The Top Five

It's always interesting to see what "strikes a chord" with others.  As of today, one of my posts in 2009 stands out way ahead of the pack with 831 page views.  It already has 31 today, so something appears to strike a chord with that one.  Maybe another look at "The Onion Peels In Argentina" is warranted. The web stats reveal that the viewers are U.S. based so the topic of interest probably wasn't Argentina, but the reminder of chaos in our country's past.

The Spicy Game of Chicken in Thailand

Things are heating up in Thailand. The New York Times reports:
BANGKOK — "Antigovernment protesters shut down parts of the Thai capital on Monday but appeared a long way from achieving their goal of forcing the government to step down. Shops and offices in the northern outskirts of the city closed for the day as convoys of red-shirted protesters converged on a military base that had become a sort of field headquarters for government leaders, including Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva. The relatively high turnout by protesters, who call themselves the red shirts, has underlined divisions in Thailand between the rural poor and the Bangkok establishment as well as the enduring popularity of the billionaire tycoon, Thaksin Shinawatra, who was ousted as prime minister in a 2006 military coup. The strategy of the red shirts appears to be to disrupt the functioning of government for as long as possible in the hope that the prime minister blinks. “It’s a game of chicken,” said Gothom Arya, director of research at Mahidol University in Bangkok. “They are saying, ‘We will bring you to the edge and see who falls first.’ ” "

As I posted a year ago, we're Talkin' Bout A Revolution.