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Fear Rules Gen. Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha’s Junta in Thailand

Thai Army chief General Prayuth Chan-ocha attends the inauguration ceremony of the National Legislative Assembly at the Ananta Samakhom Throne Hall

BANGKOK – With the dust settling a week after Gen. Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha handpicked parliament unexpectedly binned the draft constitution that had been under construction for months, what seemed to have motivated the refusal was fear. The practical effect is the possibility of democratic elections has receded far into the future

With the proposed charter generating criticism from both the junta’s supporters and opponents, it was clear that a self-imposed constitutional referendum tentatively set for around the first of the year, could damage the junta if the constitution was rejected, as seemed likely. This is why all but three of 30 generals on the National Reform Council voted on Sept. 6 to reject the draft, with the media speculating that these military representatives were ordered to vote it down. Even in the unlikely event that the charter got beyond the referendum, the generals were apprehensive that the Bangkok elites and the royalists were still unpopular enough that promised elections might once again produce an unwelcome outcome.

The discarded charter was designed to serve the military junta’s concerns about political order and control. Despite some language suggestive of liberal proclivities, the main elements of the draft were conservative, unrepresentative and undemocratic.

Observers have suggested several reasons for a draft charter put together by the servants of the junta, in the interests of the junta and its supporters, and reflecting the political desires of many conservatives was ditched. Some speculated that the whole exercise was a sham from the start, and was a cover for the junta’s desire to hang on to power. There was also talk of splits in the broader royalist elite while those who focus on the monarchy concluded that the junta still has succession jitters.

Each of these suggestions carries some weight when it is considered that the next draft and the path to the elections promised by the junta are probably another two years away. On that timeline, the junta will have been in power for at least three years and four months before an election is held.

For army chief-turned-Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha and the generals of his cabinet, the fears about a vote, especially in the northeastern region that still retains loyalty to long-ousted former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, the possibility of an unwelcome outcome clearly told them that the country has not seen sufficient “reform” for elections to reject the surrogate political parties associated the exiled former premier.

“Reform” for the junta has been defined as uprooting the so-called Thaksin regime. This has involved the junta seeking to so neuter political parties that even an election victory would not permit any tinkering with the rule of the royalist elite, supported by the military.

That was the task of the charter drafters. More significantly, “reform” involved disassembling and weakening the broad red shirt movement that had backed Thaksin. It also meant a thoroughgoing purge of those considered associated with Thaksin in the military and bureaucracy, replacing them with royalists. Important institutions from the Constitutional Court to university administrations have been repopulated by loyalists. While all this was going on all anti-coup activism had to be repressed.

Despite unceasing repression and censorship, the junta apparently came to the view that opposition to the charter meant that it needs to do a lot more to guarantee its version of Thailand’s political future is in place. Since the May 22, 2014 coup, with hundreds having been detained for periods of “re-education,” dozens of political opponents have fled overseas, and the draconian lese majeste law has been used aggressively with record length of prison sentences. But this has been insufficient.

Sporadic anti-coup activism has continued and the erratic and prickly Prayuth has shown considerable frustration and anger that he is opposed. His outbursts against Thaksin and his supporters, the media and anyone who criticises his regime are evidence of his fear that the future is not secured.

In the week since the charter was dropped, the junta’s fears and motivations have become clear.

General Prayuth Chan-ocha has declared that he will escalate measures against opponents. Two senior pro-Thaksin figures and former ministers have been detained. Pheu Thai Party’s Pichai Naripatapan has been taken into indefinite military detention and Karun Hosakul is being held by the military for at least a week. Both have been critical of the junta and are said to require “attitude adjustment.” According to Prayuth, Pichai must “confess” to his political misbehavior and will not be released until he is “cooperative.” The general has declared: “You cannot oppose me.”

A new attempt to craft a conservative charter is getting underway, with Prayuth seeking to recruit an old guard of military loyalists and royalists for the task, with 77 year-old legal expert Meechai Ruchupan being invited to lead a new charter-drafting body.

Meechai and many of the other figures being mentioned as likely to assist him have long histories of serving military governments following the coups of 1991, 2006 and 2014. In recent years, most have been associated with the right-wing and anti-Thaksin movements that have sought to bring down elected governments.

Such a deeply reactionary team and the expanding repression of all opposition confirms that the ruling junta considers that there is still more work to do before the people can be allowed to cast votes. While the military and police can repress opponents, Meechai will be tasked with concocting a set of political rules that will surely result in elections being a political sideshow.

Prayuth and his supporters are clear that the military government must stay in power for as long as it takes to complete this “national reform” that seeks to so entrench authoritarianism in law, education and society that democracy will be off the agenda for years to come.

His strategy is thus not without risk. What Prayuth ignores is that this use of blunt and brutish repression and the military’s determination to stay in power has, in the past, resulted in popular revolts. Prayuth may well bring his own downfall through his determination to “reform.”

Human Rights Watch has condemned what it says is the continued use of arbitrary arrest and secret detention to intimidate and silence people who criticise the country’s military rulers.

“As the junta tightens its dictatorial powers, Thailand’s climate of fear is intensifying,” Brad Adams, its Asia director, said in a statement last week.

By Kevin Hewison, Asia Sentinel

Kevin Hewison is the Sir Walter Murdoch Professor of Politics and International Studies and Director, Asia Research Centre, Murdoch University

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Google’s Search Dominance Is Unwinding, But Still Accounting 48% Search Revenue

Google is so closely associated with its key product that its name is a verb that signifies “search.” However, Google’s dominance in that sector is dwindling.

According to eMarketer, Google will lose control of the US search industry for the first time in decades next year.

Google will remain the dominant search player, accounting for 48% of American search advertising revenue. And, remarkably, Google is still increasing its sales in the field, despite being the dominating player in search since the early days of the George W. Bush administration. However, Amazon is growing at a quicker rate.

Google’s Search Dominance Is Unwinding

Amazon will hold over a quarter of US search ad dollars next year, rising to 27% by 2026, while Google will fall even more, according to eMarketer.

The Wall Street Journal was first to report on the forecast.

Lest you think you’ll have to switch to Bing or Yahoo, this isn’t the end of Google or anything really near.

Google is the fourth-most valued public firm in the world. Its market worth is $2.1 trillion, trailing just Apple, Microsoft, and the AI chip darling Nvidia. It also maintains its dominance in other industries, such as display advertisements, where it dominates alongside Facebook’s parent firm Meta, and video ads on YouTube.

To put those “other” firms in context, each is worth more than Delta Air Lines’ total market value. So, yeah, Google is not going anywhere.

Nonetheless, Google faces numerous dangers to its operations, particularly from antitrust regulators.

On Monday, a federal judge in San Francisco ruled that Google must open up its Google Play Store to competitors, dealing a significant blow to the firm in its long-running battle with Fortnite creator Epic Games. Google announced that it would appeal the verdict.

In August, a federal judge ruled that Google has an illegal monopoly on search. That verdict could lead to the dissolution of the company’s search operation. Another antitrust lawsuit filed last month accuses Google of abusing its dominance in the online advertising business.

Meanwhile, European regulators have compelled Google to follow tough new standards, which have resulted in multiple $1 billion-plus fines.

Pixa Bay

Google’s Search Dominance Is Unwinding

On top of that, the marketplace is becoming more difficult on its own.

TikTok, the fastest-growing social network, is expanding into the search market. And Amazon has accomplished something few other digital titans have done to date: it has established a habit.

When you want to buy anything, you usually go to Amazon, not Google. Amazon then buys adverts to push companies’ products to the top of your search results, increasing sales and earning Amazon a greater portion of the revenue. According to eMarketer, it is expected to generate $27.8 billion in search revenue in the United States next year, trailing only Google’s $62.9 billion total.

And then there’s AI, the technology that (supposedly) will change everything.

Why search in stilted language for “kendall jenner why bad bunny breakup” or “police moving violation driver rights no stop sign” when you can just ask OpenAI’s ChatGPT, “What’s going on with Kendall Jenner and Bad Bunny?” in “I need help fighting a moving violation involving a stop sign that wasn’t visible.” Google is working on exactly this technology with its Gemini product, but its success is far from guaranteed, especially with Apple collaborating with OpenAI and other businesses rapidly joining the market.

A Google spokeswoman referred to a blog post from last week in which the company unveiled ads in its AI overviews (the AI-generated text that appears at the top of search results). It’s Google’s way of expressing its ability to profit on a changing marketplace while retaining its business, even as its consumers steadily transition to ask-and-answer AI and away from search.

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Google has long used a single catchphrase to defend itself against opponents who claim it is a monopoly abusing its power: competition is only a click away. Until recently, that seemed comically obtuse. Really? We are going to switch to Bing? Or Duck Duck Go? Give me a break.

But today, it feels more like reality.

Google is in no danger of disappearing. However, every highly dominating company faces some type of reckoning over time. GE, a Dow mainstay for more than a century, was broken up last year and is now a shell of its previous dominance. Sears declared bankruptcy in 2022 and is virtually out of business. US Steel, long the foundation of American manufacturing, is attempting to sell itself to a Japanese corporation.

Could we remember Google in the same way that we remember Yahoo or Ask Jeeves in decades? These next few years could be significant.

SOURCE | CNN

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The Supreme Court Turns Down Biden’s Government Appeal in a Texas Emergency Abortion Matter.

(VOR News) – A ruling that prohibits emergency abortions that contravene the Supreme Court law in the state of Texas, which has one of the most stringent abortion restrictions in the country, has been upheld by the Supreme Court of the United States. The United States Supreme Court upheld this decision.

The justices did not provide any specifics regarding the underlying reasons for their decision to uphold an order from a lower court that declared hospitals cannot be legally obligated to administer abortions if doing so would violate the law in the state of Texas.

Institutions are not required to perform abortions, as stipulated in the decree. The common populace did not investigate any opposing viewpoints. The decision was made just weeks before a presidential election that brought abortion to the forefront of the political agenda.

This decision follows the 2022 Supreme Court ruling that ended abortion nationwide.

In response to a request from the administration of Vice President Joe Biden to overturn the lower court’s decision, the justices expressed their disapproval.

The government contends that hospitals are obligated to perform abortions in compliance with federal legislation when the health or life of an expectant patient is in an exceedingly precarious condition.

This is the case in regions where the procedure is prohibited. The difficulty hospitals in Texas and other states are experiencing in determining whether or not routine care could be in violation of stringent state laws that prohibit abortion has resulted in an increase in the number of complaints concerning pregnant women who are experiencing medical distress being turned away from emergency rooms.

The administration cited the Supreme Court’s ruling in a case that bore a striking resemblance to the one that was presented to it in Idaho at the beginning of the year. The justices took a limited decision in that case to allow the continuation of emergency abortions without interruption while a lawsuit was still being heard.

In contrast, Texas has been a vocal proponent of the injunction’s continued enforcement. Texas has argued that its circumstances are distinct from those of Idaho, as the state does have an exemption for situations that pose a significant hazard to the health of an expectant patient.

According to the state, the discrepancy is the result of this exemption. The state of Idaho had a provision that safeguarded a woman’s life when the issue was first broached; however, it did not include protection for her health.

Certified medical practitioners are not obligated to wait until a woman’s life is in imminent peril before they are legally permitted to perform an abortion, as determined by the state supreme court.

The state of Texas highlighted this to the Supreme Court.

Nevertheless, medical professionals have criticized the Texas statute as being perilously ambiguous, and a medical board has declined to provide a list of all the disorders that are eligible for an exception. Furthermore, the statute has been criticized for its hazardous ambiguity.

For an extended period, termination of pregnancies has been a standard procedure in medical treatment for individuals who have been experiencing significant issues. It is implemented in this manner to prevent catastrophic outcomes, such as sepsis, organ failure, and other severe scenarios.

Nevertheless, medical professionals and hospitals in Texas and other states with strict abortion laws have noted that it is uncertain whether or not these terminations could be in violation of abortion prohibitions that include the possibility of a prison sentence. This is the case in regions where abortion prohibitions are exceedingly restrictive.

Following the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, which resulted in restrictions on the rights of women to have abortions in several Republican-ruled states, the Texas case was revisited in 2022.

As per the orders that were disclosed by the administration of Vice President Joe Biden, hospitals are still required to provide abortions in cases that are classified as dire emergency.

As stipulated in a piece of health care legislation, the majority of hospitals are obligated to provide medical assistance to patients who are experiencing medical distress. This is in accordance with the law.

The state of Texas maintained that hospitals should not be obligated to provide abortions throughout the litigation, as doing so would violate the state’s constitutional prohibition on abortions. In its January judgment, the 5th United States Circuit Court of Appeals concurred with the state and acknowledged that the administration had exceeded its authority.

SOURCE: AP

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Supreme Court Rejects Appeal From ‘Pharma Bro’ Martin Shkreli, To repay $6.4 Million

Washington — The Supreme Court rejected Martin Shkreli’s appeal on Monday, after he was branded “Pharma Bro” for raising the price of a lifesaving prescription.

Martin appealed a decision to repay $64.6 million in profits he and his former company earned after monopolizing the pharmaceutical market and dramatically raising its price. His lawyers claimed the money went to his company rather than him personally.

The justices did not explain their reasoning, as is customary, and there were no notable dissents.

Prosecutors, conversely, claimed that the firm had promised to pay $40 million in a settlement and that because Martin orchestrated the plan, he should be held accountable for returning profits.

Supreme Court Rejects Appeal From ‘Pharma Bro’ Martin Shkreli

Martin was also forced to forfeit the Wu-Tang Clan’s unreleased album “Once Upon a Time in Shaolin,” which has been dubbed the world’s rarest musical album. The multiplatinum hip-hop group auctioned off a single copy of the record in 2015, stipulating that it not be used commercially.

Shkreli was convicted of lying to investors and defrauding them of millions of dollars in two unsuccessful hedge funds he managed. Shkreli was the CEO of Turing Pharmaceuticals (later Vyera), which hiked the price of Daraprim from $13.50 to $750 per pill after acquiring exclusive rights to the decades-old medicine in 2015. It cures a rare parasite condition that affects pregnant women, cancer patients, and HIV patients.

shkreli

He defended the choice as an example of capitalism in action, claiming that insurance and other programs ensured that those in need of Daraprim would eventually receive it. However, the move prompted criticism, from the medical community to Congress.

Supreme Court Rejects Appeal From ‘Pharma Bro’ Martin Shkreli

Attorney Thomas Huff said the Supreme Court’s Monday ruling was upsetting, but the high court could still overturn a lower court judgment that allowed the $64 million penalty order even though Shkreli had not personally received the money.

“If and when the Supreme Court does so, Mr. Shkreli will have a strong argument for modifying the order accordingly,” he told reporters.

Shkreli was freed from prison in 2022 after serving most of his seven-year sentence.

SOURCE | AP