HEADLINES [click on headline to view story]:

TOT 8 MB service is not available

Ban factory farming

Re: the debate continues

Better to err on the side of caution

Benefits of living in U.K. or Thailand

TOT 8 MB service is not available

Editor;
I was very pleased to hear that on August 8 TOT offered 8 MB and 12 MB Internet service in Pattaya. But hold on, this is not the case. While it is available in some limited areas, it is not available city wide.
I live only 600 meters south of the TOT office. The faster service is not even available here. So I am wondering, just where is it available. And why was it made such a big deal of when only a handful of numbers can get it? I was told that my current 3 MB is the maximum I can have. When I asked about the future availability, the staff laughed and said, “Maybe in 2 years.” Clearly this is not good customer service, nor is it an honest representation of the new service availability.
Why must businesses continue to not tell the truth, omit full details, and otherwise be so dishonest in the quest for face? This country has slow service by international standards. Sure, it is faster than Cambodia’s, but even a snail is faster. When will they ever get up to date with the rest of the internet world, and start to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth? My guess is never.
Sign me...
Disappointed (again)

Ban factory farming

Dear Editor:
I completely agree with recent comments made by Dr Corness that the World Health Organization is hyping up H1N1 for its own political and financial reasons. Quite frankly all these headlines in the Bangkok Post about how science is racing against time to find a cure for this “dreaded” disease bore the hell out of me. With millions of people dying of heart disease, cancer and AIDS why should I have a nervous breakdown worrying about a wimp like H1N1? As Dr Corness pointed out H1N1 is less deadly than the seasonal flu.
Still, this doesn’t mean that if we don’t do something about factory farming in particular or the overcrowding of farm animals in general that we might not eventually have a pandemic which does kill millions of people. On factory farms diseases spread like wild fire among the animals and those diseases can sometimes be transmitted to humans. Salmonella is an example of a “human” disease which originally came from farm animals and it’s much more serious than most people realize.
Instead of wasting my time with all this nonsense about H1N1 why doesn’t the media and the medical establishment demand an end to factory farming before we end up with a pandemic which really does turn out to be as bad as our worst nightmares?
Eric Bahrt

Re: the debate continues

Editor;
Bob posts an eloquent reply to the global warming debate. Note to Bob, if you are going to cut and paste large portions of a website/post, then it is polite to mention your source.
Bob would have you believe that there is no such thing as global warming and cites studies that indicate that the “alarmists” are totally wrong, or are attempting to change their data to fit studies.
Problem is Bob, regardless of what studies you cite, there is one inescapable fact that is supported by current data, the world is indeed getting warmer. Refer to the experts at www. physicalgeography.net and you will see the following:
“In the 1930s and 1950s, the central United States experienced two periods of extreme drought. In the seventeen year period from 1990 to 2006, ten of the warmest years in the last 100 years and possibly since the Little Climatic Optimum have occurred. Proxy and instrumental data indicate that 2005 was the warmest year globally in 1200 years of Earth history. Many scientists believe the warmer temperatures of the 20th and 21st centuries are being caused by the human enhancement of the Earth’s greenhouse effect.”
So where does this leave us? Basically in a quandary. Bob will quote lots of studies that say the ice is getting thicker and everything’s alright, and I will counter with lots of studies that say “so what!” The central ice fields are getting thicker, but the peripheral fields are melting.
Basic physics should tell you that without the major snowfall to replenish the peripheral ice fields, then we have a problem. Is man’s use of energy to blame and will it get worse? I don’t know, but I do know that all major long term studies have found that the world’s temp is increasing and man made pollution cannot be ruled out. So Bob, what I can say is maybe we are all OK, but what about future generations?
Are you so willing to turn a blind eye and say everything is OK, or would you rather see a managed response to the use of energy that might give your and our future generations a habitable planet?
We can ignore man’s destruction of rainforests and huge increase in CO2 emissions, or we can do something about it now, when we still have a chance.
Freddie Clark

Better to err on the side of caution

Dear Editor,
Bob, given that the implications could be slightly serious if you are in error (one recent article was titled ‘Global warming to wipe out most species’), do you have any good reasons (or indeed any reasons) that it would be imprudent to err on the side of caution with fossil fuel use and CO2 emissions?
Are you concerned that ‘civilization’ might get off the ‘consume all the planet’s resources as quickly as possible - it’s good for the economy’ bus?
The liability considerations are mind boggling.
Stuart

Benefits of living in U.K. or Thailand

Editor;
In reply to Michael, I lived in Thailand for approximately one year before my private pension was paid and I heard whinging about everything (family allowance, N.H.S., etc.). I was saying that before I left the U.K. I had contacted the tax office and was told I would not pay tax on my pension if I lived in Thailand. In the year I was there that changed, so I made the decision on the benefits of living in either country as to where I was going to live and I named some of the benefits.
Now the person had stated he had paid in all his life and it was something he felt he was entitled to and I was trying to point out that whilst you are working you are paying for the previous generation plus for the N.H.S. I agree that many people were led to believe that medical treatment and a decent pension was what they were working for and when it comes to the N.H.S. many people agree with them but many don’t.
So I suggested that they argue that the “From Birth to the Grave” promise be kept. At the moment in the U.K. there are many Eastern Europeans who are getting N.H.S. treatment straight away and social security. People are upset about this and I would like Michael to explain to them why someone who has gone to live the high life (in their eyes) should get all the increases and N.H.S. treatments?
Oh! It was Gordon Brown who raided the pension funds and in doing so stole the future of many people close to retirement. I agree with some of your argument but I was trying to put the other side as well and as Labor are talking about raising the retirement age to seventy (how many will still be alive to emigrate?) I think being anti-Labor will be a good thing. But who I vote for is my secret (could be UKIP, Liberal, Tory, BNP who knows).
Wayne

Letters published in the Mailbag of Pattaya Mail
are also published here.