Apologies to George Bellows as well as Dempsey and Firpo.

Other nations can find their own ways to cope with earthquakes, floods, cyclones and the plague of Big Oil. Thailand deals directly with God.

“God”, that is, in the sense of the spirits of the land, the Hindu pantheon and whoever’s in charge of the stars and planets.

Thaksin “Ousted” Shinawatra, who should be done with his pilgrimage around 99 temples and become fairly enlightened by now, said on June 16 that Thailand’s once-again-lethal political mess will be well and truly sorted out by July 2, and here we’ll extrapolate to include all the world’s current problems.

You see, he said, Mars — the planet but also the god of war and all things military (like coups d’etat) — would be “moving away” on June 21, and then there’d be no more danger. “After July 2, confusion in the country will ease. Let’s be patient. We will have headaches until July 2,” he said.

Apparently, by “moving away”, he meant that Mars will have caught up to and passed beyond Saturn as they run the million-kilometre dash across the constellation of Leo. Saturn, far bigger, a whole lot farther away and thus a much slower orbiter, is the tortoise in this celestial footrace. There could be trouble when the two planets meet en route.

The local star-gazers were quick to point out, though, that it’s not as simple as that, Mr Know-It-All-Who-Can’t-Even-Hold-a-Job. International Astrology Association president Pinyo Pongcharoen said the anti-corruption People’s Alliance for Democracy now massed around Government House is likely to clash violently with the defenders of Thaksin and current Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej between June 21 and August 29, with the Interior Ministry “targeted” in particular.

Another astrologer, Lak Rekhanithet, was much more dire: July 2, he said, will be “a day of hell”, Thailand’s worst day in 30 years, with death, explosions, fires and combat. He couldn’t have been more specific: “The situation will reach a climax at 11.07pm.”

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Earlier Siamese spook stories

Another shrine destroyed
Thaksin consults the spirits
Post-coup shivers
Tsunami magic
My superstitious medium

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Actually, Dorseyland has received a press release announcing that the world will end on July 5.

Apparently the Church of the SubGenius issues the same press release every year, which may be why Wikipedia seems to think it’s a “parody”. But, as with everything in Wikipedia, I’m not so sure.

The church predicted in 1980 that the world’s end would come on “X-Day” — July 5, 1998 — in the form of an alien invasion and global destruction, from which only church members would be rescued (by alien “Sex Goddesses”). When nothing happened in 1998, church theorists suggested they’d got the year upside down (it should be 8661), or that the calendar was wrong and July 5, 1998 hasn’t yet arrived, or that Earth and Mars were switched in 1998, and we missed “the Rupture” because we’re now actually living on Mars.

At any rate, the “SubGenials” will again be gathering this July 5 at the Brushwood Folklore Center in Sherman, New York, to await the outcome amid rock concerts, bonfires and random mayhem. Their sins will be ritually washed away in a baptism and they’ll “receive new ones in return”.

“Random mayhem” might be a good description for what’s been happening in Thailand lately, but what follows is a synopsis of certain events, all of which lead me to one inescapable conclusion: Thaksin Shinawatra is attempting to regain power through magic. And there’s very little about it that’s random.

On April 5, to celebrate his birthday, Air force Commander-in-Chief Chalit “Big Toi” Pukphasuk led an entourage to several religious sites around Thailand’s North and Northeast, which are Thaksin’s stronghold, and at Prasert Phanom Rung, a Khmer temple in Buri Ram, he declared — loudly enough for everyone to hear, including the local politicians — “I hope the situation in this country will soon improve, and that His Majesty the King will remain in good health.”

Thaksin has been tarred with an anti-monarchy brush, or at the very least it’s said that he abhors the King’s privy council for its perceived meddling. It’s widely believed that another former PM, Prem Tinsulananda, now head of the privy council, triggered the 2006 coup that dumped Thaksin.

Nation photo by Watcharachai Klaipong
Sorcery in Chiang Mai: Chalit Pukpasuk, left, and Warin Buawiratlert.

On April 7 Chalit joined astrologer Warin Buawiratlert (sometimes written as Varin Buaviratlert) in Chiang Mai for a ceremony designed to bring the country good fortune.

His various rituals, it’s been suggested in the press, were intended to send a message to the politicians of the Northeast — Thaksin’s lieutenants in particular — that their disruptions won’t be tolerated by the military. And what came next is seen as their response to the threat:

The sacred images at Phanom Rung were bashed up, the shrine desecrated.

The wholesale destruction was “startling” even for superstitious and politically polarised Thailand, wrote Nation columnist Chang Noi on June 9. “The intention seemed highly aggressive … Not only did it damage a historical treasure, it seemed to indicate a shift from [magical] defence to attack.

“Of course, the desecration might have nothing to do with the current political situation. But the knee-jerk reaction was to make that association … As the monument is of Khmer origin, the trail quickly led to Newin Chidchob — Thaksin Shinawatra’s lieutenant for politics and magic.”

Politicians, Chang Noi said, now compete aggressively over access to supernatural powers.

Astrology has always been a key to power in Thailand, as it was elsewhere in mediaeval times. In the 18th century King Rama III rebuilt Bangkok’s already ancient Wat Pho as a university of astrology, among other subjects. The Brahmin star-watchers employed by the Siamese royal court selected the best times for coronations and battles. But back then, as Chang Noi pointed out, it was an exclusive science, all the moreso for its mystery.

Today anyone can consult an astrologer, or at the very least hire a monk to perform an arthan blessing ceremony, like the one that takes place annually at my condominium building. The rite is ostensibly Buddhist but, like holy amulets, the roots are in Hindu mysticism.

Wealthy and powerful Thais, though, play tug-of-war over a select few “authentic” rune-readers, like Warin, who in April also made a pronouncement that Prime Minister Samak actually took the trouble to denounce on his weekly television show.

Warin had said Samak might be ousted in May, and Army Chief Gen Anupong Paochinda could replace him “if he makes more merit” — even though, according to Warin, the premier and Anupong had been friends and colleagues in a previous life, both working at the royal palace.

Warin, as it turned out, was wrong about Samak being in serious danger in May, wrong about street violence erupting at the end of April or beginning of May and wrong about the country losing a well-known senior figure in May.

Surely there’s more to it.

DISORDER IN THE COURT

On July 8 the Supreme Court is expected to hand down a ruling on whether his pal Yongyuth Tiyapairat pulled a fast one in last December’s national elections. The accusation cost Yongyuth his cushy job as parliament speaker, and the court’s decision will cast a shadow over how Thaksin fares in the slew of corruption charges he’s facing.

Sometime this week the same court is supposed to reveal the results of its investigation into an apparent attempt to bribe the judges. Either Yongyuth’s or Thaksin’s or former interior minister Vatana Asavahame’s lawyer dropped by on June 10 with a bag of pastries wrapped in Bt2 million and told the clerk he should share the goodies among his colleagues.

The clerk either summoned a judge, or one happened to be passing by, and — in a move that has dumbfounded commentators — the judge had the bag’s contents photographed and then handed back to the lawyer, who then walked away. Only in the midst of its investigation did the Supreme Court decide that the lawyer should be called back in to explain himself.

Surely there’s more to it.

THE MANSION ON THE HILL

On July 2 UNESCO’s World Heritage Committee begins a week-long meeting in Quebec City to consider new contenders for World Heritage Site status, and there are 10 in Cambodia, including the 11th-century Khmer temple Prasat Khao Phra Viharn, known to the rest of the world as Preah Vihear, which sits at the edge of a 525-metre cliff on the Thai border. It’s now once again causing considerable heat in Bangkok.

There were huge street protests here in 1962 after the International Court of Justice in The Hague ruled that Cambodia owned the Hindu temple, not Thailand. Arguing the case for Cambodia was former US secretary of state Dean Acheson, who evidently did a better job than Britain’s former top justice, Sir Frank Soskice, representing the Thai side.

Thailand had grabbed the temple as soon as the French abandoned Indochina in 1954, but the colonists’ 1907 map had marked Siam’s border along a watershed, placing the temple in Cambodia, and the court said Thailand really ought to have protested earlier. Cambodia got the ruins, but the surrounding 4.6 square kilometres remained in dispute, with Thai and Cambodian nationalists bickering over pride and Thai and Cambodian entrepreneurs scuffling over the lucrative tourist-souvenir trade on the site.

Various governments dithered, but Thailand’s still-new-though-seemingly-doomed People Power Party coalition government has a minister of Foreign Affairs who’s a motivated man. This month Noppadon Pattama, Thaksin’s former lawyer, hammered out an agreement with the Cambodians that he’s touted as a great deal for everybody, although the shadow of doubt obliterates his good cheer.

He’s been charged with trading off Thai territory for offshore oil or natural-gas concessions, or for a sweetheart business arrangement on or leading to the Cambodian isle of Koh Kong for his former client (who could well be the next king of Cambodia, having failed in that ambition in Thailand).

Surely there’s more to it.

NOT IN THE STARS?

On July 10 Mars will pass less than a degree below Saturn.

“Governments have thought that they know what’s best and many pieces of repressive legislation have been passed. The new laws were designed to ‘protect’ us, but in this new phase, we the people are going to feel as if there is just too much restriction on us with Saturn having moved into such a strong and fixed Fire sign. These two years ahead will be very challenging for those in authority.”

Richard Giles was writing for Astrology.com about Saturn moving from Cancer into Leo, on July 16, 2005. Every two and a half years the planet — the Lord of Karma, he called it — rolls into a new constellation.

Whereas Saturn’s transit of Cancer had given world leaders free rein to “play a parental role”, Giles said, its passage through Leo — which is every bit the control freak that Saturn is, but also rules children, “the creative issue of their parents (the leaders)”– will foment a “youth” rebellion.

“This can signal clashes as those in authority try to squelch the natural exuberance of people who are exerting their good nature or their native creativity … [but] when healthily integrated, we get the combination of constructive leadership in government and management.”

Giles then lapses into pointless “predictions” of events that can and do happen anytime anyway, but the Indian website Sify gets a little more specific about 2008, especially if you know your moon sign (or the government’s).

Both Saturn, already in Leo, and Mars, just entering, are “first-rate malefics capable of causing sorrow and pain”, the star-gazers there say. “Mars is a bundle of energy representing, like the younger generation, aggressiveness, fury, differences, disagreements and confrontation. Saturn, on the other hand, like the elder generation, is identified with suffering, difficulties, impediments and problems.”

Barbara Palliser is considerably more optimistic on her website, Silver Wheel Astrology:

“Mars conjunct Saturn is about constructive action. There’s no frittering away time and energy when Saturn is project manager. It settles well to hard work because it isn’t held up by the need for immediate gratification. This is a planet into long-term results, and is into a slow build-up, a visible progression. Meanwhile Mars adds the va va voom … It’s not an easy partnership, but when it works, it’s unbeatable.

“The downside is that Saturn puts pressure on what it contacts, so there’s a strong pressure to act, which can be difficult for Mars to come to terms with. Saturn is also associated with fear… of success, failure, disapproval, you name it, and Saturn can get the jitters about it. Put that next to action-planet Mars in the sign of Leo and you’ve got something like stage-fright, or similar rabbit-in-headlights responses.”

THERE’S MORE TO IT

A denouement that doesn’t involve bloodshed would be nice, but many Thais now believe there has to be a sacrificial blood-letting. They’re not so much superstitious as they are weary of wheels grinding pointlessly and expensively. There was widespread hope that the bloodless 2006 coup would muscle Thailand out of its cycle of corrupt feudalism, but nothing changed. So much for bloodlessness.

From the above list of coinciding events and musings, let’s subtract the Church of the SubGenius and add the strange (though unconfirmed) report that Thaksin wants to alter the iconography of his football team’s crest, and all we’re missing is a map showing all the temples he visited in his bid to overcome the bad karma accumulated during his regime. I’m betting that the map, with all points connected, would be a picture of some significance.

Just as, while prime minister, he scheduled the inaugural flight departure from the new Suvarnabhumi Airport “auspiciously” for precisely 9.19am on opening day, Thaksin is now casting magical spells on a grand scale, and I mean that literally. Whether they work — whether magic works at all — remains to be seen, but I believe this is wizardry afoot in the modern world unlike anything attempted in centuries.

Preah Vihear is a major key. Another stylised representation of Mount Meru, the home of the Hindu gods, it’s unusually aligned for a Khmer temple, running 800 metres north-south rather than facing east, a positioning that could have been simply dictated by the cliff outcrop, or could indicate geomancy.

Often characterised as a “fortress” or “castle”, it was indeed the last hold-out for government troops in the Khmer Rouge takeover in 1975 and then for the Khmer Rouge when the Vietnamese invaded three years later, although KR remnants regained control in 1992. They were persuaded to surrender after six more years.

Is it the last stand for Thaksin too? At base a possible gift to Cambodia in exchange for a casino on Koh Kong, there seems to be as much symbolism at this deal’s heart as there is in the seemingly crude “bribe” offered to the Supreme Court. That was no bribe — that was a time bomb packed with magic powder.