal democracy split into its component parts of liberalism and democracy. Invoking the legacy of liberalism, the people in the streets sought to remove Thaksin for his violations of human and civil rights and his arbitrary rule, while Thaksin's supporters sought to keep him in power by appealing to the basic principle of a democracy--that is, the rule of the majority. The anti-Thaksin forces, however, claimed that Thaksin's majority rule fit the phenomenon that John Stuart Mill described as the "tyranny of the majority." Prior to the coup, Thailand was not in gridlock. And it was far from descending into civil war. Thaksin's resignation as prime minister indicated, more importantly, that the moral tide had turned against him. He had lost control, criticism of him was widespread in a media that was once tame, and the pressure was on for him to resign before the next elections, originally scheduled for October 15 but rescheduled for November. On Thursday, the day after the coup, the People's Alliance for Democracy had planned to stage a mass rally to begin a final push against Thaksin from the streets. This was democracy in action, with all its rough and tumble and the rambunctious efforts to resolve conflicting principles. Of course, the outcome was not guaranteed, but indeterminacy and prolonged resolution of disputes are part and parcel of the risks that come with democracy. Thais were wrestling to resolve the question of political succession through democratic, civilian methods. And it seemed like the democracy of the streets would successfully determine political succession, creating an important precedent in democratic practice. Direct democracy not only had relevance for the political succession; it was reinvigorating and renewing the democratic practice and democratic spirit.
Cure Worse than Disease The military coup cut short a vibrant democratic process and was, everybody agrees, unconstitutional, illegal, and undemocratic. Many say, however, that yes, it is all this, but it is popular and it is valid because it ended a crisis. This is questionable. For several reasons, this coup may have temporarily ended the crisis but at the pain of provoking a much deeper one.
Coup leader Army Chief General Sondhi Boonyaratkalin may well be sanguine about stepping aside. But personal predilections are no match for institutional interests. More than any other military in Southeast Asia, the Thai military has had a propensity for intervening in the political process, having launched some 18 military coups since 1932. Thai military men have an ingrained, institutional contempt for civilian politicians, regarding them as blundering fools. The generals have often promised to return to civilian rule after a coup, but proceeded to rule directly or indirectly through military-appointed civilians. Gen. Sondhi's post-coup reassurances must be taken with the same seriousness as his claim days before the takeover that military coups "were a thing of the past." Already, the generals have drafted an interim constitution that makes them "advisers" to an interim civilian government. And they have appointed one of their own, Surayud Chulanont, a retired general and former Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces, as interim premier. The April 28, 2003 issue of Time describes him as a military reformer but notes that troops of his elite unit played a role in repressing protestors during the bloody May 1992 uprising in Bangkok. He is definitely an Army insider and conservative in his political views. This retreat from democracy bodes ill not only for Thailand. The coup is an expression of a larger trend-a deep crisis of legitimacy among elite democracies that came into being in the 1980s and 1990s as part of what Samuel Huntington called the "Third Wave of Democratization." The Thai coup is the second high-profile collapse of an elite democracy in the last seven years. It may not be the last. Is there now a reverse wave leading democracies back to authoritarian or semi-authoritarian regimes? Walden Bello is executive director of Focus on
the Global South and professor of sociology at the University
of the Philippines. He is the author of A
Siamese Tragedy: Development and Disintegration in Modern Thailand
(London: Zed, 1998). He is a columnist for FPIF.
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from CounterPunch Books! The Case Against Israel By Michael Neumann  Grand Theft Pentagon: Tales of Greed and Profiteering in the War on Terror by Jeffrey St. Clair          Sick of sit-on-the-Fence speakers, tongue-tied and timid? CounterPunch Editors Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St Clair are available to speak forcefully on ALL the burning issues, as are other CounterPunchers seasoned in stump oratory. Call CounterPunch Speakers Bureau, 1-800-840-3683. Or email beckyg@counterpunch.org.                      |
