Those Thai Teslas aren't cheap - and they're Made In China
The Fishwrap Hope is that you are having a great weekend as you prepare for winter.
As you proceed to read today's edition, please do not run with sharp objects.
Anti-junta protests are not going to stop
The Big Deal yesterday was reform of the constitution. It was World Constitution Day - and the 90th anniversary of the end of Thailand's absolute monarchy.
Pheu Thai Party (remnants of Thaksin, directed by Thaksin's youngest daughter Paethongtam) demanded reform of the military's current constitution.
SPORTS SOCCER WORLD CUP
Messi's World Cup dream lives on with Argentina win. Next: Argentina faces Brazil-killer Croatia in a semi-final on Tuesday.
NETHERLANDS 2-2 ARGENTINA
penalties
NETHERLANDS 1-2 ARGENTINA
Also: Go home, Portugal, you can't even beat Morocco for Pete's sake.
https://www.bbc.com/sport/football/63843785
The current World Cup champion France (won in Russia in 2018) scored first, and France never have lost a World Cup game in which they scored first.
ENGLAND 0-1 FRANCE (halftime)
But then, at the last moment, England scored and the game went to overtime...
Simple graphic of the World Cup brackets as of this morning.
https://ggle.io/5QgA
Experts: Amount of sadness by Thai soccer bookies 'too great to measure'
Paying for Good Luck
The Department of Land Transport's annual auction of "most auspicious" vehicle licence plate numbers produced the highest-ever winning bid at 45.09 million baht for plate number "9 Kor Kor 9999" - about US$130,000.
A total of 64 licence plates were up for auction on Saturday and another 237 will be offered today.
Yesterday's highlight was the fierce bidding competition to secure "9 Kor Kor 9999".
Bidders included people who attended the live auction in the department’s conference room and those who made phone or online bids.
The final bid of 45.09 million baht was from Titan Capital Group Holding, an investment firm. It shattered the previous record of 28.1 million baht for "8 Kor 8888" set in October 2020.
https://www.bangkokpost.com/thailand/general/2457484
"We were focused on securing that lucky licence plate even though the price was slightly over our budget."
Proceeds from the auction will go to the Road Safety Fund.
THAILAND CORONAVIRUS VACCINE
'Get a booster'
It's not a total, national mandate. Yet.
The Public Health Ministry is urging people to get boosters within four months of receiving their last Covid-19 vaccination as the number of infections is back on the rise.
https://www.bangkokpost.com/thailand/general/2457120/
'Prime Minister' Prayut pretends he can't hear any of the media's questions about politics.
Pheu Thai Party's de facto leader Paethongtarn and Progressive Movement spokesman Pita Limjaroenrat play along.
Prayut's next speech likely to be a yawner
The token 'prime minister' is off to Brussels this week for a meeting between ASEAN and European Union leaders.
It's the official 45th anniversary of ASEAN-EU relations. Prayut intends to sign a "Thai-EU Partnership and Cooperation Agreement aka Thai-EU PCA.
Aides said Prayut intends to focus on 'Thailand as a BCG model' in public speeches and private sidebar meetings.
BCG aka bio-circular green is the latest environmental-global warming obsession of the ruling junta.
Top Number 1 junta spokesman Anucha Burapachaisri assured the media and the public that Prayut supports unquestionably the current EU calls to "play a creative role in promoting trust, and encourage peacemaking in ASEAN."
Pattaya police say that...
These two Polish men attacked a Cambodian woman savagely, then left her for dead and successfully fled the country.
The cops have identified the men, aged 22 and 31, from fingerprints and DNA on a cutter, a hammer, adhesive tape, a wire and a glass left at the crime scene. There is surveillance video and testimony from neighbours in Nong Prue village of Bang Lamung district.
Now, the Royal Thai Police have appealed to Interpol for help.
Details of the attack on the Cambodian artist (inside) are not for the squeamish.
One problem: Well-known deputy police chief Surachate "Big Joke" Hakparn has demanded to take over the case, which is not a prediction of a quick, efficient solution.
https://www.bangkokpost.com/thailand/general/2456967/
EXCELLENT BACKGROUNDER
https://thethaiger.com/hot-news/crime/polish-men-attack-cambodian-woman-with-acid-knife-and-hammer-in-thailand
plus
The tortured woman's employer denied she had anything to do with the horror.
https://www.bangkokpost.com/thailand/general/2457477/
The release of Viktor Bout, a global weapons merchant, was hailed as a victory in Russia.
Yes, well, because it is.
Bout was arrested at the Novotel Siam Square in Bangkok on March 6, 2008.
He was in Bangkok in reply to a sting by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration and was actually arrested and held by the Royal Thai Police, based on his Interpol Red Notice.
For two years, he appealed against Thailand's decision to deport him to the United States. The Russian government and the Russian embassy in Bangkok paid for the excruciating case.
Thailand's three-level legal system, known as The Courts of Justice, was messed up over Bout's case, because of the heavy diplomatic and undercover pressures from the U.S. and Russia. In the end, the then-prime minister Abhisit Vejjajiva ruled that Bout had to go to the United States, and he was whisked out of Bangkok and onto a U.S. Department of State airplane within hours.
Thus it is entirely credible when The New York Times crows:
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/09/world/europe/viktor-bout-welcome-russia.html
In the same vein...
Kremlin 'victory'
In the West, he is known as a convicted illicit arms trafficker, "the merchant of death" who helped fuel wars around the world.
But in Russia, Viktor Bout was welcomed home as something of a hero or at least an innocent victim of American politics.
The New York Times: https://www.bangkokpost.com/world/2457394/
PHOTO: Bout in his Thai jail cell after his arrest in 2009.
A valid Whataboutism
President Biden Calls for ‘Assault Weapons’ Ban at 'Gun Violence' Vigil While Freeing International Arms Dealer Who Sold to al-Qaeda, Taliban.
https://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/president-biden-calls-for-assault-weapons-ban-at-gun-violence-vigil-while-freeing-international-arms-dealer-who-sold-to-al-qaeda-taliban/
Stick it to The Man
Pushback: Students win US$90,000 from University of Idaho for restricting their free speech.
3 million baht plus in real money
CORONAVIRUS USA CLOTS
University of Tennessee's women's basketball star Tamari Key is out for the season with blood clots in her lungs.
This has nothing, repeat nothing to do with her mandatory inoculations-plus-boosters. Nothing, I say, nothing!
Related SUNDAY READ
John Hinderaker: Do the Vaccines Work? Follow the science!
https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2022/12/do-the-vaccines-work.php
Also for Sunday ingestion:
The Twitter Files, Ikatlong Yugto: We're not finished yet.
THREAD:
SPACE SCIENCE
This sounds like the alien forcefield designed to keep us contained.:
A Ghostly Glow of Light Surrounds The Solar System, And Nobody Can Explain It.
https://www.sciencealert.com/a-ghostly-glow-of-light-surrounds-the-solar-system-and-nobody-can-explain-it
TECHNOLOGY
It was just a glitch in our computers. Heck anyone can have a computer glitch. (Especially corporate thieves.)
Hertz Car-Rental Company to Pay US$168 Million in False-Arrest Settlements: More than 364 reports of wrongful theft will now be resolved in the customers' favours.
5.8 billion-with-a-b baht in real money
The crooks who run Hertz reported the rental cars were stolen - and then filed charges against the customers who rented the automobiles - who had nothing to do with it.
There should be at least, minimum, one extra zero on that Hertz buyoff penalty.
https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a42188437/hertz-rental-cars-false-arrest-settlements/
Instagram unveils Reels, a TikTok clone. Facebook will soon do the same.
The copycats confirm the almost global belief that the Communist Party of China's cute little data-gathering software is 'the best in the world.
https://news.filehippo.com/2019/11/instagram-unveils-reels-a-tiktok-clone/
And speaking of data gathering...
Every time you vacantly type in your phone number because some website or app asks for it, you're handing over bushels of your personal information.
Credit or blame The New York Times for revealing this revolting development.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/15/technology/personaltech/i-shared-my-phone-number-i-learned-i-shouldnt-have.html
Which leads (automagically?) to calls to
BAN TIKTOK! Even TikTok's Biggest Users Support Ban -- China Spying and Blackmail Concerns Abound.
Biden's Bowe
or Will Brittney make it to the Rose Garden? Like Bowe?
Bowe Bergdahl went AWOL and then committed treason by parlaying with the Taliban, which IIRC resulted in US soldiers being killed and wounded in combat. What did Obama do? Release five big shot Taliban terrorists in exchange for Bergdahl's release, and then fêteing him in the Rose Garden.
https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2022/12/08/merchant-of-death-latest-in-wave-of-international-criminals-freed-by-biden/
The release of Bout echoes a similar situation in South America in October, when the Biden Administration carried out a prisoner swap with the authoritarian socialist regime of Venezuela. Biden released two of socialist dictator Nicolás Maduro’s convicted drug trafficking nephews in exchange for seven unjustly imprisoned American oil workers...
Convicted spy Ana Belen Montes, a key figure in the Cuban Wasp Network, is scheduled for early release from prison on Jan. 8, 2023. She began her career in the U.S. Justice Department, where she was an outspoken critic of U.S. policy in Latin America. It was at Justice that she was recruited as a spy.
Totally undetected for years.
Even today, there are an estimated 300 Cuban spies operating in the United States. “The Wasp Network was the largest foreign spy network to operate in the United States, and Montes was one of Havana’s top ten assets,” said DIA's Chris Simmons. He is not happy with her early release.
http://ace.mu.nu/archives/402258.php
How much RAM do you need in your Windows PC? Don't ask a journalist, they only use Notepad. (ZDNet)
Nut cases, and ONLY nut cases, believe that eight (8GB) of RAM is way more than enough.
I happened to reboot the Fishwrap's main desktop PC this morning. By the time it had finished booting, before I opened a single application, 8GB of RAM was already in use.
https://www.zdnet.com/article/how-much-ram-does-your-windows-11-pc-need/
Video at the link.
In France, it is 1984: France will distribute free condoms to fight rising STD rates.
https://www.upi.com/Top_News/World-News/2022/12/09/france-issuing-free-condoms-combat-rising-std-rates/8601670609299/
Yes, actually there is a 'New Space Race'
China just opened its very first space station, a 'heavenly palace' manned by taikonauts.
https://fortune.com/2022/12/09/china-space-station-competition-us-russia/
TECHNOLOGY
Tesla Thailand (Episode 2) consists of two vehicles - the Model 3 (US$50,580, 1,76 million baht in real money) and the Model Y (CDN 77.3 million loonies, 2 million baht in real money.
You can give Elon your money now for a guarantee that your Tesla will arrive at your home in Thailand before April Fool's Day.
The cars you order today are all made in Shanghai, a town in China.
https://sea.mashable.com/tech/22010/tesla-launches-two-ev-models-in-thailand-both-can-be-reserved-right-now
This straw lets you safely drink water from any outdoor source (even dirty ones) (internet advert)
It makes up to 3,000 litres of contaminated water immediately safe to drink by strictly filtering out waterborne microorganisms such as E.coli and parasites (Glardia and Cryptosporidium), microplastics, dirt, and silt.
Probably true. Amazon Singapore peddles packs of five LifeStraw, portable filters included, for S$61.1, or 1,560 baht in real money.
https://tinyurl.com/mwnpjvm7
Indonesia's future capital city of Nusantara in East Kalimantan is designed for flying cars.
Testing will start in 2024, the year that Nusantara will officially open.
All the tech stuff will be handled by Hyundai Motor Group's Advanced Air Mobility (AAM) system.
https://bityl.co/G7Z8
For the addicts of "too many" open tabs on the browser.
Google just made Chrome better for browser tab hoarders. And it saves tonnes of RAM.
Turn on 'Memory Saver' and Chrome will automatically shut off tabs you aren’t actively using so they take up less memory.
https://blog.google/products/chrome/new-chrome-features-to-save-battery-and-make-browsing-smoother/
