OPINION

Thai-style reality

I read, "Racist teacher policy," (PostBag, Aug 11) with great interest.

 I think, elsewhere, hiring practices would be considered racist. But, let's look at Thailand and Thais particularly.

Like many others, Thais have preconceived notions for what so many things must be, and are unwilling to either understand or open their minds to other options. Examples: I could not sell red skinned Guatemala bananas on the local market because I was told, "bananas must always be yellow". There were so many good brown Thai beers in the past that did not last long.Why? Because Thais consider beer to be yellow.

The same goes for teaching English. A person from a Western country is considered the norm, although many teachers from non-Western countries can be far superior in their subject matter.

I was once told that no one would want to learn Thai from a Western or non-Thai speaker, even if that person was proficient and qualified to teach Thai. So it goes, I suppose. It may be unfortunate, but it is the "reality" in Thailand, how Thais perceive many things, not as they should be, but as they are.

Dyer in his piece on the Great War (1914-1918), pointed out that history cares little for 'what ifs'. The Great War was inevitable once Bismarck's Prussia had defeated first Austria then Napoleon III in battle and created the unified German state; something the mighty European powers in turn had carefully avoided doing over many centuries. Once united, and as always feared, those centuries of careful geopolitical power balancing was undone, and there was no end to rearmament to secure each nation's own safety.

The Great War was a new type of war, with horrific new weapons, huge artillery pieces, machine guns, submarines and massive battle cruisers. Statesmanship was absent. Like a track race, it just took just one gunshot in the Balkans to start them off: Germany/Austria-Hungary and the Turkish Ottoman Empire on one side the French/British Empires and Russia on the other.

OK, what if Great Britain had delayed entering the war for a month or so, perhaps France/Germany/Russia would have compromised for a while, but the large armies backed by even more powerful weaponry being developed would still have been there; another single incident a decade later would have been all that was needed to make new alignments.

As the writer said, visionary statesmanship was not there in 1918, and there was no reason to hope it would suddenly appear when there were outstanding unforgotten historical scores to settle.

Re: "China could yet win trade war with Trump's America," (Opinion, Aug 8).

The main reason Trump could yet win a trade war is because the reason to start the war is based on false allegations. At a recent rally outside Columbus, Ohio, President Trump once again reiterated that China has a $500 billion surplus over the US for decades. According to Trump, China has grown to prosperity at the expense of the US. Let us look at the facts of modern China's economic development.

In 1978 China's Daeng Xiao Ping opened up China's market to foreigners. In 1980 the US under President Bill Clinton granted Most-Favoured-Nation (MFN) status to China as an incentive for promoting the trade between China and America. In the next few decades, China's exports leapt forward and blossomed. In those days, the annual Chinese Trade Fair in Guangzhou was like a one-stop shopping mall that had attracted thousands of overseas buyers. By 2001, China joined the World Trade Organisation and became more integrated into the world economy.

China has become the world factory. Chinese workers, like other workers in the region, worked diligently to build up their well being, and trade surplus over the US, if that matters. In exchange, Americans could pay for good value-for-money, labour-intensive goods imported from China and keep the cost of living down. More and more foreign manufacturers moved or open their manufacturing facilities in China, as they all want a part of the lucrative Chinese market.

Trump has over-exaggerated the massive trade deficit with China. According to Bloomberg, the US trade deficit in goods and services with China in value-added terms in 2014 was $200 billion, not $500 billion. Take an iPhone for example, from the export value of say $180 for an iPhone 6, the Chinese factory received roughly $8 for assembling with the rest paid to component suppliers from Japan, Taiwan and Korea. Since the export value is attributed to China as a final exporter, the billions of iPhone export revenue are counted as China's surplus over the US which is a distorted figure.

Obviously Donald Trump knows what he is saying is not true, just as he knows that it is not possible to relocate a Nike sewing factory to the US and employ American seamstresses at the current wages. But in front of his voters and supporters he must find someone to blame. Chinese products are everywhere in the US, so vote for Trump and he will raise the tariff and move the manufacture of these products back to the US.

According to a recent AFP report, Iran's foreign minister must be given our sympathy because, "Before nobody supported Iran. But now, all the countries in the world are supporting Iran", and, "America has zigzagged constantly, so now no one trusts them."

AFP fails to mention anything regarding the civilian protests and the Royal Guard's brutal repression of its people, the corruption of the mullahs and Iran's state sponsored terrorism throughout the world. AFP fails to mention it because propagandising sympathy for the mullahs better conforms with its globalist-leftist agenda.

To answer Motoguzzibob's question about who can dictate to whom about the possession or manufacture of nuclear weapons, I'd like to direct the letter writer to the opening scene of the movie, 2001, A Space Odyssey, "the dawn of man". In essence, if you hold a bigger, more powerful weapon than your neighbour, right or wrong, you are entitled to call the shots.

The Great Wall is a wonderful cultural heritage item. Congratulations to the Chinese if they stop Airbnb's development plan (Business, Aug 10). That building doesn't belong to the wall's history.

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