Sunday, October 11, 2009
Tom Friedman's list of those who Obama should accept the Nobel Peace prize on behalf of:- men and women of the U.S. Army, Navy, Air Force and Marine Corps.
- American soldiers who landed on Omaha Beach on June 6, 1944
- American soldiers and sailors who fought on the high seas and forlorn islands in the Pacific
- American airmen who in June 1948 broke the Soviet blockade of Berlin with an airlift
- American soldiers who protected Europe from Communist dictatorship
- American soldiers who stand guard today at outposts in the mountains and deserts of Afghanistan
- American men and women who are still on patrol today in Iraq
- American soldiers who today help protect a free and Democratic South Korea
- American men and women soldiers who have gone on repeated humanitarian rescue missions after earthquakes and floods
- American airmen and sailors today who keep the sea lanes open and free in the Pacific and Atlantic so world trade can flow unhindered between nations.
- [Obama's] grandfather, Stanley Dunham, who arrived at Normandy six weeks after D-Day
- [Obama's] great-uncle, Charlie Payne, who was among those soldiers who liberated part of the Nazi concentration camp of Buchenwald
- American men and women soldiers, past and present
No diplomats, non-military charity workers, doctors, or human rights activists. Instead, virtually nothing but gun-toting agents of power.
posted by Quiddity at 10/11/2009 01:27:00 AM
6 comments
i first misread the last part as:
"virtually nothing but gun-toting agents of change."
eesh.
No, no, no, no, no.
Obama should accept on behalf of 101st Fighting Keyboarders. No one sacrificed more than they did during Iraq War II. The prize money should go to their Cheetos and Mountain Dew Code Red fund, with a special proviso warning Doughbob Loadpants to "Get Your Own Bag."
"American soldiers who landed on Omaha Beach on June 6, 1944"
While those soldiers were indeed heroic, the fact is that (for better or worse) Naziism was mostly defeated by the USSR, not the Western Allies. (By my count, 5/6 of German casualties were on the eastern front.)
1. Diplomats are gun-toting agents of power. The diplomatic power of a country is a function of its military capability and will.
2. To follow up on Anonymous, if the USSR had been unsuccessful in breaking Nazi Germany on the eastern front, the United States would have defeated it in short order with nuclear weapons in 1945.
3. American soldiers are the world's real human rights activists. The reason why your list of interfering fools gets no respect from Friedman is because they deserve none. What conflicts have been ended by Doctors?, "non-military charity workers" or "human rights" activists? What country went from war and strife to peace and justice because of their efforts?
It would be great if Obama did accept the award on behalf of the American Empire's military might. He would be telling the world to, as the Mustache of Understanding himself would say, "suck on this". And all would be right with the world again.
PS to Anono 3 - Comment three - three game changing human rights activists without a sword: Ghandi, MLK & Mandela off the top of my head.
Jeebus, spell "Gandhi" right, will ya? It's not hard.
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