Meanwhile in Thailand, five years of crony capitalist and phoney intellectual Thaksin Shinawatra as the all-powerful boss of his ruling Thai Rak Thai Party have been more than long enough to demonstrate conclusively that money politics manifests itself in moral bankruptcy and rampant personal enrichment by a powerful ruling clique. These have been the hallmark of Thaksin's parliamentary dictatorship, along with our Dear Leader's outstanding personal attributes: world-class chutzpah, nouveau riche egomania and galloping hubris. Indeed, it seems odd that Thaksin didn't drop in for a coffee with fellow world traveller and former Italian PM Silvio Berlusconi, but perhaps the explanation lies in the difference between Silvio's "adieu" and Thaksin's "au revoir".

At any rate, our Dear Leader is home again all too soon after last month's phoney election and after Kuala Lumpur and Manila (two more "useless friends" these days, one suspects) refused to offer him coffee, tea or biscuits.

By contrast, opposition leader Abhisit Vejjajiva scored quite a public-relations coup recently with the heavy diplomatic-corps turnout at the Democrat Party's annual conference in Bangkok, where political reform was the main item on the agenda. Evidently, Abhisit was his usual articulate and determined self, despite being unable to reveal full policy details for the obvious reason that with an election expected soon, other parties could well "steal" his ideas, as used to occur frequently in Western countries.

Nevertheless, should Abhisit become prime minister, he will be expected to provide the leadership that has been so obviously absent and so desperately needed to stop the rot and put Thailand on the path to becoming a modern nation, instead of remaining a dysfunctional 21st-century de facto city-state. Moreover, for anyone to achieve this, they will certainly have to make sure they do not "match the initiatives or stature of Thai Rak Thai leader Thaksin Shinawatra", as Thai Rak Thai heavyweight Sudarat Keyuraphan put it recently.

Actually, that shouldn't be too difficult for anyone. Beyond Thaksin, however, sustainable and balanced development of Thailand will require our political leaders to deal with courage and wisdom with the lasting political legacy of Siam's 1932 revolution: Thailand has only one political party, the "big money" party, which has two factions: new money and old money.

Frank Lee

Nonthaburi

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Capital punishment keeps society free of murderers

 Ne: "Capital punishment's major drawback risk to innocents", Letters, May 7.

Danthong Breen of the Union for Civil Liberty submitted quite a dissertation against capital punishment, but it was a bit slanted. For one thing, he made it sound like all the death rows of the world are loaded with innocent men, and that just isn't true. In many cases, DNA evidence has clouded the issue, but it doesn't imply innocence.

Be that as it may, the main argument always put forward against capital punishment is the fear of sending an innocent person to his or her death. That argument intrigues me, because during the course of their rant against the death penalty, its opponents continually bring up the number of cases that have been resolved by DNA. If that is the case, and DNA is so accurate, then the chances of an innocent person actually being executed should be non-existent.

The pro-death-penalty logic they love to pick at is whether or not the death penalty is actually a deterrent to murder. Personally, I agree with them that it is not, because a murderer really doesn't stop to think about what the penalty is. The fact is we who believe in the death penalty don't give a hoot as to whether or not it is a deterrent. The only thing we care about is that the death penalty ensures there is no possibility a murderer will get back on the street to kill again and that we are not rewarding murderers by supporting them for the remainder of their lives.

It would be very nice if the liberals of the world were half as concerned about the welfare of the victims and their families as they are the about the criminals of the world.

I don't care how murderers got that way or why they have turned on society; all I know is there are a lot of people in the world who have had to overcome major deprivation and in many situations never do, but they don't become criminals. Let's get the psychiatrists out of the courtroom and get back to the real world of good people and bad people.

John Arnone

Yasothon

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Only the inhumane support the death penalty

 Re: "Costly oil not a bad thing; neither is capital punishment", Letters, May 8.

I challenge Bill Cymbalsky to show me one study that proves the death penalty is more of a deterrent to crime than life imprisonment without parole.

Studies in America have shown that states that don't have the death penalty generally have a lower murder rate than states that do. For example, Hawaii has a low murder rate, despite the fact it doesn't have the death penalty.

When I was living in the Philippines, they reinstated the death penalty for murder and rape, yet the number of rapes in the country went up the next year.

But the worst thing about the death penalty is that it is irreversible. If it turns out years later that the person executed was innocent, you can't return him or her to life. In the American state of Illinois, DNA testing showed that nearly half the people on death row were innocent. So anyone who would still support the death penalty has no more respect for innocent human life than the most hardened criminal on death row.

Eric Bahrt

Pattaya

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Actual day of His Majesty the King's anniversary is June 9

 Re: "Coronation Day ceremony", News photo, May 6. The correct date of the 60th anniversary of His Majesty the King's accession to the throne should be June 9, not May 5 as stated. King Rama VIII passed away on June 9, 1946, and His Majesty assumed the reign from that time, so June 9 will mark his 60th anniversary on the throne, making him the world's longest-reigning monarch.

Long live His Majesty the King!

Sailom Chaitalay

Bangkok

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Correct erroneous labelling on locally made DVDs

 Millions of tourists come to Thailand every year, and thousands of them purchase DVDs to take home. So why do Thai video companies want them to have an unpleasant experience? Why is it the cover of a DVD is often marked differently than the contents are?

I have a few direct questions for DVD manufacturers and distributors in Thailand:

1. Why do covers claim to have two soundtracks and two subtitle sets (English/Thai) but are nearly always missing one of these four, which are required for a mixed (foreigner/Thai) household?

2. Why do covers claim that the video can be played on all machines and in all countries when they cannot?

3. Why don't all the covers list the video formats: NTSC, PAL, etc?

Of the nine videos I checked today, all have official government stamps. Most of these videos were purchased where tourists would shop (railway station, air terminal). Each jacket says the video will play on all systems. Two videos are marked PAL-video format; the rest are unmarked. Two of the videos are foreign movies (US, China). All are marked as having English and Thai soundtracks and subtitles, but three are missing one of the four. None of these videos will play in the DVD player I brought from the US, but all play in my Thai DVD player.

Mistakes like these badly damage the reputation that Thailand is trying to create. Why sell junk? These DVDs should be clearly marked in large print, so the vendor will know the difference, and a tourist in a hurry can make a good selection.

Michael Weldon

Udon Thani

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US shows incredible hypocrisy on Iran's nuclear development

 Intent on securing control of all Middle East resources, Washington VIPs are on an all-out anti-Iran rampage. Since Iran does not actually have nuclear weapons, nor does it represent a direct or imminent threat to the US, the ardent desire to meddle in Iran's domestic affairs while condoning more aggressive nuclear weapon build-ups elsewhere smacks of incredible double standards.

Iran's inclusion or exclusion from the elite international nuclear community raises the question of the legitimacy of its sordid country-club membership. Iran is positioning itself as the champion of Muslim rights and vigorously buying like-minded favours. Misconstrued acts of vengeance will ignite more anti-American hatred and intense, angry retribution.

By George, tread carefully. Only fools would naively underestimate the potent and volatile mixture of Persian nationalism and Shia traditions of martyrdom that would undoubtedly ensue and spread like out-of-control wildfire.

Dr Charles Frederickson

Bangkok

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Stop saying Khao Lak has not yet recovered from tsunami

 It's sad that Phuket along with the Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) are continuing to send a message to tourists that Khao Lak has not recovered from the tsunami. The Khao Lak is the highlight of the whole region and the TAT should promote it as a new area with great hotels that is now open to tourists.

There should also be a desk at the region's airport in Phuket to promote Khao Lak and provide a choice of hotels and transportation to get there.

Stuart Davie

Darwin, Australia