Earning His Nobel Prize

http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/earning_his_nobel_prize_20100407/

Earning His Nobel Prize

Posted on Apr 6, 2010


AP Photo/Pete Souza, White House

President Barack Obama discusses the START treaty during a phone call with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on March 26, 2010, in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington.

By Robert Scheer



At last, a believable sighting of that peace president many of us thought we had elected. Give Barack Obama credit, big time, for the startling progress he has made in tempering the threat of nuclear annihilation.

The Obama administration’s Nuclear Posture Review Report for the first time prohibits “first use” of nuclear weapons against nations complying with the nonproliferation treaty. It also pledges a halt to U.S. efforts to modernize such weapons, as had been proposed by then-President George W. Bush in his call for new nuclear “bunker busters.”

Whereas his predecessor succeeded only in eliminating the nonexistent Iraqi nukes, this president has forged a treaty with the Russians that will reduce the world’s supply of the devil’s weapons by one-third. But it was essential to follow that up with a clear departure from the always-insane policy that the U.S. has a right to develop and use such weapons as conventional tools of war.

That is the right that Harry Truman acted on in perpetrating the most atrocious act of terrorism in world history when he annihilated the civilian populations of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. That is what spawned the nuclear arms race that so troubles us today, especially regarding North Korea and Iran.

Yet until Tuesday no American president had renounced the immoral claim that our nation had some God-granted right to use those weapons again. While we consistently insisted it was morally repugnant for any other state to follow in our footsteps, we continued to build ever deadlier versions of these intrinsically heinous weapons.

But that madness ended when Obama on Tuesday affirmed an all-important distinction that Bush, more than any other president, had insisted on blurring—the distinction between nuclear and all other weapons, including the chemical and biological varieties. Lumping them together as weapons of mass destruction denies the global life-ending threat that nukes alone present.

snip//

After decades of both Republican and Democratic administrations indulging the absurdity that “nuclear war fighting” could have a humane outcome, Obama has reversed course. It took 150 meetings, including 30 at the White House, and the president’s frequent direct intervention. The outcome is a bold statement of nuclear sanity, and for that President Obama should be applauded.

Sorry, but he has yet to earn that peace prize. Don't get me wrong, negotiating an arms reduction treaty is a good thing, but it's pretty old hat. Now ending the wars, that would be worthy of the peace prize. But sadly, it doesn't look like he's going to do that.

...will ever be. Iraq is winding down and can barely even still be called a war. Yea yea, I know, you disagree. I don't care. That doesn't change the fact that Iraq is, for all purposes, pretty much over. We are engaged in 1 serious war. And that one war is kids stuff compared to what a nuke could do. This is a bigger deal than the wars.

People who "forget" the facts cannot speak the truth.

...looks like.

;)

Did you forget that President Obama announced firm, conditions-based timelines for withdrawal from both Iraq and Afghanistan last year? BTW, the Iraq war drawdown is going according to schedule. Pullout from Afghanistan is to begin in July 2011.

<<Now ending the wars, that would be worthy of the peace prize.>>

President Obama has effectively ended both wars by announcing his withdrawal plans, one of which is proceeding according to schedule (Iraq) and the other is set to begin in July 2011 (Afghanistan).

<<negotiating an arms reduction treaty is a good thing, but it's pretty old hat>>

You conveniently ignored the groundbreaking move outlined in the OP:

"Yet until Tuesday no American president had renounced the immoral claim that our nation had some God-granted right to use those weapons again. While we consistently insisted it was morally repugnant for any other state to follow in our footsteps, we continued to build ever deadlier versions of these intrinsically heinous weapons.

But that madness ended when Obama on Tuesday affirmed an all-important distinction that Bush, more than any other president, had insisted on blurring—the distinction between nuclear and all other weapons, including the chemical and biological varieties. Lumping them together as weapons of mass destruction denies the global life-ending threat that nukes alone present.

snip//

After decades of both Republican and Democratic administrations indulging the absurdity that “nuclear war fighting” could have a humane outcome, Obama has reversed course. It took 150 meetings, including 30 at the White House, and the president’s frequent direct intervention. The outcome is a bold statement of nuclear sanity, and for that President Obama should be applauded."

and encouraged him to do when it came to nuclear weapons, in awarding the prize.

I guess you'll never accept that it is not your prize or our prize that someone awarded the president without our blessing. Our opinions make no difference, though I for one agree with the committee in their mission statement, as well as in the will of Alfred Nobel.

there is nothing this President can do that will impress you, no matter what, there is
always going to be some smart ass comment from you every bloody time.

What is it? Do you need some LOVE?

The republicans are turning inside out, so it must be in the right direction.

"The republicans are turning inside out, so it must be in the right direction."

:P

Agreement with Iran and North Korea.