Well, if you were to read The Nation or the Bangkok Post, that would certainly be the perspective that you will get. Not everyone is of the same opinion.

AP:

“Their image last year was very negative in people’s views. They were defeated then, but this year they have improved in terms of the nonviolent movement,” said Prinya Thewanaruemitkul of the Law Faculty at Bangkok’s Thammasat University. “We have to give them some credit for not using violent means.”

“The blood-pouring stunt might not get them points,” he said, but added: “If they are looking at a long-term fight, they’re not losing. It’s more like they’re gaining.”

BP: Prinya was a PAD supporter back in 2006, but now leads the white shirt, no violence campaign.

Reuters:

“The size of the protest, the show of emotion and discipline, has been impressive, and Thai people will have got the message quite strongly,” said Chris Baker, who has written several books about Thaksin.

“The tendency to dismiss the ‘red shirts’ will diminish from this point on. There’s an upsurge that’s really a lot bigger than people imagined, and anyone who says this protest was a failure is just kidding themselves.”

Federico Ferrara, a political science professor at the National University of Singapore, said the rally could garner some support from Bangkok’s politically powerful middle classes by softening the image of a movement widely blamed for Thailand’s worst street violence in 17 years last April.

“A mobilisation of this number of people from the provinces, against a scaremongering government that did everything in its power to stop them, is somewhat unprecedented,” he said. “They’ve been portrayed as barbarians coming to tear up the capital, but that didn’t happen. They came to Bangkok to show they’re legitimate. Mission accomplished.”

Reuters again:

“It’s tricky for them. They have to do it in a way that does not embarrass the leaders and disappoint participants too much because that could undermine their credibility among their own supporters,” said political scientist Somjai Phagaphasvivat.

BP: From asking around half a dozen people who attended the protests for their crowd estimate, 150,000 was the mean. This is is also in line with Reuters and WSJ. AP simply states more than 100,000.* Other news organizations simply have the 100,000 figure whereas The Times (UK) and The National put it at 200,000 so a figure of 150,000 seems like a fair number.

Now, 150,000 is way down on expectations, but it would be the largest anti-government protest figure (this is partly based on the views of people BP spoke to who were at this rally and also the peak PAD rally in early February 2006 and said the latest UDD protest was bigger at its peak) in a long time.

Reuters again on the red shirts new strategy:

The United Front for Democracy Against Dictatorship (UDD), which is demanding new elections, planned to drum up support in the capital and the provinces to reinforce a rally that was showing signs of fizzling out after four days.

“We will have pick-up trucks and motorcycles going out all over Bangkok to urge people who agree with us that this government is illegitimate to come out,” a UDD leader Nattawut Saikua told reporters.

Although the number of protesters has dwindled from its peak of over 150,000 on Sunday, tens of thousands remain, which is still large for a political protest in Thailand.

Straits Times:

Instead, they would launch a fresh round of city-wide protests tomorrow.

Encouraged by Bangkok residents who cheered them on during their marches, the red shirts will spread out across the capital and urge sympathisers to wear red in a show of support.

BP: This is planned to begin Saturday, no doubt to avoid adding to rush hour traffic on a workday, and to capitalize on what has been interesting aspect of the red shirt rally and that is the latent support for the red shirts in Bangkok.** This seems to be the exit strategy. Get a final round of support and then end the rally on a high note. Rallies will no doubt continue throughout the country on a weekly or monthly basis (ie this week a rally in Udon, next week a rally in Khon Kaen etc).

The red shirts face the same problem that PAD faced. You stay in Bangkok for too long people will get annoyed as their daily life is upset. If the numbers for a long-term protests are very high then the downside of this is that when you go walking around the city on the various gimmicks you will just cause greater traffic problems. Of course though if your numbers are not high enough, well you become less relevant. Media attention cannot be sustained for long. In fact, now it is on the wane. They will still attract attention for this weekend, but beyond that it becomes more difficult. 

What you hear from the red shirts though is a concerted public campaign to hassle Abhisit wherever he goes by following him and protesting. So far they have stated it is to protest (and annoy him) rather than a blockade to prevent him from moving around. If it is coordinated, this may work for a week or two at most if Abhisit actually goes somewhere like parliament, but what happens if he stays at the 11th army regiment or flies by helicopter? He may then look like he is on the run, but it will also look like the red shirts are preventing him from governing. Where will the red shirts be based then?

*The earlier link was to here. The photo caption said AP so mistook it for an AP story, but it was actually Reuters. So have found an AP story and corrected the number accordingly.

**For a further example of the latent support in Bangkok from the March 17 visit to Abhisit’s house see this Prachatai thread. Now, not everyone who is watching and taking photos is a red shirt sympathizer/supporter, but it is those with red items, clapping in support, or showing other signs of support who likely are.