Obama Wins Nobel Peace Prize

[hortysir]

I totally agree.
I just don't think aspirations are award-winning

Where's my Pulitzer for the book I plan on writing?

[sybarite]

Originally Posted by hortysir

I totally agree.
I just don't think aspirations are award-winning

Where's my Pulitzer for the book I plan on writing?

Pfffftttt! I'm going to have all wars ended by next month and it will be world peace. Where's my Nobel peace prize????

[sybarite]

Actually the Nobel Peace Prize lost all credibility when Yasser Arafat won it. Arafat and peace are an oxymoron. Then Al Gore, and Obama takes the cake. I place it up there with the MTV music awards.....or better yet the Darwin Awards!!!

[Patrish]

Originally Posted by Nympheas

huh?.

iT WAS AGE PROGRESSION, AND I GOTTA SAY - IT WAS GREAT FOR A LAUGH.

Originally Posted by sybarite

Actually the Nobel Peace Prize lost all credibility when Yasser Arafat won it. Arafat and peace are an oxymoron. Then Al Gore, and Obama takes the cake. I place it up there with the MTV music awards.....or better yet the Darwin Awards!!!

iF yASSAR [TERRORIST] CAN WIN IT, THEN CERTAINLY oBAMA CAN. :d


dang caps lock...

[kipper]

Originally Posted by Patrish

iT WAS AGE PROGRESSION, AND I GOTTA SAY - IT WAS GREAT FOR A LAUGH.




iF yASSAR [TERRORIST] CAN WIN IT, THEN CERTAINLY oBAMA CAN. :d


dang caps lock...

When did 'dang cap locks' win the Nobel peace prize then? Sounds foreign to me as well...Chinese perhaps?

[DLJStRap]

Let there be Peace on Earth, Goodwill toward Men!

Peace in the world today
is all about American foreign policy --
our directions, and our actions,
as to how we shall lead the world.

We could be headed down the path of unilateralism --
ignoring the rest of the world,
pursuing, essentially, a foreign policy dictated by Big Energy,
where only the questions of oil reserves, of mineral rights
are considered, by the extraction industries.

And, we could simply ignore and flaunt international law,
the kinds of moral rules that prohibit the abuse of prisoners,
the severe mistreatment of human beings.

Or, we could resume the ancient traditions of the United States,
to be a shining example to other nations,
that we only have this one world,
and that what we do has an impact on it.

Obama, it is true, did not "deserve" a Nobel Peace Prize --
not if you measure "merit" on the scale that reflects accomplishment,
as the prizes in Chemistry and Physics, Literature and Economics do.

Peace, as the Angels once announced, is always Aspirational --
a Hope for a Better World --
and we announce that fact, sometimes,
by noting who, among the many Notables,
most likely offers the most significant promise of pursuing Peace.

Yes, the Prize this year was about Hope,
for the world is weary of the Bush War years,
of a needless war fought out uncertainly and bitterly in Iraq,
of a foreign policy that aggressively pursued a forward posture,
of military bases, missile defenses, of threats and coercions.

Obama did not award himself this prize --
and any and all criticism of him in this matter is quite meritless --
almost as lacking in merit as the criticism the week before,
when conservatives cheered the loss of the Olympics --
although America, Wisconsin, Illinois, and especially Chicago
would have so greatly benefited from hosting the 2012 Games.

Instead, Obama was jeered at,
"the ego has landed" chortled Limbaugh,
putting his hatred of Obama ahead of any putative love he has of America.

Obama did not award himself the prize --
and any student of history will note how similar the unjust criticisms are,
when they ask what was said of Ralph Bunche, of Martin Luther King,
when they were awarded Nobel Peace Prizes.

Partisan jealousies explain hatreds --
as was noted long ago, pari passu, in Julius Caesar, Act I...
Cassius, enviously speaking:
"Why, man, he doth bestride the narrow world
Like a Colossus, and we petty men
Walk under his huge legs and peep about
To find ourselves dishonourable graves.
Men at some time are masters of their fates: 230
The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars,
But in ourselves, that we are underlings.
Brutus and Caesar: what should be in that 'Caesar'?
Why should that name be sounded more than yours?
Write them together, yours is as fair a name; 235
Sound them, it doth become the mouth as well;
Weigh them, it is as heavy; conjure with 'em,
Brutus will start a spirit as soon as Caesar.
Now, in the names of all the gods at once,
Upon what meat doth this our Caesar feed, 240
That he is grown so great? Age, thou art shamed!
Rome, thou hast lost the breed of noble bloods!
When went there by an age, since the great flood,
But it was famed with more than with one man?
When could they say till now, that talk'd of Rome, 245
That her wide walls encompass'd but one man?
Now is it Rome indeed and room enough,
When there is in it but one only man."

There is that. Criticize, if you must, hope,
but better would it be that you find similar reasons to hope.

Let there be Peace on Earth, and let it begin with me (too).

[Flynn]

It is a slap in the face for Morgan Tsvangirai that his credibility was called into question by the Nobel Peace Prize Inquisitors just prior to scheduled announcement of this years laureate.

It says a lot about America that their President would accept second place on behalf of all American citizens.

[Nympheas]

Originally Posted by hortysir

I totally agree.
I just don't think aspirations are award-winning

Where's my Pulitzer for the book I plan on writing?

That's true.
Don't get me wrong I was scratching my head but just not riled up over it.
I don't like to focus on negatives because all too often that can block out
any and all positives.

Originally Posted by Patrish

iT WAS AGE PROGRESSION, AND I GOTTA SAY - IT WAS GREAT FOR A LAUGH.

age proJECTion maybe.
but interesting choice of post unrelated to the topic
"Funny" Pictures perhaps?...

[Shkeeptareh]

Originally Posted by hortysir

Mimi's avatar is the very definition of the word "perfect"!

firstly i gotta say i agree on that one... it makes me smile every time i log on if only mine could be that jiggly, i'd have a lot more confidence... though i'm fine with what i got... they are bouncy too!

Originally Posted by hortysir

I totally agree.
I just don't think aspirations are award-winning

Where's my Pulitzer for the book I plan on writing?

id like to know too... i mean i plan on curing cancer and a number of other diseases... i've got a whole plan for world peace too, where's mine?

Originally Posted by sybarite

Actually the Nobel Peace Prize lost all credibility when Yasser Arafat won it. Arafat and peace are an oxymoron. Then Al Gore, and Obama takes the cake. I place it up there with the MTV music awards.....or better yet the Darwin Awards!!!

yes but it wasn't nearly as entertaining...
though watching Rev. Jessie Jackson trying to validate his comments was a riot...


I love you guys!
gotta go... you know class and stuff...

[DLJStRap]

Originally Posted by hortysir

I totally agree.
I just don't think aspirations are award-winning

Where's my Pulitzer for the book I plan on writing?

The Audacity of Hope is a book. It's worth reading.

Beyond that, Hope is one of the three principal virtues,
along with Faith and Charity, of which the former is less important,
and the latter vital.

So, what is wrong with Hope, or Aspiration for Peace...
if you are trying to award the person or the organization
which you deem to be most likely to bring Peace in the world?

Obama's rhetoric is nothing if it is not filled with hope,
a hope, perhaps foolish as the world oft judges matters,
that the ways of Peace are those of aspirational words.

Example: I will not permit prisoners to be tortured.

This is a simple rule.

You can depart from it as the fool Bush did,
at the evil counsel of the Cheney crowd.

Make no mistake about it:
not only is torture (totally) ineffective,
but even if it were "effective",
it is wholly evil, as a practice.

It is a false moral dichotomy, to ask,
but if "torture" were effective, to disclose dire threats,
wouldn't you sanction torture, to save innocent lives?

But, it isn't effective. It's a totally false premise.

And, besides that, it ignores the moral question:
what is the duty you owe your fellow man,
as to how you treat him.

If ethics, morality, is relegated to the role of a critic,
rather than valued as an essential guide,
then its prudential warnings will be ignored.

Cheney and his ilk have shown no respect for man,
for mankind, ah yes our kind -- only ruthlessness.

Now, that kind of thinking is what is evil in the world,
the idea of bureaucrats like Cheney,
who respect no law except the authority of power --
power, which Cheney says, can do whatever it pleases.

Peace, my friends, is not possible in a world dominated by Cheney,
by the idea that there is no morality
except that of the interests of the powerful,
to do as they will, whenever it shall please them to do so.

That latter may be a truth,
as to how evil intentions do, in fact, so often, rule,
but it remains immoral, evil in its seductions to power.

Hope has Faith that the Charity of Man will prevail.

The aspiration of Hope is all that we should desire.

Who, better than Obama, has given us Hope?

Make fun of that, if you will --
pretend that Peace is best honored by deeds,
and you create a world in which wars must be begun
so that a peacemaker can later be honored.

I don't think that was what the blessing was all about,
when it announces
"Blessed are the Peacemakers!"

Those who make Peace increasingly possible are, indeed, Blessed, too --
especially when it comes to the US of A,
and the mightiest military in the history of the world.

All this the Norwegians considered.

They felt Obama best represented the possibility of Peace.

If you wish to fault them, for believing in Hope,
then do so,
announcing, as you do so,
like the Damned in Dante's Inferno,
"Abandon all Hope, ye who enter here, following me."