If she feels that way, then nobody can force her to change her opinions or tell her to think differently about Bangkok. However, if this is her private opinion, it is not something she should say during a report. Perhaps she doesn't care what effect her words will have on Thailand and Thai people watching the news, but I do not want her to look down on Thailand.

I know that Bangkok and Thailand have many problems, many issues that will be difficult to solve in a short time, but is this reason for her to make such a statement?! I think it is not suitable and I am angry.

Many people in the US and Canada watched that broadcast and heard her refer to Bangkok in that way as well. It makes me uncomfortable because the Ramsey arrest is big news - her report will be repeated and other reporters too will probably say similar things about Bangkok. I can understand why they need to report on Thailand, but what benefit is there in making such a remark?

I don't know what action to take. Should I complain to the television station about her rude remarks or just let it go as other people do? Many Thai people who live abroad and have heard reports like this feel angry. I am happy that they caught this suspect, but I still feel anger about the way that Bangkok was portrayed in these reports.

Monchaya Praprueddee

Toronto

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Arrest demonstrates need to better screen int'l teachers

I am glad to hear that Thai and American authorities have worked together to arrested the alleged murderer of six-year-old JonBenet Ramsey, who was killed in the US nearly 10 years ago.

As a teacher myself, I am alarmed to read that this man has been teaching children and was seeking work in Thailand. Increasing numbers of foreign teachers are coming to work with children in Thailand, in mainstream schools, international schools and schools teaching the English language. This should be of benefit to Thailand. It is essential that such teachers are genuinely qualified to teach and that they have no criminal convictions. Other countries, such as Australia, have now introduced registers for teachers to ensure only the right people are working with children. It is hoped that education, police and immigration authorities, within Thailand and abroad, can work closely to ensure that less reputable foreigners posing as teachers are not working here with children.

Brian Savage

Chiang Mai

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Israel has much to gain, little to lose in pulling back on land

Re: "Give Palestinians their own state to ease Mideast tensions", Letters, August 18.

Niek's message is correct, but for the wrong reasons. Israel should give up all occupied territories and go back to its original borders. Additionally, the Palestinians should be granted statehood. It is time for Israel to once again illustrate that Palestinian statehood is not and never was the issue here. The true agenda here belongs to Iran, Syria, Iraq and Hizbollah, who wish to see Israel wiped off the face of the map. This fact can only be illustrated by starting the entire process over again because obviously people have short memories.

Those who are out to destroy Israel will always find an excuse to pursue their cause. Today it is Israel's borders and tomorrow something else.

I strongly urge Israel to pull back tomorrow. They stand nothing to lose but a little bit of land, but a lot to gain because world opinion is slowly changing against them and will ultimately become aggressive protestation and sanctions. The only way they can illustrate what their position and that of the non-Muslim world amounts to is to once again remind non-Muslims that all of the problems we are now all facing are nothing more than tribal and religious warfare. As I call it, the "my people and my God are better than your people and your God" syndrome.

I strongly feel that Israel, which has been supported by world opinion for so long, owes it to the remainder of the world to do something dramatic. If they continue to hold on to the few scraps of land they are holding when it may be conceivable that giving them up could relieve world tension, then they deserve whatever happens to them.

I personally don't think that pulling back will solve the problem because unfortunately, thanks to events in the Middle East for the past fifty years, Muslims have now learned that through the use of oil power and mass migration they can truly persecute the non-Muslim world and I think they like it. I would love to be proven wrong though and only Israel can do that. And at this point in time their only means of doing that is to back off.

John Arnone

Yasothon

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Why were Thailand's best and brightest drawn to the TRT?

Caretaker Deputy Prime Minister Somkid Jatusripitak is quitting at last, it seems! Such a brilliant, practical, sensitive and decent man, how could you have taken so long? The same could be asked of Bowornsak Uwanno and Wissanu Krea-ngam. And Prommin Lertsuridej, where do you think we're headed now? Indeed, there has been a terrible history of great minds who have been slow to realise that no great ideal can be realised if the means are not worthy of the cause. Many leaders who had devastating effects on their people while they were alive had brilliant apologists who came out after the tragic facts of their misrule were revealed.

My question is such a simple one, but nobody seems able to answer it. Exactly what great ideal did Thaksin Shinawatra articulate that could have drawn in so many brilliant and sensitive minds? What rallied wonderful humanitarians like Prawase Wasi and Chamlong Srimuang, for example?

How could Chamlong have sat down next to the defendant  in 2001? What was the ideal that could cancel out for him such a glaring moral glitch? And if there really was an ideal there, where did it go?

Was it social engineering, perhaps - yet again? Was that the ticket? Please tell us, someone, so we'll never be tempted to stand by his side again!

Lung Kip

Chiang Mai

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Education a vital policy point being ignored by all parties

When the Thaksin administration came into power in 2001, one of the major tasks it promised to carry out was to bring about education reforms. Now more than five years and six ministers of education later, everything seems to be at a standstill or even regressing very alarmingly backward as confusion reigns in regard to whether education reforms will be implemented after all.

This is the biggest failure of all committed by the present administration in not appreciating the importance of education as the main pillar of Thailand's prosperity and well-being. The nice figures on GDP growth as claimed by the caretaker prime minister are certainly not enough. "All who have meditated on the art of governing human beings," said Aristotle more than two thousand years ago, "have been convinced that the fate of empires depends on the education of the youth". This astute observation of his remains even more relevant today as decadence, greed and the excess of materialism unleashed by what collectively is known as "Thaksinomics" or "Thaksinocracy" have come to dominate all aspects of the soul in Thai society.

More bad news is yet to come, however. Recently the Office of Educational Standardisation and Quality Assurance disclosed to Abhisit Vejjajiva, leader of the Democrat Party, that nearly two-thirds of all the schools across the country fail to meet the minimum standards required for quality education, and more than 10,000 of them are badly in need of immediate upgrading right now.

It is obvious, to say the least, that the Thai educational system has gone totally bankrupt in the last five years, and it will require more than a mere reform to get the system where it should be. In the run-up to the October 15 general election, if there ever is an election, none of the competing political parties, including the Democrat Party, has taken up education as an important issue in their campaigning strategies. Maybe education won't bring them votes.

And so we are back into the vicious cycle of money politics and promises of a good material life to come as part of the efforts to lure voters to the voting booth, the outcome of which is predictable: the party with the most goodies will win. It will not matter which party gets elected because they are all the same as judged by their approach - or the lack of it - towards education. It is sad as to think despite the fact that reform is preached by everybody, nobody really knows what it means and all of us continue to live in the society of yesterday, not one of tomorrow.

Prachyadavi Tavedikul

Bangkok

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Canal project requires having the right people on the ground

Re: "Thai sea power and the Kra Isthmus canal project", Opinion, August 14.

This article offered a very good perspective on the Kra Isthmus canal project. From my own experience as a shipmaster travelling through the Suez Canal since 1965, the Panama Canal and the German Kiel Canal, I would say it is the on-the-ground, day-to-day operators who will be the ones to make this project a success from the outset. 

Those developing this project must ensure that two-way transit at the same time is possible, in order to minimise delays. Experienced canal pilots must be in place to navigate the 120 kilometres, to ensure the shortest waiting times. 

The maritime generation of the next 10 to 20 years working on the ground will be the ones who make this project a success. Ensuring that the right people are in place in this regard must be at the forefront of plans for this project.

Captain Aye Tut

Bangkok