Transcript of the above video:

I was kind of hoping to put some of these videos like this behind us but for whatever reason, I don't know why, there seems to be a contingent of folks out there that just sort of wants to just get bogged down in a quagmire and seemingly never come out. The reason I thought of making this video was I was reading a recent article in the Bangkok Post, bangkokpost.com, the article is titled: Government warns Bangkok Governor to curb activities to prevent COVID spread. Quoting directly: "The Public Health Ministry will on Monday tell Bangkok Governor Chadchart Sittipunt to limit public activities to minimize a possible Coronavirus resurgence. Kiattiphum Wongrajit, Permanent Secretary for Public Health Affairs said on Sunday he will call for the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration (BMA) to reduce the number of events drawing large crowds." Quoting further: "The latest Government manoeuvre is likely to be viewed as politicking, given its waning popularity, its perceived inability to address the Covid-19 pandemic and the landslide election of the former Pheu Thai heavyweight to lead the nation's capital." 

Okay, I see where the media is getting at this but I don't view this as "politicking, given its waning popularity or perceived inability to address COVID". Covid has been addressed. This is done in my opinion; this is 2 years going on with this stuff. I mean at what point do we say, "hey, yeah there is a disease out there; people need to be aware of it; but we have got to get on with our lives?" We have to forever live in a kind of petrification of like our daily lives, our daily quite honestly our basic Thai liberties associated with living in Thailand? On top of that getting on with our economic activities. I don't think there's any real political sort of ulterior motive behind this. My thing is there just seems to be people that just want to perpetually be in fear of something that quite honestly at a certain point it seems like you have to just kind of say there are certain things we just can't control. Another point on this, nobody has ever brought up, where is the data that anything regarding the lockdowns or any of those measures have worked? If anything, I have seen publications out there that say quite the contrary including peer reviewed publications which we have discussed. One was I believe from John's Hopkins University that we have discussed on this channel before. Where is the data that any of this stuff had this meaningful positive impact that just seems to be presumed when you read about just some of this stuff out there? I don't like the term "mainstream media" and all of that but there seems to have been a concerted effort or maybe it is not a concerted effort but again, what is it they say in the press business? "If it bleeds, it leads." There is always kind of a sensationalism aspect to the news business that especially seems to have been heightened as technology has improved and we have seen all this social media where everybody is running around trying to get clicks, one has to wonder if that impetus behind the media to try and stay relevant for lack of a better term, didn't drive us into a level of hysteria that really was unwarranted based upon the actual circumstances when you look back at them in the cold reality of hindsight, in the cold light of hindsight, you see things for how they really have been. Quite honestly, can we honestly say that all of this was a good idea? I really wonder if we can. Now nobody in my opinion it's behind us now and let's leave it there. This notion, trying to politically blame the Government, this and that, I don't want to get into all that. I don't think there is any point to it. 

My point with this video is there seems to be a contingent out there that wants to perpetually just be fearful and sort of have this kind of ethereal nanny out there to just tell everybody what they can and can’t do. That's not doing anybody any good. It's proven to have not done anybody any good and quite honestly when a huge chunk of GDP gets knocked out, not only from the lockdowns but just from tourism in general, this should not be in my opinion the priority. Yes it is something to worry about; yes it is something to be concerned about, but what we are seeing right now in the greater, wider world and this will come home to roost to some extent in Thailand, although I think Thailand is better situated than a lot of other countries, is the economics are going to be the real problem moving forward. We need to get our economy back on its feet because I can tell you I think statistically problems with things like food supply are going to be a much bigger deal than this sort of ethereal issue of continuing to just be constantly paranoid about something that quite frankly we have already put behind us.