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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 144]
Burning the Fat: Obesity and Global Warming
Tuesday, 5 May 2009, 2:34 pm | Binoy Kampmark
A study in the latest issue of the International Journal of Epidemiology by Phil Edwards and Ian Roberts plays out a grim scene: a world of overweight populations draining the earth’s resources and forcing up global temperatures. ‘We argue ... More >>
Avoiding a Pig’s Breakfast: Swine Flu Politics
Saturday, 2 May 2009, 7:56 am | Binoy Kampmark
Governments don’t do the business of combating pandemics well. While we should be relieved when health officials leap at the opportunity to protect, quarantine and save, we should also be slightly skeptical. A cough might signal immediate detention. ... More >>
Chimps in Bow Ties: The Passing of J.G. Ballard
Thursday, 23 April 2009, 9:46 am | Binoy Kampmark
On April 19, J.G. Ballard succumbed to cancer. His writings were, in his own words, set on “picturing the psychology of the future”. And it often wasn’t pleasant, featuring humans as often little more than instinctive creatures, primordially driven, ... More >>
The Legal Treadmill: The Demjanjuk Case
Tuesday, 21 April 2009, 11:17 am | Binoy Kampmark
The Ukrainian-born John Demjanjuk has been living in a fashioned legal purgatory. Stripped of American citizenship after his alleged role as a death camp guard emerged, the courts have been breathing down his neck. Despite persistent legal interest, ... More >>
Disestablishment and Worried Anglicans
Saturday, 11 April 2009, 12:56 pm | Binoy Kampmark
Several callers ringing the middle-brow Radio 4 station in England a fortnight ago were concerned about one thing: that placing disestablishment of the Church of England back on the agenda was a serious mistake. Attempts to change the Act of Settlement ... More >>
The Fujimori Verdict: Justice in Latin America
Friday, 10 April 2009, 2:01 pm | Binoy Kampmark
In a region of the world where state brutality has been the depressing norm, the conviction of former Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori on grave human rights charges seems something akin to a miracle. Usually, cases of brutality have been papered ... More >>
Binoy Kampmark: The Cambridge and Oxford Boat Race
Sunday, 29 March 2009, 6:40 pm | Binoy Kampmark
On Sunday, March 29, Oxford and Cambridge will do battle for the 155th time on the waters of the Thames. The occasion, one of the more known sporting events between rival universities, is the Boat Race. On March 12, 1829, Cambridge issued a challenge ... More >>
A Government without Newspapers
Wednesday, 25 March 2009, 11:16 am | Binoy Kampmark
And were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers or newspapers without government, I should not hesitate to prefer the later. Thomas Jefferson, January 1787 More >>
The end of French ‘Exceptionalism’
Friday, 20 March 2009, 12:27 pm | Binoy Kampmark
Last Wednesday, before the École Militaire, Nicolas Sarkozy promised what on paper seemed rather radical: the French armed forces would be re-integrated into NATO after an absence of 43 years. Then, the redoubtable Charles De Gaulle gave US President ... More >>
Back into NATO: The end of French ‘Exceptionalism’
Thursday, 19 March 2009, 3:26 pm | Binoy Kampmark
Last Wednesday, before the École Militaire, Nicolas Sarkozy promised what on paper seemed rather radical: the French armed forces would be re-integrated into NATO after an absence of 43 years. Then, the redoubtable Charles De Gaulle gave US President ... More >>
The Case of Tim K: Guns in Germany
Monday, 16 March 2009, 2:18 pm | Binoy Kampmark
The slayings in Winnenden last week throw up the stock character traits and responses typical to such a tragedy. Someone has to appear at fault; the blamegame has to assume force and character. The child, with the Beretta, can’t appear to be the only one ... More >>
Binoy Kampmark: Mary Stuart in Copenhagen
Friday, 13 March 2009, 3:18 pm | Binoy Kampmark
The laughs grate, the performances seem grotesque. But the warning signs were there: Friedrich Schiller’s Maria Stuart at the Betty Nansen Theatre in Copenhagen, the adaptation of the demise and end of Mary Stuart at the hands of her nemesis, Queen ... More >>
Goodbye Iraq; Hello Afghanistan
Tuesday, 3 March 2009, 9:39 am | Binoy Kampmark
There was no gasp, merely a lingering sigh that came with the announcement that the vast bulk of US combat forces would be leaving Iraq by August 31, 2010, with the final departures taking place at the end of December 2011. Before a gathering of ... More >>
The politics of empathy: Cameron and Ivan’s Death
Friday, 27 February 2009, 10:09 am | Binoy Kampmark
Politics, and modern politics at that, has as much to do with forged empathy (occasionally sympathy) as with anything else. Candidates lagging in the polls often dig around for which malady to feign, or what sentimental moment can be used to inspire a popular ... More >>
Cricket & Cartels: The fall of Sir Allen Stanford
Monday, 23 February 2009, 10:06 am | Binoy Kampmark
Sir Allen Stanford was, at his height, valued in the billions. His money financed an empire of sporting pursuits and tournaments, ranging from golf, tennis, football and, most notably of all, that archaic wonder called cricket. And, like those before ... More >>
After Rushdie: Wilders & Ironies of Censorship
Tuesday, 17 February 2009, 8:55 am | Binoy Kampmark
Binoy Kampmark writes that on the occasion of the twentieth anniversary of the fatwah against the writer Salman Rushdie, the case of free expression and its permissible limits remains more pertinent than ever. More >>
Taking To The Bong: Phelps And The Curse Of Purity
Sunday, 8 February 2009, 10:22 pm | Binoy Kampmark
There has been a marked hysteria towards Michael Phelps, caught in flagrante with a bong by eager photographers for the sordid News of the World . For a person as taken with swimming as Bobby Fischer was with chess, it is almost a relief to see ... More >>
The Kirill Appointment: Russia’s Orthodox Revival
Tuesday, 3 February 2009, 10:54 am | Binoy Kampmark
Sunday’s enthronement of Russia’s first patriarch since the fall of the Soviet Union, Patriarch Kirill, was a moment of some reflection for those present. Alexey II’s successor finds the Russian Orthodox Church in a healthier state than his ... More >>
Virtual Obsessions: Facebook and the Pope
Tuesday, 27 January 2009, 2:21 pm | Binoy Kampmark
‘When this group reaches one million, we will petition the Pope to get a Facebook [sic]. Bishops, priests, deacons, brothers, nuns, Catholics, and non-Catholics are all welcome.’ More >>
Farewell Dick Welcome Biden: Where to with the VP?
Monday, 26 January 2009, 9:36 am | Binoy Kampmark
Jon Stewart on The Daily Show mocked the Blofeldian characteristics of that seemingly evil, wheelchair bound creature (without accompanying cat), but there was something to it. Dick Cheney, with a strained back incurred while moving to McLean, Virginia ... More >>
