OPINION

You can't fish with cash

Re: "Prawit meets farmers in an effort to woo voters," (BP, Oct 18).

In Surat Thani, Deputy Prime Minister Gen Prawit Wongsuwon promised to maintain the price of palm oil. But he should learn from Lao Tzu, who noted: "Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach him how to fish and you feed him for a lifetime."

Cash from government price support is gone in a few days -- it's like giving a man a fish. Recipients will soon be no better off than before, for we cannot manipulate the long-term market. Also, taxpayers are out millions of baht.

Instead, Gen Prawit should empower farmers to know market trends and take advantage of them. For example, local universities should broadcast market forecasts over smartphones and conduct research to increase income by diversification. In short, teach a farmer how to fish rather than give him a fish.

Have vision, Gen Prawit. Look to the long run.

Conflicts pay no dividend

Re: "Wars are not won with peace economies," (Opinion, Oct 19).

Nobel Laureate Joseph Stiglitz is correct that the markets will always move slowly during wars. Sadly, the Vietnam war and other wars the US fought in the Middle East and Afghanistan did not yield any long-term benefits. During the Iraq war, everyone thought the US was engaged in the carnage just for Big Oil. There is no evidence to show how billions spent on warfare in Iraq stabilised the oil process.

Similarly, US, UK and EU engagement in the Ukraine war will not help stabilise energy and rising food costs. Mr Stiglitz must know that this war is not just about sovereignty. Iraq, Syria and Afghanistan's infrastructure and economy have been disseminated with unjust wars. Ukraine will have similar consequences.

Russia is doing what the USA did in Iraq and Syria. It is protecting its turf -- geopolitical and economic interests. In the process, global energy and food prices are spiralling, not just in Ukraine but also in the USA, UK, EU and elsewhere in the world. The lack of basic amenities, food items, and high energy costs have created huge problems worldwide.

The latest saga of Liz Truss and her economic policy debacle in the UK is a preview of things to come in the rest of the EU. Mr Stiglitz must have come across this quote: "There are no winners in war, but countless lives will be torn apart."

Wrong on America

Re: "US plans for Indo-Pacific 'misguided'," (Opinion, Oct 18).

I sympathised with Kavi Chongkittavorn's feelings as to America's declining place in the world and diminishing global influence, even if much that decline was arguably self-inflicted from decades of poor policy decisions. However, since it seems the author perceives that a US-led world order is supposedly essential for a "free, open, prosperous and secure world", I think it would be fair for an older American like me to criticise some of his blatant misperceptions of America.

Foremost, like many authors today, his reference to the Jan 6 riots seems (at least to me) to overstate the actual threat level the rioters ever posed to democracy in America and abroad.

I would point out to Mr Kavi that on Aug 24, 1814, British troops torched the Presidential Mansion (White House) and large chunks of 'Washington City' (DC), sending president James Madison and numerous politicians running for their lives.

Yet, as a united young country, democracy carried on with barely a scratch because it is people and their faith in the system which sustain democracy; not ornate halls of power or particular passing politicians of the day. Alas, somewhat like in the 1850s, US citizens are once again bitterly divided and, right or wrong, both sides resisted accepting the results after the presidential elections of 2016 & 2020.

Blaming it all on Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton is ridiculous, and the American people themselves are to blame for destructive political extremism. So, if I were Mr Kavi, I'd be drafting a Plan B for a US-led world order because the part he missed was that America is rotting from the inside out, sort of as it did in the 1850s, and I'd say there is a 50/50 shot that America may wind up tending to its own wounds; eventually perhaps quite unavailable to tend to the wounds of others.

That said, I ask the writer an obvious question: Rather than asking America to do everything, why not just build your own democracies and do it yourself?