PHUKET: The mass anti-government rally in Thailand appears to be losing steam. Tens of thousands have returned to their farms. They drew nowhere near the promised million protesters. But according to The Star Online, Thaksin’s red-shirted protesters, vilified as a thuggish mob after their street insurrection in Bangkok in 2008, may have regained some credibility as a non-violent political movement.
“The size of the protest, the show of emotion and discipline, has been impressive, and Thai people will have got the message quite strongly,” said Chris Baker, a Thailand-based author.
Meanwhile, a tiny contingent of less than 1,000 red shirts from Phuket remains in Bangkok, with the vast majority of Phuket people, like their compatriots throughout Thailand, bemused by the ghoulish and increasingly irrelevant antics of the red fringe skulking the capital.
The New York Times observes that Deputy PM Suthep Thuagsuban echoed the feelings of many educated Thais when he said that the blood protests had “sent a message to the world that some sections of the Thai populace are crazy about black magic, which is unscientific and uncivilized.”
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