Didn’t President Obama just deploy 13,000 more troops to Afghanistan a few hours ago? Aren’t troops still dying there? Has military spending decreased?

This would be relevant if Afghanistan was a war of aggression, but it was not. It is a just war. Even the UN agrees. Or was FDR wrong for fighting Japan after Pearl Harbor?

Has the Administration repealed the Patriot Act and FISA Amendment? In other words, are warrantless wiretaps of the American public a thing of the past?

Has the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act been repealed? Has the Commodity Futures Modernization Act been repealed? Has Glass Steagall been reenacted? Has NAFTA and GATT been renegotiated? Have lobbyists and donors left Washington? Has President Obama disavowed support of the Class Action Reform Act?

None of those have any relevance to the cause of peace.

The reality that the Nobel Peace prize is given as a political sop based on the ideology of the presenters has never been more evident.

As Greg explained in his “open letter”, “The ultimate goal, and perhaps only noble goal, of politics is to find and support peace, within and between nations. Were you thinking there was some other objective, or that politics, ideally and in its most expansive form, was for something else?”

Armenia and Turkey just signed an historic peace deal – who brokered that?

Um, the Obama Administration:

The administration of President Barack Obama had been pressing the parties to reach agreement.

The ceremony was attended by US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, as well as Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and the EU’s High Representative for the Common Foreign and Security Policy, Javier Solana.

Mrs Clinton later said the US would build on the “milestone” that had been achieved, but admitted “concerns on both sides” had delayed the signing.

A senior state department official told Associated Press that Mr Obama had called Mrs Clinton “to congratulate her and the team” on their role in the signing.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/8299712.stm

(Besides, even if the deal had had nothing to do with the US, the deal was done long after the Nobel nominations deadline, so has very very little relevance over who the Nobel Peace Prize 2009 should’ve gone to)

I should know–I’ve been called “more cynical than it’s healthy to be.”

I think Michael Moore is right in that too many of us are dropping the ball, action-wise, and letting the loud-mouth right-wing idiots control the dialogue. OTOH, as it seems that “the American people,” & thus congress, are more swayed by scare rhetoric than reason, where does that leave us? Cursed to adopt the same tactics? Even when we do, it’s hard to sound sincere…But it’s probably past time for a large anti-war protest in Washington. (Where’s the draft when you need it?)

Diane, veteran of the 60’s…

I know we got distracted. But let’s not forget, nothing has changed.

Has the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act been repealed? Has the Commodity Futures Modernization Act been repealed? Has Glass Steagall been reenacted? Has NAFTA and GATT been renegotiated? Have lobbyists and donors left Washington? Has President Obama disavowed support of the Class Action Reform Act?

But boy, how about that Nobel Peace Prize? The President can go pee-pee on the potty.

Otherwise, thanks for the post–I fully concur with Maddow’s sentiments.

IMO, the Nobel committee effectively gave the award to us (those of us who voted for Obama, anyway), in hopes of encouraging us to stay strong–and vigilant. They must have known that, even with Obama’s strong mandate, we’d soon return to our egocentric divisiveness.

Apollo 13
Saving Private Ryan
Toy Story (if you have a kid the right age, which I did)
The Green Mile
And a couple of others

Cult-wise, the man with one red shoe and Dragnet are good too.