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On October 10 2009 16:22 Kazius wrote:
Obama got the prize because they hated Bush. There is no other reason to select someone who has been in office under a year and has yet to stop any wars.
Desmond Tutu got his prize 10 years before apartheid was abolished.
Ang San Suu Kiy is still in house arrest and Burma is still not democratic.
Woodrow Wilson's organisations could not prevent WW2.
I could go on.
You can make a legitimate argument as to why Obama perhaps didn't deserve the award, but the fact that he hasn't stopped any wars yet or hasn't fully achieved anything yet is not a good argument at all. The Nobel Prize is frequently used to express support of some cause. It's essentially to bring attention to, promote and endorse a cause which promotes peace.
That's why Obama got the award despite not having 'achieved anything yet'. Because of what the Nobel committee (and rest of the international community) hope he will continue to do. It's like "here, take this award: now please don't let us down!"
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"Deserving" the award is beside the point. The point is to promote peace. Yeah, they used an award to help promote peace. Sneaky sneaky politics, but this is a good thing. Is he deserving? maybe, maybe not, but it doesn't matter because the prize was used in the right way. So what if he actually does or doesn't deserve it.
For the purpose of trying to create peace, Obama was the right person to give the award.
As many people have said, they want to support peace efforts, and Obama is the best candidate for actually changing something in the world.
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On October 11 2009 04:16 Kaneh wrote:
"Deserving" the award is beside the point. The point is to promote peace. Yeah, they used an award to help promote peace. Sneaky sneaky politics, but this is a good thing. Is he deserving? maybe, maybe not, but it doesn't matter because the prize was used in the right way. So what if he actually does or doesn't deserve it.
For the purpose of trying to create peace, Obama was the right person to give the award.
As many people have said, they want to support peace efforts, and Obama is the best candidate for actually changing something in the world.
I was a lot less supportive of Obama getting the award until I heard this argument. Of course there are people who have invested themselves more in the cause of peace, but Obama has the most leverage to work in that direction.
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Obama won a Nobel prize for what , campaigning? wtf
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On October 11 2009 04:27 ultramagnetics wrote:Show nested quote +On October 11 2009 04:16 Kaneh wrote:
"Deserving" the award is beside the point. The point is to promote peace. Yeah, they used an award to help promote peace. Sneaky sneaky politics, but this is a good thing. Is he deserving? maybe, maybe not, but it doesn't matter because the prize was used in the right way. So what if he actually does or doesn't deserve it.
For the purpose of trying to create peace, Obama was the right person to give the award.
As many people have said, they want to support peace efforts, and Obama is the best candidate for actually changing something in the world. I was a lot less supportive of Obama getting the award until I heard this argument. Of course there are people who have invested themselves more in the cause of peace, but Obama has the most leverage to work in that direction.
Its more that giving him the peace prize makes it harder for Obama to make "unpeaceful" actions.
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On October 11 2009 02:39 TanGeng wrote:
Well the idea behind the Constitution was a more perfect union above and beyond what could be possible in the Articles of Confederations. In modern words, it would be called a permanent alliance of states. The federal government while stronger than that created by the Articles of Confederation still exemplified the idea of divided sovereignty.
In the 72 year run up to the Civil War, the federal government had already significantly overstepped the Constitution and violated its spirit. But the American Civil War and the resulting 14th Amendment, destroyed sovereignty of the states in a brutal bloodbath. The American government was always a democratic republic, but the founders were rightfully very pessimistic about it remaining a republic.
I would argue that the Articles of Confederation had outright failed. I more or less agree with you though.
On October 11 2009 03:49 Mindcrime wrote:Show nested quote +On October 10 2009 23:20 Mortality wrote:
Up until the American Civil War, we referred to ourselves not as "the United States," but as "these United States," in other words, power was supposed to be predominantly at the state level. The Civil War itself was not fought simply because of slavery, but because of state's rights. Slavery just happened to be one of the more significant bones of contention (and probably not for the reasons you might believe -- it really was at heart an economic struggle, far more so than it was a moral one; most northerners didn't see black people as equals either). The South seceded because a president who, while he would not have interfered with slavery in the south anymore than Stephen Douglas, would have opposed the spread of slavery that the south had been fighting for in the territories. And do realize that the southern position was that owning a slave was a right no matter what a state government decided. They wished to extend slavery into the territories no matter what the territorial governments wanted.states' rights my ass If it were about "states' rights," the southern states would have rallied behind Stephen Douglas.
There certainly were those who wanted slaves no matter what, period, but you're badly overgeneralizing those statements to all southerners.
And if you think the South would have rallied behind Stephen Douglas under any circumstances, you are incredibly mistaken. His ideas about popularity sovereignty being used to determine whether a state remain free or slave fanned the flames of conflict between North and South and alienated Douglas on both sides of the aisle. Breaking off from President Buchannon only bred more mistrust.
No, there's no way that they would have rallied behind him.
I should also mention a key point: the South was greatly afraid that as new states came into the union, they would be free states and vote with the free states accordingly. The South was steadily losing it's position of power and they were scared that with enough states choosing to be free, the union would force them into submission through legislation.
That's why saying that a vote for state's rights would have been a vote for Stephen Douglas is badly misguided.
On October 11 2009 04:27 ultramagnetics wrote:Show nested quote +On October 11 2009 04:16 Kaneh wrote:
"Deserving" the award is beside the point. The point is to promote peace. Yeah, they used an award to help promote peace. Sneaky sneaky politics, but this is a good thing. Is he deserving? maybe, maybe not, but it doesn't matter because the prize was used in the right way. So what if he actually does or doesn't deserve it.
For the purpose of trying to create peace, Obama was the right person to give the award.
As many people have said, they want to support peace efforts, and Obama is the best candidate for actually changing something in the world. I was a lot less supportive of Obama getting the award until I heard this argument. Of course there are people who have invested themselves more in the cause of peace, but Obama has the most leverage to work in that direction.
I disagree with this. Obama is the best candidate for "changing the world," but not through peaceful means. The U.S. is strongly pro-Israel and Obama is no different on this matter. How do you think he got so much election funding?
"Our alliance is based on shared interests and shared values. Those who threaten Israel threaten us. Israel has always faced these threats on the front lines. And I will bring to the White House an unshakeable commitment to Israel's security."
"The Iranian regime supports violent extremists and challenges us across the region. It pursues a nuclear capability that could spark a dangerous arms race, and raise the prospect of a transfer of nuclear know-how to terrorists. Its President denies the Holocaust and threatens to wipe Israel off the map. The danger from Iran is grave, it is real, and my goal will be to eliminate this threat.
But just as we are clear-eyed about the threat, we must be clear about the failure of today's policy. We knew, in 2002, that Iran supported terrorism. We knew Iran had an illicit nuclear program. We knew Iran posed a grave threat to Israel. But instead of pursuing a strategy to address this threat, we ignored it and instead invaded and occupied Iraq...."
This is from a speech made by Obama. Link here: http://www.barackobama.com/2008/06/04/remarks_of_senator_barack_obam_74.php
You'd think that we are the Israeli States of America.
I do want to be clear that I don't think President Obama is alone in this. In this speech I linked to, Obama blasts Bush for invading Iraq stating:
"When I opposed the war, I warned that it would fan the flames of extremism in the Middle East. That is precisely what happened in Iran – the hardliners tightened their grip, and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was elected President in 2005. And the United States and Israel are less secure."
But I want to be clear that it was originally Israeli intelligence information that initially sent the CIA on a wild goose chase trying to catch Saddam Hussein buying Uranium. In other words, I think that pressure from the Israeli government was one of the chief reasons President Bush took us into Iraq in the first place.
Let me again make a clarification: Israel is our ally. I am not writing this with the intention of sparking anti-Israeli sentiments on the forum. But I want to point out that we are heavily wedded to Israel and that the words and actions of our current President and our previous President both reflected this. I do think that Obama would like to resolve the conflict with Iran diplomatically, but he is going to have to step away from his pro-Israel position if he doesn't want the Iranians to feel alienated when he brings them to the table.
Right now, America is policing the world. And we can't do that if we play favorites. It's bad enough that we police the world at all, but people aren't going to like us if they think we're playing games with them.
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On October 10 2009 02:08 Archerofaiur wrote:
A man had fallen on hard times. He stood outside a convenience store debating whether to rob it. Suddenly, he received a text message from his daughter. “Thank you for being such a good person.” The man turned around and walked home.
Good job knocking down that straw man.
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On October 11 2009 13:07 Mortality wrote:Show nested quote +On October 11 2009 03:49 Mindcrime wrote:On October 10 2009 23:20 Mortality wrote:
Up until the American Civil War, we referred to ourselves not as "the United States," but as "these United States," in other words, power was supposed to be predominantly at the state level. The Civil War itself was not fought simply because of slavery, but because of state's rights. Slavery just happened to be one of the more significant bones of contention (and probably not for the reasons you might believe -- it really was at heart an economic struggle, far more so than it was a moral one; most northerners didn't see black people as equals either). The South seceded because a president who, while he would not have interfered with slavery in the south anymore than Stephen Douglas, would have opposed the spread of slavery that the south had been fighting for in the territories. And do realize that the southern position was that owning a slave was a right no matter what a state government decided. They wished to extend slavery into the territories no matter what the territorial governments wanted.states' rights my ass If it were about "states' rights," the southern states would have rallied behind Stephen Douglas. There certainly were those who wanted slaves no matter what, period, but you're badly overgeneralizing those statements to all southerners. And if you think the South would have rallied behind Stephen Douglas under any circumstances, you are incredibly mistaken. His ideas about popularity sovereignty being used to determine whether a state remain free or slave fanned the flames of conflict between North and South and alienated Douglas on both sides of the aisle. Breaking off from President Buchannon only bred more mistrust. No, there's no way that they would have rallied behind him. I should also mention a key point: the South was greatly afraid that as new states came into the union, they would be free states and vote with the free states accordingly. The South was steadily losing it's position of power and they were scared that with enough states choosing to be free, the union would force them into submission through legislation. That's why saying that a vote for state's rights would have been a vote for Stephen Douglas is badly misguided.
Popular sovereignty was the states' rights position. The fire-eaters disliked Douglas for that states' rights position; they were not fighting for states' rights.
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On October 10 2009 05:29 BalliSLife wrote:
Ok so if he's done nothing, what would you guys like him to do?
Pull our troops out of Afghanistan and Iraq and let the free market cleanse the imbalances in the economy by letting the banksters fail.
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On October 11 2009 13:46 HowitZer wrote:Show nested quote +On October 10 2009 05:29 BalliSLife wrote:
Ok so if he's done nothing, what would you guys like him to do? Pull our troops out of Afghanistan and Iraq and let the free market cleanse the imbalances in the economy by letting the banksters fail.
Even better let the free market fix afghanistan.
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On October 11 2009 13:53 Archerofaiur wrote:Show nested quote +On October 11 2009 13:46 HowitZer wrote:On October 10 2009 05:29 BalliSLife wrote:
Ok so if he's done nothing, what would you guys like him to do? Pull our troops out of Afghanistan and Iraq and let the free market cleanse the imbalances in the economy by letting the banksters fail. Even better let the free market fix afghanistan.
opiates yay!
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On October 10 2009 18:37 Arbiter[frolix] wrote:
As for the Nobel award: well, given that Shimon Peres, Henry Kissinger and Woodrow Wilson all won the prize this is hardly the first time that the committee has dished it out to someone who stands in violation of the most basic principles on which the award is supposedly based.
Woodrow Wilson O.o.... I mean I know he was a racist but his brainchild was the league of nations, the predecessor to the U.N; he sacrificed everything in order to achieve an international forum for peace. Sounds like he deserved the peace prize to me
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Wait what exactly did Obama do again lol?
I'm a democrat to just asking because he really didn't do anything to promote peace.
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Obama is a symbol of change and with this, brings hope for many people.
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United Kingdom2674 Posts
On October 11 2009 14:02 n.DieJokes wrote:Show nested quote +On October 10 2009 18:37 Arbiter[frolix] wrote:
As for the Nobel award: well, given that Shimon Peres, Henry Kissinger and Woodrow Wilson all won the prize this is hardly the first time that the committee has dished it out to someone who stands in violation of the most basic principles on which the award is supposedly based. Woodrow Wilson O.o.... I mean I know he was a racist but his brainchild was the league of nations, the predecessor to the U.N; he sacrificed everything in order to achieve an international forum for peace. Sounds like he deserved the peace prize to me
Perhaps I am just a naive moralist but I would have thought that ordering the murderous and brutal invasion of Haiti, a terrible event which continues to affect that nation to this very day, might have disqualified him from receiving a peace prize. The occupation saw the "practically indiscriminate killing of natives" by the occupying US Marine force, not my words but those of marine general George Barnett. It is rather ironic that 1919, the very year in which Wilson received the award, Haiti saw the beginning of a citizen's revolt against the American occupation which cost the lives of 3,000 people, the overwhelming majority of them Haitian peasants.
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On October 11 2009 14:26 Monstah-_- wrote:
Wait what exactly did Obama do again lol?
I'm a democrat to just asking because he really didn't do anything to promote peace.
He's undertaken a lot to stop nuclear proliferation for one, bringing along Russia and China, recently signing a deal with Russia. If he keeps it going (which is what the Nobel committee want him to) we could see a huge reduction in nuclear stockpiles and avoid stuff like nukes getting into terrorist hands.
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why blame the whole norway for doing this decision when it was just like 10 ppl who decided? :O
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Sanya12364 Posts
On October 11 2009 14:02 n.DieJokes wrote:Show nested quote +On October 10 2009 18:37 Arbiter[frolix] wrote:
As for the Nobel award: well, given that Shimon Peres, Henry Kissinger and Woodrow Wilson all won the prize this is hardly the first time that the committee has dished it out to someone who stands in violation of the most basic principles on which the award is supposedly based. Woodrow Wilson O.o.... I mean I know he was a racist but his brainchild was the league of nations, the predecessor to the U.N; he sacrificed everything in order to achieve an international forum for peace. Sounds like he deserved the peace prize to me
The stupidity of Woodrow Wilson in getting involved in World War I laid grounds for World War II? Perhaps it's just hindsight. Wilson was idealistic. People in Europe got caught up in that delusion right along with him and gave him the award.
But consider that until the Americans got involved, the war was a deadlock and that the delay in peace negotiations probably resulted in additional half a million casualties if not more. Wilson also convinced Russia to fight beyond its capacity and essentially giftwrapped that country to the Soviet Bolsheviks.
On October 11 2009 04:58 Archerofaiur wrote:Show nested quote +On October 11 2009 04:27 ultramagnetics wrote:On October 11 2009 04:16 Kaneh wrote:
"Deserving" the award is beside the point. The point is to promote peace. Yeah, they used an award to help promote peace. Sneaky sneaky politics, but this is a good thing. Is he deserving? maybe, maybe not, but it doesn't matter because the prize was used in the right way. So what if he actually does or doesn't deserve it.
For the purpose of trying to create peace, Obama was the right person to give the award.
As many people have said, they want to support peace efforts, and Obama is the best candidate for actually changing something in the world. I was a lot less supportive of Obama getting the award until I heard this argument. Of course there are people who have invested themselves more in the cause of peace, but Obama has the most leverage to work in that direction. Its more that giving him the peace prize makes it harder for Obama to make "unpeaceful" actions.
So now Nobel Peace Prize is being used as a strategic political tool. I think that pretty much defines cheap and meaningless.
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On October 11 2009 23:15 TanGeng wrote:
So now Nobel Peace Prize is being used as a strategic political tool. I think that pretty much defines cheap and meaningless.
Only if it doesn't have any influence. I would give the peace prize to Harvey Dent if it resulted in more peace.
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On October 11 2009 13:46 Mindcrime wrote:Show nested quote +On October 11 2009 13:07 Mortality wrote:On October 11 2009 03:49 Mindcrime wrote:On October 10 2009 23:20 Mortality wrote:
Up until the American Civil War, we referred to ourselves not as "the United States," but as "these United States," in other words, power was supposed to be predominantly at the state level. The Civil War itself was not fought simply because of slavery, but because of state's rights. Slavery just happened to be one of the more significant bones of contention (and probably not for the reasons you might believe -- it really was at heart an economic struggle, far more so than it was a moral one; most northerners didn't see black people as equals either). The South seceded because a president who, while he would not have interfered with slavery in the south anymore than Stephen Douglas, would have opposed the spread of slavery that the south had been fighting for in the territories. And do realize that the southern position was that owning a slave was a right no matter what a state government decided. They wished to extend slavery into the territories no matter what the territorial governments wanted.states' rights my ass If it were about "states' rights," the southern states would have rallied behind Stephen Douglas. There certainly were those who wanted slaves no matter what, period, but you're badly overgeneralizing those statements to all southerners. And if you think the South would have rallied behind Stephen Douglas under any circumstances, you are incredibly mistaken. His ideas about popularity sovereignty being used to determine whether a state remain free or slave fanned the flames of conflict between North and South and alienated Douglas on both sides of the aisle. Breaking off from President Buchannon only bred more mistrust. No, there's no way that they would have rallied behind him. I should also mention a key point: the South was greatly afraid that as new states came into the union, they would be free states and vote with the free states accordingly. The South was steadily losing it's position of power and they were scared that with enough states choosing to be free, the union would force them into submission through legislation. That's why saying that a vote for state's rights would have been a vote for Stephen Douglas is badly misguided. Popular sovereignty was the states' rights position. The fire-eaters disliked Douglas for that states' rights position; they were not fighting for states' rights.
Sigh. I hate having to repeat myself.
I should also mention a key point: the South was greatly afraid that as new states came into the union, they would be free states and vote with the free states accordingly. The South was steadily losing it's position of power and they were scared that with enough states choosing to be free, the union would force them into submission through legislation.
That's why saying that a vote for state's rights would have been a vote for Stephen Douglas is badly misguided.
Edit: the southern states were interested in protecting their rights as states. This is the point you seem to be missing. They wanted to continue preserving their way of life meanwhile the North was steadily getting bigger and importing immigrants by the truckloads to get bigger still.
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EPT
