Thais won't holiday if you pay them

Hello all readers of the Monday Bulldog edition of all the news that matters.
This is not the beginning of the work week, anywhere in Thailand. That's tomorrow.

AVIATION

Air India crash mystery https://shorturl.at/kOQZT
A preliminary investigation into the June 12 Air India plane crash at Ahmedabad.
It 260 people on board and on the ground. It seems the Boeing 787's fuel control switches were cut off just seconds after takeoff.
Flight AI171 bound for London took off normally -- for less than a minute.
It (seemingly) stalled, went tail-up and crashed into a residential area.
All but one person on board and 19 on the ground died when the plane went nose-first into a medical college hostel.
The sole survivor escaped through a broken emergency exit and sustained minor injuries.

Yet another suicide by pilot?
With link to the official crash report.
And also here

We don't grow older. We grow riper. -- Pablo Picasso

The government must stop playing politics and work harder to safeguard tourists.-- Safer tourism needed now. Editorial, Bangkok Post newspaper.

Taking a journey into the unknown
This is possibly the first time Bulgaria has ever been mentioned here, let alone its currency, the "lev".
But it reinforces my feeling that the European Union and the euro is taking the fun and romance out of travel.
There's no more getting your passport stamped in funny languages by menacing mustachioed immigration officers.
Eating peculiar foreign food and tackling strange languages? Gone with the euro.
And there used to be getting plastered with mates on the local plonk, the cheaper the better.

Ammo Grrrll only supplies two exclamation points

to the title of this column, but you might want to add a third:
MILLIONS WILL DIE IN THE STREETS!! She writes:

Oh Dear, not again!

And I was just recovering from the prospect of having to just TELL our grandchildren about snow which will have disappeared from the earth as MILLIONS roast to death every day. MILLIONS!!

THAILAND CRIME
4 men arrested for posing as police in tourist shakedown
PATTAYA
Two Chinese and two Thais face charges of impersonating police, and abduction.
It happened early last Thursday in North Pattaya.
Four men grabbed and hustled tourist Lin Yifan, 52, intoi an unmarked van. During the day they forced him to hand over the 10,000 Thai baht he was carrying. But then...
They got into Lin's smartphone banking app, and took 150,000 baht from his account in China.

ABOVE: Lin (right) and skirt report the 'crime' to Pattaya police.
There were witnesses, including Lin's young Thai girlfriend. Their story is that they thought the kidnappers were real police.
More at this link

THAILAND TRADE WARS

Don't blame us, it's that Trump guy!

The unrepentant racist/Nazi who is literally Hitler set out to reshape US trade with the world.
So far, it has caused only discord and uncertainty.
Lengthy version

Go on holiday for the weekend and we'll pay 50 percent!
Government plan to boost domestic tourism flops spectacularly.

PHOTO show the usually packed, popular beach on Koh Larn, the island just off Pattaya.
Despite a promised discount of 50 percent, travel sentiment was 'lower than expected'.
Tourism and Sports Minister Sorawong Thienthong was shocked. He had predicted that millions would take part.
Thais were clearly put off by the collapse of the government's booking app.
They didn't bother even trying to book hotels.

THAILAND ECONOMY
Second major government failure of the holiday weekend: the 'Land Bridge'
China wants the proposed project but exporters, importers and property speculators do not.

The Land Bridge was the brainstorm of short-lived prime minister Srettha Thavisin.
His idea was for foreign ships to dump their cargos at Ranong, where trucks would move them to Chumphon, where they would be reloaded.
Time saver? Possibly. Huge drain on the economy? For sure.
Greater than the 350-year-old idea of the Kra Canal.
PHOTO: Citizens of the deep South of Thailand show their displeasure.

Always fun, via Powerline
The Week In Pictures: Summer Vacation Edition

THE NEW SPACE RACE
China eyes the moon, Mars and space dominance.
Interesting read. Or is a warning?

HOWEVER, In The Short Meantime

NASA’s Moon Rover Will Hunt for Ice, Map Minerals, and Reveal What Lies Beneath.

JAPAN
More Nukes Is Good Nukes
Yoroi Reactor Ushers In a New Era of Micro-Nuclear Power.
Japan has quietly taken a radical step in nuclear energy innovation with the deployment of the Yoroi Reactor.
It's a compact, self-contained nuclear power unit designed to operate autonomously in remote or disaster-prone regions.
Unlike conventional reactors, Yoroi requires no towers, no operating crew, and no on-site refueling for a decade.

NATURE VIDEO
The Venus Fly Trap plant grows only in one region of North Carolina state of America.

It eats meat -- mostly houseflies, yeah, but any unsuspecting insect or bug.
This 1-minute video by a 'Noth Ca-lina' (there are no "R's" in North Carolina) -- anyways,
a guy grows Venus Fly Traps and videos them --
In this case, the plant eats a Black Widow Spider.
True Story

Dont lose
Your head
To gain a minute
You need your head
Your brains are in it.