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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 38]
The “China Threat” And The Solomon Islands
Thursday, 14 April 2022, 2:53 pm | Binoy Kampmark
Rarely has the Solomon Islands had as much attention as this. Despite being in caretaker mode as it battles the federal election, the government of Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison still had room to politicise its anti-China twitch. The person given ... More >>
Stumbles And Fictions: The Australian Election Campaign Begins
Wednesday, 13 April 2022, 4:04 pm | Binoy Kampmark
That a figure like Scott Morrison comes across as competent, able and free of imbecility after a day of electioneering in Australia suggests a broader sickness in politics. This is not to say that the incumbent will not be skewered and bayoneted at the ballot ... More >>
Law’s Limits: The Passage Of The Antilynching Bill
Monday, 11 April 2022, 2:38 pm | Binoy Kampmark
In 1900, Representative George Henry White of North Carolina, the sole Black law maker in Congress at the time, dared to introduce legislation (HR 6963) that would make lynching a hate crime. To back his case, he submitted an anti-lynching petition ... More >>
Political Appointments: Downgrading The Australian Human Rights Commission
Monday, 11 April 2022, 5:07 am | Binoy Kampmark
With all the hollering and scolding of Russian barbarity in Ukraine and Chinese viciousness against the Uighur populace, one could be forgiven for thinking that Australia’s politicians were presiding from the summit of human rights superiority. ... More >>
AUKUS In The Hypersonic Missile Wonderland
Thursday, 7 April 2022, 1:27 pm | Binoy Kampmark
If further clues were needed as to why AUKUS, the security pact comprising the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia, was created, the latest announcement on weapons would have given the game away. Australia, just as it became real estate ... More >>
Joe Biden’s Democracy Gaffe
Monday, 4 April 2022, 1:55 pm | Binoy Kampmark
It does not pay to be too moralistic in politics. Self-elevation can lead to tripping up. Sermonising even as your stable needs cleaning can enfeeble the argument. But Bidenism, this gaffe-prone ideology currently doing the rounds in a barely breathing ... More >>
Give Me That Flipper Shane
Saturday, 2 April 2022, 5:19 pm | Binoy Kampmark
For more terrestrially grounded people, writing about cricket can be seen as an exercise in distant planetary speculation. The Nobel laureate Harold Pinter did not think so, calling this old English game “the greatest thing that God ever created ... More >>
A Nine-Year Obscenity: The Australia-NZ Resettlement Deal
Thursday, 31 March 2022, 2:06 pm | Binoy Kampmark
Obscenities occupy the annals of State behaviour, revolting reminders about what governments can do. One of Australia’s most pronounced and undeniable obscenities is its continuing effort to gut and empty international refugee law of its relevant ... More >>
Backyard Jitters: Australia, China’s Military And The Solomon Islands
Tuesday, 29 March 2022, 1:35 pm | Binoy Kampmark
The impression given was that of a temple burgled by blaspheming reprobates. But Australian politicians were having none of it. A draft official document published online by an adviser to the Malaita Provincial Government of Premier Daniel Suidani ... More >>
Aroused By Power: Why Madeleine Albright Was Not Right
Sunday, 27 March 2022, 6:59 pm | Binoy Kampmark
When involved in war, those who feel like benefactors are bound to congratulate the gun toting initiators. If you so happen to be on the losing end, sentiments are rather different. Complicity and cause in murder come to mind. The late US Secretary ... More >>
Weaponizing Coal: Australia Gives Ukraine A Gift
Thursday, 24 March 2022, 2:11 pm | Binoy Kampmark
Few would forget the antics of Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison who, as Treasurer, entered Parliament with a lump of coal and proceeded to praise it with the enthusiasm of a fetish worshipper. “Don’t be afraid,” he told fellow parliamentarians. ... More >>
Ukraine, Russia And The Sporting McCarthyites
Thursday, 24 March 2022, 6:35 am | Binoy Kampmark
The cultural vandals and iconoclasts have been busy of late, removing Russians from the stables at short notice and demanding what might be called a necessary affirmation of disloyalty. It’s all good to talk about world peace and the resolution of disputes, ... More >>
Troubled Ideas: A Nuremberg Tribunal For Putin
Tuesday, 22 March 2022, 2:57 pm | Binoy Kampmark
In a good number of Western states, the ruling classes, former and current, have lost their heads. Bugbear and boogieman Vladimir Putin’s efforts in Ukraine have lent themselves to some rather extreme suggestions, ranging from assassination to ... More >>
When Politics Kills: Kimberley Kitching, Politics And Bullying
Saturday, 19 March 2022, 6:54 pm | Binoy Kampmark
Politics can, literally kill. It can seep into the vitals, gnaw away and suck life. Some of the worst battles are waged against colleagues within your own party, all driven by a crazed Social Darwinism to survive. Individually, they may be human and ... More >>
Normal Butcheries: Saudi Arabia’s Latest Mass Execution
Friday, 18 March 2022, 1:53 pm | Binoy Kampmark
Great reformers are not normally found in theocratic monarchies. Despite assertions to the contrary, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia remains archaic in the way it deals with its opponents. In its penal system, executions remain standard fare. With liberal ... More >>
Homicidal Drives: US Dreams Of Killing Putin
Thursday, 17 March 2022, 2:05 pm | Binoy Kampmark
Wars disturb and delude. The Ukraine conflict is no exception. Misinformation is cantering through press accounts and media dispatches with feverish spread. Fear that a nuclear option might be deployed makes teeth chatter. And the Russian President ... More >>
Rotten Rulings: Julian Assange And The UK Supreme Court
Tuesday, 15 March 2022, 2:16 pm | Binoy Kampmark
Julian Assange, even as he is being judicially and procedurally tormented, has braved every legal hoop in his effort to avoid extradition to the United States. Kept and caged in Belmarsh throughout this farce of judicial history, he risks being extradited ... More >>
Foreign Policy Tripe: Scott Morrison’s “Arc Of Autocracy”
Thursday, 10 March 2022, 1:55 pm | Binoy Kampmark
Grand foreign policy speeches are not usually the specialty of Australian Prime Ministers. Little insight can be gleaned from them. A more profitable exercise would be consulting the US State Department’s briefings, which give more accurate barometric ... More >>
Cutting Ties: The West, Ukraine, And The Russian Academy
Tuesday, 8 March 2022, 3:22 pm | Binoy Kampmark
Working with Russian academics and institutions. The attack upon Ukraine by Russia. These are two features playing out heavily in university discussions. As typifies such chitchat, nuance features rather less than cant and sanctimony. As writer and ... More >>
Advertising Gimmicks: Australia’s Nuclear-Powered Submarines
Monday, 7 March 2022, 3:41 pm | Binoy Kampmark
Never trust anything that comes out of a politician’s mouth in an election year. Pledges are made to be broken; promises are made to seduce, not convince. When the subject matter involves fictional submarines, even greater care should be taken. ... More >>
