or police could have been behind it. 2005-2009 media 2005–2006 The PAD is supported by the Sondhi Limthongkul-owned Manager Media Group, including Manager Daily newspaper and the ASTV satellite television channel. Sondhi had originally co-hosted a political talk show called Muangthai Raisabdah on MCOT's Channel 9. Sondhi's pro-Thaksin views (in a 23 September 2003 broadcast, he noted that Thaksin was "the best prime minister our country has ever had.") started changing in 2004 after the government fired Sondhi's banker, Viroj Nualkhair, from Krung Thai Bank for incurring too many bad debts. In September 2005, Sondhi allegedly made repeated disrespectful on-air references to King Bhumibol Adulyadej. Among these references was a claim that the government's 2004 appointment of Somdet Phra Buddhacharya as acting Supreme Patriarch of Thailand in place of the critically ill Somdet Phra Yanasangworn contravened the prerogative of the King. After discussions with King's principal private secretary, Arsa Sarasin, MCOT executives cancelled the program. Sondhi took his increasingly anti-Thaksin talkshow on the road, broadcasting via satellite (through his NEWS1 ASTV channel based out of Hong Kong) and webcasting via the website of his Manager Daily newspaper. Talkshow sites, including Sanam Luang and the King Rama V equestrian statue, became magnets for the PAD crowds. After the 2006 military coup, the military junta ordered broadcaster MCOT to cover weekly tapings of Muangthai Raisabdah. Sondhi was also given a slot on the junta-run National Broadcasting Service of Thailand's Channel 11 where he hosted Yam Fao Paendin, a pro-junta, anti-Thaksin talkshow which made accusations of excessive government spending at Suvarnabhumi Airport. 2008 During the 2008 political crisis, armed masked PAD forces broke into the government-owned National Broadcasting Service of Thailand and seized control of the television station. The television broadcast of the morning news program briefly showed pictures of PAD forces breaking into the gates of the station before blacking out for several hours. NBT employees were threatened with violence and forced out of the station. Police eventually regained control of the building and arrested 80 of the raiders, seizing guns, knives, golf clubs, and drugs. The raiders were charged with causing damage to public property and illegal possession of weapons and drugs. Later in the same day, hundreds of hundreds of PAD members, led by Amorn Amornrattananon, again seized the NBST station. Police eventually regained control of the station. The Southeast Asian Press Alliance and the Thai Journalists Association condemned what