ISIS: the Game of Thrones continues
- September 27, 2014
- by
- Matt
I have long since despaired of the ability or willingness of the mainstream media to give a full and in depth analysis of almost anything, but foreign policy in particular. With the exception of a few writers, I rely on the MSM to tell me only what has happened, but I don’t expect any in depth analysis of why it is happening.
Take for example, today’s Guardian editorial, which praised yesterday’s ‘thoughtful and reasoned’ parliamentary debate on the UK’s decision to carry out air strikes against Islamic State in Iraq. In...
The Eyes of Richard Cheney
- August 26, 2014
- by
- Matt
Some years back, Faye Dunaway starred in a vaguely kinky thriller called The Eyes of Laura Mars. Dunaway plays a glamorous fashion photographer who specializes in taking pictures of stylised violence, only to develop a second sight that enables her to see actual murders through the eyes of a real-life killer. At...
ISIS: Made in Washington?
- June 23, 2014
- by
- Matt
As a result of its continuing offensives in Iraq, the Islamic State of Syria and the Levant (ISIS) has become the latest Islamist threat to civilisation. If the rightwing Internet website World Net Daily is to be believed however, the US government may have inadvertently played a direct role in ISIS’s creation, through...
Negotiating With Boko Haram?
- May 15, 2014
- by
- Matt
Is Nigeria intending to negotiate the release of the 276 kidnapped schoolgirls or it preparing to attack Boko Haram? The answer to this question does not seem clear, even to the Nigerian government itself. Throughout much of the crisis the administration of President Goodluck Jonathan has dropped fat hints that it...
Hashtags, Militarism and the ‘Konyisation’ of Boko Haram
- May 10, 2014
- by
- Matt
In the last week the Boko Haram kidnappings of Nigerian schoolgirls have become the object of the same crusading zeal that was once directed at Joseph Kony’s Lord’s Resistance Army. Hashtag twitter campaigns, celebrity condemnation, political outrage, and now Michelle Obama holding up a placard calling for the release of our girls –...
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