Doonesbury by Garry Trudeau for October 24, 2009

Yeah, it’s time to stop blaming the Norwegians – especially since Nobel was Swedish.

but he could have turned them down.

@luckylouie, you’re almost right: Nobel was Swedish and all of the Nobel committees are Swedish – except for the Peace price committee. They are Norwegian. I know, it seems strange. Perhaps he thought it would be less political that way. But then perhaps he was wrong.

Yes, he could - but would you? That’s another thing that’s easy to say, and considerably more difficult to do.

Nobel, BTW, specifically asked that the Peace Prize be awarded by Norway. All of the other prizes are awarded by Sweden.

Really smart cookie for a Swed .

Nixon got us out of Vietnam and normalize diplomatic relations with China. Guess they don’t give peace prizes to Quakers.

(I don’t go there because no matter how lonely it gets I don’t want to be made in China.)

from the Quakers: 2010 recommended discretionary spending:

57% Military (Dept. of Defense, War, Veteran’s Affairs) 6% Health & Human Services 6% Transportation 4% State & other International Programs 4% Housing & Urban Development 4% Education 4% Other Agencies 3% Homeland Security 2% Energy 2% Agriculture 2% Justice 1% Environmental Protection Agency 1% NASA 1% Commerce 1% Labor 1% Treasury 1% Interior

“get the picture? yes, we see.”

It can’t be that difficult to understand the implications of the President of the United States singlehandedly changing U.S. Foreign Policy from go-it-alone, we’ll invade if you dare us, cowboy diplomacy to actual let’s talk diplomacy.

Unless, of course, it’s one of those things you simply refuse to believe, like religious fundamentalism.

Bush felt we could fight wars in Iraq and Afghanistan indefinitely, and still found time to threaten North Korea, Iran, Venezuela, Russia, Syria, Somalia, and anybody else who crossed his line of vision.

Reversal of the Bush Doctrine (Unilateralism, Attacking countries that harbor terrorists, Preemptive strikes, and Democratic regime change) absolutely deserves a Peace Prize.

@Susan001, I’m not sure if you’re trying to contrast the two, but the primary usage of dynamite is for the betterment of mankind.

Lewreader: The Congress got us out Vietnam.

If I recall correctly, the evacuation of Americans from Saigon occurred during April of 1975, eight months after President Gerald Ford succeeded Nixon.

Actually, it was the Vietcong and North Vietnamese who got us out of Vietnam….

Oopsie, my bad. The Internet is great – you can post some wrong information and you KNOW you’ll get the straight scoop in no time.

The VietCong were decimated in 1968 as a result of the Tet Offensive.

Kissinger and Le Duc Tho got us out of Vietnam.

“Certain war has yielded to an uncertain peace in Vietnam. Where there was once only despair and dislocation, today there is hope, however frail.” – Thomas R. Byrne, United States ambassador to Norway, representing Henry A. Kissinger at the ceremonies for the 1973 Nobel Peace Prize

Given the history of Communism, I can’t see how anyone could think that NV would leave the South alone without any kind of a deterrent.

Anyone got stats on South Vietnamese casualties from December 13, 1974 onward? That’s when the NV invasion started.

The Swedes were clever - outsourcing the most controversial of the prizes to Norway…

“The Accords mandated nationwide elections by 1956, which Diem refused to hold, despite repeated calls from the North for talks to discuss elections.”[16] (free elections)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vietnam#History

This may have had a teensy tad to do , for influencing “evacuation”. There’s a myriad of other reasons .

In reference to Obama returning the prize, I suspect he wishes he could. It’s not that simple. Mother Theresa tried desperately to refuse it, finally she just gave the money to charity, as Obama is doing. For the President of the US, or any country for that matter, to refuse it would be an international insult. And the radical right would criticize him just as much for doing that.

@beaniebones which is probably why Le Duc Tho is the only one who ever refused it. he probably didn’t care about making an international insult since so much of the world seemed to be against his country at the time (if memory serves me correctly). as to farren’s question about would i turn it down… in the event that it happened, i would not. nor am i suggesting Obama should have, merely that it was an option.

Didn’t obummer join the baseball HoF by watching the BB playoffs???

Re: Vietnam

Nixon SAID in his first campaign that he had a plan to get out of Vietnam. However, once in office, he escalated the war. He ordered a secret and unauthorized invasion of Cambodia, for example. (That was what led to the protest and killings at Kent State University.)

Nixon promised to get us out of Vietnam in 1968, but we were still there when he ran again in 1972. (I entered the US Air Force in March, 1971. We were increasing spending on Vietnam-related programs at the time.)

If Nixon had kept his promise, it’s likely that two of my friends would now be alive and enjoying their grandchildren. They were killed in Vietnam in 1970 & 1972. All told, about 21,000 Americans died in Vietnam during Nixon’s tenure. (About 36,000 died during LBJ’s terms.)

Nixon, like GW Bush, liked to show his “support” for the troops by denying pay raises passed by Congress, cutting benefits, reducing funding for training, all the while funneling more money to big corporations.

What always bugs me when people refer to the Kent State killings, is remembering that at the time they happened, I noticed there had also been a steady stream of killings of black students, also for political reasons. Those never made any big newspaper nor were ever mentioned, except briefly when they happened.

And no, I’m not black. I’m Caucasian. But I often notice inconvenient things like this.