India is often heralded as the great hope of the democratic state in the 21st century. Let the wonderful Arundhati Roy, writing in Outlook, show you otherwise: Is it a house or a home? A temple to the new India, or a warehouse for its ghosts? Ever since Antilla arrived on Altamont Road in Mumbai,…
Category General
What’s the next capitalist car? Hamas?
Fascinating example of the corporate world trying to appropriate a political position (via Foreign Policy): In 2003, Volkswagen launched its first ever SUV, the Touareg. ”˜”Touareg” literally means “free folk” and is the name of a nomadic tribe from the Sahara,’”… they wrote… in a press release, explaining their decision to borrow the name of the nomadic…
The lying liar behind Iraq war says he lied
No kidding: A man whose lies helped to make the case for invading Iraq – starting a nine-year war costing more than 100,000 lives and hundreds of billions of pounds – will come clean in his first British television interview tomorrow. “Curveball”, the Iraqi defector who fabricated claims about Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction, smiles…
Since when did Australia protect its future through mining interests?
My following book review appeared in last weekend’s Melbourne’s Sunday Age and Sydney’s Sun Herald: The news late last year that Australia’s richest man, Andrew ”Twiggy” Forrest, had not paid any corporate tax for seven years was unsurprising. Fortescue Metals’s tax manager, Marcus Hughes, conceded to a parliamentary committee in December: ”We have not cut…
Big Brother isn’t in the future, it’s here today
Via the New York Times: Law enforcement tracking of cellphones, once the province mainly of federal agents, has become a powerful and widely used surveillance tool for local police officials, with hundreds of departments, large and small, often using it aggressively with little or no court oversight, documents show. The practice has become big business…
Pakistan takes small step in refusing mercenaries access to their territory
It’s right to be skeptical that this will ever happen – Pakistan is notorious for being a nation whose political and military class simply act above the law – but at least it’s being said (via Dawn): Members of the Parliamentary Committee on National Security (PCNS) on Saturday unanimously agreed to include two clauses into…
Why Pakistan and America will never see eye to eye
One of the strongest impressions of my recent visit to Pakistan – meeting journalists, dissidents, writers and intelligence people – was the profound disconnect between Pakistan and the West. The country has suffered due to a range of factors since 9/11 – corrupt government, American bombardment, unaccountable intelligence services, drone attacks, countless murders and economic…
Disaster capitalism in Pakistan
I’ve just visited Pakistan investigating disaster capitalism for a forthcoming book and documentary. Amazing country. Beautiful, troubled, scary, complicated and centre of the world since 9/11 for (mostly) the wrong reasons. And private security is rampant. Stories coming but in the meantime here’s photos; Islamabad/Rawalpindi/Peshawar… and Karachi.
Challenging MSM approved imperial enforcers
Here’s a book review I wrote a while ago published here exclusively: The Imperial Messenger: Thomas Friedman at Work Belen Fernandez Verso, $22.95 Michael Ignatieff: The Lesser Evil? Derrick O’Keefe Verso, $22.95 Antony Loewenstein Back in May 2003, two months after the start of the American-led war in Iraq, New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman…