Word: redness
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...scene: A dinner party in a Bangkok penthouse, silverware clinking on fine China, various foams and reductions tickling cultured palates. An out-of-town guest turns to a Thai man and asks about the red-shirted protesters calling for the government's downfall. "Who supports the red shirts?" asks the foreigner, trying to understand the years-long standoff between the red shirts and the pro-government yellow shirts. "No one," replies the Thai, dismissively, sniffing a fine Bordeaux. Then, as an afterthought, he adds, "Well, except for the poor...
...When the red shirts announced plans to stage a massive rally in Bangkok in mid-March, taking supporters in by bus, tractor, boat and pickup truck, the Bangkok-based press warned of the havoc the rural hordes might wreak. City governor Sukhumbhand Paribatra advised residents to "please stay home," lest the demos degenerate into rioting as did a red protest last year. The overall mood was one of fortress Bangkok being surrounded by alien beings. Then the unexpected happened. As tens of thousands of red-shirt vehicles wound through Bangkok streets on March 20 in a miles-long caravan, members...
...Class warfare" is how the red-shirt leaders describe their movement - and the designation is more than a rhetorical flourish. Within a generation, Thailand was transformed from an exotic R&R playground for American soldiers fighting in Vietnam into Southeast Asia's manufacturing base, the world's top rice exporter and one of the most inviting vacation destinations on the planet. Yet even though per capita annual incomes reached nearly $4,000 in 2009, many Thais are still stuck in rice paddies or fish canneries wondering how the nation's economic boom bypassed them. Thailand...
...red shirts originally coalesced as supporters of former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, who was ousted in a 2006 coup and later convicted in absentia of abuse of power. Their key demand is a new election, whereby a party linked to Thaksin could conceivably return to power. But in recent weeks, their raison d'être has expanded beyond loyalty to a fallen politician. The movement's leaders now include a motley crew of populist orators, social activists and opportunist politicians - all preaching the gospel of class struggle. "I don't even like Thaksin," says Thienchai Mangmeetanasothon, owner of a small...
...Yawning Gap Anger on the streets is directed not only at current Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva, an Oxford-educated economist, but also at an entire political and military establishment that many in the lower classes believe lives only to enrich itself at the common man's expense. For the red shirts it doesn't matter that Abhisit appears to be a rare clean politician in a country where politics and corruption seem as closely linked as mango and sticky rice. Nor is it significant to them that during his 15 months in power the Prime Minister has unveiled a raft...