We first saw it after the coup when the BBC went and spoke to people in rural areas on their feelings. Then Reuters looked at how the PAD protests were affecting the poor (i.e the majority of the people in the country). Recently, both the NYT and Bloomberg have reported from the Northeast on local views of the PAD and Thaksin.

BP: Isn’t this outrageous? What about reporters doing? How dare they leave their offices and actually report! They should do what their fine media colleagues at The Nation do and invent monologues about corruption and democracy to pass the time.

There are two more nefarious examples, again from hostile foreign media. AP:

It’s been two years since the ouster of Thailand’s charismatic and controversial Thaksin Shinawatra. Yet amid the rice-growing villages of the country’s heartland, the former prime minister’s legacy lives on.

A walk down the rutted roads of Kok Loi illustrates why Thaksin, despite facing a possible conviction on corruption charges Tuesday, remains a polarizing figure in Thai society and the central figure behind the country’s deepening political crisis.

Villagers point to the homes they built during Thaksin’s tenure from 2001 to 2006, the refrigerators they bought, the general store they opened — all a result of the low-interest loans his government offered.

“Thaksin was the savior of the poor,” said Kamcham Pokasang, 68, a farmer from Kok Loi in the northeastern province of Buriram, where lush green paddies of jasmine rice stretch to the horizon. “Before Thaksin we had nothing, only rice fields. Thanks to Thaksin, my family now has everything.”
…
“Thaksin is a bad man. He does everything for himself,” said Naree Sivaboon, 54, a government employee. “He never helped the people of Thailand.”

The Nation, an English-language newspaper, wrote in a commentary: “All problems in Thailand are seen by many as masterminded by Thaksin.” It noted that even a skirmish last week between Thai and Cambodian troops was “attributed to Thaksin’s maneuvering behind the scenes.”
…
“Thaksin is behind every political move of this government,” said Suriyasai Katasila, one of the protest movement’s leaders. “He wants them to unlock his assets and clear his name so he can return to power.”

The residents of Kok Loi pay little heed to the corruption accusations.

“I don’t care if Thaksin was corrupt. All politicians are corrupt,” said Gad Pokasang, a 68-year-old rice farmer in Kok Loi.

He and his wife, Kamcham, praised Thaksin for banishing drug dealers, giving them affordable health care and helping put food on the table.

“We built this house thanks to Thaksin,” said Kamcham, also 68, as she proudly showed a visitor around her modest two-story cement home. “This TV and stereo came from Thaksin. This refrigerator and washing machine, our two motorcycles. Everything.”

Many in the rural heartland recall Thaksin as the first prime minister who paid attention to them.

He created a program known as the 1-million baht ($30,000) village fund, in which villagers could apply for low-interest loans of $600 each.

Kok Loi built a general store with interest generated from the loans [BP: ie people repay the loans]

“I’m so sick of all the protests in Bangkok,” said farmer Somporn Ongklang, who took a loan to buy a plowing machine. “Those people are not poor. They don’t know how difficult life can be, and how much Thaksin helped us.”
…
“I might be poor, but I know they can’t take away my right to vote,” said Somboon Boontee, a rice and tapioca farmer who scrapes by on under $2,000 a year. “If you ask me, Thailand’s troubles started when Thaksin left.”

BP: Isn’t it odd that some government employee in Bangkok (i.e already in the middle-class) knows that Thaksin has done nothing to help the poor, but some actual poor farmers in the Northeast actually thinks differently?

Nirmal Ghosh in the Strait Times:

In Ban Na Kha, locals are free with their opinions on the political turmoil in Bangkok–and none are very complimentary to the anti-government People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD).

Ban Na Kha is 16km from Thailand’s northeastern town of Udon Thani. Headman Wiratyu Khulidi, 52, points to a road in front of his house and asks a rhetorical but pointed question.

“This road is as well paved as, or better than, any road in Bangkok,” he says.

“I have personally overseen the one million baht budget for my village. Why is it wrong for me to like the (ruling) People Power Party when the PAD has done nothing for me?‘

Also in Ban Na Kha, coconut seller Chichanok Taimuangphak, 39, belies her kindly appearance when she says: “I wish the police and the military would wipe the PAD protests out. There should be a coup to end the economic turmoil.“

The political turmoil in Bangkok has spawned an 80 per cent drop in business for the village, a centre for cotton and silk trading which normally sees a steady stream of tourists. This fuels the anger of people like Chichanok.

“It’s in our blood. Everyone hates the PAD,” she says, pointing to her wrist for dramatic effect.
…
The Bangkok-centric view, crystallised in the speeches and propaganda of the right-wing, royalist PAD, is that upcountry people are ill-educated peasants, easily bought by venal politicians and therefore with only a dim understanding of democracy.

The reality is less simple. Many locals are well informed and perceptive, not just on national issues but even regional and global issues. They watch television and read newspapers, and many have sons and daughters working in Bangkok and beyond–some even in the United States.

The conflict in Bangkok which has created what many say is the worst social division in memory, is viewed with concern in Isan, mixed with a sense of powerlessness, frustration and some anger.

Udon Thani is where a PAD rally was violently attacked by pro-government thugs in July, leaving dozens badly injured. Politically active locals say the attack was a warning to the PAD not to overstep the limits in penetrating the upcountry hinterlands that remain loyal to the ruling People Power Party (PPP), whose mentor is Thaksin.

In village after village in the northeast, locals list the schemes that have benefited them, after years of neglect from aloof central governments, including those of the Democrat Party, which has been on the opposition benches since 2001.

Among the programmes was the cheap, 30 baht-a-visit (approximately US$1) universal health-care scheme, a range of cash and micro-credit schemes that lifted locals out from the clutches of loansharks; and the 2003 crackdown on drugs.

Locals cared little about how Thaksin got things done. In 2003, one local told The Straits Times, “So what if he is corrupt? He gets the job done.”

Explained Wiratyu in Ban Na Kha: “Accepting money for votes is simply our culture whenever the election comes around. But in the end, we vote only for who we like. We don’t know who the politicians are, but we know that the PPP has solid policies which we have benefited from.”

This toleration of corruption and abuse is cited by the PAD, with the backing of powerful sectors of Bangkok’s old elite, as grounds for political reform.

But it ignores the fact that rural voters are more politically mature today, and know how to use their votes.

It is not as if there is no sympathy for the PAD. While locals in villages have little or none, those living in the city of Udon Thani seemed to be more ambivalent. One man was pro-PAD, and some others sympathised.

Offering a balanced view, Professor Prasart Phonimdaeng, 56, of the University of Khon Kaen, another nearby city, told The Straits Times: “The people don’t know how to utilise democracy, so we need a new system which is not just electing people. The villagers can accept corruption and money because they don’t realise the extent to which corruption hurts the country in the long run.

“But the PAD also has no idea what democracy is, because they keep repressing the rights of other people by disrupting public order.

“I want peace. But I want the PAD to follow the government like a shadow, to make sure that they do their work properly–not to destroy the government.

BP: We are in for interesting times at the next election.