Transcript of the above video:

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing "The Buck Stops Where?" For those unaware, there is a quote from the late President Truman in the United States. He used to say "The Buck stops here." The expression basically it is sort of an idiom. It means, I am the accountable person. At the end of the day this is where all the lack of accountability ends; the responsibility is on me. It is kind of the way that has always been portrayed.

I thought of that when I was reading this recent article from Bangkok Post, bangkokpost.com, Reopening Delayed for Nightclubs, Bars. Quoting directly: "CCSA spokesman Taweesilp Visanuyothin said the CCSA meeting chaired by Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha decided to defer by another month a plan to allow pubs, bars and karaokes to reopen on December 1. The new tentative (tentative) re-opening date was set for January 16th and only for some areas depending on the COVID-19 situation." Now we have done a video on all this; we know where this stands. I have done kind of my little op-ed on it. I am not thrilled by the way this is going but I am thinking that the policy thinking on this is "look we are going to get it to mid-January then we are going to reopen and we are really planning to really be re-opened and just move on with all our lives." If that is the case, which I hope it is, great let's just barrel ahead and do that. 

The reason for this video was this further quote, same article, quoting directly: "The Public Health Ministry have been the key agency proposing the delay after consulting with other agencies. The CCSA had indicated that it would follow the direction set by the Prime Minister." And I don't mean to laugh but who is doing what here? Within this one little excerpt there is just "the Public Health Ministry had been the key agency proposing the delay after consulting with other agencies", okay. "The CCSA had indicated (proposing, indicated) that it would follow the direction set by the Prime Minister," which I thought they were advising him what to do. The point of this video is I just find it very odd the level of just this I hesitate to call it bureaucratic, but this kind of I don't know just this, “the buck is not seeming to stop anywhere". Now ultimately I guess it does stop with the Prime Minister who ends up having to be the one that ultimately implements this or executes this stuff but just the lack of accountability of "well we proposed in consultation with somebody on this thing but with other agencies and then we advise but it ultimately is over here", I found it strange and frankly I would just prefer someone to just say "Look, this is me. This is my advice and this is what I think we should do and let's move on! Right or wrong moving on down the road". I do understand politics and in the legal world you don't always want to be out there on a limb but it just seems like this one excerpt just seemed to intentionally, everyone seem to be sort of dodging any responsibility which is concerning when huge segments of the economy are still shut down because of these policies. 

Just in my opinion I would like to see you know at least someone say "look this was on my advice, this is why I think we should do this and we should do this so we can get open faster".