BANGKOK - "Thailand's future is up for grabs," proclaimed the eminent Thai scholar Thitinan Pongsudhirak just before the country's Constitutional Court ruled, in effect, that the ruling People Power Party (PPP) and its two smaller coalition partners are "illegal," and hence must disband due to "election frauds" committed by party executives a year ago. Party leaders, including Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat, are barred from politics for five years.

With that one stroke, Thailand's popularly elected government fell. Parliament must now reconstitute itself without the three parties loyal to Somchai.