Obama wins Nobel Peace Prize


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Freakzilla
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Re: Obama wins Nobel Peace Prize

Post by Freakzilla »

Obama accepted the prize today.
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Re: Obama wins Nobel Peace Prize

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I was initially against him getting it, but then I found out about other people who got it for doing less than the award deserves (in my opinion), and Obama is nowhere near the bottom of the pile.
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Re: Obama wins Nobel Peace Prize

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30,000-troop surge followed by the accepting of a Nobel peace prize. I must say, that's a little fucked up.

Then again, the prize was probably awarded to him mainly for being the first black president. That is still pretty important.
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Re: Obama wins Nobel Peace Prize

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Drunken Idaho wrote:30,000-troop surge followed by the accepting of a Nobel peace prize. I must say, that's a little fucked up.

Then again, the prize was probably awarded to him mainly for being the first black president. That is still pretty important.
That troop surge is totally necessary for peace. Pacifism ain't going to work in Afghanistan, and if we just were to walk away it would result in much more violence in the long run. I wish Canada would add troops there as well, and get the job done properly. Obviously has to be combined with rebuilding their economy or it'll all be for nothing, but unfortunately there is no way to do it "peacefully".

Plus, you make the mess you clean it up, and man did we make one hell of a mess.
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Idahopotato
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Re: Obama wins Nobel Peace Prize

Post by Idahopotato »

A Thing of Eternity wrote:
Drunken Idaho wrote:30,000-troop surge followed by the accepting of a Nobel peace prize. I must say, that's a little fucked up.

Then again, the prize was probably awarded to him mainly for being the first black president. That is still pretty important.
That troop surge is totally necessary for peace. Pacifism ain't going to work in Afghanistan, and if we just were to walk away it would result in much more violence in the long run. I wish Canada would add troops there as well, and get the job done properly. Obviously has to be combined with rebuilding their economy or it'll all be for nothing, but unfortunately there is no way to do it "peacefully".

Plus, you make the mess you clean it up, and man did we make one hell of a mess.
How much Afghanistan history do you know? We certainly didn't start that mess over there, and no one has ever won shit over there. Nothing good will come of this. And I don't know this for sure, but isn't Obama the first world leader to get the Nobel Peace prize while his nation is in the middle of two wars, with a serious escalation in the way of troops, arms, and casualties on pretty much a daily basis? I am sorry my friend, but I have to disagree with the statement that the surge is necessary for peace. The surge is necessary to increase the GDP through the military industrial complex, which will do nothing in alleviating unemployment. What is good for a nation's economy is not always good for that nation's people.
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Re: Obama wins Nobel Peace Prize

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A Thing of Eternity wrote:
Drunken Idaho wrote:30,000-troop surge followed by the accepting of a Nobel peace prize. I must say, that's a little fucked up.

Then again, the prize was probably awarded to him mainly for being the first black president. That is still pretty important.
That troop surge is totally necessary for peace. Pacifism ain't going to work in Afghanistan, and if we just were to walk away it would result in much more violence in the long run. I wish Canada would add troops there as well, and get the job done properly. Obviously has to be combined with rebuilding their economy or it'll all be for nothing, but unfortunately there is no way to do it "peacefully".

Plus, you make the mess you clean it up, and man did we make one hell of a mess.

Dude, another 18 months isn't going to accomplish any of that shit. I strongly suggest you read Matthew Hoh's resignation letter if you haven't already. He makes some very convincing points. We're hanging around in the middle of an Afghan civil war which has been going on for decades. This civil war runs deep. You think we can just set up decent government, economy and security and walk away and everything is going to work perfectly over there? Never going to happen.

And surely you've heard about Karzai's brother being on the CIA payroll. He's getting paid to continue to be one of the biggest drug dealers in Afghanistan (and the world) while simultaneously recruiting Afghans for some kind of CIA-directed paramilitary force. Meanwhile, al Qaeda is still getting most of its funding from the same drug industry that this guy is fuelling. What the fuck kind of strategy is that?

Osama bin Laden has said more than once that he doesn't care if he gets caught or killed, or if his entire gang is squashed. He said that what he really wants is the US to run out of money doing it. It worked with the Soviets, right?

I say GTFO.
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Re: Obama wins Nobel Peace Prize

Post by A Thing of Eternity »

Idahopotato wrote:
A Thing of Eternity wrote:
Drunken Idaho wrote:30,000-troop surge followed by the accepting of a Nobel peace prize. I must say, that's a little fucked up.

Then again, the prize was probably awarded to him mainly for being the first black president. That is still pretty important.
That troop surge is totally necessary for peace. Pacifism ain't going to work in Afghanistan, and if we just were to walk away it would result in much more violence in the long run. I wish Canada would add troops there as well, and get the job done properly. Obviously has to be combined with rebuilding their economy or it'll all be for nothing, but unfortunately there is no way to do it "peacefully".

Plus, you make the mess you clean it up, and man did we make one hell of a mess.
How much Afghanistan history do you know? We certainly didn't start that mess over there, and no one has ever won shit over there. Nothing good will come of this. And I don't know this for sure, but isn't Obama the first world leader to get the Nobel Peace prize while his nation is in the middle of two wars, with a serious escalation in the way of troops, arms, and casualties on pretty much a daily basis? I am sorry my friend, but I have to disagree with the statement that the surge is necessary for peace. The surge is necessary to increase the GDP through the military industrial complex, which will do nothing in alleviating unemployment. What is good for a nation's economy is not always good for that nation's people.
Obviously we didn't start that place off in it's messed up history, that goes back quite a ways, but we certainly did cause a lot of damage and if we don't make sure to rebuild the country as best we can they're just going to hate us even more when they eventually end up under complete control by extremists again. Without outside help that country is doomed to a long time in desperate poverty and violence. I'm not saying our troops are necessarily doing what it takes to help them out, but to just walk away after invading and seriously fucking up a country is dishnourable.

95% of rebuilding that country is going to be helping them in non-military aspects, but until their own police and military can handle the insurgents I think it's our responsibilty to help them in every way we possibly can.

Trust me, I'm a pretty anti-war guy, I'm 100% against Iraq and cheered when our Prime Minister essentially told Bush to fuck himself with a sharp object for invading that country. I was never even a compltet supporter of Afghanistan, but we did what we did and now we need to help them rebuild. It's essential not only for their safety and wellbeing, but ours as well.

No, no one has ever won anything over there, and I don't expect the troops to take out the insurgents - what I do expect is for them to keep the insurgents under control for long enough for that country to establish a good democracy (even if we have to knock heads to force that on their leaders) and a good economy. Once those things happen and have been in place for a while, support for the insurgents will dwindle and dwindle until they're reduced to a level where Afgan troops can handle them on their own.



Obviously though, if we all just pull out in a year or two then, yeah, might as well get out now. I don't dissagree with anyone on that, and I don't dissagree that the situation that country is in is way beyond our ability to help repair any time soon, and that right now a lot of what we're doing is causing even more damage. Trust me, I'm no expect but I am reasonably well informed on this issue.


I'm talking about leaving troops their for a hundred years if necessary.

EDIT TO ADD:

We've been over this argument several times already (Idahopotatoe I know this is your first run in with it here though), and we just dissagree. I think leaving accomplishes only one thing: getting it off our minds. Many people dissagree with me, including the people in power apparently. I have no power, so I wouldn't stress too much about trying to convince me that somehow that country is going to be better off without us there, my opinion doesn't count for much. I believe they're better off with us there.
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Re: Obama wins Nobel Peace Prize

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We've (USA) been rebuilding Afghanastan since we've been there.
Under the Taliban, only 900,000 boys and no girls were enrolled in schools. Today, as a result of efforts by the Afghan government, the U.S., and other donors, more than six million children are in school. A third of them are girls. With 80 percent of schools severely damaged or destroyed by the Taliban, USAID constructed or repaired more than 680 schools and printed 60 million textbooks. Beyond its accelerated learning program that enrolled over 170,000 students – more than half of them girls – USAID support to government has translated into a significant increase in female enrollment at secondary and university levels.

The health status of Afghans is among the worst in the world. One out of every five Afghan children dies before the age of five. To this end, USAID and other donors have worked so that now more than 85 percent of the population has access to some form of health care, up from nine percent in 2002. In addition, the infant mortality rate has dropped by 22 percent, partially due to USAID’s support of midwife training, which has increased the number of midwives from 404 to nearly 1,700 in six years. Finally, Afghanistan, one of only four countries in the world where polio remains endemic, has seen over 90 percent of children under five years old vaccinated against the disease since 2002, partially due to USAID support.
http://www.usaid.gov/locations/asia/cou ... ghanistan/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
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Re: Obama wins Nobel Peace Prize

Post by A Thing of Eternity »

Freakzilla wrote:We've (USA) been rebuilding Afghanastan since we've been there.
Under the Taliban, only 900,000 boys and no girls were enrolled in schools. Today, as a result of efforts by the Afghan government, the U.S., and other donors, more than six million children are in school. A third of them are girls. With 80 percent of schools severely damaged or destroyed by the Taliban, USAID constructed or repaired more than 680 schools and printed 60 million textbooks. Beyond its accelerated learning program that enrolled over 170,000 students – more than half of them girls – USAID support to government has translated into a significant increase in female enrollment at secondary and university levels.

The health status of Afghans is among the worst in the world. One out of every five Afghan children dies before the age of five. To this end, USAID and other donors have worked so that now more than 85 percent of the population has access to some form of health care, up from nine percent in 2002. In addition, the infant mortality rate has dropped by 22 percent, partially due to USAID’s support of midwife training, which has increased the number of midwives from 404 to nearly 1,700 in six years. Finally, Afghanistan, one of only four countries in the world where polio remains endemic, has seen over 90 percent of children under five years old vaccinated against the disease since 2002, partially due to USAID support.
http://www.usaid.gov/locations/asia/cou ... ghanistan/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
I'm sure this isn't how you meant it, but there is a lot more to that "we" in Afghanistan than "USA".
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