BANGKOK, Thailand -- The horror of 78 Muslim men who were forcibly tied up, laid out like logs in army trucks, crushed until their eyes bled and they suffocated to death, has not been forgotten despite the coup regime's apology.

Ethnic Malay Islamist insurgents continue to unleash fresh attacks against Thailand's Buddhist establishment, pro-government Muslim collaborators, and innocent people.

More than 1,700 people have been killed on all sides since 2004.

Southern Thailand's Narathiwat, Yala, and Pattani provinces suffer one of the world's bloodiest Islamist rebel wars outside of Iraq.

America gave helicopters, weapons, technical assistance, and training to Thailand's confused military to kill Muslim rebels in the south.

But some U.S. weaponry, including M-16 assault rifles and Humvees, were used by a Thai army faction when they staged a bloodless coup in Bangkok on Sept. 19.

Now the worried coup leaders are enforcing nationwide martial law, stifling free speech, blocking political activity, and installing a pliant government and constitution to defend themselves.

The New York Times (12/4/06), profiling new CNN Headline News host Glenn Beck, called him "brash" and "opinionated," with an "unfiltered approach." The conservative talk-radio host-turned-cable news announcer, the paper reported, "take[s] credit for saying what others are feeling but are afraid to say."

The Times mentioned one of the things Beck has said recently, to newly elected U.S. Rep. Keith Ellison (D-Minn.), a Muslim: "Sir, prove to me that you are not working with our enemies." But as press critic Eric Alterman pointed out (Altercation, 12/4/06), as offensive as that question is, it doesn't begin to suggest the poisonousness of Beck's rhetoric about Muslims.

On his August 10 radio show, distributed by Clear Channel's Premiere Radio Networks, Beck told listeners, "The world is on the brink of World War III," then issued this warning:

James Baker III and the seven dwarfs of the "Iraq Study Group" have come up with some simply brilliant recommendations. Not.

Baker's Two Big Ideas are:

1. Stay half the course. Keeping 140,000 troops in Iraq is a disaster getting more disastrous. The Baker Boys' idea: cut the disaster in half -- leave 70,000 troops there.

But here's where dumb gets dumber: the Bakerites want to "embed" US forces in Iraqi Army units. Question one, Mr. Baker: What Iraqi Army? This so-called "army" is a rough confederation of Shia death squads. We can tell our troops to get "embedded" with them, but the Americans won't get much sleep.

2. "Engage" Iran. This is a good one. How can we get engaged when George Bush hasn't even asked them out for a date? What will induce the shy mullahs of Iran to accept our engagement proposal? Answer: The Bomb.

The slithery junior senator from Illinois, Barack Obama is ensuring himself a steady political diet of publicity by refusing to take his name out of consideration as a possible candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2008. We're entering the timeframe when all such aspirants have to make up their minds whether they can find the requisite money and political base. Sen. Russell Feingold of Wisconsin, the obvious peace-and-justice candidate, has already decided that he can't, which gives us a pretty revealing insight into the weakness of the left these days.

            It's a no-brainer for Obama to excite the political commentators by waving a "maybe" flag. It keeps the spotlight on him, and piles up political capital, whatever he decides to do in the end.