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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 51]
Covid Offices And The Religion Of Remote Work
Wednesday, 18 November 2020, 3:57 pm | Binoy Kampmark
Masks can prove liberating. The hidden face affords security. Obnoxious authority breathes better, hiding in comfort. Behind the material, confidence finds a home. While tens of millions of jobs have been lost to the novel coronavirus globally, ... More >>
Rolling Heads At The Pentagon: Trump As Sacker-in-Chief
Friday, 13 November 2020, 4:08 pm | Binoy Kampmark
A sense of redundancy might encourage calm. The job is done, however well or poorly. The legacy charted. But in the case of President Donald Trump, there is still much to be done. Leaving aside his priority of fortifying himself in the White House against ... More >>
Petitions, Probes And Rupert Murdoch
Thursday, 12 November 2020, 4:04 pm | Binoy Kampmark
Australia has given the world two influential and disruptive exports in the field of media. One, currently in London’s Belmarsh Prison, is facing the prospect of extradition to the United States for charges that could see him serve a 175 year ... More >>
Hologram Daddies And Posthumous Molestation
Wednesday, 11 November 2020, 3:33 pm | Binoy Kampmark
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Viral Optimism: The Pfizer-BioNTech Vaccine
Tuesday, 10 November 2020, 2:39 pm | Binoy Kampmark
The announcement that Pfizer Inc., along with its collaborative partner BioNTech SE, had come up with a successful vaccine candidate to combat the novel coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 sent the markets soaring . In New York, Pfizer’s shares rose by 15 percent ... More >>
Biden’s Victory: A Eunuch Presidency Beckons
Monday, 9 November 2020, 12:28 pm | Binoy Kampmark
Whatever was set to happen on November 3, President Donald J. Trump would not lose. Falling in that establishment firebreak against democracy known as the Electoral College would not erase, let alone repudiate him. His now victorious opponent, far ... More >>
Fur Trades And Pandemics: Coronavirus And Denmark’s Great Mink Massacre
Saturday, 7 November 2020, 3:16 pm | Binoy Kampmark
“The worst case scenario is a new pandemic, starting all over again out of Denmark,” came the words of a grave Kåre Mølbak, director of the Danish health authorities, the State Serum Institute. According to the Institute, COVID-19 infections were registered ... More >>
The US Presidential Election: The View From Outside
Friday, 6 November 2020, 4:08 pm | Binoy Kampmark
It was now the turn of other states to vent about, and at, the United States. The 2020 US presidential elections were coming down to a razor sharp wire. The Democrats were starting to feel confident in the swing states. Republicans and the Trump camp ... More >>
Trump, Blue Mirages And False Polls
Thursday, 5 November 2020, 12:47 pm | Binoy Kampmark
The great bard remarks in Henry VI: Part II that all the lawyers ought to be killed. In entertaining this homicidal formula, William Shakespeare had yet to encounter that barnacle breed known as the pollster. There is much to suggest that those practising ... More >>
The US Republic, Trump And The Authoritarian Fear Mongering Club
Tuesday, 3 November 2020, 1:11 pm | Binoy Kampmark
It’s an oxymoron with a long history: American democracy. In referring to the United States, it does not exist. Nor does it take a follower of refrigerated communism to note the obvious point that democracy plays a small part in the processes of the ... More >>
Sawing The Sacred: Felling The Djab Wurrung Directions Tree
Monday, 2 November 2020, 4:00 pm | Binoy Kampmark
s“Djab Wurrung women are in an abusive relationship with Victoria’s government.” Sissy Eileen Austin, The Guardian , Sep 14, 2019 It was a penultimate day in the Australian state of Victoria. The state government had announced that some of harshest ... More >>
Factionalising Antisemitism: The British Labour Party Suspends Jeremy Corbyn
Saturday, 31 October 2020, 2:07 pm | Binoy Kampmark
Whatever stance taken by followers of the British Labour Party on the subject of antisemitism within its ranks, the suspension of Jeremy Corbyn must be seen as an exercise of muscle on the part of Sir Keir Starmer. Since coming to the leadership, ... More >>
Begging Outrage: British Journalists For Assange
Friday, 30 October 2020, 4:16 pm | Binoy Kampmark
Even that title strikes an odd note. It should not. The Fourth Estate, historically reputed as the chamber of journalists and publishers keeping an eye on elected officials, received a blast of oxygen with the arrival of WikiLeaks. This was daring, rich stuff: ... More >>
Google Meets The Sherman Act
Thursday, 29 October 2020, 4:04 pm | Binoy Kampmark
“Ambition is the subtlest Beast of the Intellectual and Moral Field,” wrote John Adams to his son, John Quincy Adams, in January, 1794. “It is wonderfully adroit in concealing itself from its owner.” Father Adams was thinking of Thomas ... More >>
Cultivated Lunacy, Nuclear Deterrence And Banning The Nuke
Tuesday, 27 October 2020, 2:13 pm | Binoy Kampmark
Is international relations a field for cautious minds, marked by permanent setbacks, or terrain where the bold are encouraged to seize the day? In terms of dealing with the existential and even unimaginable horror that is nuclear war, the bold have certainly ... More >>
Impunity And Carefree Violence: Australia’s Special Forces In Afghanistan
Monday, 26 October 2020, 5:03 pm | Binoy Kampmark
In 2016, Australian Major General Jeff Sengelman approached the then chief of the Australian army Lieutenant General Angus Campbell with a nagging worry . The concern lay in allegations that Australian special forces had committed various war crimes ... More >>
Poor Timing: Cartier Meets Australia Post
Saturday, 24 October 2020, 3:13 pm | Binoy Kampmark
Watch brands do not tend to circulate as discussion topics in the Australian federal parliament. Time watching is a more functional affair. But Australia Post’s Chief Executive Christine Holgate gave politicians their chance to shine on October 21 ... More >>
Trusted Demonologies: US Electoral Interference, The Proud Boys And Iran
Friday, 23 October 2020, 4:13 pm | Binoy Kampmark
Iran, Russia and electoral interference. It is all part of the delicious mess that any observer of US politics has come to expect. Were the US body politic capable of being examined on the clinician’s couch, historical fears, psychic disturbances, ... More >>
Tarnished Crown: Finding The Thorns Of A Gambling Empire
Thursday, 22 October 2020, 1:19 pm | Binoy Kampmark
The Crown Resorts Annual General Meeting last year, held inside the company’s now flagging flagship Melbourne casino, was an ill-tempered matter. Members of the board were in no mood to please shareholders, many of whom have occupied the barricades ... More >>
Follow The Money: Banking, Criminality And The FinCEN Files
Tuesday, 20 October 2020, 3:45 pm | Binoy Kampmark
It was all a fitting reminder of Bertolt Brecht’s remark that bank robbery lies in the province of amateurs. The real professionals of plunder establish banks. Last month, the labours of Buzzfeed and the International Consortium of Investigative ... More >>
