In an effort to keep unrest active in Thailand, when it looked like the red shirts got their wish on the constitution, they simply said no thanks but now we want this. Needless to say it is very clear their true goal is not what they claim.
The practice of moving goal posts in Thailand is by no means a new idea, and it is not only done in a protest rally setting. Many foreigners experience this as well as Thais just look to make things tougher for no reason. But when it comes to the red shirts, their reason is clearly to keep the division in Thailand as wide as possible.
Although this is getting to be old news and we are getting a bit tired of writing about it, there are some things just under the surface getting ready to debut, but even for Connecting the Dots things are a bit fuzzy. So as we do not want to make a call just yet on specifics, we can list a few possibilities based on history. Also the fact the red shirts seem to have lost a significant rally cry or point tends to make predicting difficult.
We have already concluded that the red shirts are just a diversion while Thaksin rebuilds his power base by quietly buying people and keeping them dormant until the right time. Of that there is no doubt as it does match how Thaksin has operated in the past.
The show of force by the government to keep the red shirts under control is building precedents in that the recent yellow shirt rally by the People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD) did not have the same security measures. But then again the red shirts are violent and they yellow shirts only act in defense, but they will try to make some noise about that in court.
The government seems to expect what we have predicted in that things will become decentralized in future red shirt rallies and looks to do its best to be ready for that. Thaksin would like nothing better than to embarrass Prime Minister Abhisit around the time of the ASEAN meeting. The frequency of finding Bombs in Bangkok has increased as we predicted, so this is a possibility during the rallies as well. It seems one or two a week are being discovered now, but apparently not hidden very well. There is an added concern that the bombs are in and around areas members of the Royal family may pass.
No matter how you cut it, the red shirts are not doing anything good for Thailand, and perhaps the government should charge them a fee for the added security to keep them in control. Thaksin’s political party the Pheu Thai Party (PTP) has already pointed out the money being spent on keeping the red shirts in check when someone from the government goes to places where the red shirts are likely to attack. So piloting the idea will be easy as all sides seem to agree keeping Thaksin in check is expensive and should be addressed. After all it is not unheard of to bill the people having a rally or gathering in other countries, so why not Thailand as well. The most recent example was the Michael Jackson public memorial in Los Angeles California.
