Thailand—to visit or not to visit?

Update 13th May: Thailand tourist numbers 1/2 of last year's numbers.-----------------------------If you only read/watch the news on the major sites then you’d probably concede that tourists in Thailand are in a world of danger because of the ongoing political protests there.  But talking with people on the ground, I find that quite the opposite is true.  I have one friend on holiday there now.  No problems.  Ditto multiple friends that live and work right in downtown BKK.  This article would agree with their experiences.Certainly the long term consequences of the color coded temper tantrums will be significant.  Even disastrous.  But fears of physical harm to tourists are overplayed by the media looking for a story and subsequent over-reacting governments issuing travel warnings based on “news” reports.  (By the way, is there anything more overvalued by it’s own people and less valued by the rest of the world nowadays than the MSM?)  You should be much more worried about being poisoned by a mistress/hooker or beat up by a bootlegger than being caught up in political violence.  Even the Thai's with color-coded blinders realized how stupid it was to shut the airport down, so that's not much of a fear anymore.  The point is, you’re in about as much danger as you put your self in.Further to the point that the media has to make up work for it's employees, when I was a student in Israel in ’94 my parents were freaking out watching the news each day just sure that I was going to get blown up while shopping.  Other than a few limes thrown at us and a few rocks thrown at our buss, nothing happened for an entire semester.  Indeed, the “news” stories that my parents were seeing I’d not even heard about!  And I was living there!One more example and then I'll let the poor horse die.  I was in Chongqing in ’95 when China was shooting missiles into the Taiwan Strait.  Once again, we got a number of phone calls and letters (no email at that our “Communications University” yet, but they’d all read books about it!) full of concern that we were either being bombed or going to be thrown in the gulag and never allowed to leave.  If we hadn’t had the riveting and insightful CCTV and the People’s Daily we wouldn’t have even have known it was happening.Now is a great time to go to Thailand; it hasn't started raining yet and you’ll have the place all to yourself!  And if there are any more political problems this year, Christmas in Thailand is going to be a fantastic time to take long walks on totally empty beaches too!  Foreigners can buy homes/apartments there too and, like most places, it’s a buyers market right now. (No, I don't get paid if you go there.)Just remember to get an on-the-ground perspective before you cancel your factory visit or your beach vacation to Thailand.