Thai protesters poured several jugs of their own blood on the front gate of the government headquarters yesterday in a symbolic sacrifice to press their demands for new elections.

Thousands of red-shirted demonstrators formed long lines to have their blood drawn by nurses, a day after their leaders vowed to collect 1 million cubic centimeters of blood - 264 gallons (1,000 liters) - to spill at Government House.

The recent 'people power' protests by the 'reds' in Thailand may have been deliberately manipulated in such a way as to weaken the highly popular former Thai prime minister Thaksin.

Thaksin reportedly upset the US elite by:

1. withdrawing troops from Iraq

2. flirting with China

3. cracking down on drugs.

...we did not see Army chief General Anupong Paochinda or police boss Patcharawat Wongsuwan show up while the red shirts were ambushing the Asean Summit. The security forces were not doing their duty, standing by idly as the protesters wreaked havoc in Pattaya.

made international headlines at the end of 2008 with the closure of Bangkok’s two airports. Th yellow colour was adopted by the protesters to show their allegiance to the king, with yellow being the king’s colour because of the date of his birth.

In the build up to the September 2006 military coup that saw prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra removed from office, there had been pressure put on Thaksin and his policies by a group called the People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD).

The PAD were not a political party, but were a political pressure group formed by individuals concerned by the power wielded by Thaksin and the direction he was taking Thailand.

PAD had some influential backers including those with links to the media, army and Royal Palace. As well as the corruption allegations launched against Thaksin, there were allegations from PAD that Thaksin had a republican agenda.

Whether this was true or not, it became a rallying call for the new movement and one of the main reasons PAD were able to bring so much pressure to bear on Thaksin and his government and helped to bring about the catalyst for the 2006 coup.

are angry that the former government that they supported was forced to relinquish power as a result of a legal ruling by the Thai courts. The red shirts have called this a ‘judicial coup’ and a ’silent coup’ and they see the hand of Bangkok’s traditional and elite power base at work including important figures in the army.

Two dominant groups – UDD (United Front for Democracy Against Dictatorship) and DAAD (Democratic Alliance Against Dictatorship) are behind the red shirt movement. They have demanded that the new Democrat led parliament be dissolved because it hasn’t been democratically elected. They are also demanding legal action be taken against the leaders of the PAD movement.

[The current prime minister Abhisit Vejjajiva] was born in Newcastle, England and educated at Eton. He then went on to gain a bachelor degree in politics, philosophy and economics (PPE), first class honor, and a master degree in economics, both from Oxford University.

In a parliamentary vote on 28 January 2008, Abhisit was defeated by Samak for the post of Prime Minister, receiving 163 votes against 310 votes for Samak...

Following the Constitutional Court of Thailand's removal of prime minister Samak Sundaravej in 2008 for vested interests by taking a salary from a cooking show while in the seat of PM, Abhisit lost the National Assembly vote for Prime Minister by 163 votes to 298 for Somchai Wongsawat, ex-PM Thaksin Shinawatra's brother in law....

On 2 December 2008, the Constitutional Court banned the three government parties for election fraud, including the PPP, thus dissolved the governing coalition and paving the way for a Democrat-led government.

The Court also banned Somchai from politics for five years for his involvement in the scandal as one of PPP's executive board member and removed him from office; he was succeeded by a deputy...

The enlarged Democrat-led coalition was able to endorse Abhisit as Prime Minister. Abhisit became Prime Minister after winning a special vote in parliament on 15 December 2008.

All of [the above] coups had several features in common. They were always built around a telegenic demagogue. They always features fake public opinion polling, often combined with outright vote fraud.

They required huge sums of money and abundant supplies of narcotics to fuel them.

They feature large mobs, composed especially of politically naive and suggestible young people, who would demonstrate and camp out in public squares to support the demands of the coup.

They presupposed a significant control over television, radio, key Internet sites, and other media, which were used to project and portray a youthful mob of swarming adolescents as the authentic expression of the will of the whole people.

They all arrived after a period of suffocating repression, which they opportunistically exploited to introduce a new order which was not much better, and which generally became radically worse, then the pre-coup status quo.

One was called Resistance. One was Orange. One was red, red rose. Another had the green of the cedar tree. All of them somehow ended up by installing into power NATO agents and greedy kleptocrats in the service of banks located in Wall Street and the City of London.