John Virgoe is <a href="http://www.crisisgroup.org/home/index.cfm?id=2613&l=1">southeast Asia</a> project director at the <a href="http://www.crisisgroup.org/home/index.cfm ">International Crisis
The return to democracy in Thailand following the military overthrow of the populist prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra in September 2006 has been messy. In the second half of 2008, the
