McCain Has an Interesting Past, Obama Has an Interesting Future

I don't make predictions often or lightly because there are just too many unpredictables, especially in politics, but I'm getting a strong sense of where things are going in the US presidential election.

CNN has become a gossip station, focusing on the day-to-day scraps of information

• today's poll data,

• snippets of candidates talking about each other, ignoring what they say on the issues,

• goading partisans to make nasty comments about the other candidate, etc.

This, of course, makes the campaign into a reality show - who will end up as the next American Idol President? "Who says the campaign can't be entertaining?" is one of their campaign ad lines.

• Can Hillary get enough votes to stop Obama?
  
• with story after story on how she might get them through primaries, super delegates, and even enticing those 'pledged' to Obama

• Will dragging out the Democratic primary cost them the election in November?

• Why is McCain competitive when so many people think the US is going in the wrong direction?

Very little about their policy proposals, no serious analysis of their past records and accomplishments, nothing with any meat.

Well, here's my take on things.

I was there for the excitement of the Democratic caucus in Anchorage. It was palpable. People were excited about politics like they haven't been for decades.

And there is no mistake that the people of Thailand here are excited about the possibility of Obama as president. My sense is the Thai perception is echoed around the world. Just Obama's election would totally change the rest of the world's image of the USA.

Obama's response about his pastor was statesmanlike.

• The content was intellectually solid - putting into words a new understanding of race relations that the American public was ready to hear,
  
• The language and images spoked directly to everyone
  
• The delivery sounded honest and authentic
  

Compare this to Clinton's shrill and ineffective response to her Bosnia Airport-under-fire story.


What about McCain?
The Republican primary was packed with candidates who fell by the wayside quickly. McCain was the front runner only at the very end so was never really the target. At the end Huckabee gracefully dropped out compared to Clinton's clinging. (And she has every right, and I don't necessarily buy the media's story that this will hurt the Democrats in the end.) McCain hasn't been under any serious pressure or probing spotlights the way the Democratic candidates have been.

When that happens, his numbers will drop quickly. Reading between the lines, it sounds like

• he's testy,
  
• he talks off the cuff without thinking,
  
• his ideas don't seem to be based on any comprehensive world view. Instead they seem to be idiosyncratically based on his emotional reactions to his experiences and so they are inconsistent and unpredictable.
  
• his party's establishment has no enthusiasm for him.

Once he and Obama are the two candidates, McCain will be creamed.

In summary, McCain has an interesting past. Obama has an interesting future.

Burma Border Run 9 - Almost Home

We had a little time before the bus left and we found this organic shop. Since my organization is working on these issues, I naturally take an interest in all these shops - how are they doing, how they advertise, who their customers are. I talked with one of the people working in the shop. They are making a slight profit. They have sponsorship of the Queen of Thailand which certainly doesn't hurt. They have customers from across the board. And organic wild honey they have to process themselves because it tends to come in with things floating in it.






Some of the farmers my organizations works with grow organic strawberries and I've been saying that jam has to be an option if they don't sell them all fresh. So, here is some strawberry jam.



When we got off the bus, and got into a song thaew for the ride home. Then it suddenly filled up with foreigners. Here's a Thai traveler who talked loudly the whole way, whose lived in Ireland for several years. Next to her is a Dutch woman.



This first man was a Scot who'd just spent 28 days traveling through Burma. He said he saw no signs of trouble anywhere, though there were places that were restricted to foreigners.

Burma Border Run 8 - R&R Laluna, Chiang Rai

J has put up with a lot from me over the years, so now and then it's time to just kick back and relax in something resembling luxury. So before we left I scanned the internet and found the Laluna Resort in Chiang Rai. On Sawadee.com it has about half the price it was on its own website. So we enjoyed the last part of the trip by the pool.

Here's the view from our room.

I really like open showers, like this one on the other side of the plant.

J relaxing by the pool.

And a nice leisurely breakfast.

Burma Border Run 7 - Mae Sai Swimmers

We went back into Thailand, then went to check out the riverside guest houses for lunch. Our Lonely Planet book says about the guest house in the picture,

Unfortunately, the great river views are overshadowed by a general lack of upkeep. If you stay here, pay close attention to how to find your way in and out, and pray that your hut hangs on just one more night.

We ended up almost under the border crossing bridge at a table on the water's edge, watching these kids enjoy themselves all through our lunch. This river separates Thailand and Burma. Campbell Creek is deeper and just as wide. Who says you need money to have fun?



They dove in here on this side, then floated down the river and came quickly back to dive in again.

Burma Border Run 6e - Tachileik Back Streets

Now, here's the real reason Tachileik is a destination for Thai tourists - shopping for Chinese goods. I finally found a pair of sandals - I can feel the ground through my old ones - a case for my camera, and a longyi for a friend who asked for a pakama. Will a Burmese man's sarong do instead Lewis Since he doesn't read this blog to my knowledge, I don't have to worry. Des, don't tell him.
Ron ZZ, I really have no idea about these fishing reels, but this will give you another reason to put Northern Thailand on your travel list.


And this is one of the shops that carries animal parts - many if not most prohibited in most countries. But they no longer have tiger skins, just small pieces of tiger skin.

Burma Border Run 6d - Tachileik Back Streets

Coming out of the Thai-Yai village we passed a Chinese Buddhist temple that had a small forest of beautiful trees still on the back of the grounds.

And there's garbage piles here and there.

I have no idea what the sign says. But it's to the left.

This guy knows how to pack his bike with vegies. It was ok to take a picture of the bike, but not to take his picture. Compare these vegies on the back street with the fruit stand on the main street.

Two monks walking onto a backstreet from the main street. You can see J in the background in the new shorts she got at the Textile Fair while we were waiting for the bus back in Chiang Mai.

The back streets are a real contrast to the main street that you see as you come across from Thailand. When we were in Burma at Mae Sot our guide said that rich people own the shops in town and the land prices have been going up very fast as they expect lots of traffic when the road from Thailand opens and you can drive from Hanoi to Yangoon.

But Mae Sot was a backwater town 40 years ago. Gems and other goods got smuggled over the border, but I suspect the Burmese border village was just as much of a backwater as Maesod. I'm guessing that Tachileik has been a much more important town for centuries. While it's not on the Mekong and its river was certainly not navigable while we were there, nevertheless it is very close to Yunan province in China and it certainly looked much more prosperous than Myawaddi, the town across from Mae Sot. But I'm just conjecturing, I need to look this up. But our guide then did say that a few Burmese get rich and the rest of the people are poor. The contrast between all the Chinese goods for sale - next post will have a little of that - and the unpaved back streets and tiny shops would be consistent with that.

While I was trying to find more on Tachileik, I came across this discussion of opium in the region. The post is a year old, but the comments are clearly by people who know about Burma.

Burma Border Run 6c - Tattoo, Birds, Thai-Yai Village

Just behind the temple we wandered down this back street with seemingly tiny crude houses. Actually, these were shops and the house was below on the hill.





Here they had birds to put in tiny cages to sell to temple visitors to release. You're supposed to get merit by setting a bird free. But I could never understand how this all worked out. Since you must lose merit by putting the bird in the cage in the first place. So, by buying the bird to set free, you really encourage capturing more birds.













I noticed this tattoo on the back of one of the men and he consented to have me take a picture of it.









And then a picture of him from the front. One of the people in the small shop spoke Thai fairly well so we could communicate.



We came across this woman drying peanuts and she spoke very good Thai. A friend of hers sold us 20 Baht worth of bananas and then they invited us into the Thai-Yai village that we could walk through to the main street again. I was only vaguely aware of the word Thai-Yai. Here's what Wikipedia has to say:

The Tai-Shan people are believed to have migrated from Yunnan in China. The Shan are descendants of the oldest branch of the Tai-Shan, known as Tai Long (Great Tai) or Thai Yai (Big Thai). The Tai-Shan who migrated to the south and now inhabit modern-day Laos and Thailand are known as Tai Noi (or Tai Nyai), while those in parts of northern Thailand and Laos are commonly known as Tai Noi (Little Tai - Lao spoken) [2] The Shan have inhabited the Shan Plateau and other parts of modern-day Myanmar as far back as the 10th century AD. The Shan kingdom of Mong Mao (Muang Mao) existed as early as the 10th century AD but became a Burmese vassal state during the reign of King Anawrahta of Bagan (1044-1077). Note: the Mao people are considered a Shan subgroup.

After the Bagan kingdom fell to the Mongols in 1287, the Tai-Shan people quickly gained power throughout South East Asia,

So here, apparently, was this Thai-Yai village nestled inside of a Tachileik side street.

Burma Border Run 6b - Tachileik Temples

Our casual destination was the large pagoda we'd seen from the hotel all lit up last night. But this exquisite pagoda caught our attention first. We wandered around the temple grounds and out the back to a flight of stairs.







At the top we met a couple of young Thai monks coming down.






There was a smaller pagoda at the top and views through the trees of the town. And this young monk having fun on the bike.








Just across a small road was a short walk up to this gate and the pagoda we'd seen from the hotel. It was beautiful and quiet until we heard the roar of.....then around the corner came tuk-tuk thundering up the hill with a couple of tourists. Then another, another, another, about a dozen altogether shattering the peace and quiet. We were really glad we'd turned down the hour tour of town by tuk-tuk as we got off the bridge.














Here are the noisy tourists. Looking at the picture I can't confirm that this was the group of Swiss tourists who got to immigration just before we did and thus made our two minute wait into a 30 minute wait. But because of the wait, we got to meet the head of the Korean Cultural Center in Chiang Mai who gave us his card and invited us to visit when they have open house on Friday nights.



Here's the pagoda we saw from the hotel last night.









And this is a view of Tachileik from pagoda. I looked, but I'm not sure if our hotel is in the picture.






And another view of the houses just below the pagoda




A young monk followed us from the pagoda demanding a payment. A Burmese man scolded him and J decided he wasn't quite right in the head. Soon after we saw this butterfly.

Burma Border Run 6a - Crossing the Bridge into Tachileik

Our room was on the 5th floor. In the evening we were going to walk down the stairs to the lobby, but discovered that only the 5th floor had lights. My crank up flashlight didn't put much of a dent into the complete blackness of the fourth floor so we took the elevator down. But in the morning, we took the stairs and could see the swimming pool. You can also see the shops underneath. All around the border area are shops with everything from pearls to dried everything imaginable. This was mirrored by similar stores on the Burmese side.



J is by the window having breakfast at the hotel before we head for the border crossing to get another 30 days in Thailand stamped into our passports.







When we crossed a month ago at Maesod, it all seemed much more imposing. Here we have just gone out of Thailand and are on the bridge. This one was much shorter than at Maaesod. I guess we survived that wtih no problems and so this time it was no big deal. But we didn't get captured by an English speaking guide on the bridge this time so we had to do our own interpretations.














Here's the river that separates Thailand and Burma at this point in the Thai far North.







If you have a big screen you can see the Welcome to Myanmar on the blue sign on the right.






I'm not even going to try to say what anything means. All I can honestly do is show you the pictures and add a little more context. Any interpretation would simply be me imposing my own stories onto what I see. As we walked up this street, we heard, blaring out of a music shop, "Freedom.... Freedom Now..." It was a music video in English. I thought it a little interesting to hear this blaring into the street in this country where there have been government arrests of monks not that long ago. I went in and tried to engage the young man and woman about the music and what it meant. They apparently spoke no English or Thai and had no idea of what they were playing. Or they pretended not to speak Thai or English, not knowing who I was. While a lot of people we met spoke Thai, my gut says that they really had no idea of the message they were blaring out into the street.



Tachileik seems much more prosperous and lively than the Burmese town across from Maesod. Perhaps it's because we crossed at 9am (Burma time is a half hour later than Thai time) instead of 1pm. It was relatively cool and monks were still out with their begging bowls.


Note: I've spelled the name of the Burmese border town both Thachilek (the Thai Anglicization) and Tachileik (the Burmese version.)