Despite all the efforts to bring calm to Thailand’s political conflict, just the mention of Thaksin Shinawatra and anxiety levels spike. Unfortunately that means that despite all the efforts to bring a lasting political calm, this anxiety reaction means that whatever calm is being seen is not genuine, and political unrest is only being repressed.
To the casual observer, it is obvious that Thaksin looks to come back into the political game as soon as he possibly can. With just the mention of his name causing people’s blood pressure to jump, it is clear the Thai people can sense what is coming once the next election cycle starts. This does pose a dilemma for the Government, but the common sense fix is already well underway.
The only way to keep a lasting political peace is having laws that are both effective at stopping bad boy politicians, and to do so quickly. No more of the let it run in the court for 5 to 10 years while the bad boy politicians continue in office. They need to be out of office and out of power the moment the indictment is handed down. Those teeth will come in the Constitution and supporting laws. As big as the teeth were in the 2007 Constitution, the new set of teeth will need to resemble a shredder that eats cars whole.
Much of what will keep the calm once Thaksin looks to involve himself is based in common sense. Lifetime bans from politics, immediate removal from office if indicted, and an easy to get death sentence from the court. Only an idiot would dare take that risk, but as history has shown Thaksin had no problem finding idiots to do his bidding while Thaksin himself sat safely on the side lines doing his ‘Who Me?’ denying his involvement.
Because Thaksin is very practiced at staying out of harm’s way, some sort of legal trap must be devised to place risk for him where no risk exists now. Without this there is no incentive for Thaksin to stop. However even with this risk in place, all Thaksin needs to do is stay out of arms reach. It is because of this well-known behavior and outcome people have anxiety when Thaksin’s name is mentioned.
So this comes back down to psychology that will even cut through the greed driven dense fog that Thaksin’s future idiots will likely have. The need to trigger their survival instinct is key to making it work. But then again there is some debate if idiots actually have a survival instinct when watching some YouTube clips depicting idiots doing their thing. Those idiotic acts are natural, do that for profit and an entirely new level of idiot emerges. That may even prompt a new category on the Darwin Awards website called political puppet idiots as they get themselves sentenced to death for doing Thaksin’s bidding.
