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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 26]
Natural Disasters & Facebook’s Information Scrub
Sunday, 3 September 2023, 6:06 am | Binoy Kampmark
Australia experienced this in February 2021. Facebook had gotten nastily stroppy, wishing to dictate public policy to the Commonwealth government. To teach Canberra mandarins a lesson, it literally unfriended the entire country, scrubbing all news ... More >>
A Killing Design: Osprey Fatalities In The Top End
Thursday, 31 August 2023, 1:45 pm | Binoy Kampmark
In 2022, the US Army selected Bell Textron’s tiltrotor V280 as its Black Hawk replacement. This caused more than a few eyebrows to rise in consternation. The V-22 Osprey tiltrotor, flown by the Marine Corps and Special Operations Command, has had ... More >>
Whitewashing Down Under: The Vietnam War Fifty Years On
Wednesday, 30 August 2023, 12:03 pm | Binoy Kampmark
The Vietnam War tormented and tore the societies who saw fit to participate in it. It defined a generation culturally and politically in terms creative and fractious. And it showed up the rulers to be ignorant rather than bright; blundering fools rather ... More >>
Border Massacres: The Saudi Ethiopian Migrant Killings
Tuesday, 29 August 2023, 12:48 pm | Binoy Kampmark
We know what the regime is like. Starving a country, bombing its hospitals and strafing its schools has been minor fare for the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The population of Yemen has found this out to their colossal cost. Add to this the killing of dissident ... More >>
Looting The Looters: Theft At The British Museum
Wednesday, 23 August 2023, 12:44 pm | Binoy Kampmark
What happens when the looters are looted? Perhaps that strange sense of satisfaction called justice, an offence cancelled by another. One therefore greets the realisation that the British Museum has been suffering a number of such cases with some smugness. ... More >>
Cuts At The Australian Antarctic Division
Wednesday, 23 August 2023, 8:20 am | Binoy Kampmark
Australia’s funding priorities have been utterly muddled of late. At the Commonwealth level, there is cash to be found in every conceivable place to support every absurd military venture, as long as it targets those hideous authoritarians in Beijing. ... More >>
Keeping Up Appearances: Merkel’s Hair And Scholz’s Pate
Wednesday, 16 August 2023, 2:04 pm | Binoy Kampmark
It was a shallow affair. Reputed to have exceptionally poor hairdo, the figure who became one of Europe’s, and indeed one of the globe’s most lasting and influential politicians, inspired memes aplenty for what she sported on her bonce. The teases, ... More >>
Assange Be Wary: The Dangers Of A US Plea Deal
Tuesday, 15 August 2023, 2:43 pm | Binoy Kampmark
At every stage of its proceedings against Julian Assange, the US Imperium has shown little by way of tempering its vengeful impulses. The WikiLeaks publisher, in uncovering the sordid, operational details of a global military power, would always have to ... More >>
The Censors Down Under: The ACMA Gambit On Misinformation And Disinformation
Friday, 11 August 2023, 3:56 pm | Binoy Kampmark
In January 2010, the then US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, doing what she does best, grasped a platitude and ran with it in launching, of all things, an institution called the Newseum. “Information freedom,” she declared , “supports the peace ... More >>
Peter Pan Man: Elon Musk’s Rebranding Of Twitter
Tuesday, 8 August 2023, 1:29 pm | Binoy Kampmark
“X” marks the spot. For the modern advertiser, this is problematic. It breathes pornographic escape, self-denial, elusive treasure, irresistible capture, compelling lasciviousness. And now Elon Musk has decided to impose himself upon a brand he loved ... More >>
Water Wars: Cooling The Data Centres
Sunday, 6 August 2023, 2:23 pm | Binoy Kampmark
Water. Data centres. The continuous, pressing need to cool the latter, which houses servers to store and process data, with the former, which is becoming ever more precious in the climate crisis. Hardly a good comingling of factors. Like planting cotton ... More >>
The Day Australian Sovereignty Died
Wednesday, 2 August 2023, 1:37 pm | Binoy Kampmark
If a date might be found when Australian sovereignty was extinguished by the emissaries of the US imperium, July 29, 2023 will be as good as any. Not that they aren’t other candidates, foremost among them being the announcement of the AUKUS agreement ... More >>
AUSMIN And Assange: The Great Vassal Smackdown
Tuesday, 1 August 2023, 6:23 am | Binoy Kampmark
It was there for all to see. Embarrassing, cloying, and bound to make you cough up the remnants of your summit lunch, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin III stopped by one of the vassal states to make sure that ... More >>
Dotty Domains: The Pentagon’s Mali Typo Leak Affair
Wednesday, 26 July 2023, 1:57 pm | Binoy Kampmark
Fleet-footed agility and sharp thinking rarely characterise the plodding bureaucrat. An argument can be made that different attributes are prized: cherished incompetence, spells of inattentiveness, and dedication to keeping things secret with severity. ... More >>
Congressional Concerns: Stalling Nuclear Submarines For Australia
Sunday, 23 July 2023, 7:42 pm | Binoy Kampmark
Any security arrangement with too many variables and multiple contingencies, risks stuttering and keeling over. Critical delays might be suffered, attributable to a number of factors beyond the parties concerned. Disputes and disagreements may surface. ... More >>
The Afghanistan Lithium Great Game
Friday, 21 July 2023, 4:49 pm | Binoy Kampmark
While the United States, along with its allies, left Afghanistan in August 2021 in spectacularly humiliating circumstances, the departure was never entirely complete, nor bound to be permanent. Since then, Washington has led the charge in handicapping ... More >>
Deserved Cancellations: Victoria Rejects The Commonwealth Games
Wednesday, 19 July 2023, 3:49 pm | Binoy Kampmark
Hosting sporting events has always been a government’s formula to distract their seducible subjects. It’s the secular version of smells and bells, the warbling of the church choir turned into flesh and performance. If such occasions are of sufficient ... More >>
Hindutva Goes To Washington: Narendra Modi’s US Visit
Monday, 17 July 2023, 1:32 pm | Binoy Kampmark
Again, he was at it, that charming show on two legs, playful and coy. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has been burning the charismatic fuel of late, making the necessary emissions in visiting friendly countries. Each time, he seems to be getting ... More >>
Loathsome Amiability: Why Watching Utopia Hurts
Saturday, 15 July 2023, 1:18 pm | Binoy Kampmark
Let’s be frank: watching Utopia hurts. It involves stinging your eyeballs, tearing your hair, and taking yourself to the ledge of a skyscraper to call the whole thing off. The fact that the characters are meant to be faux pleasing is no excuse not ... More >>
An Accident Waiting To Happen: NATO Looks To Asia
Monday, 10 July 2023, 1:59 pm | Binoy Kampmark
Since the end of the Cold War, the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation has distinctly strayed from its original purpose. It has become, almost shamelessly, the vessel and handmaiden of US power, while its burgeoning expansion eastwards has done wonders ... More >>
