Congratulations! Wait really???

I woke up this morning to some disturbing news. The headline reads "Nobel Stunner: Obama Wins Peace Prize". The cited reasons for granting Obama the prestigious award include: his initiatives to reduce nuclear arms, ease tensions with the Muslim world, and his efforts to focus on diplomacy rather than unilateralism. To many these might seem to be excellent reasons to award Obama the prize, and indeed they are, however these are not the entirety of Obama’s resume nor are they even 100 percent accurate. Let’s look at this through a different lens.

To many Barack Obama was and is an anti-war president. Many anti-war groups backed him during the campaign as did many individuals claiming to be pacifists. This has lead to a widespread belief that he himself is anti-war (one would think this should be a prereq of sorts for the Nobel Peace Prize). This however could not be farther from the truth. Currently we are bombing Pakistan, considering ratcheting up the war in Afghanistan, and supporting Israel. Not to mention the hypocrisy of stock piling nuclear weapons while demanding non-proliferation from other countries. If these are not enough let’s look at some closer to home examples of the violence supported by Obama and his administration: single payer universal healthcare was not even considered, housing is still not considered a human right, a livable wage has yet to enter the political discussion. As Gandhi famously stated "poverty is the worst kind of violence". In the interest of fairness these are not new to Obama or his administration these have long been characteristics of the American Empire.

I don't write this to try and burst any bubbles, or be a "hater". I am not looking for reasons to "bitch"; I do not want to find the negative in everything, or anything similar to these responses. The truth is actually quite to the contrary- I want a world of peace, a non-nuclear world. I want a world free from war and oppression, free from greed and poverty. I just received a text from my fiancée which says it the best “the wonders of the world we may never understand, but the mind possesses the capability of imagination, which is far more interesting. The world we can imagine can become our reality. Never give up, never stop fighting, keep revolting because God gave us a voice and life gave us the right!" I ask only this- that we have the courage to recognize and speak truth even in the face of facades that make it easy to become comfortable.

In Solidarity,

Ryan "BUGS" Virden