My following investigation appeared in Crikey this week: The drive from Broome in Western Australia to Derby, the town closest to the remote Curtin detention centre in the Kimberley, is two-and-a-half hours through endless, surprisingly green desert. Mobile phone reception soon dies after the journey begins and from there you see few people or cars…
Showing all posts tagged Afghanistan
Getting inside the head of Julian Assange
My following book review appeared in yesterday’s Sydney Sun Herald: Julian Assange: The Unauthorised Autobiography Julian Assange (Text, $29.95) This is unlike any book you’ve ever read. Take one of the most recognisable figures in the world, sit him down for hours of interviews and sign a multimillion-dollar contract to publish an authorised autobiography. Talk…
ABCTV News24 on the economy, Afghanistan and Murdoch thuggery
I appeared last night on ABCTV News24’s The Drum (video here). I argued that chequebook journalism is only problematic when the public increasingly distrusts the media and presumes exploitation is taking place. The mainstream media far too often simply accepts the allegedly unbiased reports released by think-tanks and interest groups. More skepticism required and independent…
Afghanistan – touch down in flight
Extraordinarily beautiful: Afghanistan – touch down in flight from Augustin Pictures on Vimeo.
Supporting Overland and indy media
Wonderful independent Australian magazine Overland is currently running its Subscriberthon. I was asked to offer some words of support: Independent media has never been more important. Our world is currently experiencing a necessary crisis in confidence in corporate media, corporate governance and capitalism itself. Relying on corporate media to accurately report on this crisis is…
Of course Afghan government can’t live without privatised forces
Don’t believe anybody who says that private security and mercenaries won’t increasingly be in the front-line of US-led wars (if not in the headlines). The New York Times reports: President Hamid Karzai’s plan to disband private security companies that protect billions of dollars worth of aid projects and replace them with government forces is fraught…
Only fools believe we should stay in Afghanistan
After more than 10 years of Western-led war in Afghanistan, The Guardian’s Jonathan Steele says that it is a conflict that we’ll (thankfully) never win. Take note America, Britain and Australia: Two days after 9/11, I wrote a column in The Guardiansaying that if the U.S. reaction was to put boots on the ground in…
Israel, your new best friend Mitt Romney (who loves you to death)
Think Progress reports on a truly fundamentalist position from the Presidential candidate that will only further isolate the Zionist state: If Mitt Romney becomes president, there are a lot of important foreign policy decisions that he’d leave up to others. Most notably, Romney often says that whatever the generals decide, that’s the course he’ll take…