“Stupid foreigners”

In an earlier post, PPT noted that the hardening attitude of anti-democrats to “outsiders” will probably lead to verbal attacks on these “stupid foreigners.” No sooner posted than one of Thailand’s leading anti-democrats confirms this.

“Veteran journalist”  Somkiat Onwimon, a deeply yellow anti-democrat, reacted badly to US Secretary of State John Kerry statement that the United States would cut aid to Thailand. Of course, Congress requires, by law, that military assistance be cut.

Somkiat seems unaware of this and says it “meant nothing.” He compared the U.S.’s $10 million cut  to “$800 million of the national budget that Thaksin regime has allegedly misused.” We doubt the rabid royalist said “allegedly,” for this is another anti-democrat concoction.

Somkiat then did something else that demonstrates the anti-democrat’s capacity for self-delusion. He claimed: “if the US is happy to support Thaksin corrupted regime, then so be it.” He means that any support for electoral democracy is equal to supporting Thaksin!

His next claim is bizarre, showing a remarkable lack of knowledge and education:

Someday the US will wake up and realise the difference between the authoritarian Thaksin regime in the guise of their own brand of democracy, and the full democracy as described by Alexis de Tocqueville 180 years ago….

One of the central observations Tocqueville made way back then, as an aristocrat looking at an agrarian society, was that the nature of American democracy was shaped by it general state of equality.

If the anti-democrats were really “fiercely fighting for full democracy,” then their focus would be on reducing inequality, double standards and elite economic and political dominance. Sadly, it is these features of society that Somkiat and his ilk fight to protect!

Just for good measure, Somkiat also attacked the BBC and CNN, “telling them that the situation in Thailand was beyond their grasp.” He added that: “Time and more education will improve your understanding of Thailand…”.

Arguing that every single person who disagrees with his politics, or makes statements he disagrees with, is ignorant is more a statement of Somkiat’s anti-democratic politics and his intolerance than a reflection of the reporting of others. Such statements flag a fascistic incapacity for a tolerant politics.