Transcript of the above video:

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing Cannabis. This is actually the first video I've made for this channel in the aftermath of the election. I've been kind of sitting around. There has been a lot of really, in my opinion, feckless, shallow and really just nonsensical, what can only be described as speculation masquerading as analysis, from some of the folks, and I'm getting this actually second hand; I don't sit around and watch all these videos, but people have told me about videos where people are saying X Y and Z about Cannabis in the aftermath of the election. As I've said many, many times, I don't think anything can or will change in any super substantive way with regard to whatever you want to call it - retail levels of Cannabis - until we see a Parliament, and an actual Parliament called and then a possible Bill that would be enacted through there. Now there can be all kinds of games played - I've done the analysis on this - the Doctrine of Codification, the way Cannabis came off the Narcotics List under the Emergency Decree. That said, to my mind we've got to have a Parliamentary Act to truly regulate or have anything to do with criminalizing or anything else with regard to Cannabis. It's just an interesting legal posture but one that leaves it legal, at least for the immediately foreseeable future, and frankly I don't think there's anything to look at out there particularly. I may be missing something, that's always possible, but I'm not seeing anything that causes me to think anything is going to radically shift in terms of whether or not Thailand is going to have this product available moving forward. 

Now there may be cosmetic changes maybe regulatorily; we could see a Bill that fundamentally changes, an Act actually passed through Congress, sorry true Parliament here, that actually substantively and fundamentally changes the way things have heretofore worked, at least since 2022. But that said, we're not there yet, and meanwhile, there have been things that have been said that cause me to believe that if anything, Cannabis is here not only to stay, but it is here as to my mind possibly one of the cornerstones of future economic policy here in Thailand because it could end up being one of the biggest cash crops and Big Ag, Agri-Business, industrial agricultural products that Thailand may be able to put out, and they have the exclusive ability to do this in Asia. We're the only jurisdiction in Asia that this is legalized.

That said, I thought of making this video after reading a recent article from the Bangkok Post, bangkokpost.com, the article is titled: BJT's chance to rebuild. For those who are unaware, BJT refers to Bhumjaithai which is the Party that gained the most seats in the last election, albeit they did not gain a simple majority; they did gain a pretty substantial plurality of the seats in the recent Parliament. And now, based on what we are hearing, they have already managed to form a coalition, and it looks like they are forming a coalition possibly with Klatham, although that still as of the time of this video somewhat out there in the ether. I think ultimately they will either at least be some sort of working allies in Parliament, or they will actually be in the Coalition; exactly how that plays out remains to be seen. 

Now I get into some deeper dive analysis on this and it goes in a slightly different direction on our news service channel, that is Integrity News Service - I will put a link in the description below to that video, because I think this goes deeper - well let me put it this way - I think there could be a longer term strategy in terms of policy and in terms of just business generally out here, Agri-Business especially, Big Pharma as well here in Thailand. And I think there are some initial telltale signs of where that may be going, but I'm getting into that over in the news service. I'm sticking this exclusively with the analysis on Cannabis because we have done that on this channel for some time now. We will continue to kind of keep that on here but there is a deeper deep dive analysis of this over on her news service channel, so I'll put it again a link in the description below; go over and check that out if you're interested, because I think this goes way deeper. 

Also while I am plugging things, I might as well plug Pancake Palace. My better half and I set up a restaurant here in downtown Bangkok, nearby our office, somewhat nearby our office, and as the name implies, Pancake Palace, we have breakfast anytime. Not just American breakfast, we also have English breakfast, but we pride ourselves on our American breakfast, and we also have American Diner style food. It's not just like breakfast only; we have got American Diner style food as well. In fact I would argue, our buffalo wings are the best in the country, if not maybe all of Asia and we have also got chili bowls, we've got cheeseburgers, we have got hamburgers; we have got hot dogs; we've got, yeah, we have even got Polish dogs. Now we've got tacos, we've also got milkshakes, we have got all kinds of good stuff. If you're interested, check us out. come on down. We have got root beer floats now, come on down to Pancake Palace; link is in the description below.

But let me get to this. So quoting, BJT’s chance to rebuild. "The current friction over Cabinet portfolios illustrates these risks. Now I heard those who are watching this video, go check out that article in bangkokpost.com. It gets into pretty good analysis actually of where things kind of stand. Also, kind of a nice little warning in there about the possibility of Parliamentary Dictatorship where they talk about, "hey if it starts going over 350 seats in favour of the Government, there gets to be less scrutiny from the opposition: it's a fair point to bring up. That being said, in my mind, I'm kind of more in line with the way that this at least in my kind of thinking in the way that this Coalition is shaping up, so I'm not quite so worried about that as I've been worried in the past, but that said, it is a fair point. That said, quoting further: "Bhumjaithai" - and the point I was making in the aside is I'm strictly speaking to the narrow issue of Cannabis here but that article, that op-ed, goes into broadly a different direction. Quoting further: "Bhumjaithai covets the Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives, long controlled by Klatham politicians. Under this vision, agriculture would become part of a new economic power cluster linked to the Ministry of Commerce overseen by Commerce Minister Supajee Suthumpun." 

Now what are they talking about? "A new economic power cluster." Well what has been a through line of Bhumjaithai, I mean going back now, going on a decade almost, back into what, the election of '17 or '19 or whatever it was, Cannabis. It's been a major one and they were giving out Cannabis plants and things going back a while back and talking about how it would add to the business sector, it would add to the agricultural sector. I can't imagine they're abandoning that, and this is more to the point. We've been through, since 2022, really choppy waters out here. Cannabis has kind of managed to like hang on legally, largely I would argue from the unique nature of its legalization, the way Anutin pulled it off that it left it in this odd legal posture where again, as I've gone into in many other videos, you need an act of Parliament to change it basically; to my mind that was pretty brilliant on Anutin's part. That being said, the point I'm trying to make here is why would they care, and we get into some of this in the analysis over at the news service, and it pertains to Klatham, the Head of that Party's kind of background and things, I think maybe playing into some of this. Again I get into that analysis deeper over there, but to my mind and narrowly on the issue of Cannabis, which is already legal here, I have to imagine the notion of an "economic power cluster" would need to be based around that. And I mean, I really don't think the analysis on all of this has been all that serious heretofore, myself included. I primarily looked at it from the retail side of things, primarily because it did a lot to help the economy and it changed the tourism sector a lot out here. I mean look, commercial retail real estate was going in the toilet everywhere else but Thailand; Cannabis saved that. Then we saw that there was no low season anymore a couple of years back, because again they were calling it the ”Green” Season; people who enjoy that product were liking to hang around Thailand longer than the usual cycles of high and low season. So again we've seen this thing change things. Now we've seen the Party who brought this into fruition, who brought this to the foreground, now we are seeing that Party basically in power, albeit through a coalition, I have to imagine that when they are talking about "agricultural economic power clusters" linked to the Ministry of Commerce, Cannabis has got to be in there somewhere. Now exactly how this plays out remains to be seen, so we will certainly be keeping you updated on this channel and our news channels as the situation evolves.