Even if Venezuela goes to hell even deeper, she still deserves the prize for what she has already done!
The way she, and her team, managed to convince venezuelans that the election mattered, and to prepare to gather the evidence of the elections under constant threats from the government, that we all knew they were going to steal, and do it entirely peacefully, was an extremely impressive achievement on its own.
I think the Peace Prize should be related to real war and real peace. There's no war in Venezuela. There's terrible leadership, but many see it differently from me. Some like the guy. But there is no real war in Venezuela.
You may think that but Alfred Nobel disagreed and it is his prize. If she fits the criteria is another question but it was certainly not intended to just be about real wars and real peace (whatever that is).
den som har verkat mest eller best för folkens förbrödrande och afskaffande
eller minskning af stående arméer samt bildande och spridande af
fredskongresser
shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations,
for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and
promotion of peace congresses
English translation is taken from Wikipedia and not totally exact but close enough.
I would say that is likely a correct translation as the original text refers to nation as in a group of people with a shared culture. But, yes, it is not nation as in country. So the original text refers to fraternity between peoples of different cultures, not of fraternity between countries.
Consider this. There are circumstances in Venezuela that some would consider worthy of a civil war. This award winner has chosen peaceful resistance, acts that may have prevented war.
Ah yes, the man actively murdering civilians via illegal drone strikes in the Caribbean and invading US cities with the Department of War, who launched dozens of missiles from stealth bombers over Iran and who has greatly expanded the drone war that Biden has mostly ended.
From the New York Times "The Daily" podcast today:
Mark, what you've described and what we're seeing unfold is genuinely an impressive feat by Trump. To be able to capitalize on what seemed like this giant setback. Israel literally bombed the negotiators and the mediators. To turn that around and get a deal that Biden couldn't get done, that no other leader in the world had managed despite trying for two years straight. It is significant achievement. He was able to bring these sides together that had shown no willingness to end the war. And now they've come to this agreement. And it should also be said that one of the biggest things here is that he was willing to put pressure on Netanyahu in a way that President Biden was unwilling to do. Why do you think that's the case?
I think there's a few reasons. First, I think Trump genuinely wanted to end the war. He campaigned on ending the war in Ukraine and in Gaza.
Too late for this year, but if it holds it should be considered for next year.
This is like buying tickets to watch your favorite sports team win first place. It's good to support the boys, but you'd didn't do anything. The rest of Trump's thinly veiled autocratic tendencies — whether they're rhetoric aimed to rile up opponents or real goals — have done little to promote fraternity amongst nations & people.
"...he was willing to put pressure on Netanyahu in a way that President Biden was unwilling to do."
Unwilling or unable? Netanyahu hated Biden and has done everything in his power to sabotage anything Democrats have done to try to help resolve the conflict, even prior to Oct 7.
Not even sure there's evidence of the pressure? What pressure?
Trump let Netanyahu run roughshod, and the proposed peace agreement (which almost certainly won't hold) is pretty... let's say vague... about the plan for Gaza post hostage-release.
All that's happened here is another agreement to exchange hostages for prisoners, which has happened multiple times in this war already. Not much else is actually agreed to and obviously even less has actually happened.
Trump does not fit the criteria set out by Alfred Nobel. By increasing the NATO spending he worked against "the abolition or reduction of standing armies" and he has made the "fraternity between nations" a lot worse with random threats which I doubt would weight up his "promotion of peace congresses".
I really hope they would not award someone the prize who works so blatantly against the word and spirit of the criteria in the will.
> To turn that around and get a deal that Biden couldn't get done,
Biden had different pressures. E.g. I suspect that he judged that the knife-edge election he was facing didn't allow him enough leeway to put more pressure on Israel.
In addition Netanyahu made it easier to force through a settlement given he'd manage to alienate practically everyone, including uniting the Arab world after that unbelievable strike on Doha.
If you were a cynical person you could also ask whether this settlement owes anything to Trump's personal narcissist saviour complex or need to distract from domestic issues such as the Epstein files...
Still, even despite some significant scepticism about Trump's motives, I think there is a reasonable case to be made for awarding him the prize. It was still a significant (maybe even brave) jump to break with American political orthodoxy to put this kind of pressure on Israel, and the practical result of this could be very significant in terms of saving lives and potentially long-term peace in the region. We also need to encourage these kind of acts, even (or especially) amongst unlikely peacemakers like Trump.
Let's see what it looks like next year, though. Middle East peace deals don't have a great history of holding together.
The nominations for this year's prize closed January 31st; anyone doing anything worthy of the Nobel Peace Prize after that date may be considered for next year.
It should be considered all right, but the committee is also going to look at the whole person and Trump isn't exactly the Gandhi-like figure you'd expect to win the prize.
I think Trump genuinely doesn't like people being killed, but he's also driving a wedge in the US that can't be ignored. Sending American troops against its own citizen: not exactly Nobel-prize worthy.
It remains to be seen if this turns into anything. He deliberately misunderstood the Palestinians and made the proclamation that everything was fixed. The Palestinians have to give up some major things for this to work, things they were previously unwilling to do, and are probably still unwilling to do.
Far more importantly, this might force Trump to continue the pressure on the Israelis, whose very nature is to be untrustworthy, not worth trusting, since they love not just violating agreements but also using agreements as a lever for abuse. There are all the typical Israeli fingerprints all over the current deal that the Israelis will likely use to bring the whole thing back down around Trump unless he can maintain pressure. This prize increases the slim likelihood that he will have to of he covers that prize as much as it seems he does. I do not think he can or will though, and the Israelis may just even persuade him that they have a far more juicy prize to offer him instead.
I think Trump wanted to force the rather compromised committee to make a similarly foolish decision as giving Obama the prize, which would have then permitted immediate Israeli breach of the settlement.
Not to take away from Machado’s work, but this year’s prize is at the very least political, to both appease Trump in line with the above and also send a message in the face of the war build-up against Venezuela. At the same time their decision also facilitates the American takeover through less than lethal means by CIA revolution and the combined pressure of it all on the Venezuelan government. Machado is in fact a CIA asset, whether she realizes it or not.
Machado is in fact a CIA asset, whether she realizes it or not.
If you think Eastern Europe was liberated without involvement from the CIA, which has a mixed history w.r.t. competent ops in that region, I've got a Nobel prize to sell you.
... and yet the consequences of what's going is as if there was war, the economy is suffering as if there was war, the people are fleeing as if there was war and dying as if there was war
But then there are dozens of impoverished and unjust places on earth.
I think the reality is that the five exclusively Norwegian politicians on the Peace prize committee are politicians. And they act accordingly. What if the committee would consist of Russian politicians exclusively, or Venezuelan ones?
> The 2009 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to United States president Barack Obama (b. 1961) for his "extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples".
> But then there are dozens of impoverished and unjust places on earth.
They only give out one prize, which means that no matter which they pick, there will be dozes of impoverished and unjust places that don't get recognized by it. That can't be used to reject a choice, since it's true no matter what choice they make.
The difference between whataboutism and discussion is that in discussion you propose an alternative. For example: how about that real estate developer who has fumbled multiple diplomatic initiatives?
There’s kidnapping, imprisonment, torture and rape of political dissidents.
They created an exodus of 8 million people.
Starved the population.
Killed people in the thousands in the favelas and other poor areas without a trial.
Steals elections.
To me that’s a regime at war with its own population and it deserves all the condemnation possible and all the support necessary to help transition back to democracy.
What he is being accused of is a tiny fraction of what has been proven to have taken place in Gaza, under the protection of the west.
Yet the aircraft carriers are poised in the gulf to enact a third regime change operation in this oil rich country America wants under its thumb with a puppet running it.
This is the PR campaign beforehand, just like the "WMD" PR campaign in the run up to Iraq, with a woman who supports genocide in Gaza (https://x.com/VenteVenezuela/status/1286346531591852036 ) being lauded with a nobel peace prize. This is probably to lend her legitimacy when she becomes that puppet.
Saddam was a bad man too but he was an average evil. The warmongers who want to destabilize every country with oil, send in the tanks and install yet another Western puppet to maintain an iron grip on global oil supplies are a very special and unique kind of evil.
I’m not going to engage in a competition of tragedies. You are replying to a venezuelan with relatives and friends that have suffered and still suffer the consequences of the regime.
Just stop and think for a moment before even think about downplaying or comparing what is happening in my country with other world conflicts, and please don’t even dare to explain what I’ve been living.
We've heard it all before, we speak english so you're not a true venezuelan, you're part of some rich caste, you're not brown enough, you're a bot, etc ... 25 years of this bullshit no matter where we go. The international left abandoned us, the international right uses us as circus act.
Of course it'd be easier for your narrative if we were defenseless people begging in our native tongue for help. It's harder when a lot of Venezuelans are actually highly educated and want to control their own country and destiny.
>> IME the venezuelans who ended up abroad speaking English almost exclusively and up being people whose families were sucking on the teat of the oil wealth under the pre Maduro government before he ripped it out of their mouths and redistributed the wealth
you mean the almost 10 million of us that left, 1/3 of the population? the 2.5 million that went to Colombia alone by foot? or the ones that that walked all the way to Peru and Ecuador to meet discrimination and xenophobia. Those are all sucking on the oil teat? (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venezuelan_refugee_crisis)
>> So i guess you want this Iraq style military operation to happen. I pity your relatives for what you want to happen to them.
No one wants that, and no one said they want that. Stop making stuff up
Gotta love when foreigners explain to me what my country is going through. And they don’t even stop to think about what they are doing, it’s borderline insulting.
The Palestinian diaspora is also around 8 million. Chavez and Maduro made the Venezuelans poorer than the Palestinians. I think Israel (and Stern/Irgun before that) has killed more than Chavez/Maduro in all its "defensive" wars of conquest. The Israeli Supreme Court seems to be surprisingly reliable and fair, even to Palestinians. Venezuela's courts are entirely under regime control.
Don't get me wrong. She has firmly opposed maduro and is a beacon of hope for many in Venezuela but she hasn't accomplished anything meaningful yet? She is just a career politician that just happens to be in the opposition of the venezuelan goverment when Maduro (a dictator) is in power. But she hasn't done anything extraordinary to merit the award.
Don't get me wrong, but perhaps what was missing was greater media coverage and genuine interest in Venezuela's situation.
María Corina Machado orchestrated a HUGE covert months long operation to collect tally sheets from the overwhelming majority of voting machines during the 2024 presidential election. Her team trained poll watchers to demand vote receipts (as legally permitted) then capture and transmit that data through various channels, even from the most remote regions of the country.
There are documented cases of people—poll workers and participants in the plan—being imprisoned or even killed for their involvement.
Thanks to this operation, the website resultadospresidencialesvenezuela2024.com exists, where venezuelan can verify the actual vote count per candidate, backed by fingerprint records and the serial numbers of both the software and hardware used.
These verified results confirm that Edmundo González was the true winner of the election.
The data provides undeniable evidence that Nicolás Maduro installed himself as a dictator, with the full support of the national electoral authority, which, to this day, has refused to release the official election results (a procedure that has historically been routine).
You can also verify the results here https://macedoniadelnorte.com/ (a whole story behind this hostname). Again, only possible by the María Corina's huge effort
Sounds right from the playbook of the superpowers, when an oil rich country has a government that doesn't allow them to profit from their oil resources - (1) demonize the current leader and government, (2) Give international publicity and recognition to a politician ideologically friendly to them (3) Destabilise the unfriendly government by launching an internal / external war against them (4) Install the friendly puppet politician as the leader of the country (while shouting "democracy has won", if you are western superpower) (5) Profit!
This comment reads as deeply ignorant and callous toward the treatment of the Venezuelan people by their government. Fully 1/3 of Venezuelans have fled the country due to repression and economic decline due to Maduro’s mismanagement. As someone who reads Spanish I can tell you the the media in non US aligned Latin American countries is regularly reporting on the dictatorship in Venezuela.
Not everything is about oils or some conspiracy of western governments.
You're creating a false dichotomy. It is true that Venezuela is very poorly governed, and it's also that the the US is doing everything they can to prevent Venezuela from monetizing their natural resources, oil in particular, in order to try to inflict economic suffering on the common people. This is the whole sadistic, and nonsensical, point of sanctions - inflict suffering on common people in hopes they'll blame their government instead of people inflicting suffering on them, overthrow their government, and then align themselves with the people inflicting suffering on them.
Without US sanctions Venezuela, and Venezuelans, would be in a dramatically better place today.
The countless human rights violations, stealing elections etc. predate the sanctions. This honestly feels like patronizing. Look up the UN reports of all the human rights violations happened over the last couple of decades there.
Wiki conveniently has a nice graph demonstrating the real GDP/capita in Venezuela [1], which is reasonably reflective of the economic crisis. In 1980 it was around $16,000. By ~2013-2014 it had peaked a bit higher than $18,000 and had risen dramatically faster than the average for Latin America.
In 2014 there were mass protests against the government, in reality it was an attempt to overthrow the government, which was responded to with brutality. That brutality was met with sanctions. Today their GDP/capita is about $5000. That's obviously going to be explained in part by the decline in oil prices around the same time, but not to that degree, to say the least.
* - As an addendum here it's also unclear to me how exactly Wiki is calculating that figure and whether it accounts for, in any way, the substantial scale of emigration from Venezuela. If not, then the relative decline is even larger than it sounds.
Not quite. A useful term related to sanctions is overcompliance. You can read the exact verbiage of some of the earliest sanctions here. [1] In a nutshell engaging in any form of trade (including transfer of expertise or whatever else) that directly or indirectly benefited a sanctioned person could trigger extremely harsh penalties.
Many government officials in Venezuela have direct involvement with various industries, including oil. So it suddenly becomes this extremely complex and dangerous mess when doing any trade whatsoever with Venezuela. This is why their economy completely collapsed following the sanctions.
> Without US sanctions Venezuela, and Venezuelans, would be in a dramatically better place today.
No. They wouldn't. The Venezuelan government has proven extremely incompetent to produce oil.
What the Trump's tariffs have shown to the world is that, in the scale globalization is today, trade with the US doesn't matter that much anymore. Case in point: Brazil. After Trump stuck 50% tariffs on them, their exports to other countries grew much more than enough to offset the loss to the U.S.
The US embargo on Venezuela is a lot like its embargo in Cuba, Iran and North Korea: it is not the cause of people suffering but is an excuse by those corrupt and incompetent regimes to hide their failures.
And what’s funny is that I’m even willing to trade oil deals if someone gets rid of the murderer kleptocracy that stole Venezuela from us. So yeah let’s do some oil deals if you help us get back to democracy.
Will you still have democracy once Corina Machado realizes her plan to privatize oil companies?
I have little doubt she did a lot of good practical work for Venezuelan democracy (to expose Maduro's government). But her ideology - accept foreign invasion (which will inevitably kill innocent venezuelans) and privatizing oil reserves (which will inevitably result in undemocratic fallout of the profits) - is unfortunately not that of peace and democracy.
I wish she would more look at Norway as an example, which is a rare case of oil profits being shared collectively and democratically.
Sure, I am maybe ignorant about local Venezuelan politics, but I am quite tuned to what is happening to it internationally. And I can confidently state that Trump or the US don't have the best interests of Venezuela when it tries to bring "democracy" there through war (internal or external). We all know that it is rubbish to call Venezuela a "narco-state". And we all know how much the Trump administration truly cares about "democracy", whether in the US or in Venezuela. The simple fact is that, along with Cuba, Venezuela remains a persistent thorn for the Americans in South America (their "backyard") because of their inability to dominate them politically. To make matters worse (for Venezuela), Venezuela has the world's largest proven reserves – roughly 18% of the global total – in the vast Orinoco Belt. (That’s more than Saudi Arabia and Canada, though Venezuelan crude is harder to process). Russia and China have invested in Venezuelan oil industry and that has further rattled the US as it brings both the Russians and the Chinese to their "backyard".
(I'll believe the west's "concerns" on Venezuela's "democracy" and "human rights" when they overthrow the dictators in Saudi Arabia, Qatar and UAE - where western companies are allowed to profit from oil resources in these regions - and bring "democracy" there).
Don’t make everything about yourself. We are in a big trouble just as it is and we could use all the help we can, even from the US regardless of who is at WH at the moment.
That personal risk includes having yourself or loved ones thrown in prison without any contact to the outside world for however long the dictatorship sees fit.
It’s a very sad history of oppression and corruption that has forced many Venezuelans to pull up their roots and risk their lives leaving their own country. It would be a dream come true to see this dictatorship overthrown and replaced by a democratic system of government that serves the people.
I suppose Venezuela has hope because it is a weak country with nominal US pressure agaisnt the current regime. Russia is self sufficient and has WMD (nuclear)
On top of that, if I am not mistaken, Russia doesn't know what Democracy is. (Yeltsin and Medvedev up for discussion) As a result, for starters, Maduro can't make radical changes in the army.
Not to diminish her valor and heroism. Mad respect. But how is that actually about peace?
A dictatorship can be peaceful, and a democracy can be warlike. Venezuela hasn't been involved in any war recently as far as I know. Of course people who fight for democracy deserve being praised and supported, but to me it looks odd to do so with a peace prize.
The prize is supposed to be awarded to people who have "done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses". Is this the case here?
There is something called "democratic peace theory" which argues that democracies are less likely to attack other democracies, compared to other forms.
So I guess you could also claim that democracy helps maintain peace from that point of view, and a person who successfully proved that a "democratic election" really wasn't democratic at all feels like the right thing to award, as it'll further international peace.
edit: the submission article also talks briefly about how peace and democracy is linked (in their eyes):
> Democracy is a precondition for lasting peace. However, we live in a world where democracy is in retreat, where more and more authoritarian regimes are challenging norms and resorting to violence. The Venezuelan regime’s rigid hold on power and its repression of the population are not unique in the world. We see the same trends globally: rule of law abused by those in control, free media silenced, critics imprisoned, and societies pushed towards authoritarian rule and militarisation. In 2024, more elections were held than ever before, but fewer and fewer are free and fair.
>Venezuela hasn't been involved in any war recently, as far as I know.
While the point you're trying to make may or may not be valid, Venezuela is not a good example. Go read up on the Venezuela-Guyana crisis. The Maduro regime has been pushing the region closer to war in recent years. Renewing its claims to Guyanan territory, and preparing its military for war. For now, all out invasion has been prevented partially by significant support for Guyana and pressure against Venezuela from neighbouring countries and the west, and distraction from its own internal problems.
A dictatorship cannot be peaceful. Peace is not merely “the absence of international war.” Peace is rooted in individual rights and freedoms.
If you walk around all day on metaphorical eggshells, surrounded by armed people who will beat you, torture you, disappear you, kill you and your family if you say the wrong thing, that is not a peaceful existence!
It sounds like repression —which if extreme enough approaches (civil) war. I’ll give you that but then we’d include Cuba, North Korea and a few other countries as well.
Sure. Now name people who are more deserving of the Nobel peace prize as this woman and explain their accomplishments and why it should make them a better pick. I'll wait.
I don't really understand what you're arguing for or against. That this woman doesn't deserve the prize because there are places worse than Venezuela? What does that have to do with the Nobel peace prize? This isn't a "pick the worst place on earth" contest.
I honestly don't understand any of the complaints in these comments. Is it because she's a woman? Or what? I've not seen anybody make any substantial arguments as to why she shouldn't be eligible.
Every country should be rooting for our situation to be solved. We have way too many people abroad enduring bad situations that would be better back at home with a decent government and democracy restored.
There are people that have WALKED all over the continent to flee, all the way to the US and Canada or Argentina, Chile, etc.
Ok, then I guess (or rather, I'm afraid that) in 20 years whoever is leading the Democratic party in the US (if it still exists) will also be eligible for a Nobel peace prize?
come on folks, no need to make everything about the US. The situation and evolution of Venezuela is vastly different. There are a lot of parallels, like with any other authoritarian government, and probably lessons the US opposition can learn, but don't equate the two as it overshadows the struggles Venezuelans have endured for 25+ years. Let them have their moment
Ok, I guess we'll see in 20 years (you did read the "20 years" part I hope?) if my assessment is correct. It was maybe a bit tongue-in-cheek, but I don't have any doubts that Trump would like to be an "actual dictator" and is actively testing how far he can expand the limits of his power. Democracy in the US is more established than in other countries that have had authoritarian takeovers in recent years (Hungary, Turkey, Russia etc.), but we'll see if it's resilient enough.
It was more than tongue in cheek, it is a mix of anxiety and overreaction. None of this is happening except for the far left's mind. I see this constantly on reddit, it's a shame it gets posted here. You are trying to be over dramatic to get your point across and maybe try to get someone to see your viewpoint? It does the exact opposite.
huh, overreaction? As an outsider looking in, the US is looking more autocratic and totalitarian every week. I have 0 doubts Trump would like to become a "strong man" a la Putin, if he can.
It's a terrible image, but I see Trump's assault on democracy like something else he has plenty of experience in: sexual assault. The victim has to escalate from quiet acceptance to resistance involving some sort of violence, which must be scary as hell because that escalation will most likely be responded to in kind, and it could turn deadly.
I'm not saying that she isn't a good politician or that what she is doing is not a step in the right direction. I personally like her. All I'm saying is that she hasn't accomplished anything meaningful to merit the Nobel prize.
That's like giving the Nobel in physics to someone that has worked all their life publishing papers but they all have been refuted and proven wrong.
I don't think "prize" for the merit of being relentless in their fight for publishing physics papers is merited, maybe a different honor, but Peace Nobels should be given to - and i quote -:
"to the person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses."
> All I'm saying is that she hasn't accomplished anything meaningful to merit the Nobel prize
I know it's frowned upon, but did you actually read the submission article? They're highlighting exactly why they've chosen her, including what meaningful work she has already done:
> The efforts of the collective opposition, both before and during the election, were innovative and brave, peaceful and democratic. The opposition received international support when its leaders publicised the vote counts that had been collected from the country’s election districts, showing that the opposition had won by a clear margin. But the regime refused to accept the election result, and clung to power.
Maybe you have some better suggestions on who this award should have gone to? Of all the candidates, I guess in the end she was seen as having done a lot, but in your mind she've done nothing, which means you're thinking about some other person who did more?
> Maybe you have some better suggestions on who this award should have gone to? Of all the candidates, I guess in the end she was seen as having done a lot, but in your mind she've done nothing, which means you're thinking about some other person who did more?
I think if there are no suitable candidates the award should be skipped. Like it has been skipped many years for the same reasons. This would send a more powerful message about how fucked up the state of the world is rather than giving it to someone just for the sake of it.
> and one part to the person who has done the most or best to advance fellowship among nations, the abolition or reduction of standing armies, and the establishment and promotion of peace congresses
Go to her Wikipedia article, do a quick skim/read and then tell me how she doesn't fit with those conditions already?
Why skip the prize when there are individuals that fit the conditions for the prize? Working for democracy and peace in a peaceful and democratic manner shouldn't be rewarded?
They are not my standards. They are the Nobel Peace committee's standards. And I do agree Nobel Peace prizes are purely performative, but this one alongside Barack Obama has been one of the most performative ones I can remember.
I think they're older than that, Nobel apparently left a will that included three conditions for what we today call the Nobel Peace Prize:
> and one part to the person who has done the most or best to advance fellowship among nations, the abolition or reduction of standing armies, and the establishment and promotion of peace congresses.
> They are not my standards. They are the Nobel Peace committee's standards.
So you're saying that the Nobel Peace committee has not been following their standards? I find this pretty hard to prove... it's like if you were telling me that even if I say that my favourite color is green, it probably isn't because green is not that special a colour.
We can only hope that she will not behave like the previous career politicians that got the Nobel Peace Prize in recent years.
Abiy Ahmed (2019), from Ethiopia, ended the cold war with Eritrea. Then he launched a war against the region of Tigray, with mass rapes and mass civilian killings. He harassed the free press, and turned the country into an autocracy.
Juan Manuel Santos (2016) from Colombia and Ellen Johnson Sirleaf (2011) from Liberia later appeared in Paradise Papers because they had secret offshore companies in Panama and Barbades. Their political activity was more tame after the prize than before. Both ended their presidential tenures with plummeting approval rates, especially because of corruption allegations.
Barack Obama (2009) received the Prize for his generous discourses on foreign policy, just after being elected. Then he lead the USA to more war in Afghanistan, and a new war in Libya. He helped Saudi Arabia invade Yemen (UN states this war killed 300,000 people). He helped the Egyptian army with its coup, that killed thousands of opponents and sent 60,000 in jails (including the elected president who died there).
In my opinion, this prize is, most of the time, a dark and heavily political joke.
Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but people are awarded the prize based on what they've done, not based on what they might do in the future.
I'm not sure you could claim the award is a joke because of people did after being awarded it, especially when most people awarded didn't launch new wars or helped coups.
Ideally, we would accept the recipients as being of “certified good character”. But the stability of this pattern shows chronic lack of basic insight into the awardees, IMO.
No, ideally you'd understand under what basis the prize is handed out, and then draw your conclusions from that (or avoid thinking something specific will happen in the future based on the prize itself).
Nothing in the criteria for the handing out the prize has anything about the reception having any sort of specific character, good or bad. This is all of the conditions for the award:
> Fraternity between nations; abolition or reduction of standing armies; and the holding and promotion of peace congresses
So every year they look at candidates and what they've done within those things, then make an judgement.
Obama didn’t actually do anything but get elected and said nice things. When he got the Peace Prize, people all over the world were confused and thought it was a joke.
Obamas was explicitly given as a hope for the future
The committee "thought it would strengthen Obama and it didn't have this
effect", Lundestad told the Associated Press, though he fell short of calling
the award a mistake.[145] "In hindsight, we could say that the argument of
giving Obama a helping hand was only partially correct", Lundestad wrote.
Yip, when reading his post I thought this would be the most obvious example. She was given the award for protesting a government that was cracking down hard on protest. She then took power and, at the minimum, was complicit in a literal genocide. In many ways I think this award should not be granted to 'resistance' types because they have a recurring habit of becoming even worse than that what they were resisting. And it obviously should not be given to political leaders based on words instead of actions. Actually maybe this prize shouldn't even exist - it's quite a joke, especially relative to the prize for the sciences.
The peace prize is often given to people still working on something, not having achieved something. In that way it is different from the science prizes.
I think that is a understandable approach (providing support), though it can lead to giving the prize to people who never achieve any of their goals. Whether that’s a worthy trade off I do not know.
People imagine political movements as something to accomplish in their lifetime. When the real movements are multi-generational and involve planting trees you'll never enjoy the shade of.
I get frustrated in the US we are always thinking in terms of the next election. Movements that effect lasting change: civil rights, national independence movements, ending slavery, heck even the current conservative regime in the US, are all multigenerational efforts with clear principles and goals that get passed down.
Being the opposition leader there is already something extraordinary. While other opposition figures have ended up coziying up with the regime she hasn’t relented. All while important members of her party have been imprisoned or murdered.
She’s also in hiding since the last elections, likely on an embassy but undetermined.
In a dictatorship, running against the leader involves more personal risk than in a country that is already democratic. Also, democracies tend to be more peaceful than dictatorships; my understanding is that efforts to transition from dictatorship to democracy may be regarded as a contribution to peace.
She also received the Sakharov Prize not long ago; if she had to receive only one, the latter would be easier to explain.
It's so disappointing to see many folks engaging with the troll you are. You made this account just to post this garbage. Why didn't you post with your regular account? You can't even face folks on the internet. Do you think you have what it takes to face a dictator in the real world?
That reminds me a bit of former winner Aung San Suu Kyi, who got the prize in 1991, while not having done or said that much at the time of the award, other than be a political prisoner.
I respect that she opposed the Burmese military junta most of her life, but then a year after coming to power in 2015, she defended the military against charges of complicity in the Rohingya genocide to preserve her fragile government.
Personally, I think the Peace Prize shouldn't go to politicians at all.
Aung San Suu Kyi was just another "compliant native" similar to those the British installed prior to leaving the colonies.
The roadmap was laid out by Cecil Rhodes in his letters and will and extensively documented in "The Secret Society" by Robin Brown.
It's quite fascinating to see their networks with the benefit of hindsight. For example, Mountbatten installed Nehru as the first unelected PM of India.
Aung San Suu Kyi was educated in New Delhi India and during that time, she lived in Nehru's home.
She managed to convince a people of a country that has been entrenched in authoritarianism that the vote was rigged without using violence.
Imagine one day we wake up after the usual yawn-inducing sham elections in Russia and Putin won as usual but a large chunk of the country, probably a plurality of it, is utterly convinced that it was completely fake and that Navalny won.
Without anybody using violence to do it.
Those who think there is nothing to be done but to counter authoritarianism without another authoritarian, or violence, or just to give up and suffer it - might be inspired by this.
I'm not the NNC but that seems like a "meaningful accomplishment".
You could ask: "Sure, allright, the populace was convinced that election was a sham. But... Maduro is still in power so she still hasn't done much". Let me flip it around, perhaps: What did Gandi ever actually accomplish? Isn't it the same thing: Show that violence is not a necessary element, get the people to reframe the situation a bit?
Can we prove Gandi sped up the UK's exit? Even if we can, one of those holocaust level holy heck humanity can get extremely dark moments in history that is rarely talked about is the absolute terror that occurred during the split of the Raj into India and Pakistan.
My point is: Judging the eligibility of a person for a peace prize on the basis of 'measurable meaningful accomplishment' is not how it works and probably shouldn't be how it works. It's either a bullshit prize (kissinger got one...) or it is like making a statue of somebody: It takes a person, turns them into a principle or ideal. Even though humans are much more complex than that.
The notion of "one is capable of being in opposition in an autocratic regime and get stuff done without resorting to violence" got a peace prize, but as per the dictat of Alfred Nobel, only people can get it, so, they stuck the label "Maria Corina Machado" on it. And that wasn't a bad labelling: She really did accomplish 'meaningfully' that goal, at least, I'd gather according to most folks' definition of the word 'capable'.
> Imagine one day we wake up after the usual yawn-inducing sham elections in Russia and Putin won as usual but a large chunk of the country, probably a plurality of it, is utterly convinced that it was completely fake and that Navalny won. Without anybody using violence to do it.
Exactly this happened in Belarus in 2020. Government wasn't shy of using its power though, many people got long prison sentences, many people had to run, nothing changed wrt to dictatorship. I don't see anything inspiring in this story honestly.
lol. Speaking of careers, leave it to HN to get a bunch of careerists whose main priority is their own pockets to engage in some armchair debate about how people who have likely done significantly more for the world than they will ever do don't deserve a peace prize.
The amount of presumption, ignorance, and lack of reflection in your comment is astounding. It shows that you don't take life seriously and/or don't understand what risks being an opposition party in a dictatorship actually entails.
It was a MAGA talking point from the start, meant for MAGA ppl... The chance he got it was 0%, because:
1- The Nobel Peace Prize is chosen by a committee of 5 Norwegians. Having Russia or Israel expressing support doesn't help, it's probably even counterproductive. Random endorsements on Twitter don't matter either..
2- The committee values international cooperation, not trade wars, isolationism, or cozying up to dictators.
3- They prize the defense of democracy, not attacks on it.
4- The cherry on the cake: Machado got the prize while he's been threatening war with Venezuela itself. It almost feels like a big f*ck off
Machado is manufacturing consent for Trump's planned invasion, so point 4 is a bit weaker than you might like. Imagine looKing at Iraq and saying "yeah, that's what I want for my country".
See I truly respect President Boric from Chile, it’s one of the few progressive leaders from the region that has been outspoken about the Maduro regime and calling it what it is: a dictatorship. Unlike other leaders of the region who could be doing way more.
It’s pretty understandable for Mrs. Corina to take whatever support she gets internationally.
Providing her with this award while Trump's naval battle groups stand ready to attack Venezuela isnt helping arrest the collapse of the west's moral authority.
That’s like saying Volodymyr Zelenskyy supports Trump. Foreign politicians operate outside of U.S. domestic politics - they don’t get to choose other countries’ leaders. Their job is to use diplomacy to navigate international politics in whatever shape those politics happen to be in.
Yeah, I'm wondering if the Nobel Peace prize has anything to do with peace for people, or for her neoliberalism stance of protection of the free market that would usher peace for the business interests of oil companies [0].
I must confess I am no Venezuelan political expert, and it always gives me pause whether the economic siege that has been laid against Venezuela with the sanctions is about democracy, or about access to unrestricted markets (a la United Fruit Company — now Chiquita — and Standard Fruit Company — now Dole plc).
The problem in South America is that both versions are true. The outside exploitation pressures are extremely strong, so any vaguely socialist government succumbs to the temptation to squash the outside agitators .. and any local opposition who actually have a valid point or real anti-corruption objections. Running a moderate social democrat centrist country in that situation is not stable, instead you get pendulum swings from left to right and back again, with significant human cost along the way.
(exception maybe Costa Rica?)
To be clear, Venezuela is long past the "popular socialism" phase and decayed into the "strongman holding on" phase.
This is a tangent, but this type of You-Know-Who speech is so irritating. If you want to say Trump just say it, don't dance around it like he's some kind of god who'll punish you if you say his name in vain.
Because "just say it" doesn't work on many sites. I don't know about this site but anecdotally, I've seen that when I use certain words / phrases / names on YouTube or Reddit subreddits, those comments are either not shown at all (not shown even to me) or shadow-banned (not shown to others).
Another reason I don't just say it sometimes is to avoid trolling by fans of whatever or whoever I criticized.
people are getting in very real world trouble for saying negative things about certain people or their friends.
i’m not sure if you’ve seen how many people have lost their jobs for saying truths about kurk or how many people are losing jobs, scholarships, visas, education etc for saying things about a certain regime, but it’s happening, for real. they’re actively pushing to force people to turn over their social media accounts for review.
we can’t blame this poster for vagueposting here. i often pushback against vagueposting but in today’s climate we cant blame people for taking their personal safety seriously when it comes to vocalizing their criticisms.
I don't know about Russia but there seem to be loads of cases of people being arrested (or detained or harrassed by police) for holding up a blank piece of paper, including one case in Cornwall: https://netpol.org/2023/02/10/cornish-protester-assaulted-an...
You assume that we're dealing with a rational person who has all their senses intact.
The deal would likely take months for the world to see if it's successful. He can get nominated next year if he keeps his own house peaceful too, else he should forget about a rational nomination + award of the Prize.
You're not dealing with anyone. There's a chap in the white house you don't like, and you want to have a pre-emptive go at him. Either he doesn't say anything, in which case you forget you said this. Or he is upset, in which case you feel justified in this. Or he's happy for the winner, in which case you feel like if he mentions it at all he must be upset.
If there's no way for you to change your stance based on any outcome, then it's pointless to say.
> I am actually dealing with a person though, and have set out a falsifiable case.
As have they? We have many tests for determining whether or not a given person's senses are or not intact.
> Same, but it's also true for anyone else.
Note I said show. If you happen to live in a world where you feel you've been devoid of such empathy then I feel for you, but such an environment of narcissism is hardly representative.
Even if the Gaza deal stick, I don't see how one could receive a nobel prize while deploying army and starting a war in their own country in cities/states/counties led by their political opponents.
What war did Trump create that you claim he's ending?
Because as far as I know, Israel's war on Gaza started before his term, and if the peace deal holds, Trump will be almost singlehandedly responsible for ending it.
If that's not worthy of a Nobel Peace prize, I truly don't know what else is.
I hope they’ve managed to convey this to the whitehouse.
It really didn’t help when they gave Obama the prize. Even he was embarrassed by it.
I think trump genuinely deserves the prize if peace in the Middle East achieved. However, I think it’s far more likely he’s being played for a fool by Israel as per Russia.
Trump does genuinely seem to want to avoid foreign wars, to his credit.
Norway is no doubt now bracing itself for tariffs or other retaliation. Hopefully they can dangle next year’s prize as worth waiting for.
The Obama one was pretty much for not being George W Bush (or, more to the point, not being controlled by Dick Cheney et al; Bush himself wasn't the _real_ problem there). They'd probably have given it to McCain if he'd won, too. People were _really_ worried about Bush and pals; by the end Cheney was pushing Bush to _start a war with Iran_.
I dunno. Do you? Does the Nobel prize have a history of shaping the future? Did winning the Nobel prize make Obama a different president? Was it supposed to?
To me, it seemed oddly aspirational, but maybe that's more often the case with the peace prize, too.
Also worth noting that the language in the press release [1] and facts page [2] makes it all sound like it was for things already achieved (although maybe that's at odds with "Inspires Hope for a Better Future"), and I'm skeptical of looking at year 1 achievements the job with arguably the most destructive power in the world.
It's not a hill I'd fight, let alone die, on, though. :)
If you wanted to avoid "misnominations", you'd be forced to wait until the career of the nominee is over (meaning in many cases: award it posthumously).
But the Nobel price explicitly tries to avoid that; hindsight is always gonna be better.
That’s not how it works. The prizes are not motivational but for achievement . Otherwise we should give the physics prize to some school kid in the hope of them discovering quantum gravity
Even Obama said basically those words when he got a call from his staff at 6AM announcing that he had won, and he said in the press conference that he didn't feel he deserved it (I looked this up in his 2020 book Promised Land).
Meanwhile for Trump... I'm pretty certain he wants it because a clever, charismatic, eloquent and beloved Black man got it...
Kissinger's decision is debatable but legit. That time it was not only about him. It was just pathetic from him to took it when his co-winner declined.
Price for Obama was probably miss-step but at least he was not desperately begging for it like Trump does.
Things in the US seem to keep sliding toward further power centralization. Regardless of politics, that is bad policy of the highest order (bit).
Great opportunity for someone to create some effective opposition.
There is a medal in it!
Ironically, someone who badly wants a medal is actually in the perfect position to turn around the brain/competency drain, “bring back science”, boost US competition with China’s green tech wave, help Ukraine win (instead of the endless: “not lose for now”), fire the all the senate confirmed bozos…
If he did, a Nobel prize would be unconventional under the circumstances. But well worth it nevertheless.
No Rushmore. There isn’t enough room left on that mountain for that size of an ego. But maybe a genuine gold working toilet installation for Rushmore tourists.
———
Humor, despair and any bias of mine aside. I am quite seriously unaware of anyone with a good opposition plan, to reverse the power centralization, at this point.
Perhaps a constitutional amendment, reaffirming key points of the existing constitution with a highlighter for supreme justices with poor eyesight, might be one promising approach.
> “No person shall” [something, something] “hold any office” [something, something], “who, having” [something, something] “engaged in insurrection”, [something, something] “or given aid” [or incited, or encouraged insurrection, or threatened a vice president for not implementing an insurrection, or delayed relief for law enforcement engaged in stopping an insurrection] “or comfort” [or praise or approval or promises of pardons] “to the enemies thereof.”
> […All the powers of the purse given to the representative branch, with no provision for presidential “creative” reinterpretation…]
> [Etc., etc.]
If anyone wants to give a shout out to anyone building effective resistance to the avalanche of presidential power, essentially being voluntarily abdicated by the other two branches, I would be interested to hear of them.
(Traditionally that has been a very high consensus bipartisan issue. Not everyone, but most everyone.)
> Humor, despair and any bias of mine aside. I am quite seriously unaware of anyone with a good opposition plan, to reverse the power centralization, at this point.
Interesting point! Bit of a tangent, bit Brazil is in the process of holding Bolsonaro to account for power grabs that have a lot of similarities with what's happening in the US.
Too early to call their long term efficacy, but definitely one to watch.
>I am quite seriously unaware of anyone with a good opposition plan, to reverse the power centralization, at this point.
Trump, and the regime associated with him, are an exploitation of preexisting degradation of limited, democratic and responsible governance in the United States. The restoration of"good government" is the obvious counter to his rising dictatorship, but that would result in other existing power blocs (themselves also abusive, if not so gratuitously as Trump) loosing their own ability to exploit the system after he exits the stage. Faced with a choice between "stop Trump and end our own abuses as a consequence" or "let him run rampant and hope the US survives so that we can exploit it later" established American institutions have overwhelmingly gone with the second option.
Its fair. She done a crucial job uniting the different interests of the oposition of the venezuelan goverment/cartel.
Too bad they where so divided for so many years, that when they trully worked together to wind a election it was too late because now MAduro dont even care to steal the ellections in plain sigth and probably theres no more solution without violence.
I don't know much about her but it's truly sad to see how absolutely eeeeeveryyyyy media reporting about this have to report it with Trump, or in relation to his statements. Man must sucks to be her, limelight is still on Trump, truly a showman.
And to repeat my point that I do every year: Nobel peace prize is the only part of the price that is actually given out by a foreign political body (Norway, founding member of NATO and Oil nation) and not the Swedish academy.
It's famous recepients include presidents that bombed/joined war during/just after been given it and bloggers that kept blogging after surviving shootings. And Henry Kissinger
Petition to rename it to "Norwegian peace price". /signed, a Swede
Because Donald Trump is the most deserving winner of the Nobel Peace Prize since Nelson Mandela in 1993. Especially so for those that think Israel was committing a genocide.
Notice what they said: This year's peace prize is being given to someone for transitioning a country from dictatorship to democracy. They sure as hell aren't going to give it to someone doing the opposite!
They certainly wouldnt have given it to Hugo Chavez in 2002 when he overcame the American backed anti democratic coup to overthrow him.
Dissidents in countries which are enemies of the west? With enormous oil reserves? With an American fleet poised offshore ready for regime change? Definitely. Who are zionists to boot? Even better.
Dissidents in brutal, dictatorial countries (e.g. Saudi) which are allies? Hell no. Never. The nobel prize is a tool of statecraft and that would be a self defeating use of its PR potential to advance western foreign policy goals.
This isn't illegal but feels like it should be illegal. You don't see corporate officers trade their stocks right before a big announcement, because there are laws on it.
Other than the fact that polymarket is legally not a stock market, what really is the difference between insider trading on a stock market vs insider trading on polymarket? Does anyone have a good argument for why one should be illegal while the other is legal?
The argument goes, the purpose of prediction markets is not to be fair, it's to provide information. Allowing insider trading benefits that purpose. And I think that's fair - this is not a place to invest your retirement savings, it's essentially gambling.
I kind of feel like abusing the information asymmetry when doing insider trading in a betting market should be illegal regardless if the purpose is to provide information or not, or if it's considered gambling or not. Just like doing so with stocks is illegal today.
why? The purpose of the prediction market is not to be fair to market participants, it's to aggregate information regarding an event. There is a public benefit to allowing participants to bet on insider information. It could be even argued there is nothing unfair about it if everyone is free to do it/can anticipate others might have insider info. If we actually limited the market to participants who have insider information(not feasible because we can't verify), that'd be a great public utility. this is the next best thing for all those who don't participate in it. These are specialized markets and we shouldn't rush to 'protect' people who bet on very technical events happening.
> Does anyone have a good argument for why one should be illegal while the other is legal?
I don't care either way but for the sake of argument:
Stock market is something you can't avoid (ignoring hermits), so an insider trade can ruin your pension fund or other financial wellbeing with you having no way to opt out of the risk, so the government protects you. (This is good!)
Polymarket is more like a bet between friends. You don't have to play but if you do understand it's unregulated and someone can cheat.
The purpose of the stock market is to play matchmaker between companies and capital. Insider trading erodes trust of unaffiliated capital owners and thus hurts the purpose.
A prediction market, on the other hand, aims to provide the best possible probabilities on events (arguably), and "insider trading" helps that purpose.
In the UK some MPs and police officers put bets on the date of the next general election on the basis of inside information. Apparently you can be prosecuted for cheating in a bet:
"The investigation, initiated in June 2024, focused on individuals suspected of using confidential information - specifically advance knowledge of the proposed election date - to gain an unfair advantage in betting markets. Such actions constitute an offence of cheating under Section 42 of the Gambling Act 2005, a criminal offence."
Just the opposite. It's to the 'benefit of the market' to let insiders trade. That is, if you think that the point of a prediction market is to get accurate predictions (and the point of a financial market is to get accurate prices).
However, I agree that they might get rules against this. But not to benefit the market, just because people think this would be proper. Social desirability bias is strong.
In the long run, if participants feel they can't ever win because there's always an insider taking advantage, then participants might leave and that's to the detriment of the market. So it might be in the interest of the market to make sure everyone has a fair enough chance. Finding the right balance here is somewhat of an art.
This is similar to the way all football teams benefit from fair referees and even matches, even if sometimes it means they lose.
Also: the point of an exchange is to make money. Different types of exchanges have different fee structures, but generally their profit is a function of volume, so there primary objective is to attract volume. Since every trade / bet requires two participants, they need to balance the needs of both participants to make it work. Price discovery is a positive side effect of efficient and fair markets, which is why as a society we like them and encourage them, but it isn't what they are trying to achieve except inasmuch as it encourages participation.
If you actually want to know 'why' people think so, have a look at all the discussions around insider trading in financial markets. No one is forcing you to buy stocks at gunpoint, either.
(And, yes, there are good arguments in favour of allowing insider trading in all markets, and a few against.)
It's easier to justify stock markets banning insider information because there are ignorant participants through their investment funds who we would like to protect. Why would we protect willing participants betting on arbitrary events? Even if we ban on this one too, should we in general be able to create a market that explicitly allows insider information for some arbitrary thing, insideinformationverywelcomemarket, where everyone is aware it's the main point of the market or shall we just protect these people from themselves?
It would be interesting to see if someone can develop insider trading tracking algorithms to uncover highly probable useful information out of prediction markets before major public announcements. It would be unfair to people involved in markets, but highly beneficial to everyone else, at least so long as prediction markets remain relatively niche.
> This question will resolve as Yes if, before January 1, 2026, the United States carries out a military attack against Venezuela's territory or military forces.
I did not recognize her name, but after doing some research, I am impressed by her work, and do not have an issue with her getting the prize.
However, her accomplishments were also clear last summer, and I feel it would have been far more appropriate to give her the prize last year. Instead, it went to an organization that has been around for 70 years. While they have done great work, there was nothing they did specifically in 2024 that stood out, at least that I could find. So, clearly, Machado was not an obvious choice, at least last year.
Also want to add that I don't think Trump should have gotten it, simply because it is far too early to tell if the current "middle east peace plan" will actually turn out to be more than just fanfare.
A better statement would have been to have no peace prize this year.
Did not realize this, you are correct. I thought nominations were accepted until late in the year since so many people were "nominating" Trump, even before the middle east thing.
But I am confused, Obama got his prize in 2009, which would mean he did not receive it for anything he did as president, and before that he was only domestically focused, afaik.
edit - I also see from other comments that people were placing bets on trump for the prize, which would not make sense if he had to be nominated by 1/31
It helped that WW-II broke the British. Non Violence needs an audience and a population that i) can feel shame ii) holds some power to do something about it.
Gandhi's protests were causing turmoil and dissent within the UK. Not to forget the fact that the massive Indian population had gone into civil disobedience as well, making it costlier to rule India. Anymore issues, including any harm to Gandhi would have caused massive problems for the British, both in India and at their own homeland. They had to spend to keep everybody safe and the situation normal. That wouldn't have been the outcome of a violent revolution. Summarizing, Gandhi's peaceful protest cannot be described in simple terms. There are a lot of nuances.
Gandhi's protests are a very valuable source of info on both violent and nonviolent protests. It's easy to talk about an armed or violent revolution. But it's not a decision to be taken very lightly. Apparently, both the sides of the American civil war went into it expecting it to somehow end in a few days! You know the carnage that followed. I have no clue why they held that belief. But it supports the fact that people almost always underestimate the cost of a war.
Non-violent protests are more effective at garnering support and mobilizing a huge movement. The human costs are also arguably lesser. I dont know if it's practical all the time. But it should be given a big chance if an opportunity exists.
I've become increasingly uncomfortable with these sorts of casual throwabouts of extremely complex and unique geopolitical situations though. Gandhi existed in a particular moment and context - take the same man and put him up against a different regime, and you would not get the same outcome.
It's like how people talk up peaceful protest by referencing Martin Luther King. He was a major centralizing figure for civil rights, but he did not exist in a vacuum of context either.
Precisely. Liberation movements have various tools at their disposal. But using the same tool in a different context does not guarantee a similar outcome.
On Gandhi in particular, many do not realize that there were parallel movements inside India that did resort to violence. So the context is not as simple as it may seem.
I mean, Poland managed to get rid of communist rule through a peaceful process(which doesn't mean people weren't arrested, tortured, intimidated and beaten). There was a desire for free and democratic elections and it happened.
As an Ethiopian man, I view this new Nobel Peace Prize with profound skepticism, a feeling rooted entirely in the disastrous outcome of Abiy Ahmed's utterly undeserved award. The premature praise he received for peace-making quickly evaporated, leading instead to a catastrophic war and the fragmentation of our nation. His prize has been followed by widespread conflict, massive displacement, and an alarming return to authoritarian rule. For us, the entire Nobel Peace Prize now feels meaningless, a hollow symbol given its failure to prevent—or perhaps its role in emboldening—such terrible suffering in Ethiopia
For me, that skepticism began when Obama received the award. To his credit, he did not think he deserved it. But I have never viewed it in the same light since.
He surely started Libyan War by bombing the hell out the government forces and creating power vacuum. The war is still ravaging the country to this day
You seem to have come from another timeline, where that's reality. Wikipedia says:
> On 19 March 2011, a NATO-led coalition began a military intervention into the ongoing Libyan Civil War to implement United Nations Security Council Resolution 1973 (UNSCR 1973). The UN Security Council passed the resolution with ten votes in favour and five abstentions, with the stated intent to have "an immediate ceasefire in Libya, including an end to the current attacks against civilians, which it said might constitute 'crimes against humanity'
but I guess that's fake news...
But I'm more interested about how you can travel between timelines. Is it with a portal gun like in Rick and Morty?
What are you saying exactly? Military intervention is not a war? Obama did not play a decisive role in starting it (mainly to sway away attention from the dragging Afghanistan war which he promised to end)? Or UN mandate makes it somewhat ok, considering NATO broke conditions of the UN resolution already in the first weeks of bombing (which was promptly objected by UN security Council members).
Make no mistake. Obama started this war for PR reasons. Had it not been for NATO bombing Libya would still exist as a state instead of a failed entity it is now.
By this logic Russia did not start Ukraine war but merely joined the internal conflict started by Ukraine in 2014.
It was hardly a civil war before NATO bombing, but rather protests which were brutally squashed by Gaddafi forces. Opposition lacked any means to wage a way before NATO started supplying them with arms too.
So in the timeline you're from, the Crimean invasion also was an internal conflict... interesting!
Also there, civilized societies should look away and just let it happen when people fighting oppression is being slaughtered. Well, that's quite similar to this timeline, because that's what's happening in Gaza and being ignored by "The West".
Well, oppression is exactly what people in Crimea and Donbass viewed Maidan events and did not want to have anything to do with this new Ukraine. Go do a research on Crimea referendum or gallups done by Pew or such and you will find out that secession was and still is the most popular option. And sure as hell people of Crimea do not want to be part of Ukraine again.
The UN mandate which NATO were given to use military force only to protect civilians was used as a figleaf to pursue a regime change operation instead.
In the context of that regime change operation they killed many civilians and left a humanitarian catastrophe in their wake. The country is beyond fucked but Hillary did get to say "we came, we saw, he died" afterwards, underscoring the lie. So mission accomplished?
For some reason the UN security council stopped approving NATO "humanitarian" operations after that and Russia started treating NATO expansion as an imperialist, existential threat.
He started a number of color revolutions though out MENA?
And let us not forget his assassination of an American citizen by drone strike for visiting the place of his fathers death, also assassinated by drone strike.
And if we want a “fun fact,” he is the only Nobel Peace winner to bomb and kill another, as commander and chief his forces bombed and killed innocents in a Doctor’s Without Borders outpost in Afghanistan. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kunduz_hospital_airstrike)
I think there's a very high bar of proof to "Americans are responsible for a popular revolution" when in practice there was a huge amount of effort by individuals on the ground, for example in Tahrir Square.
Obama did not make Mohamed Bouazizi set himself on fire.
Can we please stop propagating the flimsy conspiracies about the 2011 revolutions? They started entirely organically, but some unfortunately devolved into wider conflicts.
At worst, this conspiracy infantilizes Arab populations by removing their agency. At best, it’s false marketing for the CIA and other agencies.
Did Obama start the Afghanistan war? or the Iraq war?
Yes, he could exit those countries hastily. But that has its own cost. Getting in wars is the easy part. Getting out of one is the hard part. Ask Putin who went into Ukraine on a 3-day limited special military operation.
Bush Jr. got us into multiple wars and unlike his father did not limit the scope of them. His father did get us into a war with Iraq but was smart enough to keep it limited in scope.
Also, under Obama, the "wars" were not real wars like the Russia/Ukraine war where both sides are losing hundreds of people every week. But they were more like peacekeeping operations that occasionally ran into skirmishes.
> like the Russia/Ukraine war where both sides are losing hundreds of people every week.
Every week? If we just look at the Russian casualties numbers, its around 1000+ casualties PER DAY.
There was a recent leak of the death toll and the most active area's had a 2/5 dead rate, 1/3 "missing" rate, and the rest was wounded.
If we only count the death + "missing" over the entire front for Russia, its 500+ PER DAY.
Ironically, the Russian->Afghanistan invasion was WAY less deadly then what we see today in Ukraine.
Your point still stands about the US evolvement in Iran/Afghanistan, but darn your numbers really way below the actual body count in the Russian "3-day limited special military operation". Those are numbers from the first year, not the daily of the third year.
Peacekeeping is like the UN sending troops in to monitor a ceasefire. These were wars. 35,000+ civilian deaths in Afghanistan. Overthrowing Gaddafi. Tens of thousands of airstrikes against ISIS in Iraq and Syria. Drone strikes killing thousands of civilians in Pakistan. US foreign policy has equated “peace” and “stability” with its own military hegemony, being almost constantly at war to further its hypocritical ideology. It’s been a cash cow for the defense lobby.
If you ask me, Putin is welcome to end the Ukraine war at any time he wants! Getting out of a war is actually easy if you don't care what happens after that, e.g. in the case of Afghanistan accept as "sunk costs" the billions of dollars and thousands of lives that were lost during the 20 years that NATO was involved there.
Unlike the other Nobel prizes, the peace prize does not seem to be given as a reward for past achievements, but as an encouragement to continue current political engagement.
I mean I think you can go back well before that. At least to when Kissinger received it, while his co-laureate Le Duc Tho refused it on the basis that no peace had been achieved.
He won the award for his excellent ability of not being George W. Bush. In fairness, he really is quite good at this. I haven't really followed his career post-presidency, but reportedly he continues to not be George W. Bush to this day.
The notion that the Nobel prize is of any moral value, whatsoever, is faulty.
The Nobel Foundation is an attempt to make amends for the harms done by its founders invention of explosive materials - which subsequently birthed the military-industrial complex.
Its use of its material wealth to invest in index funds derives a great deal of wealth from weapons manufacturers such as Lockheed Martin, Boeing, and Raytheon Technologies
.. In that sense, it has only been since 2017 that it has exclusively attempted to avoid profiting from investments in the Wests' military-industrial complex. However, there is a growing voice of discontent which claims that the Foundations' policy change to "avoid investing in controversial weapons systems" is a PR move, and not a real force for change.
Awarding the "Peace Prize" to a US' President who went on to drop more bombs per minute on innocent human beings than his predecessor, is not making amends.
No, I do not think that the Nobel Foundation is making amends. I think it is functioning as a propaganda tool of the very military-industrial complex from which it derived its wealth.
OK. I was looking narrowly at "The Nobel Foundation is an attempt to make amends for the harms done by its founders invention of explosive materials", but that was not in fact the issue.
There's a "curse" in Nobel peace prize for sure. Not long after Obama got it, he got US dragged in to Libya and Syria. Merely 2 years after EU got it, Crimea was annexed during Ukraine trying to get closer to EU (and EU really did nothing about this).
Not to the fault of the people per se, but I see too much "awarded for effort, then oops turns out the complete opposite happened" with the peace prize.
Norwegians are known for their oil and salmon. not knowledge, but being spoiled. so maybe the committee are just painfully incompetent to the level we should now bet that Venezuela should expect big turmoil in the coming years
I apologise in advance for making light of the situation in your country, but did you find the peace awards more meaningless than Hinton's award for PHYSICS?!!
It's probably best to see the prize more as encouragement rather than endorsement of everything the person has ever done. Abiy Ahmed won the award "for his efforts to achieve peace and international cooperation, and in particular for his decisive initiative to resolve the border conflict with neighbouring Eritrea". His actions in the last few years notwithstanding, he did do that. And insofar I can follow Ethiopian politics, his other actions from the early years were also generally in the spirit of the Nobel Peace Prize. At least in theory, celebrating and rewarding this kind of thing is good? I don't see how it would embolden him, or anyone else?
I won't deny some of the recipients are questionable, but I don't see how someone receiving the award or not would help prevent - or embolden - suffering in a country? I'm not familiar with what happened in Ethiopia, so apologies if this is obvious.
She’s been in hiding since the last elections that Maduro blatantly stole. I lost hope myself about Venezuela but I wish the regime ends soon for those still there enduring it.
I understand your frustration. But you may want to avoid a foreign interference/invasion more than a bad regime. The former is arguably worse than the latter, though there are exceptions.
It’s been over 25 years since these thugs took power. I don’t care if one country or a coalition of countries gets rid of them. I would actually welcome foreign intervention at this point.
Like Afghanistan? Or Germany after WWII? You talk of these 'Foreign forces' as some sort of benevolent power liberating people from tyranny for charity. Wait till they stay back to extract payment for their 'efforts'. We have watched decade and decades of this moral grandstanding destroy weaker nations. And need I remind you how much these 'foreign forces' are responsible for creating the hellish conditions in South America though their interference in the first place? It's just replacement of one tyrant with another. Another that brings in weapons and troops from outside the country.
But just so you picture it: things are so dire there after 25 years that people would even cheer at any country intervening.
So let’s pause for a moment and think: what is the best alternative? Keep enduring the regime like the Cubans have been doing for double the time we have? That’s also a depressing outlook.
Of course it is. I'm not denying or downplaying how bad it is. These situations are scary as hell. They're not supposed to happen. And it must change. Venezuela deserves peace. But now imagine the alternative you're thinking of.
To start with, who was responsible for the political turmoil in South America for much of its history? Imagine another invasion. Do you expect them to withdraw as soon as the current Venezuelan regime has fallen? The regime that's virtue signalling now has a history of proudly brandishing their xenophobia and racism. What do you think life will be like under a remote controlled rule by them? There are plenty of examples around the world for how that will end. Is that the change you wish for?
> what is the best alternative?
The best alternative is for the native population to bring about change without foreign interference. But honestly, I have no clue if that's practical at all. I don't know any other solutions either. The people must decide for themselves as to how to resolve this. All I'm saying is that you must be careful about the intentions of anyone who steps in offering help. I sincerely wish that the Venezuelans win peace. Good Luck!
I'm not very familiar with the situation in Venezuela. But the 'bad regime' is just a generic phrase that was not intended to convey the seriousness in any sense. However, what I can claim is that you totally ignored the seriousness of a foreign interference and invasion. Yes - a dictatorship is not a good situation at all anywhere in the world. But what good is it for a nation if one horrible regime is to be replaced by another? Do you know how many atrocities western militaries have inflicted in countries that they invaded in the name of liberating them? Many of them compete with the local tyrants on how cruel they can get. You wont learn much about it because the western media doesn't seem to care. Ask the people of countries that suffered western military invasion instead. I'm not sure you realize how much people outside the west resent the 'services rendered' in their countries. It's a long running trope around the world that if there is a serious conflict in any part of the world, it's sure to have the hand of one of two western powers in it. Yet, the western population pat themselves in the back for the virtues of freedom and equality. There are even those who are still proud of their colonial past, believing that they enriched their colonies somehow. Meanwhile, don't forget the depth of xenophobia and racism of the current regime that's virtue signalling with the intent to invade Venezuela.
Trump will never win, nobody who floods the zone with a low signal/noise ratio will ever win this prize or any of the 'elite' prizes.
The low signal/noise ratio people are at best perceived as 'communicators' more often jesters.
If anything the anomaly of the social media era is that people who put themselves out there as low signal/noise ratio character are even taken seriously at all.
Prizes like that are given to people who are perceived to be special, the more you talk and yap the more you give people an opportunity to realize how NOT special you are and how NOT special your character is.
Peter Grant did it best with his clients Led Zeppelin back in the days, keeping them in the dark before and after the 3.5 hour shows.
Would have preferred it going to aid workers in Gaza or something like that but an NED-funded dissident politician will do as long as it's not Donald Trump.
The funny thing is, both sides can read your comment and assume you’re talking about the other side having the "wrong" opinion. It’s the kind of platitude that doesn’t really add anything, it just signals that you see yourself as being above "the wrong side", whichever side that happens to be.
There has been some speculation that if Trump didn't win this one, he'll lose all motivation in making peace, at least in the near future. Like for example Gaza.
The man has the shortest attention span in history, and needs constant dopamine hits to continue on something.
But as I said in another thread, María Corina Machado is more than worthy - and well deserved. It is just such a shame that Trump will likely throw the biggest tantrum, and destroy stuff, for no other reason that he didn't get the big shiny thing he wanted.
> There has been some speculation that if Trump didn't win this one, he'll lose all motivation in making peace, at least in the near future. Like for example Gaza.
Were this the reason for him to receive it, he would deserve it even less, and erase every shred of dignity this award ever had.
A Trumpist witch against a dumb ogre (Maduro). It doesn't make her any better.
This woman has been sided with Vox in Spain, a pro-Francoist party which they didn't condemn the former Fascist regime. And I remind you all Franco supported Hitler (Hendaye meeting) with Wolframium as a raw metal for the war; and he event sent the Blau Division against Russia in WWII.
So this woman indirectly supports parties which applauded people accountable on sending American WWII soldiers back home... in coffins.
Yeah it's the same a criminal dictator than the person risking her life to overthrown him peacefully. Maria Corina is trying to get all the support possible, and in Spain that support clearly comes from the right, not the left. Maybe because the two main left parties have well known ties with the regime.
100% true, although the opinion is unpopular in this forum. In the end, this is rewarding some very bad people just because they oppose somebody (supposedly) even worse. But that doesn't have anything to do with "peace". This award lost its meaning a long time ago, maybe Netanyahu will be the winner next year.
lol!! Most people from rest of the world, minus west, knows what Nobel prize is all about. It is just a political tool for usa and west. Clearly, it about Venezuela oil and gold. Pathetic to see their hypocrisy and double standards.
Another CIA asset, manufacturing consent for war, wins the Nobel Peace Prize. Not as debased as Kissinger winning it, but still another nail in the coffin of the award's credibility.
Between Kissinger, Obama, the Myanmarese CIA asset, etc., it's basically the Nobel Crimes Against Humanity prize at this point. I'm surprised they didn't give it to the Orange Thing.
Is the Nobel Peace Prize given to people who accomplished a lot as individuals (like Maria Corina Machado) or people who accomplished a lot at scale without doing much beyond a few phone calls and document-signings, like Trump?
Because a few phone calls and document-signings can bring about many orders of magnitude more "peace units" in the world, if backed by the world's largest economy and the world's most effective military at projecting power.
The Nobel peace prize cannot be given to someone who rebrands the ministry of defence to the ministry of war and proclaims on a stage that he hates his enemies. These things are mutually exclusive.
Not only that. He has threatened to militarily invade countries like Canada and Greenland just because he wants what they have. He also asked his supporters to punch his critics in the face and offered to pay their legal fees.
And arguably it should not be given to someone who requests/asks/begs for it constantly and openly. It would brign about all sorts of bad incentives in something that should be a reward for good intentions and efforts.
Go on ..? On the face of it, a prize for holding back from being an asshole seems like a good thing, and perhaps a more worthwhile incentive than a prize for saints who would have been extremely virtuous anyway.
Incentivizing foreign interventions in conflicts "just" to earn a prize and risking to aggravate a situation/conflict/war does not sound good at all to me.
It's not about rewarding saints, it's about rewarding people who do genuine efforts to bring peace in this world.
You wouldn't want to incentivize a reckless vigilante just because some of the times it might lead to a desired outcome, disregarding all the times they'd get it wrong and would cause injustices (leading to more chaos, and not peace) just in their selfish pursuit of accolades and prizes.
Trump is openly mentioning that what he's doing right now is worth a prize, can't get closer to doing it "for the prize". He exaggerates all his accomplishment (no he did not end 7, 8, 9, etc. wars... barely even one).
All of this is done/said for one purpose, and it's not actually peace. It's one thing you can't reproach to him, he is pretty transparent in his intent when you give him a microphone. Do you think he will lose sleep over the peace in the middle east failing (once again)... or do you think he will care more about not getting the prize he literally mentions every time he's questioned about a war?
There doesn't need to be. Basic dignity and logical thinking tell you that an award for honest efforts to facilitate peace awarded to MLK and Mother Teresa cannot be awarded to someone like Donald Trump. And you see that obviously the Nobel committee shares this opinion, which is why he luckily did not receive it.
Have you checked some of the winners? Arafat is there and so are Kissinger - the napalm sticks on kids guy and Obama - the guy that shot hospitals and weddings in Afghanistan. Trump will fit right in.
Isolated, I think his efforts in the middle east, particular around normalising Israel's relations with its neighbours (though I believe he did fuck up handling Iran because of his personal bias) could have let to a peace prize in a few years time (maybe a shared one) and certainly be more deserved than Obama's, however I agree with others that all his other actions, including threatening to invade allies, should disqualify him.
> Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, or celebrities, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon. Videos of pratfalls or disasters, or cute animal pictures. If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic.
You know, funilly enough, if trump's peace plan for the gaza war actually holds, then that idiot has somehow probably done more for peace than most nobel peace prize winners.
Who said there are no good news? For the people that never lived in a dictatorship here are a few reasons people were killed in one:
• grafitty agains the regime
• making anti refime jokes
• beeing a top official and saying you don't think the direction we are going is good
Beeing thrown in prison for years reasons:
• owning a walkie talkie. Can be used to organize a revolution they said
• listening to foreign radio stations
The way she, and her team, managed to convince venezuelans that the election mattered, and to prepare to gather the evidence of the elections under constant threats from the government, that we all knew they were going to steal, and do it entirely peacefully, was an extremely impressive achievement on its own.
What an impressive act of coordination from MCM
:standing-ovation:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nation
"There's no war in Germany. There's terrible leadership, but many see it differently from me."
Everyone you don't like is Hitler.
Democracy is not just when more than one "party".
Just because a fascist or fascist adjacent party is disallowed, does not mean democracy is absent.
For raising the bar so high.
Surely a prime candidate for a peace prize.
Unwilling or unable? Netanyahu hated Biden and has done everything in his power to sabotage anything Democrats have done to try to help resolve the conflict, even prior to Oct 7.
Trump let Netanyahu run roughshod, and the proposed peace agreement (which almost certainly won't hold) is pretty... let's say vague... about the plan for Gaza post hostage-release.
All that's happened here is another agreement to exchange hostages for prisoners, which has happened multiple times in this war already. Not much else is actually agreed to and obviously even less has actually happened.
I really hope they would not award someone the prize who works so blatantly against the word and spirit of the criteria in the will.
I will personally try to refrain from commenting on the Venezuelan opposition since I do not know enough about them.
Biden had different pressures. E.g. I suspect that he judged that the knife-edge election he was facing didn't allow him enough leeway to put more pressure on Israel.
In addition Netanyahu made it easier to force through a settlement given he'd manage to alienate practically everyone, including uniting the Arab world after that unbelievable strike on Doha.
If you were a cynical person you could also ask whether this settlement owes anything to Trump's personal narcissist saviour complex or need to distract from domestic issues such as the Epstein files...
Still, even despite some significant scepticism about Trump's motives, I think there is a reasonable case to be made for awarding him the prize. It was still a significant (maybe even brave) jump to break with American political orthodoxy to put this kind of pressure on Israel, and the practical result of this could be very significant in terms of saving lives and potentially long-term peace in the region. We also need to encourage these kind of acts, even (or especially) amongst unlikely peacemakers like Trump.
Let's see what it looks like next year, though. Middle East peace deals don't have a great history of holding together.
I think Trump genuinely doesn't like people being killed, but he's also driving a wedge in the US that can't be ignored. Sending American troops against its own citizen: not exactly Nobel-prize worthy.
I think Trump wanted to force the rather compromised committee to make a similarly foolish decision as giving Obama the prize, which would have then permitted immediate Israeli breach of the settlement.
Not to take away from Machado’s work, but this year’s prize is at the very least political, to both appease Trump in line with the above and also send a message in the face of the war build-up against Venezuela. At the same time their decision also facilitates the American takeover through less than lethal means by CIA revolution and the combined pressure of it all on the Venezuelan government. Machado is in fact a CIA asset, whether she realizes it or not.
If you think Eastern Europe was liberated without involvement from the CIA, which has a mixed history w.r.t. competent ops in that region, I've got a Nobel prize to sell you.
You don't need a war to have a lack of Peace!
Venezuela is number 5 by the number of displaced people, the rest are all wars, it's crazy for a country at peace
But the relation between USA and the Arabic states were on an all time low after the Bush Crusade.
And Obama reached out to fix the relations. This is my recollection of it.
But i can agree that the rushed decision created problems afterwards for the committee. Like today when it is questioned.
> The 2009 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to United States president Barack Obama (b. 1961) for his "extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples".
They only give out one prize, which means that no matter which they pick, there will be dozes of impoverished and unjust places that don't get recognized by it. That can't be used to reject a choice, since it's true no matter what choice they make.
That would be a basis for discussion.
They created an exodus of 8 million people.
Starved the population.
Killed people in the thousands in the favelas and other poor areas without a trial.
Steals elections.
To me that’s a regime at war with its own population and it deserves all the condemnation possible and all the support necessary to help transition back to democracy.
Yet the aircraft carriers are poised in the gulf to enact a third regime change operation in this oil rich country America wants under its thumb with a puppet running it.
This is the PR campaign beforehand, just like the "WMD" PR campaign in the run up to Iraq, with a woman who supports genocide in Gaza (https://x.com/VenteVenezuela/status/1286346531591852036 ) being lauded with a nobel peace prize. This is probably to lend her legitimacy when she becomes that puppet.
Saddam was a bad man too but he was an average evil. The warmongers who want to destabilize every country with oil, send in the tanks and install yet another Western puppet to maintain an iron grip on global oil supplies are a very special and unique kind of evil.
Just stop and think for a moment before even think about downplaying or comparing what is happening in my country with other world conflicts, and please don’t even dare to explain what I’ve been living.
We've heard it all before, we speak english so you're not a true venezuelan, you're part of some rich caste, you're not brown enough, you're a bot, etc ... 25 years of this bullshit no matter where we go. The international left abandoned us, the international right uses us as circus act.
Of course it'd be easier for your narrative if we were defenseless people begging in our native tongue for help. It's harder when a lot of Venezuelans are actually highly educated and want to control their own country and destiny.
>> IME the venezuelans who ended up abroad speaking English almost exclusively and up being people whose families were sucking on the teat of the oil wealth under the pre Maduro government before he ripped it out of their mouths and redistributed the wealth
you mean the almost 10 million of us that left, 1/3 of the population? the 2.5 million that went to Colombia alone by foot? or the ones that that walked all the way to Peru and Ecuador to meet discrimination and xenophobia. Those are all sucking on the oil teat? (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venezuelan_refugee_crisis)
>> So i guess you want this Iraq style military operation to happen. I pity your relatives for what you want to happen to them.
No one wants that, and no one said they want that. Stop making stuff up
You can also verify the results here https://macedoniadelnorte.com/ (a whole story behind this hostname). Again, only possible by the María Corina's huge effort
On the other hand, Gore got one for less.
A little premature, anyway. Let's get through 24 hours of a ceasefire first. That'd be an achievement these days ...
>Every Country has signed on! If this LAST CHANCE agreement is not reached, all HELL, like no one has ever seen before, will break out against Hamas.
That's not negotiating.
Not everything is about oils or some conspiracy of western governments.
Without US sanctions Venezuela, and Venezuelans, would be in a dramatically better place today.
In 2014 there were mass protests against the government, in reality it was an attempt to overthrow the government, which was responded to with brutality. That brutality was met with sanctions. Today their GDP/capita is about $5000. That's obviously going to be explained in part by the decline in oil prices around the same time, but not to that degree, to say the least.
* - As an addendum here it's also unclear to me how exactly Wiki is calculating that figure and whether it accounts for, in any way, the substantial scale of emigration from Venezuela. If not, then the relative decline is even larger than it sounds.
[1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crisis_in_Venezuela#/media/Fil...
Many government officials in Venezuela have direct involvement with various industries, including oil. So it suddenly becomes this extremely complex and dangerous mess when doing any trade whatsoever with Venezuela. This is why their economy completely collapsed following the sanctions.
[1] - https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2015/03/11/2015-05...
No. They wouldn't. The Venezuelan government has proven extremely incompetent to produce oil.
What the Trump's tariffs have shown to the world is that, in the scale globalization is today, trade with the US doesn't matter that much anymore. Case in point: Brazil. After Trump stuck 50% tariffs on them, their exports to other countries grew much more than enough to offset the loss to the U.S.
The US embargo on Venezuela is a lot like its embargo in Cuba, Iran and North Korea: it is not the cause of people suffering but is an excuse by those corrupt and incompetent regimes to hide their failures.
I have little doubt she did a lot of good practical work for Venezuelan democracy (to expose Maduro's government). But her ideology - accept foreign invasion (which will inevitably kill innocent venezuelans) and privatizing oil reserves (which will inevitably result in undemocratic fallout of the profits) - is unfortunately not that of peace and democracy.
I wish she would more look at Norway as an example, which is a rare case of oil profits being shared collectively and democratically.
(I'll believe the west's "concerns" on Venezuela's "democracy" and "human rights" when they overthrow the dictators in Saudi Arabia, Qatar and UAE - where western companies are allowed to profit from oil resources in these regions - and bring "democracy" there).
You may also want to educate yourself on the real reason for the Gaza Genocide and why Trump and Tony Blair ( https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cq5j989107lo ) now plan to "directly administrate" Gaza - (1) https://asiatimes.com/2025/02/trumps-gaza-takeover-all-about... (2) https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinion/war-gaza-israel-brutal... ... As always, the sudden interest by the ex-colonials to bring "democracy" in Palestine is also about oil and gas.
Sire thing your links will be right and all my years suffering here are BS
I think this prize recognizes her courage and fight for human rights.
Dismissing that as "just being in the opposition" ignores the reality of what it takes to stand up to Maduro's dictatorship.
It’s a very sad history of oppression and corruption that has forced many Venezuelans to pull up their roots and risk their lives leaving their own country. It would be a dream come true to see this dictatorship overthrown and replaced by a democratic system of government that serves the people.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/oct/09/fernando-alban...
On top of that, if I am not mistaken, Russia doesn't know what Democracy is. (Yeltsin and Medvedev up for discussion) As a result, for starters, Maduro can't make radical changes in the army.
So it isn't as bad as Russia. Putin hasn't such boundaries.
A dictatorship can be peaceful, and a democracy can be warlike. Venezuela hasn't been involved in any war recently as far as I know. Of course people who fight for democracy deserve being praised and supported, but to me it looks odd to do so with a peace prize.
The prize is supposed to be awarded to people who have "done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses". Is this the case here?
So I guess you could also claim that democracy helps maintain peace from that point of view, and a person who successfully proved that a "democratic election" really wasn't democratic at all feels like the right thing to award, as it'll further international peace.
edit: the submission article also talks briefly about how peace and democracy is linked (in their eyes):
> Democracy is a precondition for lasting peace. However, we live in a world where democracy is in retreat, where more and more authoritarian regimes are challenging norms and resorting to violence. The Venezuelan regime’s rigid hold on power and its repression of the population are not unique in the world. We see the same trends globally: rule of law abused by those in control, free media silenced, critics imprisoned, and societies pushed towards authoritarian rule and militarisation. In 2024, more elections were held than ever before, but fewer and fewer are free and fair.
While the point you're trying to make may or may not be valid, Venezuela is not a good example. Go read up on the Venezuela-Guyana crisis. The Maduro regime has been pushing the region closer to war in recent years. Renewing its claims to Guyanan territory, and preparing its military for war. For now, all out invasion has been prevented partially by significant support for Guyana and pressure against Venezuela from neighbouring countries and the west, and distraction from its own internal problems.
If you walk around all day on metaphorical eggshells, surrounded by armed people who will beat you, torture you, disappear you, kill you and your family if you say the wrong thing, that is not a peaceful existence!
They kidnap, torture and kill political prisoners.
Deployed the national guard on the favelas to kill indiscriminately thousands without a fair trial.
You can Google all the UN reports on these matters.
I don't really understand what you're arguing for or against. That this woman doesn't deserve the prize because there are places worse than Venezuela? What does that have to do with the Nobel peace prize? This isn't a "pick the worst place on earth" contest.
I honestly don't understand any of the complaints in these comments. Is it because she's a woman? Or what? I've not seen anybody make any substantial arguments as to why she shouldn't be eligible.
There are people that have WALKED all over the continent to flee, all the way to the US and Canada or Argentina, Chile, etc.
It completely banalizes the risks people like Machado face just for opposing authoritarian power.
Pretending there's any equivalence between the two situations says a lot about your worldview, or lack thereof.
What makes you think otherwise?
I take it you haven't read the news in approximately 6 months?
Scarier when you understand that 20 years is way too long an estimate for this.
Europe is watching.
That's like giving the Nobel in physics to someone that has worked all their life publishing papers but they all have been refuted and proven wrong.
I don't think "prize" for the merit of being relentless in their fight for publishing physics papers is merited, maybe a different honor, but Peace Nobels should be given to - and i quote -:
"to the person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses."
I know it's frowned upon, but did you actually read the submission article? They're highlighting exactly why they've chosen her, including what meaningful work she has already done:
> The efforts of the collective opposition, both before and during the election, were innovative and brave, peaceful and democratic. The opposition received international support when its leaders publicised the vote counts that had been collected from the country’s election districts, showing that the opposition had won by a clear margin. But the regime refused to accept the election result, and clung to power.
Maybe you have some better suggestions on who this award should have gone to? Of all the candidates, I guess in the end she was seen as having done a lot, but in your mind she've done nothing, which means you're thinking about some other person who did more?
I think if there are no suitable candidates the award should be skipped. Like it has been skipped many years for the same reasons. This would send a more powerful message about how fucked up the state of the world is rather than giving it to someone just for the sake of it.
> and one part to the person who has done the most or best to advance fellowship among nations, the abolition or reduction of standing armies, and the establishment and promotion of peace congresses
Go to her Wikipedia article, do a quick skim/read and then tell me how she doesn't fit with those conditions already?
Why skip the prize when there are individuals that fit the conditions for the prize? Working for democracy and peace in a peaceful and democratic manner shouldn't be rewarded?
Every Venezuelan that aspires freedom should be proud today.
I think they're older than that, Nobel apparently left a will that included three conditions for what we today call the Nobel Peace Prize:
> and one part to the person who has done the most or best to advance fellowship among nations, the abolition or reduction of standing armies, and the establishment and promotion of peace congresses.
https://www.nobelprize.org/alfred-nobel/full-text-of-alfred-...
So you're saying that the Nobel Peace committee has not been following their standards? I find this pretty hard to prove... it's like if you were telling me that even if I say that my favourite color is green, it probably isn't because green is not that special a colour.
standing up and risking their lives for the good of humanity merrits more then a nobel price can give!
Abiy Ahmed (2019), from Ethiopia, ended the cold war with Eritrea. Then he launched a war against the region of Tigray, with mass rapes and mass civilian killings. He harassed the free press, and turned the country into an autocracy.
Juan Manuel Santos (2016) from Colombia and Ellen Johnson Sirleaf (2011) from Liberia later appeared in Paradise Papers because they had secret offshore companies in Panama and Barbades. Their political activity was more tame after the prize than before. Both ended their presidential tenures with plummeting approval rates, especially because of corruption allegations.
Barack Obama (2009) received the Prize for his generous discourses on foreign policy, just after being elected. Then he lead the USA to more war in Afghanistan, and a new war in Libya. He helped Saudi Arabia invade Yemen (UN states this war killed 300,000 people). He helped the Egyptian army with its coup, that killed thousands of opponents and sent 60,000 in jails (including the elected president who died there).
In my opinion, this prize is, most of the time, a dark and heavily political joke.
I'm not sure you could claim the award is a joke because of people did after being awarded it, especially when most people awarded didn't launch new wars or helped coups.
Nothing in the criteria for the handing out the prize has anything about the reception having any sort of specific character, good or bad. This is all of the conditions for the award:
> Fraternity between nations; abolition or reduction of standing armies; and the holding and promotion of peace congresses
So every year they look at candidates and what they've done within those things, then make an judgement.
Of course it’s now led to Trump having a Peace Prize obsession, which sis not a bad thing.
Aung San Suu Kyi, 1991 prize winner, resided over the genocide of the Rohingya people.
I think that is a understandable approach (providing support), though it can lead to giving the prize to people who never achieve any of their goals. Whether that’s a worthy trade off I do not know.
I get frustrated in the US we are always thinking in terms of the next election. Movements that effect lasting change: civil rights, national independence movements, ending slavery, heck even the current conservative regime in the US, are all multigenerational efforts with clear principles and goals that get passed down.
She’s also in hiding since the last elections, likely on an embassy but undetermined.
She also received the Sakharov Prize not long ago; if she had to receive only one, the latter would be easier to explain.
I respect that she opposed the Burmese military junta most of her life, but then a year after coming to power in 2015, she defended the military against charges of complicity in the Rohingya genocide to preserve her fragile government.
Personally, I think the Peace Prize shouldn't go to politicians at all.
The roadmap was laid out by Cecil Rhodes in his letters and will and extensively documented in "The Secret Society" by Robin Brown.
It's quite fascinating to see their networks with the benefit of hindsight. For example, Mountbatten installed Nehru as the first unelected PM of India.
Aung San Suu Kyi was educated in New Delhi India and during that time, she lived in Nehru's home.
Imagine one day we wake up after the usual yawn-inducing sham elections in Russia and Putin won as usual but a large chunk of the country, probably a plurality of it, is utterly convinced that it was completely fake and that Navalny won.
Without anybody using violence to do it.
Those who think there is nothing to be done but to counter authoritarianism without another authoritarian, or violence, or just to give up and suffer it - might be inspired by this.
I'm not the NNC but that seems like a "meaningful accomplishment".
You could ask: "Sure, allright, the populace was convinced that election was a sham. But... Maduro is still in power so she still hasn't done much". Let me flip it around, perhaps: What did Gandi ever actually accomplish? Isn't it the same thing: Show that violence is not a necessary element, get the people to reframe the situation a bit?
Can we prove Gandi sped up the UK's exit? Even if we can, one of those holocaust level holy heck humanity can get extremely dark moments in history that is rarely talked about is the absolute terror that occurred during the split of the Raj into India and Pakistan.
My point is: Judging the eligibility of a person for a peace prize on the basis of 'measurable meaningful accomplishment' is not how it works and probably shouldn't be how it works. It's either a bullshit prize (kissinger got one...) or it is like making a statue of somebody: It takes a person, turns them into a principle or ideal. Even though humans are much more complex than that.
The notion of "one is capable of being in opposition in an autocratic regime and get stuff done without resorting to violence" got a peace prize, but as per the dictat of Alfred Nobel, only people can get it, so, they stuck the label "Maria Corina Machado" on it. And that wasn't a bad labelling: She really did accomplish 'meaningfully' that goal, at least, I'd gather according to most folks' definition of the word 'capable'.
Exactly this happened in Belarus in 2020. Government wasn't shy of using its power though, many people got long prison sentences, many people had to run, nothing changed wrt to dictatorship. I don't see anything inspiring in this story honestly.
The amount of presumption, ignorance, and lack of reflection in your comment is astounding. It shows that you don't take life seriously and/or don't understand what risks being an opposition party in a dictatorship actually entails.
1- The Nobel Peace Prize is chosen by a committee of 5 Norwegians. Having Russia or Israel expressing support doesn't help, it's probably even counterproductive. Random endorsements on Twitter don't matter either..
2- The committee values international cooperation, not trade wars, isolationism, or cozying up to dictators.
3- They prize the defense of democracy, not attacks on it.
4- The cherry on the cake: Machado got the prize while he's been threatening war with Venezuela itself. It almost feels like a big f*ck off
Please. At least get the facts right.
It was not just Russia and Israel. It was also Cambodia, Azerbaijan, Gabon and Rwanda.
On charges of... uhhh... hm...
Because... uhhmm.. he doesn't like them?
Here is a related tangent:
>Norway walks back US Navy fuel supply boycott
https://www.bairdmaritime.com/security/naval/naval-ships/nor...
It’s pretty understandable for Mrs. Corina to take whatever support she gets internationally.
https://x.com/VenteVenezuela/status/1286346531591852036
Providing her with this award while Trump's naval battle groups stand ready to attack Venezuela isnt helping arrest the collapse of the west's moral authority.
I must confess I am no Venezuelan political expert, and it always gives me pause whether the economic siege that has been laid against Venezuela with the sanctions is about democracy, or about access to unrestricted markets (a la United Fruit Company — now Chiquita — and Standard Fruit Company — now Dole plc).
[0]: https://www.instagram.com/reel/DKU-8MCO10P/
(exception maybe Costa Rica?)
To be clear, Venezuela is long past the "popular socialism" phase and decayed into the "strongman holding on" phase.
Another reason I don't just say it sometimes is to avoid trolling by fans of whatever or whoever I criticized.
i’m not sure if you’ve seen how many people have lost their jobs for saying truths about kurk or how many people are losing jobs, scholarships, visas, education etc for saying things about a certain regime, but it’s happening, for real. they’re actively pushing to force people to turn over their social media accounts for review.
we can’t blame this poster for vagueposting here. i often pushback against vagueposting but in today’s climate we cant blame people for taking their personal safety seriously when it comes to vocalizing their criticisms.
I'm reminded of the (apocryphal?) Russian protestor arrested for holding a blank piece of paper.
In Singapore someone was charged for holding up a piece of cardboard with a smiley face drawn on it: https://www.economist.com/asia/2020/11/26/public-order-in-si...
The deal would likely take months for the world to see if it's successful. He can get nominated next year if he keeps his own house peaceful too, else he should forget about a rational nomination + award of the Prize.
If there's no way for you to change your stance based on any outcome, then it's pointless to say.
Also: the day Trump shows genuine selfless happiness for another's accomplishments, there won't be enough boots for me to eat.
> Also: the day Trump shows genuine selfless happiness for another's accomplishments, there won't be enough boots for me to eat.
Same, but it's also true for anyone else.
As have they? We have many tests for determining whether or not a given person's senses are or not intact.
> Same, but it's also true for anyone else.
Note I said show. If you happen to live in a world where you feel you've been devoid of such empathy then I feel for you, but such an environment of narcissism is hardly representative.
Ironically, trump may win the peace prize next year for ending a war he created. If indeed, against the odds, he has ended this war.
What war did Trump create that you claim he's ending?
Because as far as I know, Israel's war on Gaza started before his term, and if the peace deal holds, Trump will be almost singlehandedly responsible for ending it.
If that's not worthy of a Nobel Peace prize, I truly don't know what else is.
It really didn’t help when they gave Obama the prize. Even he was embarrassed by it.
I think trump genuinely deserves the prize if peace in the Middle East achieved. However, I think it’s far more likely he’s being played for a fool by Israel as per Russia.
Trump does genuinely seem to want to avoid foreign wars, to his credit.
Norway is no doubt now bracing itself for tariffs or other retaliation. Hopefully they can dangle next year’s prize as worth waiting for.
Just going to drop this here: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=QQYFVEka3fA&pp=ygUYc2FyY2FzbWl...
https://x.com/StevenCheung47/status/1976601157041856756
(To be clear, I don't think Trump should get one; and Obama's win was really weird. But, hey, if Kissinger can get one..)
Nobel secretary regrets Obama peace prize
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-34277960
If there's one job in the world where I'd wait until someone's well out of office before judging their impact on peace, it's the US presidency.
I'm in a circle of people who lean pretty damn far left and even at the time, the only reactions I heard were "huh, what?"
Sure, but if you want your prize to have an impact, you sometimes have to hand it out to hopefuls?
To me, it seemed oddly aspirational, but maybe that's more often the case with the peace prize, too.
Also worth noting that the language in the press release [1] and facts page [2] makes it all sound like it was for things already achieved (although maybe that's at odds with "Inspires Hope for a Better Future"), and I'm skeptical of looking at year 1 achievements the job with arguably the most destructive power in the world.
It's not a hill I'd fight, let alone die, on, though. :)
1- https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/peace/2009/press-release/ 2- https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/peace/2009/obama/facts/
But the Nobel price explicitly tries to avoid that; hindsight is always gonna be better.
Meanwhile for Trump... I'm pretty certain he wants it because a clever, charismatic, eloquent and beloved Black man got it...
Price for Obama was probably miss-step but at least he was not desperately begging for it like Trump does.
https://www.reuters.com/world/us/trump-finlands-stubb-expect...
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ICE_Pact
Great opportunity for someone to create some effective opposition.
There is a medal in it!
Ironically, someone who badly wants a medal is actually in the perfect position to turn around the brain/competency drain, “bring back science”, boost US competition with China’s green tech wave, help Ukraine win (instead of the endless: “not lose for now”), fire the all the senate confirmed bozos…
If he did, a Nobel prize would be unconventional under the circumstances. But well worth it nevertheless.
No Rushmore. There isn’t enough room left on that mountain for that size of an ego. But maybe a genuine gold working toilet installation for Rushmore tourists.
———
Humor, despair and any bias of mine aside. I am quite seriously unaware of anyone with a good opposition plan, to reverse the power centralization, at this point.
Perhaps a constitutional amendment, reaffirming key points of the existing constitution with a highlighter for supreme justices with poor eyesight, might be one promising approach.
> “No person shall” [something, something] “hold any office” [something, something], “who, having” [something, something] “engaged in insurrection”, [something, something] “or given aid” [or incited, or encouraged insurrection, or threatened a vice president for not implementing an insurrection, or delayed relief for law enforcement engaged in stopping an insurrection] “or comfort” [or praise or approval or promises of pardons] “to the enemies thereof.”
> […All the powers of the purse given to the representative branch, with no provision for presidential “creative” reinterpretation…]
> [Etc., etc.]
If anyone wants to give a shout out to anyone building effective resistance to the avalanche of presidential power, essentially being voluntarily abdicated by the other two branches, I would be interested to hear of them.
(Traditionally that has been a very high consensus bipartisan issue. Not everyone, but most everyone.)
Interesting point! Bit of a tangent, bit Brazil is in the process of holding Bolsonaro to account for power grabs that have a lot of similarities with what's happening in the US.
Too early to call their long term efficacy, but definitely one to watch.
Trump, and the regime associated with him, are an exploitation of preexisting degradation of limited, democratic and responsible governance in the United States. The restoration of"good government" is the obvious counter to his rising dictatorship, but that would result in other existing power blocs (themselves also abusive, if not so gratuitously as Trump) loosing their own ability to exploit the system after he exits the stage. Faced with a choice between "stop Trump and end our own abuses as a consequence" or "let him run rampant and hope the US survives so that we can exploit it later" established American institutions have overwhelmingly gone with the second option.
Too bad they where so divided for so many years, that when they trully worked together to wind a election it was too late because now MAduro dont even care to steal the ellections in plain sigth and probably theres no more solution without violence.
And to repeat my point that I do every year: Nobel peace prize is the only part of the price that is actually given out by a foreign political body (Norway, founding member of NATO and Oil nation) and not the Swedish academy.
It's famous recepients include presidents that bombed/joined war during/just after been given it and bloggers that kept blogging after surviving shootings. And Henry Kissinger
Petition to rename it to "Norwegian peace price". /signed, a Swede
Are you suggesting that the committee should consist of some kind of qualified experts instead of non-competent politicians?!
Preposterous. Typically of a Swede.
(To be fair to Nobel himself, the world was a bit different when he authored his testament, and Norway was relatively innocent still.)
Actually its not limited to Obama, its whole history is ridden with scandals, definitely a far cry from the Nobel prizes in natural sciences.
Dissidents in countries which are enemies of the west? With enormous oil reserves? With an American fleet poised offshore ready for regime change? Definitely. Who are zionists to boot? Even better.
Dissidents in brutal, dictatorial countries (e.g. Saudi) which are allies? Hell no. Never. The nobel prize is a tool of statecraft and that would be a self defeating use of its PR potential to advance western foreign policy goals.
https://x.com/polymarket/status/1976434242386317640
Someone without any history whatsoever put 70k on her 5 hours before the announcement
https://x.com/polywhalewatch/status/1976499384373121488
Trump was never above 5-10% and out of nowhere she was the winner (see the 1 day market view) https://polymarket.com/event/nobel-peace-prize-winner-2025?t...
Other than the fact that polymarket is legally not a stock market, what really is the difference between insider trading on a stock market vs insider trading on polymarket? Does anyone have a good argument for why one should be illegal while the other is legal?
Other than a vague sense of "fairness", can you articulate why insider trading should be illegal?
I don't care either way but for the sake of argument:
Stock market is something you can't avoid (ignoring hermits), so an insider trade can ruin your pension fund or other financial wellbeing with you having no way to opt out of the risk, so the government protects you. (This is good!)
Polymarket is more like a bet between friends. You don't have to play but if you do understand it's unregulated and someone can cheat.
A prediction market, on the other hand, aims to provide the best possible probabilities on events (arguably), and "insider trading" helps that purpose.
"The investigation, initiated in June 2024, focused on individuals suspected of using confidential information - specifically advance knowledge of the proposed election date - to gain an unfair advantage in betting markets. Such actions constitute an offence of cheating under Section 42 of the Gambling Act 2005, a criminal offence."
https://www.gamblingcommission.gov.uk/news/article/gambling-...
However, I agree that they might get rules against this. But not to benefit the market, just because people think this would be proper. Social desirability bias is strong.
This is similar to the way all football teams benefit from fair referees and even matches, even if sometimes it means they lose.
Also: the point of an exchange is to make money. Different types of exchanges have different fee structures, but generally their profit is a function of volume, so there primary objective is to attract volume. Since every trade / bet requires two participants, they need to balance the needs of both participants to make it work. Price discovery is a positive side effect of efficient and fair markets, which is why as a society we like them and encourage them, but it isn't what they are trying to achieve except inasmuch as it encourages participation.
Depends on jurisdiction.
Why?
Is someone forcing you to place bets at gunpoint?
(And, yes, there are good arguments in favour of allowing insider trading in all markets, and a few against.)
https://www.metaculus.com/questions/39336/us-attacks-venezue...
> This question will resolve as Yes if, before January 1, 2026, the United States carries out a military attack against Venezuela's territory or military forces.
Alright, we are into conspiracy theory territory now. But let me just say that these awards make me a bit nervous.
However, her accomplishments were also clear last summer, and I feel it would have been far more appropriate to give her the prize last year. Instead, it went to an organization that has been around for 70 years. While they have done great work, there was nothing they did specifically in 2024 that stood out, at least that I could find. So, clearly, Machado was not an obvious choice, at least last year.
Also want to add that I don't think Trump should have gotten it, simply because it is far too early to tell if the current "middle east peace plan" will actually turn out to be more than just fanfare.
A better statement would have been to have no peace prize this year.
But I am confused, Obama got his prize in 2009, which would mean he did not receive it for anything he did as president, and before that he was only domestically focused, afaik.
edit - I also see from other comments that people were placing bets on trump for the prize, which would not make sense if he had to be nominated by 1/31
Gandhi's protests are a very valuable source of info on both violent and nonviolent protests. It's easy to talk about an armed or violent revolution. But it's not a decision to be taken very lightly. Apparently, both the sides of the American civil war went into it expecting it to somehow end in a few days! You know the carnage that followed. I have no clue why they held that belief. But it supports the fact that people almost always underestimate the cost of a war.
Non-violent protests are more effective at garnering support and mobilizing a huge movement. The human costs are also arguably lesser. I dont know if it's practical all the time. But it should be given a big chance if an opportunity exists.
It's like how people talk up peaceful protest by referencing Martin Luther King. He was a major centralizing figure for civil rights, but he did not exist in a vacuum of context either.
On Gandhi in particular, many do not realize that there were parallel movements inside India that did resort to violence. So the context is not as simple as it may seem.
And still your comment is about 'US invading Venezuela' and not about the people suffering.
Maduro is a scum that has took Venezuela by brute force. Any effort to wipe him out will improve dramatically the lives of millions.
But please go on with your 'US invading countries' narrative and don't even think for a minute about the people.
> On 19 March 2011, a NATO-led coalition began a military intervention into the ongoing Libyan Civil War to implement United Nations Security Council Resolution 1973 (UNSCR 1973). The UN Security Council passed the resolution with ten votes in favour and five abstentions, with the stated intent to have "an immediate ceasefire in Libya, including an end to the current attacks against civilians, which it said might constitute 'crimes against humanity'
but I guess that's fake news...
But I'm more interested about how you can travel between timelines. Is it with a portal gun like in Rick and Morty?
If I'm joining an ongoing party, did I start the party?
It was hardly a civil war before NATO bombing, but rather protests which were brutally squashed by Gaddafi forces. Opposition lacked any means to wage a way before NATO started supplying them with arms too.
Also there, civilized societies should look away and just let it happen when people fighting oppression is being slaughtered. Well, that's quite similar to this timeline, because that's what's happening in Gaza and being ignored by "The West".
In the context of that regime change operation they killed many civilians and left a humanitarian catastrophe in their wake. The country is beyond fucked but Hillary did get to say "we came, we saw, he died" afterwards, underscoring the lie. So mission accomplished?
For some reason the UN security council stopped approving NATO "humanitarian" operations after that and Russia started treating NATO expansion as an imperialist, existential threat.
And let us not forget his assassination of an American citizen by drone strike for visiting the place of his fathers death, also assassinated by drone strike.
And if we want a “fun fact,” he is the only Nobel Peace winner to bomb and kill another, as commander and chief his forces bombed and killed innocents in a Doctor’s Without Borders outpost in Afghanistan. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kunduz_hospital_airstrike)
Obama did not make Mohamed Bouazizi set himself on fire.
At worst, this conspiracy infantilizes Arab populations by removing their agency. At best, it’s false marketing for the CIA and other agencies.
Yes, he could exit those countries hastily. But that has its own cost. Getting in wars is the easy part. Getting out of one is the hard part. Ask Putin who went into Ukraine on a 3-day limited special military operation.
Bush Jr. got us into multiple wars and unlike his father did not limit the scope of them. His father did get us into a war with Iraq but was smart enough to keep it limited in scope.
Also, under Obama, the "wars" were not real wars like the Russia/Ukraine war where both sides are losing hundreds of people every week. But they were more like peacekeeping operations that occasionally ran into skirmishes.
Every week? If we just look at the Russian casualties numbers, its around 1000+ casualties PER DAY.
There was a recent leak of the death toll and the most active area's had a 2/5 dead rate, 1/3 "missing" rate, and the rest was wounded.
If we only count the death + "missing" over the entire front for Russia, its 500+ PER DAY.
Ironically, the Russian->Afghanistan invasion was WAY less deadly then what we see today in Ukraine.
Your point still stands about the US evolvement in Iran/Afghanistan, but darn your numbers really way below the actual body count in the Russian "3-day limited special military operation". Those are numbers from the first year, not the daily of the third year.
Peacekeeping is like the UN sending troops in to monitor a ceasefire. These were wars. 35,000+ civilian deaths in Afghanistan. Overthrowing Gaddafi. Tens of thousands of airstrikes against ISIS in Iraq and Syria. Drone strikes killing thousands of civilians in Pakistan. US foreign policy has equated “peace” and “stability” with its own military hegemony, being almost constantly at war to further its hypocritical ideology. It’s been a cash cow for the defense lobby.
The Nobel Foundation is an attempt to make amends for the harms done by its founders invention of explosive materials - which subsequently birthed the military-industrial complex.
Its use of its material wealth to invest in index funds derives a great deal of wealth from weapons manufacturers such as Lockheed Martin, Boeing, and Raytheon Technologies .. In that sense, it has only been since 2017 that it has exclusively attempted to avoid profiting from investments in the Wests' military-industrial complex. However, there is a growing voice of discontent which claims that the Foundations' policy change to "avoid investing in controversial weapons systems" is a PR move, and not a real force for change.
No, I do not think that the Nobel Foundation is making amends. I think it is functioning as a propaganda tool of the very military-industrial complex from which it derived its wealth.
Duplicity is not making amends.
All it takes is for its capital investments to be handled by a third party.
Not to the fault of the people per se, but I see too much "awarded for effort, then oops turns out the complete opposite happened" with the peace prize.
Norwegians are known for their oil and salmon. not knowledge, but being spoiled. so maybe the committee are just painfully incompetent to the level we should now bet that Venezuela should expect big turmoil in the coming years
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/oct/09/norway-braces-...
But just so you picture it: things are so dire there after 25 years that people would even cheer at any country intervening.
So let’s pause for a moment and think: what is the best alternative? Keep enduring the regime like the Cubans have been doing for double the time we have? That’s also a depressing outlook.
Of course it is. I'm not denying or downplaying how bad it is. These situations are scary as hell. They're not supposed to happen. And it must change. Venezuela deserves peace. But now imagine the alternative you're thinking of.
To start with, who was responsible for the political turmoil in South America for much of its history? Imagine another invasion. Do you expect them to withdraw as soon as the current Venezuelan regime has fallen? The regime that's virtue signalling now has a history of proudly brandishing their xenophobia and racism. What do you think life will be like under a remote controlled rule by them? There are plenty of examples around the world for how that will end. Is that the change you wish for?
> what is the best alternative?
The best alternative is for the native population to bring about change without foreign interference. But honestly, I have no clue if that's practical at all. I don't know any other solutions either. The people must decide for themselves as to how to resolve this. All I'm saying is that you must be careful about the intentions of anyone who steps in offering help. I sincerely wish that the Venezuelans win peace. Good Luck!
The low signal/noise ratio people are at best perceived as 'communicators' more often jesters.
If anything the anomaly of the social media era is that people who put themselves out there as low signal/noise ratio character are even taken seriously at all.
Prizes like that are given to people who are perceived to be special, the more you talk and yap the more you give people an opportunity to realize how NOT special you are and how NOT special your character is.
Peter Grant did it best with his clients Led Zeppelin back in the days, keeping them in the dark before and after the 3.5 hour shows.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45537006
The actually sad thing is, it's pretty damn obvious.
The man has the shortest attention span in history, and needs constant dopamine hits to continue on something.
But as I said in another thread, María Corina Machado is more than worthy - and well deserved. It is just such a shame that Trump will likely throw the biggest tantrum, and destroy stuff, for no other reason that he didn't get the big shiny thing he wanted.
Big if, there have been many agreements between Israel and Palestine!
Probably need to wait at least 2 years, preferably like 8-10 but by then he might already be dead (natural causes).
Were this the reason for him to receive it, he would deserve it even less, and erase every shred of dignity this award ever had.
This woman has been sided with Vox in Spain, a pro-Francoist party which they didn't condemn the former Fascist regime. And I remind you all Franco supported Hitler (Hendaye meeting) with Wolframium as a raw metal for the war; and he event sent the Blau Division against Russia in WWII.
So this woman indirectly supports parties which applauded people accountable on sending American WWII soldiers back home... in coffins.
Neither Maduro, Trump nor Zelenskii deserve it.
Just to see what happens.
Because a few phone calls and document-signings can bring about many orders of magnitude more "peace units" in the world, if backed by the world's largest economy and the world's most effective military at projecting power.
It's not about rewarding saints, it's about rewarding people who do genuine efforts to bring peace in this world.
You wouldn't want to incentivize a reckless vigilante just because some of the times it might lead to a desired outcome, disregarding all the times they'd get it wrong and would cause injustices (leading to more chaos, and not peace) just in their selfish pursuit of accolades and prizes.
Trump is openly mentioning that what he's doing right now is worth a prize, can't get closer to doing it "for the prize". He exaggerates all his accomplishment (no he did not end 7, 8, 9, etc. wars... barely even one).
All of this is done/said for one purpose, and it's not actually peace. It's one thing you can't reproach to him, he is pretty transparent in his intent when you give him a microphone. Do you think he will lose sleep over the peace in the middle east failing (once again)... or do you think he will care more about not getting the prize he literally mentions every time he's questioned about a war?
> Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, or celebrities, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon. Videos of pratfalls or disasters, or cute animal pictures. If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic.
Beeing thrown in prison for years reasons: • owning a walkie talkie. Can be used to organize a revolution they said • listening to foreign radio stations