when i posted this a few weeks ago about the karmic beat-down i’ve been getting from some students, p’bpu told me that thais believe it is better to pay off our karmic debts in this lifetime. the moscow times is now reporting that our ex-prime minister was robbed while eating at mcdonalds. thaksin (before he was laid off) was the 5th richest head of state in the world. he won a huge majority when coming to power, based much on his populist policies of helping out the rural poor. in fact, he still enjoys a huge support base in rural areas. unfortunately his populist policies mostly helped his friends … something i guess we’re used to in usa too, haliburton has done much more to help it’s own bottom line than it has the iraqui people.

Thailand’s globe-trotting deposed leader, Thaksin Shinawatra, garnered an academic honor by visiting Moscow last week, but lost thousands of dollars and his passport when he stopped at a McDonald’s in the city center.

Thaksin, who has been living in exile since a coup last year ousted him as prime minister, had entrusted his briefcase to an aide sitting at a nearby table as they had a meal Monday at the McDonald’s restaurant on the Arbat, said his lawyer, Noppadol Pattama, in Bangkok.

thaksin was ousted from power in a very thai ultra polite coup last september, and since then we’ve had a military government. draft copies of the new constitution have been circulated for comment recently, there’s a big pile sitting in the lobby of my building. i still struggle reading fashion magazines so i haven’t really made much of an attempt at the constitution. the big excitement surrounding the government lately has been the decision to ban many politicians from politics (and from voting) for 5 years, and also disbanding thaksin’s party, thai rak thai (thais love thais). the thing i keep hearing is that the party will just form under a different name, which might actually end up making things more confusing.

the democratic party (the country’s oldest party) did have members banned from politics but the party survived disbanding.

this wsj article came out the morning before the decisions were announced and makes some really good points, including this:

Bangkok’s generals justified September’s coup in part by charging former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra with corruption. So it made sense to press an existing fraud case against his political party, Thai Rak Thai, announced last June by the attorney general’s office. The attorney general alleged that Thai Rak Thai rigged parliamentary elections by hiring small parties to “run” against them, splitting the opposition vote and ensuring a victory. The Democrat Party, in contrast, was accused of paying parties not to run.

ohhh … my last post had two video clips in it, if you’re just reading this from an email subscription the clips probably didn’t show up, so click through and watch … unless you don’t want to …