tongodeon: Barack Obama gets the Nobel

Barack Obama gets the Nobel
Just over six months after George Bush took office the message he'd ignored titled "Bin Laden Determined to Strike in US" came true. Like some King Midas in reverse he turned that disaster into an even worse disaster by alienating our allies, invading the wrong country, then horribly botching the invasion. Along the way he eliminated habeas and trial by jury and legalized torture. Then when people called him on it he didn't say "oops my bad", he fought them all the way to the Supreme Court where he lost repeatedly.

That's just the really big stuff. Not outing Valerie Plame, not covering up Pat Tillman's death, not fighting the science that global warming was real, not posturing impotently while North Korea got the bomb. It's going to be hard to explain the sheer magnitude of stupid evil in the White House for the last eight years, and I provide this summary because otherwise I get the feeling many of us have suppressed it like the distant memory of an awkward date that nobody enjoyed gone horribly wrong.

Every year the Nobel committee awards the Prize "to the person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses", honoring fighters not necessarily winners. They awarded the 2007 Prize to Al Gore and the UN Panel on Climate Change because the panel is right about climate change, not because the panel has successfully ended global warming. They awarded the 2005 Prize to the IAEA because the IAEA was right about Iraq and North Korea, not because the panel stopped the Iraq War and North Korean arms race. They awarded the 1994 Prize to Arafat, Rabin, and Peres "for their efforts to create peace in the Middle East" because they were right about needing middle east peace, not because that peace has been created. They awarded the 1991 Prize to Aung San Suu Kyi for "for being on the right side in her non-violent struggle for democracy and human rights" in Burma, not because those rights have yet been won.

Barack Obama has won the Nobel "for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples".

via tongodeon.livejournal.com

I agree. (Thanks, Noah, for this link.)

Posted via web from dianaf's posterous