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Chinese Dissident Wins Nobel Peace Prize; China Outraged
Imprisoned Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo won the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize today for "his long and non-violent struggle for fundamental human rights" - a prize likely to enrage the Chinese government, which had warned the Nobel committee not to honor him.
Liu Xiaobo Thorbjoern Jagland, the Norwegian Nobel Committee chairman, said Liu Xiaobo was a symbol for the fight for human rights in China and the government should expect that its policies face scrutiny."China has become a big power in economic terms as well as political terms, and it is normal that big powers should be under criticism," Jagland said.
Unlike some in China's highly fractured and persecuted dissident community, the 54-year-old Liu has been an ardent advocate for peaceful, gradual political change, rather than a violent confrontation with the government.
In China, broadcasts of CNN, which is available in tourist hotels, upmarket foreign hotels and places where foreigners gather, went black during the Nobel announcement and when reports about the award later aired.
China's Foreign Ministry did not immediately comment, but a spokeswoman said recently that choosing Liu would go against the prize's aims.
"The person you just mentioned was sentenced to jail by Chinese judicial authorities for violating Chinese law. I think his acts are completely contrary to the aspirations of the Nobel Peace Prize," said spokeswoman Jiang Yu.
It was the first Nobel for the Chinese dissident community since it resurfaced after the country's communist leadership launched economic, but not political reforms three decades ago. The win could jolt a current debate among the leadership and the elite over whether China should begin democratic reforms and if so how quickly.
The Nobel citation said China's new status a big economic and political power must entail increased responsibility.
"China is in breach of several international agreements to which it is a signatory, as well as of its own provisions concerning political rights," it said, citing an article in China's constitution about freedom of speech and assembly.
"In practice, these freedoms have proved to be distinctly curtailed for China's citizens," the citation said.
The document Liu co-authored, Charter 08, called for greater freedoms and an end to the Communist Party's political dominance. It was an intentional echo of Charter 77, the famous call for human rights in then-Czechoslovakia that led to the 1989 Velvet Revolution that swept away communist rule.
"The democratization of Chinese politics can be put off no longer," Charter 08 says.
Thousands of Chinese signed Charter 08, and the Communist Party took the document as a direct challenge.
Police arrested Liu hours before Charter 08 was due to be released in December 2008. Given a brief trial last Christmas Day, Liu was convicted of subversion for writing Charter 08 and other political tracts and sentenced to 11 years in prison.
In a year with a record 237 nominations for the peace prize, Liu had been considered a favorite, with open support from winners Archbishop Desmond Tutu, the Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama and others.
When the Tibet-born Dalai Lama won the peace prize in 1989, both the Chinese government and some of the public were angry - the exiled Buddhist leader was endlessly vilified in official propaganda as a traitor for his calls for more autonomy for Tibet.
The son of a soldier, Liu joined China's first wave of university students in the mid-1970s after the chaotic decade of the Cultural Revolution.
Liu's writing first took a political turn in 1988, when he became a visiting scholar in Oslo - his first time outside China.
Liu cut short a visiting scholar stint at Columbia University months later to join the Tiananmen Square protests in Beijing in 1989. He and three other older activists famously persuaded students to peacefully leave the square hours before the deadly June 4 crackdown.
Liu went to prison after the crackdown and was released in early 1991 because he had repented and "performed major meritorious services," state media said at the time, without elaborating.
Still, five years later Liu was sent to a re-education camp for three years for co-writing an open letter that demanded the impeachment of then-President Jiang Zemin.
President Barack Obama won the Nobel peace prize last year.
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Show AllWhat an interesting contrast to last year's war-mongering Nobel Peace Prize winner!!!!!
alas! there's no contrast, if you dig a little deeper than the surface.
Why don't you tell us.
it turns out, much to your chagrin, that Xiaobo and O-bomber are both on the global neo-nazi capitalist payroll. read his "charter 08" on wikipedia.
Sorry, you have no proof that Xiaobo is on the "global neo-nazi capitalist" payroll. All you have are your unsubstantiated theories.
P.S - China is a capitalist state you know.
A long non-violent struggle for peace.
Well done Nobel Committee. It is like you woke up from some bad dream and did the right thing this year to make up for last year...
I would have preferred to see the Flotilla members that have been peacefully trying to break the Gaza blockade win the prize.
I think their turn will come.
Quote: Imprisoned Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo won the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize today for "his long and non-violent struggle for fundamental human rights".
Courageous and admirable yes but how has his struggle advanced peace among nations? When I scour the world of candidates for that price I conclude that no one should get it for a long time to come.
China will no doubt react with it's customary Sun Tzu on steroids strategy _
I _ Stake out an inflexible position. Norway must unconditionally rescind Nobel prize & apologize for 'hurting the feelings of the Chinese people' and 'interfering in' its domestic affairs _ no negotiating.
II _ Claim the moral high ground. This will be played as another example of the big, bad 'West,' Norway being a puppet of the US, disparaging the legal system of a 'developing country' whose superior, downtrodden, misunderstood 'Asian Values' it cannot possible comprehend.
III _ Respond in kind by torturing Liu 先生, persecuting his family, locking up more dissidents, punishing Western countries with trade & other sanctions, locking up some foreigners for 'unrelated' reason & just going on a general big diplomatic tantrum until it wins some financial gain.
They'll no doubt use the absolute stupidity of that Obama award to their full advantage, playing on some legitimate international anti-American sentiments to win sympathy abroad & stoke up domestic nationalism. As stupid as awarding Obama was, please do not let the Chinese use it to manipulate your opinion, or to cloud their sadistic lunacy.
I am not going to comment on the relative "worthiness" of this person when it came to being awarded "The Peace Prize" by the Nobel Committee.
I can not help but notice that the awarding of the Prize to Barack Obama last year, a warmonger, a person who claims the right to assassinate such "dissidents" around the world, and one that harbors people that have ordered the torture of others in prisons , and Liu Xiaobo awarded it THIS year, is pure political gamesmanship.
The CONTRAST between last years winner and this one and the FACT that they one one hand award the peace prize to a Barack Obama for being one of the VERY people Liu Xiaobo battles against has hopelessly tainted this award.
I can not praise the prize Committee .
>>China is in breach of several international agreements to which it is a signatory, as well as of its own provisions concerning political rights," it said, citing an article in China's constitution about freedom of speech and assembly.
So why on Earth was this awarded to Barack Obama last year? WHY?
This is a peace prize. China might well be in violation of treaties but so too is the United States of America. China has NOT invaded Iraq and Afghanistan and is not bombing Pakistan.
I can only conclude that this "Peace Prize Committee" is totally compromised and its goal is not the promting of PEACE but of the Foreign Policy of the United States of America and her allies.
Again this not intended as a slight on Liu Xiaobo .
Well said.
Chinese Nationalists have been greatly offended.
the only thing you are proving is your own lack of imagination.
Fantasy
It would be neat if Liu were to decline the "honor" as he did not want to stand in the ranks with war criminals Henry Kissinger, and Barack Obama.
Ah well...
Lê Ðức Thọ ( pronunciation (help·info)) (October 14, 1911 – October 13, 1990) was a Vietnamese revolutionary, general, diplomat, and politician, who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize jointly with United States Secretary of State Henry Kissinger in 1973, although he declined it.
Lê Ðức Thọ was born Phan Đình Khải in the Nam Ha province of Vietnam.
In 1930, Lê Ðức Thọ helped found the Indochinese Communist Party. French colonial authorities imprisoned him from 1930 to 1936 and again from 1939 to 1944. After his release in 1945, he helped lead the Việt Minh, the Vietnamese independence movement, against the French, until the Geneva Accords were signed in 1954. He then joined the Lao Dong Politburo of the Vietnam Workers' Party in 1955, now the Communist Party of Vietnam. Lê oversaw the Communist insurgency that began in 1956 against the South Vietnamese government.
From 1978 to 1982 Lê Ðức Thọ was named by Hanoi to act as chief advisor to the Kampuchean United Front for National Salvation (FUNSK) and later to the nascent People's Republic of Kampuchea. Lê Ðức Thọ's mission was to ensure that Khmer nationalism would not override Vietnam's interests in Cambodia after the Khmer Rouge was overthrown.[1]
He was the Standing Member of the Central Committee's Secretariat of the Party from 1982 to 1986 and later became the Advisor of Party's Central Committee.
How does any one not feel affinity for this Nobel peace prize receipient. Especially one isolated by unjust imprisonment and isolation etc. The issue is not if the committee gets it right sometimes and wrong at other times. What is its overarching agenda? The moment you are bestowed with their impramatur, you are compromised.
This is what make western imperialism so penicious and wicked. It's bedfellows and facilitators are a mile wide and an inch deep.
The IMF, World Bank,Vatican, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, Doctors without Borders, National Geographic(CIA operatives in indeginous cultures), Oxfam, WHO, Nobel Committee, Constellation of 3rd world NGOs, , 3rd world missionaries and " do gooders", peacer corp, etc, etc. are all part of a cabal of shared interest. They do stategic evil by doing tactical good. A conspiracy of thieves. And no, they do not have to seat at " Taco Bell" to conspire among each other.
Whatever happened to the legions of Political Prisoners in the US prisons, the numerous Black Panthers who have been in US prisons since the 70s under blantantly dubious charges.
Or say Palestinians and Arab peaceniks who continiously labor against oppression
The extent to which we give a modicum of respect to these front groups and organizations is the extent to which we are unwitting co-conspirators by proxy.
http://apracticalpolicy.org/2007/01/26/art-literature-and-the-cia/
CORRECT. you put the Nobel Peace Prize itself in Perspective.
put it this way..committees, peace prize in nobel , or the Chinese Communist Party , or the US Congress, or a corporate boardroom, or Chevron's inner sanctum with Condoleeza Rice once lusting: "if we can just GIT IN THAR..(iraq)...the Sky's the limit")...
are , in the final analysis, COMMITTEES, consisting of individuals -- one year a different group, the following another group....
who knows what their Inner agendas are...who they are close to ?
but when such a "committee" chooses
Henry Kissinger and his fellow war criminal Obama as Peace prize winners...and then the "honor" was rejected BY another awardee -- the Vietnamese who co-signed with kissinger to end the vietnam war because the vietnamese did NOT approve of being co-awarded WITH KISSINGER....
not just the particular year's committee, but the Peace Prize itself is, one way or another COMPROMISED.
yes -- imo, china is WRONG in making a mountain out of this. sooner or later . things will change . but that is UP TO THE CHINESE party and the chinese people..not UP to some western , COMPROMISED committee calling for china to "democratize"
which itself is a western concept that is HUGELY COMPROMISED due to certain countries themselves that use democracy as a battering ram that causes ...what else?
WAR and WAR CRIMES...and then...self-righteously aware or deny "peace prizes"......
to a WORTHY person one year ...and a WAR CRIMINAL another year.
did people know that MAHATMA GANDHI was denied the award several times....and only awarded it POSTHUMOUSLY?
did people know that ADOLF HITLER was on the LIST of potential awardees?
================================
The ignoble Nobel
Jimmy Carter gets his peace prize next week. Just don't mention Nicaragua, Korea or East Timor
(9)
Tariq Ali
The Guardian, Saturday 7 December 2002 01.33 GMT
Article history
On Tuesday, former US president Jimmy Carter will fly to Oslo and receive the Nobel Peace Prize from the unassuming bicycling monarch of Norway. Why him? Why now? And what is the real aim of the peace prize?
When it was first established in 1900, the Nobel committee clearly thought it should be awarded to people who really did believe in peaceful solutions and non-violence. Accordingly, in 1901, the first brace of recipients were Jean Henry Dumont, the Swiss founder of the Red Cross, and Frédéric Passy, the French dreamer who founded the International League for a Permanent Peace. Similar recipients were sought and found over the next four years.
A rearguard action must have been mounted soon after, because in 1906 the prize was awarded to Theodore Roosevelt, the US president. To be fair, this swashbuckling, aggressive leader never hid his love of war and adventure. In The Rough Riders (1899), a riveting account of the Spanish-American war (which led to the establishment of the base atGuantanamo Bay), Teddy describes an engagement with the Spanish enemy in Cuba: "By this time we were all in the spirit of the thing and greatly excited by the charge, the men cheering and running forward between shots, while the delighted faces of the foremost officers, like Captain CJ Stevens, of the Ninth, as they ran at the head of their troops, will always stay in my mind."
The imperial resolve of the old warrior is admired to this day. Donald Rumsfeld, the US defence secretary, has a plaque in his office with a quotation from Roosevelt in praise of war and empire. The prescience of the Nobel committee can only be admired.
The decision must have led to a vigorous debate in which the doves triumphed. For the next four years, the prize was awarded to genuine peace activists. Soon after, the blood of the first world war soiled the drawing rooms of the belle époque. A traumatised Nobel committee went into hibernation. No prizes were awarded between 1914 and 1919, with the exception of the prize given to the Red Cross in 1917.
This is slightly surprising since there was no shortage of distinguished thinkers and politicians opposed to the war: Keir Hardie and Bertrand Russell in Britain; the French Socialist leader, Jean Jaures, who was assassinated for his hostility to the conflict; the German Socialist member of parliament, Karl Liebknecht, who voted against war credits in the Reichstag and declared that "a patriot was an international blackleg", and his colleague Rosa Luxemburg, who was imprisoned for her fiery anti-war speeches; and yes, two unknown Russian exiles, Lenin and Trotsky, who convened a European conference in the Swiss town of Zimmerwald to oppose the war. None of these people was considered suitable for the prize.
on the NOBEL PRIZE continued
===================
There was no doubt in 1920. The architect of the Treaty of Versailles was the unanimous choice of the committee. Both variants of US imperial power - Teddy Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson - had now been rewarded. A pity that no member of the committee had bothered to read Keynes' lucid pamphlet, The Economic Consequences of the Peace, which predicted the dire results that led to the rise of fascism in Germany.
Throughout the 1920s, the committee reflected a pathetic helplessness in the face of a growing crisis. Politicians, usually of the same liberal-conservative stripe, were regularly rewarded. During the 1930s, world politics was dominated by the fascist victories in Italy, Germany and Spain, the Japanese occupation of Manchuria and the eruption of a mass non-violent struggle against the British empire in India. The committee, sensitive to these developments, was divided. In 1938, the shortlist for the prize was headed by Hitler and Gandhi. The choice proved too difficult for the mandarins. The prize ultimately went to the Nansen International Office of Refugees.
The committee's inclusion of Hitler appears shocking today, but at the time many in the west regarded the German Führer as a bulwark against Bolshevism. Earlier, the American writer Gertrude Stein had come out for Hitler getting the prize. "I say that Hitler ought to have the peace prize, because he is removing all the elements of contest and of struggle from Germany," she wrote in the New York Times magazine in May 1934. "By driving out the Jews and the democratic and left element, he is driving out everything that conduces to activity. That means peace... By suppressing Jews... he was ending struggle in Germany."
In 1938, Time magazine had made Hitler its "Man of the Year" with an appreciative profile and in Britain, Geoffrey Dawson, editor of the Times, had no doubt that an Anglo-German deal was vital for world peace. Hitler's pre-invasion rhetoric, too, emphasised his desire for peace. The invasions were presented as defensive, humanitarian operations, necessitated by the threat posed to the Third Reich or ethnic Germans by Czechoslovakia, Poland, Norway, etc.
The committee decided that if Hitler was not acceptable, then neither was Gandhi. But did it ever consider giving them a joint prize, as became the norm later in that century? In 1973 it was Henry Kissinger and North Vietnam's chief negotiator, Le Duc Tho (the latter declined to accept the prize in such company); in 1978 it was the former Israeli terrorist Menachem Begin and the turncoat Egyptian leader Anwar Sadat; in 1993 it was Nelson Mandela and FW de Klerk; in 1994 three recipients - Yasser Arafat, Shimon Peres and Yitzhak Rabin - shared the loot. Why was Mother Teresa awarded it on her own in 1979? Surely her close friend and sponsor Papa Doc Duvalier of Haiti could have been included?
In keeping with this tradition, the shortlist for this year included a joint award to George Bush and Tony Blair. The committee was browbeaten by 43,000 protest letters from all over the world and caved in to the pressure. Another time, perhaps - after the occupation of Iraq. Also on the list was Hamid Karzai, the puppet ruler of Kabul, but without his sparring partner Mullah Omar, whose refusal to engage made it a short war. Instead, the committee panicked and awarded the prize to another US president. The commendation honouring Carter should read as follows:
· For ordering the CIA to organise the killers running the death squads in Argentina to train Nicaraguan Contras in Honduras and hurl them into battle against the Sandinista government.
· For dispatching millions in aid and riot equipment to the Salvadorian military and sending US personnel to train Salvadorian officers in Panama.
· For sending special envoy Richard Holbrooke to South Korea, where workers and students were demanding democracy. Holbrooke gave US backing to the South Korean military and insisted that they crush the rebellion. Some 3,000 South Koreans were killed in March 1980.
· For authorising the covert CIA operation in Afghanistan that led to the creation of the mojahedin and giving the green light for Saudi religious, ideological and financial intervention, begun under the leadership of Osama bin Laden.
· For re-arming Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge in Thailand after they were defeated by the Vietnamese.
· For leading a campaign in favour of the release of Lieutenant William Calley, found guilty of mass murder in the My Lai massacre in South Vietnam.
· For support and weaponry supplied to the Indonesian military dictatorship after the brutal occupation of East Timor.
· For encouraging the rise of the Christian right.
· For accepting financial help from the Bank of Credit and Commerce International while this outfit calmly cheated its depositors.
For all these reasons, the Nobel committee is delighted to award the peace prize for 2002 to former US president Jimmy Carter.
· Tariq Ali's latest book is The Clash of Fundamentalisms (Verso)
tariq.ali3@btinternet.com
Excellent points, expressing much better the same thing I attempted in my 1:25 post.
China should "retaliate" by awarding the Gaza flotilla people an equivalent "peace prize". This will expose the duplicity of the west and get them on even moral ground as China. From a real politik perspective China will win some points with the Arab
and Islamic Govts in general. A lot of oil and gas reserves are under these govt's control.
I do not consider Barack Obama a war criminal. How on Earth does the public expect Obama to right a ship of state that has spent 40 years moving off the track. Eisenhower warned us. Can you imagine what would happen if Obama tried to change things in one fell swoop!! First of all, he would be dead. Second, he would legitimately be called a dictator. I think one day he will go down in history as one of our greatest presidents. He works hard, consistently, and takes the rap for all his predecessors who have played politics with government secrecy in the name of national defense. If he were to pull out immediately from Afghanistan, cut the defense budget, withdraw our troops at a time of depression and huge unemployment, we would be in chaos. Meantime, he works hard and steadfastly, gradually turning around this great ship of state and getting pummeled all the way for trying by both right and left.
So Obama can't poll out of Afganistan becasue some hypothetical US jobs depend on Afghani blood? If Obama is trying to do good, why has escalated the military action in Afghanistan? Why has he signed continuations or every single one of Bush's policies?
Ther rest of your arguments are disingenuous, or plain wrong. The president has enormous power to make agency policy under existing laws without being a "dictator". The president is also the commander in chief of the entire US military. Note that most of the policies and programs that poeple are media-brainwashed into thinking are "unpopular," are not. A majority of USAns support single-payer, government-run health insurance. A majority of USAns support raising taxes on the rich; an overwhelming majority of USAns (even Republicana!) support raising minimum wage to $10.00 per hour.
I'm sure, 2 years ago, you were probably telling us not to worry about the Obamas profoundly conservative positions woven among the empty platitides (Change You Can Beleieve In (TM) and the brazenly stolen from the UFWA "Yes We Can"). "He's just saying these things becasue he has to to get elected" you probably said: "once he's in office, he will switch to being a genuine progressive".
if he can't right the ship he's in charge of, what the hell is he doing in the white house?
Allow me to engage in a bit of skepticism.
Liu's imprisonment is certainly a terrible affrint to basic human rights, but I can't help but to think that his capitalism-friendly political beliefs really helped him get the prize. In contrast, many others have their basic freedoms of expression violated in the sme way (notably in the US) but they sit in prison in complete anomynity, becasue they, unfortunately, ascribe to political-economic beliefs that the western "democracies" don't like.
"...but I can't help but to think that his capitalism-friendly political beliefs really helped him get the prize." –(SaboCat)
Correct. Liu's reactionary politics not only 'helped' him garner the obscene prize, but was surely the deciding, albeit unspoken factor, in awarding it to him.
The award is meaningless and is reactionary propaganda– a convention for the consumption of the western haute bourgeoisie as a veneer to candy coat their on going crimes of imperial capitalism.
The rebarbative Tony Blair would seem to have a more suitably appropriate résumé for the Nobel gnomes. How about Netanyahu? The one's with the most blood on their hands should be prioritized.
The prize is now– after the fact of the Obama atrocity– little more than an excremental piety, couched in hypocritical sanctimony. No truly anti-capitalist voice would or could even be considered, much less a voice for 'peace.' Cindy Sheehan? Noam Comsky? Fidel Castro?
EXACTLY!!! the nobel prize committee's HEMLINES are showing...and it has "MADE IN THE USA" on it.
the REAL QUESTION HERE is....
which country/countries/region/:civilization
is/are PULLING THE STRINGS for what is CLEARLY a POLITICIZED , GAMESMANSHIP, "peace prize" nobel committee?
what DO these countries,....reeling in the collapse of their own economies -- so called as "democracies" while having caused the greatest world wars in history and caused with their colonialisms and the consequences of such colonoialisms and a certain EMPIRE's project of dominance and their DISCOMFORT with a rising china to whom they are DEPENDENT.....
have as their REAL INTERESTS or "containing" a certain Dragon?
THAT is the question.
it is not about the THEATRE of "awarding the peace prize" to a WORTHY awardee, such as perhaps this chinese dissident.
but then -- if DISSIDENT against one's government that is REPRESSIVE, TYRANNICAL, WARLIKE , SPYING, MENDACIOUs, FASCIST...with its history of GENOCIDE and SLAVERY
makes a person WORTHY of the peace prize
for the last 8 years -- the Nobel Peace Prize ought to have been awarded to
CINDY SHEEHAN!!!
now -- why isn't SHE the 8-time Consecutive Winner of the Peace Prize...and instead it's BARACK the FASCIST?
ahhhhhhhhhhhh.....because this year -- it's a chinese DISSIDENT against REPRESSIVE CHINA..and china ISN"T the USA!!! of NOBEL PRIZE WINNER KISSINGER the WAR CRIMINAL......
now ---- we get it!!
there should be an international committee...perhaps to be headed and comprised of citizens of ALL countries that were INVADED and COLONISED and MEDDLED WITH by western nations.....
and it will be called the "WAR CRIMINALS PRIZE"..........
you will have a long, long list and honorees.....
Barack Obama, George Bush sr. jr., Ronald Reagan, Henry Kissinger, Tony Blair, Adolf Hitler, Jimmy Carter, General Colin Powell, general Scwhartzkopf, General Petreaus, the NATO generals....oooooooooooooo lots and lots of them.......
MARLON BRANDO -- the great American Actor...REFUSED the award OSCAR -- sending a Native Indian woman to speak on his behalf...
in protest of the genocide of Native American Indians.
so much for "noble awards" given by some committee that is so compromised and really, behind the peace persona, has become a front for western imperialism.
PERIOD.
as was said by a famous writer, a Roman Historian, i believe:
"Such was the confusion that they left behind everything, and even the sick ... the starving population was reduced to cannibalism and, filthy and foul ... is to have said about the Romans before he, too, was defeated: "They rob, kill and rape and this they call Roman rule.
They make a desert and call it peace." ...
NOBEL PEACE PRIZE should do HOUSECLEANING....
steps on housecleaning:
1)have sweden and norway DISMANTLE their ENTIRE ARMS INDUSTRY....
2)clean out Henry Kissinger...Barack Obama...etc....
3)RECALL the Trophies....
4)and THEN install these dissidents along with Cindy Sheehan...Private Manning...WikiLeaks...
That prize is no longer worth crap. If warmonger Obama can get a "peace" prize, then anyone who gets it should be suspect. If Xiaobo really a "peace" person, he'll throw it back in their faces.
Not to disparage the gentleman who was awarded the prize, but please. The Nobel Peace Prize?
This entire Nobel BS is just cultural imperialist, ethnocentric, politically-motivated, sensationalist, elitist, corporate media fodder, clap-trap.
We don't need no wealthy white folks to tell the rest of the world who is worthy of a prize. Their credibility was already nil when they awarded one to Henry (Dr. Strangelove) Kissinger.
Then they gave one to Emperor Obama.
Not to mention how many sociopathic neo-lib Economists like Milton Friedman that have been awarded the prize for economics.
Why not give one to Bibi Nuttyahoo? He is working toward peace right?
Perfect Summary.
this is really about the "western" nations collaborating with the US imperium trying to "contain" china.
it's not about "democraticing" in china..it's about lending the USA some space to "coerce" china into "changes" ...the most important of which is , UNDER THE BANNER Of "democraticing and opening up politically"
coercing china to "change its ways" :
NAMELY:
RAISE THE YUAN ...to FIX the PROBLEMS OF THE IMPERIUM.
THAT is what it boils down to.
it's the USA's convoluted way, and with connivance from its fellow "westerners", using the THEATRE of "human rights" (ironically enough) , to GET THE USA out of ITS OWN ECONOMIC MESS...through "democratic changes in china"
with the top prize being THE YUAN!!
so transparent.
and the chinese see right through it..albeit their screams are about the NOBEL...but no...they see right through it..it's about their YUAN . and when things get back to THAT> after all the uproar...
the chinese will just go about their business and return with the yuan issue:
"WHY SHOULD CHINA TAKE THE MEDICINE FOR AMERICA's ILLNESS?"
lol.
Good points teddy, have you seen this recent article about China bashing?
http://michael-hudson.com/2010/09/america%e2%80%99s-china-bashing-a-compendium-of-junk-economics/
Thank you VashkarKim and Socialist.
the article you linked, Socialist, eerily echoes , in much easier condensed form, VOLUMINOUS and very dense reading by HenryCKLiu
please , everyone, make a habit of reading his work on his own website or in Asiatimes.
http://www.henryckliu.com/
some have been so dense (since he ensures that there is always a historical, chronological account of the why and how of things: how did Monetarism come about...even as far back as biblical times; what is Dollar Imperialism...how has the USA gotten away with making the rest of the world PAY for ITS profligacy : such as that explained in the link of Socialist; articles explaining clearly , tracing the genesis, continuation, the precise treaties, which people were involved..when, where ...how come the USA is "the World's MAIN and Biggest Currency Manipulator and the HEad of the Global Currency Manipulation Snake")....
all things, like the article above that the likes of FAKE NOBEL ECONOMY PRIZE winner Paul Krugman (now practically the most prominent US "economist") dearly try to Suppress.
DOLLAR HEGEMONY
http://www.henryckliu.com/page2.html
GREENSPAN: The WIZARD of BUBBLE LAND
http://www.henryckliu.com/page14.html
WAR AND MIC
http://www.henryckliu.com/page31.html
EMPIRE ECONOMICS
http://www.henryckliu.com/page36.html
BLAMING YUAN
http://www.henryckliu.com/page52.html
THE NEED FOR GLOBAL LABOR CARTEL
http://www.henryckliu.com/page37.html
THE COMING TRADE WARS
http://www.henryckliu.com/page5.html
LIBERATING SOVEREIGN CREDIT FROM DOLLAR IMPERIALISM FOR DOMESTIC DEVELOPMENT
http://www.henryckliu.com/page3.html
WAGES OF NEOLIBERALISM
http://www.henryckliu.com/page54.html
THEY are just a few of dozens and dozens of extremely exhaustive discussions about each "topic title"...warning..they ARE very long and very involved. many of them were written well before the actual events DID happen: such as the economic collapse of 2007/08...
Exactly! Well said, Teddy.
Socialist,
Bravo!
C:)
the NOBEL PRIZE should give Awards in peace and medicine
to the USA and its doctors ....for MEDICAL EXPERIMENTS on human beings in Guatemala, giving them syphillis. etc.....for "DEMOCRACY and HUMAN RIGHTS".........
how's that?
the USA should get an award from NOBEL PEACE PRIZE for Democratizing IRAQ and Afghanistan and Pakistan ...by means of WAR....
oh wait - they just did that TOO ..to barack obama...and before that to kissinger....
the nobel peace prize Committee are SUCH NOBLE PEOPLE..they CARE so much about human rights and PEACE........
It would appear as if the Chinese government has not learned from either the last time a prominent dissident won the Nobel peace prize to the vexation of the governing elite (Rigoberta Menchu & Guatemala), or it's tone deaf in terms of public relations reaction to the Dalia Lama winning said award.
In fact, they will give Liu Xiaobo a much higher profile than letting it pass without comment would have.
the nobel committee didn't make a mistake or had some wishful thinking when they gave o-bomber the "peace" prize last year.
i bet my bottom dollar that the majority of the committee members are neo-liberal global capitalists themselves.
Xiaobo's rhetoric is all too familiar: "human rights to freedom of expression and assembly" blah blah blah.
Human Rights Watch, a US-based "human-rights" group, has always been motivated by global capitalist agenda than by any sincere "faith" in "human rights", and they were touting Xiaobo as their (very-useful-at-the-moment-indeed) hero at Democracy Now, out of all venues, this morning. go figure. the neo-fascists have been trying hard to tarnish DN's progressive credibility, by pushing dubious issues (like the three "hikers") upon DN.
do humans have the "god-given" right to exploit other human beings and kill them if they refuse to cooperate in the global fascist game?
gees, why don't the chinese communists eagerly embrace that "god-given" right to freedom to exploit and kill? some dictators!
it's about time that they learn a thing or two from the freedom-loving human-rights-respecting americans, before we have to bomb the hell out of china!
exactly....
whatever the personal merits are of the Awardee..including his exhorting his fellow chinese in tiananment to protest peacefully...his "expressions" are . for all intents and purposes . to the chinese leadership ..a WESTERN concept. it does not matter to the chinese what the westerners PUSH as "democracy" .
and certainly the more so since the western pushers of democracy THEMSELVES are the arbiters and pushers of WARS globally..who are now concerned that their own "democracy" ideals are being exposed or have always been exposed previously, albeit without much opposition from weaker colonies in the east or south, as being SELECTIVE and hypocritical as well as being BETRAYED by the actions of the westerners THEMSELVES.
and yet they continue to abrogate upon themselves -- the people and continents that produced the greatest sources of human conflicts in history, militarily and economically and culturally - the JUDICIOUSNESS on what is "democracy".
this is like the pot calling the kettle black....just because the pot managed to paint a THIN coat of white on itself that keeps falling off to reveal it's STILL black.
furthermore...it is curious that the same Nobel Peace Prize Committees Award to a DISSIDENT in china because "china is a growing power and has responsibilities and gets the attention and must lead" in human rights....
that they have NOT awarded DISSIDENTS against the FASCIST REGIME of the UNITED STATES in the USA itself..but INSTEAD award the Nobel Peace Prize to the LEADER of the world's Fascist Empire USA?.
is it not curious that they award to a Dissident Chinese citizen as a way to criticise the "growing power" china because CHINA actually WON'T BE BULLIED
by the world's MAIN BULLY - the USA -- whose OWN DISSIDENTS like Cindy Sheehan and many others, against the USA's OWN WAR CRIMES and FASCISM are JAILED..and instead awards it --
THE PEACE PRIZE - for human rights -- to the JAILERS of the American Dissidents for PEACE?
hypocrisy -- they new name is NOBEL PEACE PRIZE.
it has the USA PATENT on it! coz -- truth to tell...the REAL reason is because CHINA WOn"T BE BULLIED by Uncle Sam..the WAR CRIMINAL. and won't raise its YUAN to FIX the USA"s OWN SELF_MADE MESS!
Mister Bjoern Amland . presumably a swedish speaker or norwegian speaker might want to send a missive , on behalf of some "observers" , to the NOBEL COMMITTEE...
"CLEAN YOUR OWN HOUSE FIRST...first demand for Barack Obama, Henry Kissinger...and their kind...to RETURN the Awards...and THEN start your awards from scratch. "
"oh -- and don't forget to tell your own governments and industries to stop MANUFACTURING ARMAMENTS..because it just makes you ALL LOOK LIKE HYPOCRITES to the world".
heh -- i should really be INVITED to speak to them in their wonderful big Nobel Prize Cavern..and tell them what they OUGHT to hear behind their oh-so-civilized rituals!
"curiousteve October 8th, 2010 3:26 pm" you might want to check out this link.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marc_Garlasco
Until very recently, HRW's military advisor was Mark Galasco formerly with the Pentagon and other military contractors. At the Pentagon his role was to call out targets to be "droned" in Iraq. He only was let go by HRW early this years after some quarrel about some antisemitic accusation or the like. Researching most of the so called human right organization one encounters again and again these "contradictions"
These "human rights " organizations are almost fully funded by US and western corporations. The most recent addition to the imperialist tool box is the ICC. The overwhelming number of those it is currently prosecuting are Africa rebel leaders who will not or are not in the position to play ball with the west.
Had the ICC been in force a few decades back, it would under it current mandate prosecute ALL the liberations leaders in colonial Africa. Welcome to Neocolonialism Version 2.0
thanks for digging up the "facts" for all "fact" lovers to see.
I understand Steve, you just hate those "fact" lovers.
Who do you like, the "lie" overs?
there you answered your own question:
your "facts" are my "lies". so much about the usefulness of "your facts".
"Chinese Dissident Wins Nobel Peace Prize; China Outraged'
I am moved to two quite separate comments at this news:
1. People should not be imprisoned for dissent.
2. "Obama Wins Nobel Peace Prize; Decency Outraged"
In a word, well, two, really: Fuck China.
And yes, this award has more integrity about it than last year's fiasco of awarding it to Obama. Which under the circumstances was rather like giving it to Bush.
it needs to be said, clearly and directly:
the USA EMPIRE , far from being the "leader" in BENEFICIAL effects on the planet and civilization is , historically and in practice and INTENT, actually the world's and history's Greatest single SOURCE of the Greatest ILLS in the planet .
in a character of hubris and exceptionalISM, the USA is Exceptional ONLY in CONTRADICTING its claims for exceptionality.