Was my text alert from my AP iPhone app this morning. I had to look again because I didn’t believe it. Jokingly, I stated, will he turn water into wine next? That was a great morning chuckle.
What really got me laughing this morning is when I thought to my self “Boy, the we only care about some of America Party, formally known as the Republican Party is going to have a baby today!” The shear comedy of it all as I speak has the late night writers probably buzzing with new material.
The GOP now famous for only caring about “real America” and their supporters, since the election have been trying to through elephant dung at the President for every little thing from his oratory (from a teleprompter they joke), to his smiling, cool demeanor (aloof they say), to his nomination of Sotamayor to the Supreme Court (he’s a racist), to his policies on the economy and healthcare (he’s a socialist-nazi), to his address to school children (he’s trying to indoctrinate them into the Obama Youth) etc. etc. etc. I mean at every turn they have been whining, crying, “protesting”, over these outrages. They have been such staunch advocates of segregation between Americans that recently when the Olympic Committee shot down AMERICA’s bid to host the Olympics in Chicago, they actually hailed America’s loss as a defeat for Obama!
So now that he has been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, one can only imagine what colorful commentary will come from “Real America”. I can almost guess that they will now call the Prize unimpressive, or lacking merit, or something silly like that. They will mock the President more and try to belittle it as a meaningless achievement.
I mean come on now, what do you expect from a Party who’s only offering to policy and governance these days is to reject anything from a President who doesn’t “represent” (see look like) “Real America”?
The Republican Party, well most likely the “base” as I’m certain their politicians aren’t so stupid (then again there was the “you lie” incident) will embarrass themselves yet again attacking their President and America for something positive.
I mean give me a break, Democrats gave George Bush hell for sure, the lowest thing was insinuating that he wasn’t intelligent, but they never called him an un-American, socialist, Nazi! They never questioned whether he was a “real American”, and I never recall black Democrats universally rejecting him because he was white. Just saying…. Maybe it’s time that the Democrats hire Karl Rove and craft a strategy that will call all these “Republicans” unpatriotic psuedo citizens, or something.
Either way, it’s worthy of a good laugh today.
Congratulations President Obama for highlighting the great things about America and Americans and bringing even more pride and honor to the office. Those who care about all Americans and all of America regardless of race, religion, sexuality, and party lift our heads a little higher today.
Related articles:
WASHINGTON (AP) — The chairman of the Republican Party is contending that President Barack Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize as result of his “star power” rather than meaningful accomplishments.
Michael Steele issued a statement Friday saying, “The real question Americans are asking is, What has President Obama actually accomplished?”
Steele, who took over the reigns of the party earlier this year, said he thought it was “unfortunate that the president’s star power has outshined tireless advocates who have made real achievements working towards peace and human rights.” He said he doesn’t think Obama will be “receiving any awards from Americans for job creation, fiscal responsibility, or backing up rhetoric with concrete action.”
President Barack Obama wins Nobel Peace Prize
By KARL RITTER and MATT MOORE
Associated Press Writers
AP Photo/Richard Drew |
|
efforts are at far earlier stages than past winners’. The Nobel committee acknowledged that they may not bear fruit at all.
“He got the prize because he has been able to change the international climate,” Nobel Committee chairman Thorbjoern Jagland said. “Some people say, and I understand it, isn’t it premature? Too early? Well, I’d say then that it could be too late to respond three years from now. It is now that we have the opportunity to respond – all of us.”
The selection to some extent reflects a trans-Atlantic divergence on Obama. In Europe and much of the world he is lionized for bringing the United States closer to mainstream global thinking on issues like climate change and multilateralism. At home, the picture is more complicated. As president, Obama is often criticized as he attempts to carry out his agenda – drawing fire over a host of issues from government spending to health care to the conduct of the war in Afghanistan.
U.S. Republican Party Chairman Michael Steele contended that Obama won the prize as a result of his “star power” rather than meaningful accomplishments.
“The real question Americans are asking is, What has President Obama actually accomplished?” Steele said.
Obama’s election and foreign policy moves caused a dramatic improvement in the image of the U.S. around the world. A 25-nation poll of 27,000 people released in July by the Pew Global Attitudes Project found double-digit boosts to the percentage of people viewing the U.S. favorably in countries around the world. That indicator had plunged across the world under President George W. Bush.
“Only very rarely has a person to the same extent as Obama captured the world’s attention and given its people hope for a better future,” Jagland said.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who has made no secret of his admiration for Obama, called the decision the embodiment of the “return of America into the hearts of the people of the world.”
But Obama’s work is far from done, on numerous fronts.
He said he would end the Iraq war but has been slow to bring the troops home and the real end of the U.S. military presence there won’t come until at least 2012.
He’s running a second war in the Muslim world, in Afghanistan – and is seriously considering ramping the number of U.S. troops on the ground and asking for help from others, too.
“I don’t think Obama deserves this. I don’t know who’s making all these decisions. The prize should go to someone who has done something for peace and humanity,” said Ahmad Shabir, 18-year-old student in Kabul. “Since he is the president, I don’t see any change in U.S. strategy in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.”
Obama has said that battling climate change is a priority. But the U.S. seems likely to head into crucial international negotiations set for Copenhagen in December with Obama-backed legislation still stalled in Congress.
Lech Walesa, who won the prize in 1983, questioned whether Obama deserved it now.
“So soon? Too early. He has no contribution so far. He is still at an early stage. He is only beginning to act,” said former Polish President Lech Walesa, a 1983 Nobel Peace laureate.
“This is probably an encouragement for him to act. Let’s see if he perseveres. Let’s give him time to act,” Walesa said.
Unlike the other Nobel Prizes, which are awarded by Swedish institutions, the peace prize is given out by a five-member committee elected by the Norwegian Parliament. Like the Parliament, the committee has a leftist slant, with three members elected by left-of-center parties. Jagland said the decision to honor Obama was unanimous.
The award appeared to be at least partly a slap at Bush from a committee that harshly criticized Obama’s predecessor for his largely unilateral military action in the wake of the Sept. 11 terror attacks. The Nobel committee praised Obama’s creation of “a new climate in international politics” and said he had returned multilateral diplomacy and institutions like the U.N. to the center of the world stage.
“You have to remember that the world has been in a pretty dangerous phase,” Jagland said. “And anybody who can contribute to getting the world out of this situation deserves a Nobel Peace Prize.”
Until seconds before the award, speculation had focused on a wide variety of candidates besides Obama: Zimbabwe’s Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai, a Colombian senator, a Chinese dissident and an Afghan woman’s rights activist, among others. The Nobel committee received a record 205 nominations for this year’s prize, though it was not immediately apparent who nominated Obama.
“The exciting and important thing about this prize is that it’s given to someone … who has the power to contribute to peace,” Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg said.
Archbishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa, who won the prize in 1984, said Obama’s award shows great things are expected from him in coming years.
“It’s an award coming near the beginning of the first term of office of a relatively young president that anticipates an even greater contribution towards making our world a safer place for all,” Tutu said. “It is an award that speaks to the promise of President Obama’s message of hope.”
Obama is the third sitting U.S. president to win the award: President Theodore Roosevelt won in 1906 and President Woodrow Wilson was awarded the prize in 1919.
Wilson received the prize for his role in founding the League of Nations, the hopeful but ultimately failed precursor to the contemporary United Nations.
The Nobel committee chairman said after awarding the 2002 prize to former Democratic President Jimmy Carter, for his mediation in international conflicts, that it should be seen as a “kick in the leg” to the Bush administration’s hard line in the buildup to the Iraq war.
Five years later, the committee honored Bush’s adversary in the 2000 presidential election, Al Gore, for his campaign to raise awareness about global warming.
In July talks in Moscow, Obama and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev agreed that their negotiators would work out a new limit on delivery vehicles for nuclear warheads of between 500 and 1,100. They also agreed that warhead limits would be reduced from the current range of 1,700-2,200 to as low as 1,500. The United States now has about 2,200 such warheads, compared to about 2,800 for the Russians.
But there has been no word on whether either side has started to act on the reductions.
Former Peace Prize winner Mohamed ElBaradei, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna, said Obama has already provided outstanding leadership in the effort to prevent nuclear proliferation.
“In less than a year in office, he has transformed the way we look at ourselves and the world we live in and rekindled hope for a world at peace with itself,” ElBaradei said. “He has shown an unshakable commitment to diplomacy, mutual respect and dialogue as the best means of resolving conflicts.”
Obama also has attempted to restart stalled talks between the Israelis and Palestinians, but just a day after Obama hosted the Israeli and Palestinian leaders in New York, Israeli officials boasted that they had fended off U.S. pressure to halt settlement construction. Moderate Palestinians said they felt undermined by Obama’s failure to back up his demand for a freeze.
Obama was to meet with his top advisers on the Afghan war on Friday to consider a request by Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the U.S. commander in Afghanistan, to send as many as 40,000 more troops to Afghanistan as the U.S war there enters its ninth year.
Obama ordered 21,000 additional troops to Afghanistan earlier this year and has continued the use of unmanned drones for attacks on militants in Afghanistan and Pakistan, a strategy devised by the Bush administration. The attacks often kill or injure civilians living in the area.
Nominators for the prize include former laureates; current and former members of the committee and their staff; members of national governments and legislatures; university professors of law, theology, social sciences, history and philosophy; leaders of peace research and foreign affairs institutes; and members of international courts of law.
In his 1895 will, Alfred Nobel stipulated that the peace prize should go “to the person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between the nations and the abolition or reduction of standing armies and the formation and spreading of peace congresses.”
The committee has taken a wide interpretation of Nobel’s guidelines, expanding the prize beyond peace mediation to include efforts to combat poverty, disease and climate change.
The Norwegian Nobel Committee decided not to inform Obama before the announcement because it didn’t want to wake him up, committee chairman Thorbjoern Jagland said.
“Waking up a president in the middle of the night, this isn’t really something you do,” Jagland said.
—
Associated Press writers Ian MacDougall in Oslo, Celean Jacobson in Johannesburg, George Jahn in Vienna, Monika Scislowska in Warsaw, Poland and Jennifer Loven in Washington contributed to this report.
—
On the Net:
http://www.nobelpeaceprize.org
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President Obama Wins the Nobel Peace Prize
Was my text alert from my AP iPhone app this morning. I had to look again because I didn’t believe it. Jokingly, I stated, will he turn water into wine next? That was a great morning chuckle.
What really got me laughing this morning is when I thought to my self “Boy, the we only care about some of America Party, formally known as the Republican Party is going to have a baby today!” The shear comedy of it all as I speak has the late night writers probably buzzing with new material.
The GOP now famous for only caring about “real America” and their supporters, since the election have been trying to through elephant dung at the President for every little thing from his oratory (from a teleprompter they joke), to his smiling, cool demeanor (aloof they say), to his nomination of Sotamayor to the Supreme Court (he’s a racist), to his policies on the economy and healthcare (he’s a socialist-nazi), to his address to school children (he’s trying to indoctrinate them into the Obama Youth) etc. etc. etc. I mean at every turn they have been whining, crying, “protesting”, over these outrages. They have been such staunch advocates of segregation between Americans that recently when the Olympic Committee shot down AMERICA’s bid to host the Olympics in Chicago, they actually hailed America’s loss as a defeat for Obama!
So now that he has been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, one can only imagine what colorful commentary will come from “Real America”. I can almost guess that they will now call the Prize unimpressive, or lacking merit, or something silly like that. They will mock the President more and try to belittle it as a meaningless achievement.
I mean come on now, what do you expect from a Party who’s only offering to policy and governance these days is to reject anything from a President who doesn’t “represent” (see look like) “Real America”?
The Republican Party, well most likely the “base” as I’m certain their politicians aren’t so stupid (then again there was the “you lie” incident) will embarrass themselves yet again attacking their President and America for something positive.
I mean give me a break, Democrats gave George Bush hell for sure, the lowest thing was insinuating that he wasn’t intelligent, but they never called him an un-American, socialist, Nazi! They never questioned whether he was a “real American”, and I never recall black Democrats universally rejecting him because he was white. Just saying…. Maybe it’s time that the Democrats hire Karl Rove and craft a strategy that will call all these “Republicans” unpatriotic psuedo citizens, or something.
Either way, it’s worthy of a good laugh today.
Congratulations President Obama for highlighting the great things about America and Americans and bringing even more pride and honor to the office. Those who care about all Americans and all of America regardless of race, religion, sexuality, and party lift our heads a little higher today.
Related articles:
GOP chairman scoffs at Obama winning Peace prize
WASHINGTON (AP) — The chairman of the Republican Party is contending that President Barack Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize as result of his “star power” rather than meaningful accomplishments.
Michael Steele issued a statement Friday saying, “The real question Americans are asking is, What has President Obama actually accomplished?”
Steele, who took over the reigns of the party earlier this year, said he thought it was “unfortunate that the president’s star power has outshined tireless advocates who have made real achievements working towards peace and human rights.” He said he doesn’t think Obama will be “receiving any awards from Americans for job creation, fiscal responsibility, or backing up rhetoric with concrete action.”
President Barack Obama wins Nobel Peace Prize
By KARL RITTER and MATT MOORE
Associated Press Writers
AP Photo/Richard Drew
efforts are at far earlier stages than past winners’. The Nobel committee acknowledged that they may not bear fruit at all.
“He got the prize because he has been able to change the international climate,” Nobel Committee chairman Thorbjoern Jagland said. “Some people say, and I understand it, isn’t it premature? Too early? Well, I’d say then that it could be too late to respond three years from now. It is now that we have the opportunity to respond – all of us.”
The selection to some extent reflects a trans-Atlantic divergence on Obama. In Europe and much of the world he is lionized for bringing the United States closer to mainstream global thinking on issues like climate change and multilateralism. At home, the picture is more complicated. As president, Obama is often criticized as he attempts to carry out his agenda – drawing fire over a host of issues from government spending to health care to the conduct of the war in Afghanistan.
U.S. Republican Party Chairman Michael Steele contended that Obama won the prize as a result of his “star power” rather than meaningful accomplishments.
“The real question Americans are asking is, What has President Obama actually accomplished?” Steele said.
Obama’s election and foreign policy moves caused a dramatic improvement in the image of the U.S. around the world. A 25-nation poll of 27,000 people released in July by the Pew Global Attitudes Project found double-digit boosts to the percentage of people viewing the U.S. favorably in countries around the world. That indicator had plunged across the world under President George W. Bush.
“Only very rarely has a person to the same extent as Obama captured the world’s attention and given its people hope for a better future,” Jagland said.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who has made no secret of his admiration for Obama, called the decision the embodiment of the “return of America into the hearts of the people of the world.”
But Obama’s work is far from done, on numerous fronts.
He said he would end the Iraq war but has been slow to bring the troops home and the real end of the U.S. military presence there won’t come until at least 2012.
He’s running a second war in the Muslim world, in Afghanistan – and is seriously considering ramping the number of U.S. troops on the ground and asking for help from others, too.
“I don’t think Obama deserves this. I don’t know who’s making all these decisions. The prize should go to someone who has done something for peace and humanity,” said Ahmad Shabir, 18-year-old student in Kabul. “Since he is the president, I don’t see any change in U.S. strategy in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.”
Obama has said that battling climate change is a priority. But the U.S. seems likely to head into crucial international negotiations set for Copenhagen in December with Obama-backed legislation still stalled in Congress.
Lech Walesa, who won the prize in 1983, questioned whether Obama deserved it now.
“So soon? Too early. He has no contribution so far. He is still at an early stage. He is only beginning to act,” said former Polish President Lech Walesa, a 1983 Nobel Peace laureate.
“This is probably an encouragement for him to act. Let’s see if he perseveres. Let’s give him time to act,” Walesa said.
Unlike the other Nobel Prizes, which are awarded by Swedish institutions, the peace prize is given out by a five-member committee elected by the Norwegian Parliament. Like the Parliament, the committee has a leftist slant, with three members elected by left-of-center parties. Jagland said the decision to honor Obama was unanimous.
The award appeared to be at least partly a slap at Bush from a committee that harshly criticized Obama’s predecessor for his largely unilateral military action in the wake of the Sept. 11 terror attacks. The Nobel committee praised Obama’s creation of “a new climate in international politics” and said he had returned multilateral diplomacy and institutions like the U.N. to the center of the world stage.
“You have to remember that the world has been in a pretty dangerous phase,” Jagland said. “And anybody who can contribute to getting the world out of this situation deserves a Nobel Peace Prize.”
Until seconds before the award, speculation had focused on a wide variety of candidates besides Obama: Zimbabwe’s Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai, a Colombian senator, a Chinese dissident and an Afghan woman’s rights activist, among others. The Nobel committee received a record 205 nominations for this year’s prize, though it was not immediately apparent who nominated Obama.
“The exciting and important thing about this prize is that it’s given to someone … who has the power to contribute to peace,” Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg said.
Archbishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa, who won the prize in 1984, said Obama’s award shows great things are expected from him in coming years.
“It’s an award coming near the beginning of the first term of office of a relatively young president that anticipates an even greater contribution towards making our world a safer place for all,” Tutu said. “It is an award that speaks to the promise of President Obama’s message of hope.”
Obama is the third sitting U.S. president to win the award: President Theodore Roosevelt won in 1906 and President Woodrow Wilson was awarded the prize in 1919.
Wilson received the prize for his role in founding the League of Nations, the hopeful but ultimately failed precursor to the contemporary United Nations.
The Nobel committee chairman said after awarding the 2002 prize to former Democratic President Jimmy Carter, for his mediation in international conflicts, that it should be seen as a “kick in the leg” to the Bush administration’s hard line in the buildup to the Iraq war.
Five years later, the committee honored Bush’s adversary in the 2000 presidential election, Al Gore, for his campaign to raise awareness about global warming.
In July talks in Moscow, Obama and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev agreed that their negotiators would work out a new limit on delivery vehicles for nuclear warheads of between 500 and 1,100. They also agreed that warhead limits would be reduced from the current range of 1,700-2,200 to as low as 1,500. The United States now has about 2,200 such warheads, compared to about 2,800 for the Russians.
But there has been no word on whether either side has started to act on the reductions.
Former Peace Prize winner Mohamed ElBaradei, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna, said Obama has already provided outstanding leadership in the effort to prevent nuclear proliferation.
“In less than a year in office, he has transformed the way we look at ourselves and the world we live in and rekindled hope for a world at peace with itself,” ElBaradei said. “He has shown an unshakable commitment to diplomacy, mutual respect and dialogue as the best means of resolving conflicts.”
Obama also has attempted to restart stalled talks between the Israelis and Palestinians, but just a day after Obama hosted the Israeli and Palestinian leaders in New York, Israeli officials boasted that they had fended off U.S. pressure to halt settlement construction. Moderate Palestinians said they felt undermined by Obama’s failure to back up his demand for a freeze.
Obama was to meet with his top advisers on the Afghan war on Friday to consider a request by Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the U.S. commander in Afghanistan, to send as many as 40,000 more troops to Afghanistan as the U.S war there enters its ninth year.
Obama ordered 21,000 additional troops to Afghanistan earlier this year and has continued the use of unmanned drones for attacks on militants in Afghanistan and Pakistan, a strategy devised by the Bush administration. The attacks often kill or injure civilians living in the area.
Nominators for the prize include former laureates; current and former members of the committee and their staff; members of national governments and legislatures; university professors of law, theology, social sciences, history and philosophy; leaders of peace research and foreign affairs institutes; and members of international courts of law.
In his 1895 will, Alfred Nobel stipulated that the peace prize should go “to the person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between the nations and the abolition or reduction of standing armies and the formation and spreading of peace congresses.”
The committee has taken a wide interpretation of Nobel’s guidelines, expanding the prize beyond peace mediation to include efforts to combat poverty, disease and climate change.
The Norwegian Nobel Committee decided not to inform Obama before the announcement because it didn’t want to wake him up, committee chairman Thorbjoern Jagland said.
“Waking up a president in the middle of the night, this isn’t really something you do,” Jagland said.
—
Associated Press writers Ian MacDougall in Oslo, Celean Jacobson in Johannesburg, George Jahn in Vienna, Monika Scislowska in Warsaw, Poland and Jennifer Loven in Washington contributed to this report.
—
On the Net:
http://www.nobelpeaceprize.org
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Tags: GOP, Nobel Peace Prize, Politics, President Obama
This entry was posted on October 9, 2009, 9:29 am and is filed under Articles of Interest, Commentary, Politics/Policy/Law. You can follow any responses to this entry through RSS 2.0. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.