OPINION

Look to renewables

Re: "Choking off the Mekong", (Editorial, Nov 11).

Your editorial is commendable. However, it does not go far enough, for two reasons.

Firstly, it is highly doubtful "that damage from these and other projects will be contained and indeed kept to a minimum", as you suggest. With dozens of dams built or planned on the upper Mekong and in Laos, environmental and livelihood concerns cannot be safeguarded. Secondly, Thailand has to do more than reduce its electricity demand, it must look more to alternative, renewable energy, and most importantly to conservation of energy. There is little or no energy conservation controls on building regulations, and one result is the development of new malls which use more energy than some provinces in the country.

Re: "Don't fear 'The Donald'", (PostBag, Nov 15).

Donald Trump could make the top 10 great US presidents. But comparing him to Ronald Reagan is ridiculous.

Khun Songdej said Ronald Reagan "was underrated and doubted" and "a former governor of California for two terms". If California were a country, its GDP would rank sixth in the world, behind only the US, China, Japan, Germany and the UK. He also said Reagan's victory "was somewhat similar to Donald Trump's, with a last-minute swing". Reagan won 489 electoral votes to Carter's 49. Must be some last-minute swing.

Comparing Mr Trump to Mr Duterte, yes. To Reagan, no!

Re: "Police say US guns deal on", (BP, Nov 15).

In an about-face by Philippines' President Duterte, the country's police chief said they will now go ahead with the purchase of 26,000 assault rifles from a US supplier. Apparently this is related to Donald Trump's recent win in the presidential election.

However, I consider that in view of the appalling human rights record of the Philippine police under Mr Duterte, it is the US that should have an about-face and refuse to sell the weapons. That would send a message to the world that the US cares. But will it it happen? Highly unlikely under a Trump regime!

Re: "Fragrant stalls Pattaya project", (Business, Nov 14).

The high-rise property project is another example of fabulous developments planned for Pattaya. But if one of the selling points is Pattaya beach, then buyers and investors should first take a hard look. While the beach road is regularly improved and cleaned, the beach itself is in distress and always littered with plastic garbage.

Nobody seems to be interested in ensuring it is cleaned and maintained on a daily basis to keep pace with so much ongoing luxury construction. Thirty or so years ago, Pattaya beach was a wonderful golden arc of tropical beauty. Now it needs serious attention from somebody to rehabilitate it.

Re: "Don't fear 'The Donald', (PostBag, Nov 15).

Donald Trump has not merely "frozen out thought on righteousness" or whatever that platitude means to the writer alone. As an obvious demagogue who is patently unfit to hold the high office that unfortunately now awaits him, Mr Trump is a disaster in the making. The very, very long list of his high misdemeanours, which are far too numerous to offer here, emphatically show that this man presents a degree of trepidation that is wholly warranted.

I, too, remember Reagan -- the Iran Contra deal, and in the 1980s the Central American death squads instructed in the dark arts at the so-called and now renamed "School of the Americas", for example. Indeed, the Pentagon itself has acknowledged that in the relatively recent past the School of the Americas utilised training manuals advocating coercive interrogation techniques and extrajudicial executions. Moreover, Professor Jenny Pearce's excellent book Under the Eagle offers some insightful and verifiable analysis -- not mere conjecture -- of these activities on Reagan's watch.

Songdej uses the word "hope" -- more than in expectation, one presumes. When one contemplates the power inherent to the position bequeathed to the US president-elect, something rather more substantial should be required.