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Binoy Kampmark
Dr. Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at Selwyn College, Cambridge. He lectures at RMIT University, Melbourne.
Binoy Kampmark - Latest News [Page 110]
Violating International Law: Canada's Recipe Against ISIS
Sunday, 29 March 2015, 11:17 pm | Binoy Kampmark
How is it possible to expand something that is, by definition, immeasurable? Such length of string arguments are bound to dog Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s opinion that the air campaign against ISIS needs expansion, lengthening, and deepening. ... More >>
Depression, Motivation and the Language of Terrorism
Sunday, 29 March 2015, 1:49 pm | Binoy Kampmark
The language of supposedly rational classification and categorisation has done terrible things. In the desperate need to find links, corollaries, causation, or simply correlations, we package, box and categorise like addicts in search of fixes. And when it comes ... More >>
Smiting the Brats: Jeremy Clarkson, Top Gear and the BBC
Thursday, 26 March 2015, 4:22 pm | Binoy Kampmark
It has been said for some time that the BBC, the darling doddering Beeb, has been having an image problem. The swarm of sexual allegations triggered by the Jimmy Savile scandal continues to shudder the broadcaster. More >>
The Failings of Operation Slipper: Australia in Afghanistan
Wednesday, 25 March 2015, 3:39 pm | Binoy Kampmark
It was made as a special statement. The Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott wanted it known that Australian soldiers who had fought in Afghanistan in what has been the country’s longest war should not be treated like those who had fought in Vietnam. ... More >>
The Idiosyncratic Autocrat: Lee Kuan Yew & Singapore City
Monday, 23 March 2015, 5:39 pm | Binoy Kampmark
You never hear the end of it. The “Singapore miracle”, the fabulous Asian city state, a model of development and wealth creation encrusted with “Asian values”, corporate innovation and transparent governance. “Prosperous, orderly, clean, efficient, ... More >>
National Data Retention in Oz: The Next Phas
Monday, 23 March 2015, 5:35 pm | Binoy Kampmark
March 19 should be scratched down in the diary of police state antics, if only because it was one when Australia’s non-service providing politicians decided, fairly broadly, that data retention would be a fine thing indeed. Telecommunication companies will ... More >>
When Free Speech Got Foolish: France’s Dieudonné Verdict
Saturday, 21 March 2015, 5:56 pm | Binoy Kampmark
It lies in the ambiguity of the European Convention on Human Rights. Article 10, the provision that provides for the protection of free speech, can hardly be said to be the broad creature it purports to be. Restrictions will be tolerated, as long ... More >>
Fear as Gold: The Currency of Israel’s Elections
Friday, 20 March 2015, 5:07 pm | Binoy Kampmark
Elections can be shots in the barrel of darkness. Polls can prove the poorest of measures, masking expediency, calculation and, in the end, sheer desperation. The voter finds form just before casting the ballot. The mind can take leave of its senses. ... More >>
The Strange Case Against Abid Naseer
Thursday, 19 March 2015, 9:26 am | Binoy Kampmark
There was nothing ordinary about the Abid Naseer trial, which was a proceeding that gave off different fumes and smells depending on the audience. After September 11, 2001, terror trials became something of a carnival, with manipulated legal whispers ... More >>
Statues to History: Gandhi on Parliament Square
Monday, 16 March 2015, 10:47 am | Binoy Kampmark
Statues are not for everyone. They signify flesh made into stone, the sort of transmogrification that frustrates rather than reveals. It suggest the end of an argument by those who erect it – the statue is there, acknowledge and pay due respect, and move on. But ... More >>
Detoxifying the National Front: Marine Le Pen and France
Sunday, 15 March 2015, 10:26 am | Binoy Kampmark
It has been on her agenda for some time. Marine Le Pen of the nationalist Front National (National Front) wants France out of NATO, and, by virtue of that, the US out of Europe. It is a form of neutering that doesn’t excite the warriors in Brussels, ... More >>
Forgetting the UN: Australia, Child Detention and Torture
Thursday, 12 March 2015, 2:43 pm | Binoy Kampmark
Apparently, the Australian Prime Minister, Tony Abbott, is “sick of being lectured to”. One should add that this lecturing is framed in a more collective sense – Australians, he argues, are tired of those soap box enthusiasts who keep reminding ... More >>
Cotton’s Iran Letter: The GOP, Iran and Diplomatic Sabotage
Wednesday, 11 March 2015, 3:12 pm | Binoy Kampmark
War is addictive. It is also sweet to those who do not know it. There is always someone else who fights it on their behalves. The GOP is better at that than most – their desperation to keep seats in Congress and win others has propelled them to lunatic ... More >>
The Power Vacuum: Sending more Troops to the Middle East
Tuesday, 10 March 2015, 10:49 am | Binoy Kampmark
“Five hundred Australian soldiers on the ground is boots on the ground. They will be on the frontline… Their lives will be at risk and you’ve got to ask why.” Andrew Wilkie, MP from Tasmania, Mar 2, 2015 More >>
Asleep at the Wheel: John Brennan and Restructuring the CIA
Monday, 9 March 2015, 10:55 am | Binoy Kampmark
The term “restructuring” has deserved, quite rightly, its place in the demonology of sackings, removals and exits that come with every consultant’s manual. When the boss of a unit or company passes the word around, be it in the boardroom or the ... More >>
Spreading the Web: The Extent of HSBC’s Tax Evasion Scandal
Monday, 9 March 2015, 10:37 am | Binoy Kampmark
Like a neutrino bomb on the landscape of banking, regulation and journalism, the HSBC tax evasion story via its Swiss subsidiary keeps spreading with devastating effect – at least for those whose careers concern it. According to investigative ... More >>
Signalling For War: Benjamin Netanyahu Before Congress
Monday, 9 March 2015, 9:56 am | Binoy Kampmark
He has been busy, drunk with that transformation that afflicts Israeli politicians when touring the United States. Deflecting and parrying while stabbing and thrusting, he should never have given an address to Congress in these circumstances. Cold water ... More >>
Freedom to Control: The FCC, the Internet and Net Neutrality
Monday, 2 March 2015, 10:07 am | Binoy Kampmark
The Federal Communications Commission chairman Tom Wheeler was bullish after the 3-2 vote of his commission reclassifying broadband as common carriers. Companies such as Verizon had made their mark in previous litigation, arguing that the FCC ... More >>
Fantasies of the Fleet: The Emotion of Submarines
Sunday, 1 March 2015, 8:02 pm | Binoy Kampmark
“Submarines are the spaceships of the ocean.” [1]Idiosyncratic as ever, the remark from Australia’s independent Senator John Madigan on the ABC program Q & A, who had seemingly come down from a distant historical shelf, says the needed thing when ... More >>
Abbott’s Response to Sydney’s Hostage Crisis
Thursday, 26 February 2015, 11:11 am | Binoy Kampmark
The inquiry into Sydney’s Lindt Café hostage crisis (not, as has become popular to deem it, a siege) has come out with some police state fanfare. Terminal governments tend to scrounge for poor solutions, and much of this is to be found in the joint ... More >>
