Kirsten Powers Says Barack Obama ‘Should Give Back’ Nobel Peace Prize

Mediaite.com:

Wednesday night on The O’Reilly Factor, Bill O’Reilly used a question from a Swedish reporter at this morning’s G-20 press conference to ask if President Obama should “give back” his Nobel Peace Prize now that he’s advocating military action in Syria. Fox contributor Kirsten Powers went even further, saying Obama “should have given it back a long time ago.” 

Powers said she thought the president should return the prize “for the drone war, for escalating the war in Afghanistan, having all these people die unnecessarily. Plenty of civilians have been killed by his drone war, including children.”

Taking Obama’s side in the argument, O’Reilly countered with, “you know every war in the history of mankind has resulted in collateral damage and civilian casualties.”

“First of all, I don’t use the term collateral damage because they are human beings,” Powers shot back. “I think that the war should actually be accomplishing something and I don’t think that the drones were accomplishing anything.” Instead, she said “it’s created more terrorists.” She said she may have been in favor of going into Syria earlier on but doesn’t “understand why there is a moral imperative now but there wasn’t a moral imperative a year ago.” 

Republican strategist Kate Obenshain agreed with more of what Powers said than she thought she would, saying Obama “basically won the election saying he didn’t believe in military intervention unless there was imminent threat to our national security,” but now pushing for action in Syria. She found herself in a heated debate with O’Reilly for saying the U.S. should not intervene because “seven out of nine of the factions against Assad right now is Al Qaeda and the Muslim Brotherhood.”

If that’s the case, O’Reilly wanted to know if Obenshain thinks Sen. John McCain is “trying to deceive the American people.”

“I am saying that he is understating Bill, intentionally, to further his own objectives,” Obenshain responded.

Powers, who had been quiet for several minutes, dropped into the conversation to ask, “Has John McCain never been wrong about anything?”

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Obama Does Right With Nobel Peace Prize Money

LATimes.com:

You probably recall late last year on one of his autumn commutes to Scandinavia President Obama picked up the Nobel Peace Prize. We wrote about that here and here and here. His speech was well-received here. Also some fallout over here.

Along with the 24-karat gold-plated medal and the speech and the fancy dinner comes $1.4 million from the estate of Alfred Nobel, who invented dynamite, which isn't always a weapon of destruction. (BTW, Obama's award apparently drew more attention to the international prize. The Nobel committee received 237 nominees for the 2010 award, a record. The next winner will be announced Oct. 4.)

Today, Obama's White House announced what charities will get his 2009 prize money. It's an almost perfectly balanced list of PC beneficiaries. Here they are:

“These organizations do extraordinary work in the United States and abroad helping students, veterans and countless others in need,” said President Obama. “I’m proud to support their work.”

$250,000 to Fisher House: Fisher House is a national non-profit organization that....

...provides housing for families of patients receiving medical care at major military and VA medical centers.

$200,000 to the Clinton-Bush Haiti Fund: In the wake of the devastating earthquake in Haiti, President Obama asked former Presidents George W. Bush and Bill Clinton to create the Clinton-Bush Haiti Fund to raise funds for long-term relief efforts in Haiti.

$125,000 to College Summit: College Summit is a national non-profit organization that partners with elementary and middle schools and school districts to strengthen college-going culture and increase college enrollment rates, so that all students graduate from high school career and college-ready.

$125,000 to the Posse Foundation: The Posse Foundation is a national non-profit organization that identifies public high school students with extraordinary academic and leadership potential who may be overlooked by traditional college selection processes. Posse’s college and university partners award Posse Scholars four-year, full-tuition leadership scholarships. The scholars graduate at a rate of 90 percent.

$125,000 to the United Negro College Fund: The United Negro College Fund plays a critical role in enabling more than 60,000 students each year to attend college through scholarship and internship programs.

$125,000 to the Hispanic Scholarship Fund: The Hispanic Scholarship Fund (HSF) is the nation's leading Hispanic scholarship organization, providing the Hispanic community more college scholarships and educational outreach support than any other organization in the country. In its 34 year history, the Hispanic Scholarship Fund has awarded close to $280M in scholarships to more than 90,000 students in need.

$125,000 to the Appalachian Leadership and Education Foundation: A non-profit organization funded by foundations and companies, ALEF supports and enables young men and women from Appalachia to pursue higher education though scholarship and leadership curriculum.

$125,000 to the American Indian College Fund: The American Indian College Fund transforms Indian higher education by funding and creating awareness of the unique, community-based accredited Tribal Colleges and Universities, offering students access to knowledge, skills, and cultural values which enhance their communities and the country as a whole.

The Fund disburses approximately 6,000 scholarships annually for American Indian students seeking to better their lives through higher education. The Fund also provides support for tribal college needs, ranging from capital support to cultural preservation curricula.

$100,000 to AfriCare: AfriCare was founded in 1970 and has more projects in Africa than any other U.S. based charity, reaching communities in 25 countries, primarily in Sub-Saharan Africa. Its programs address needs in three principal areas: health and HIV/AIDS; food security and agriculture; and water resource development.

$100,000 to the Central Asia Institute: The Central Asia Institute promotes and supports community-based education and literacy, especially for girls, in remote regions of Pakistan and Afghanistan. The Institute’s co-founder, Greg Mortenson, was also a Nobel Peace Prize nominee this year, whose book, Three Cups of Tea: One Man’s Mission to Promote Peace, One School at a Time, recounts his attempt to successfully establish dozens of schools and promote girls’ education in rural Afghanistan and Pakistan.

No, Barry did not deserve to win a Nobel Peace Prize for basically doing nothing besides not being George W. Bush. He knows it. Every non-liberal, non Obama stan in the world knows it. But at least Barry had the fortitude to do the right thing with the prize money, spreading out the loot to a plethora of organizations that could use really it. Barry did good here.

Jon Stewart Mocks War President Obama Getting Nobel Peace Prize

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"War President" Barack Obama To Note 'Irony' In Accepting Nobel Peace Prize

HuffPo.com:

President Barack Obama is accepting the world's best-known peace award as a wartime president, an incongruity that he will directly speak to when he receives the Nobel Peace Prize on Thursday, White House officials say.

The president departed Wednesday to Oslo in an overnight flight, in time to be there for the award ceremony and banquet, and not much more. His minimalist approach reflects a White House that sees little value in touting an honor for peace just nine days after Obama announced he was sending 30,000 more troops to the war in Afghanistan.

The contrast has been stark for weeks. Obama won the award in early October, just as his review of a revamped war plan was intensifying. He and two speechwriters pivoted attention to the Nobel address the very day after Obama announced he was escalating the U.S. forces in Afghanistan to their highest levels.

So Obama, honored for strengthening international diplomacy, will use his speech to discuss what goes into the decision to expand a war.

Asked if Obama was excited about the award, national security aide and speechwriter Ben Rhodes responded: "I think he feels as if it places a responsibility upon him."

"Responsibility"?!? More like guilt for having to accept an award Barry knows full damn well he doesn't deserve one iota. Heck, guilt is the real reason Barry wants no part of the 3-day Nobel prize ceremonies. Forget the fact that Barry only won the award for not being George W. Bush, even a louse like Barry has a conscious. A conscious that must make it hard sleep knowing that you're gonna accept some lame, leftwing peace prize a week after you just sent 30,000 troops overseas to war. In respect to the troops the better option would've been to run the award down and not to go to Norway at all, but Barry's narcissism wouldn't let him do such a noble thing like that.

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Even Liberals Can't Explain Obama Winning Nobel Peace Prize

Newsmax.com:

President Barack Obama has finally achieved bipartisan consensus: Many on both the left and the right agree that a Nobel Peace Prize after less than nine months in office is embarrassingly over the top.

Of course, most Democrats applaud the move while the Republican response has been muted – understandable given the Nobel Committee's tradition of using the award to transmit hard-left political messages.

Many mainstream media figures and hardcore progressives are none too pleased either, however. Some feel that it will simply aggravate the nation's partisan divide. Others point out that the war in Afghanistan marches on.

Of course, many Americans will no doubt celebrate the fact that only the third sitting U.S. president – after Theodore Roosevelt in 1906 and Woodrow Wilson in 1919 – will receive the coveted award.

That said, much of the ambivalence expressed Friday came from unlikely sources, including:

Filmmaker Michael Moore: He congratulated President Obama, but added, "You have to end our involvement in Afghanistan now. If you don't, you'll have no choice but to return the prize to Oslo."

Nicholas Kristof, New York Times columnist and author: "I’m nonplussed. I admire his efforts toward Middle East peace, but the prize still seems very premature. What has he done?"

Journalist Peter Beinart: Writing on The Daily Beast, Beinart remarked, "I like Barack Obama as much as the next liberal, but this is a farce. He’s done nothing to deserve the prize. Sure, he’s given some lovely speeches and launched some initiatives – on Iran, Israeli-Palestinian peace, climate change and nuclear disarmament – that might, if he’s really lucky and really good, make the world a more safe, more just, more peaceful world. But there’s absolutely no way to know if he’ll succeed, and by giving him the Nobel Prize as a kind of “atta boy,” the Nobel Committee is actually just highlighting the gap that conservatives have long highlighted: between Obamamania as global hype and Obama’s actual accomplishments."

Time Magazine's Nancy Gibbs: Gibbs suggests the prize is only going to make Obama's job harder. She writes: "The last thing Barack Obama needed at this moment in his presidency and our politics is a prize for a promise."

Bob Schieffer of CBS: The award, he worries, is "just going to widen the political divide in this country, not make it better."

Richard Kim on TheNation.com: The choice of Obama left him "a little bewildered," he says. Kim adds: "Obama got a nice vote of confidence from the Norwegians for his promises. But now, he has to actually earn the Nobel with his deeds. That will be hard to do if his administration continues to send such mixed signals on international cooperation and diplomacy."

Miread Corrigan-McGuire, 1976 Nobel Peace Prize Winner: She posts: "I am very disappointed to hear that the Nobel Committee has decided that the Nobel Peace Prize for 2009 is to be awarded to President Barack Obama. They say this is for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and co-operation between peoples, and yet he continues the policy of militarism and occupation of Afghanistan, instead of dialogue and negotiations with all parties to the conflict."

Obama Supporter Michael Russnow: Writing on Huffington Post, columnist Russnow states: "Whatever one might feel about Obama, he has not earned this singular award."

Spelman College History Professor William Jelani Cobb: Cobb writes on Politico's The Arena blog: "At this point, President Obama is like a kid who gets a Porsche for his 16th birthday. It's wonderful but where do you go from there?"

The Nobel Peace Prize is now a complete farce. The Nobel Committee made fools of themselves and Barack Obama knows it. The fact that Barry can still accept this award and live with himself once again displays his utter narcissism.

Laura Ingraham Slams The Farce That Is Obama Winning Nobel Peace Prize

White Liberals Hand Obama Nobel Peace Award For Doing Nothing

They even admit that it's NOT what he's done in 9 months as President, it's what he MIGHT do. Consider too that Barack Obama was nominated for this prize just two weeks into his presidency. In other words, Barry won for the sole reason that he's not George W. Bush. And that's why the Nobel Prize committee has become a complete and utter joke:

President Barack Obama said Friday that he was humbled by the decision of the Norwegian Nobel Committee to award him the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize.

"I am both surprised and deeply humbled," Obama said at the White House.

"I do not view it as a recognition of my own accomplishments. But rather as an affirmation of American leadership. ... I will accept this award as a call to action."

Obama said he did not feel he deserves "to be in the company" of past winners, but would continue to push a broad range of international objectives, including nuclear non-proliferation, a reversal of the global economic downturn, and a resolution of the Arab-Israeli conflict.

He acknowledged the ongoing U.S. conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, noting that he is the "commander in chief of a country that is responsible for ending" one war and confronting a dangerous adversary in another.

"This award is not simply about my administration," he said. It "must be shared" with everyone who strives for "justice and dignity."

The Nobel Committee said it decided to honor Obama for his "extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples."

The president had not been mentioned as among front-runners for the prize, and the roomful of reporters in Oslo, Norway, gasped when Thorbjorn Jagland, chairman of the Nobel committee, uttered Obama's name.

Bottom line, 9 months into his presidency and Barack Obama hasn't accomplished anything, abroad or at home--his record so far speaks for itself. This is nothing but liberal treachery with a big 'F U' to the Bush administration. If Barry had any conscience he would've turned down the award. But he doesn't.

Note To Al Gore: Please Run For President

C'mon Al, run for President again. Please. Go ahead and make a fool of yourself again, like in 2000 when you couldn't even carry your own state. But forget about that, that was a long time ago. Now you owe it to your loyal minions to run, yunno the idiots who still think the Presidency was "stolen" from you seven years ago. Plus, now your global warming propaganda machine is clearly working as its gotten you a piece of the Nobel Peace Prize (and that comes after The Great Lie that is "Inconvenient Truth" got you an Emmy and even a couple of Oscars), conning the liberal elite to the point that you're now enjoying official rock-star, VIP status around the globe. Hypocritical liberal celebrities worship the ground you walk on as you've convinced the world that God has nothing to do with abnormal weather patterns. But who cares about that. Who cares when another run for President by you could put an end to Bill & Hillary tyranny. And we know that despite what your minions like to tell us, how much you still despise Slick Willie. After all, if was you who ran away from a still-popular President while campaigning back in '00 because we know how much you hated being saddled with Monica. So run Al, please, go for it. Ever since you were a kid you've wanted to be President and your ego must be big enough now to assure you that you can beat the great Hillary and win it all. Run Al. This could be your last chance. You owe it to your loyal minions, Leo DiCaprio, Tipper and most importantly, yourself.