Alaska Primary

I like the headlines of the Republican candidates for US Senate "battling" for votes during the count. The election ought to be a battle; the count of the votes ought to be just a mathematical excercise.

Dyer on Leadership

Critics hang around and wait for others to make mistakes. But the real doers of the world have no time for criticizing others. They're too busy doing, making mistakes, improving, making progress.

- Wayne Dyer

More about Wayne Dyer

Honda on Leadership

Many people dream of success. To me success can only be achieved through repeated failure and introspection. In fact, success represents the one percent of your work which results only from the 99 percent that is called failure.

- Soichiro Honda

More on Soichiro Honda

Jobs on Leadership

If you are working on something exciting that you really care about, you don't have to be pushed. The vision pushes you.

- Steve Jobs

More on Steve Jobs

Bill Gates on Leadership

As we look ahead to the next century, leaders will be those who empower others.

- Bill Gates

More on Bill Gates

Photo (cc) Kjetil Ree.

Cicero on Leadership

Genius is fostered by industry.

- Cicero

More on Cicero

Hamilton on Leadership

Men give me credit for genius but all the genius I have lies in this: When I have a subject in mind I study it profoundly. Day and night it is before me. The result is what some people call the fruits of genius, whereas it is in reality the fruits of study and labor.

- Alexander Hamilton

More on Alexander Hamilton

Pliny on Leadership

It is a maxim universally agreed upon in agriculture, that nothing must be done too late; and again, that everything must be done at its proper season; while there is a third perception which reminds us that opportunities lost can never be regained.

- Pliny the Elder

More on Pliny

Drucker on Leadership

For it is the willingness of people to give of themselves over and above the demands of the job that distinguishes the great from the mearely adequate.

- Peter F. Drucker

More on Peter F. Drucker

Washington on Leadership

No man who continues to add something to the material, intellectual, and moral well-being of the place in which he lives is left long without proper reward.

- Booker T. Washington

More on Booker T. Washington

Jordan on Leadership

The minute you get away from fundamentals - whether it's proper technique, work ethic, or mental preparation - the bottom can fall out of your game, your schoolwork, whatever you're doing.

- Michael Jordan

More on Michael Jordan

Photo cc Steve Lipofsky.

Sarnoff on Leadership

A career, like a business, must be budgeted. When it is necessary, the budget can be adjusted to meet changing conditions. A life that hasn't a definite plan is likely to become driftwood.

- David Sarnoff

More on David Sarnoff

Steinbeck on Leadership

People need responsibility. They resist assuming it, but they cannot get along without it.

- John Steinbeck

More on Steinbeck

Lombardi on Leadership

The quality of a man's life is in direct proportion to his committment to excellence, regardless of his chosen field of endeavor.

- Vince Lombardi

Bombeck on Leadership

If you live with someone with the "Sorry-I'm-Late Syndrome, you must resign yourself to never seeing the bride walk down the aisle, never seeing the opening moments of a movie, and never hearing the national anthem to a ball game.

- Erma Bombeck

More on Erma Bombeck

Winget on Leadership

Service must be the ultimate motive of your life. Your work is the way you perform the service. Success, happiness, and prosperity come from having served well.

- Larry Winget

Busy Times

Busy week in politics; busy week for me at work. Will get this blog back on track soon.

IT Passed

This week's CNN versus Fox News:



-------------------------------



CNN as usual does the straight news better but Fox News asks the questions of the key news-maker. Bart Stupak comes across as pretty slimey.

Advantage this week: Fox News.

Tracy on Leadership

When you create a clear mental picture of where you are going in life, you become more positive, more motivated and more determined to make it a reality. You trigger your natural creativity and come up with idea after idea to help make your vision come true.

- Brian Tracy

Health Care Endgame

The process by which the Dems hope to pass their bill has become more fascinating than the substance of their bill itself. Five things to ponder:

1) nobody knows what's inside it yet. The Democrat leadership will unveil it later today or this week. They promise it will be made public 72 hours before folks can vote on it. Now just stop for just a minute and ponder the significance of this.

- A major piece of legislation, under discussion for over a year.

- A "reconciliation" of bills that have already passed both houses of Congress.

- Possibility of major innovations being put into it that were not in the original bills that passed.

Has there ever been a legislative process like this before?

2) What's up with that "reconciliation" buisness anyhow? Remember at that Health Care Summitt, where the Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid declared that no one is talking of reconciliation?

3) This voting to "deem" to pass instead of just voting for a bill: did you ever hear of such a thing? I must admit that this came as a complete surprise to me. Is there any precident for this?

4) Under the circumstances, the word "pass" takes on a whole new meaning. The Democrats may declare the bill passed. The President may sign the bill. The MSM may tout the bill as having passed and signed. But will it have actually been passed? Will it actually be enacted into law?

5) If the Democrats can pull this off, then why cannot this same kind of process be used by the Republicans in some future time when they're in the majority to pass conservative legislation?

Life on Earth?

Advanced life (shrimp) was discovered under a vast ice sheet, miles from open water. How did it get there? How does it survive. If it can survive in a cold, sunless place like that, then does similar life exist on similar moons orbiting Jupiter and Sature?



Surprising discovery. Here's the AP story.

Foreign Policy 2010

The Foreign Policy Institute has developed a wonderful briefing book on world affairs. You can read it online here for free. Just click the link.

Anybody who wants to learn about foreign policy ought to read this book. It is filled with wonderful articles about every area of the world from many of our country's leading thinkers.

My own highlights:
Decline is a Choice, Charles Krauthammer
FPI Fact Sheet: The case for a fully resourced counterinsurgency strategy for Afghanistan
Iran Outlook: Grim, John R. Bolton, National Review
A Road Map for Asian-Pacific Security, Gary J. Schmitt, American Enterprise Institute
Center Stage for the 21st Century, Robert D. Kaplan, Foreign Affairs
Open Letter to President Obama on Central Europe, Multiple Authors,The Foreign Policy Initiative
The Colombian Miracle, Max Boot and Richard Bennet, The Weekly Standard
Pirates, Then and Now, Max Boot, Foreign Affairs
Obama and Gates Gut the Military, Thomas Donnelly and Gary Schmitt, Wall Street Journal


These are just a few among the many wonderful articles in this book. Must read! (And it's free!!!)

CNN vs Fox on the Texas History Story

Fox had much more coverage of this subject, so this week they win.

Words of Wisdom

When you create a clear mental picture of where you are going in life, you become more positive, more motivated and more determined to make it a reality. You trigger your natural creativity and come up with idea after idea to help make your vision come true.

- Brian Tracy

Mitch McConnell Fact File

Republican’s Senate Leader

Born: February 20, 1942. Age: 68 years old.

College: 1967 - University of Louisville, honors. Student
Body President, Student Bar Ass’n President.

Intern: 1967 John Sherman Cooper, U.S. Senator.

Legislative Assistant: Senator Marlowe Cook.

Deputy Attorney General: in Ford Administration.

County Admin: 1978 – 1984 top political office of Jefferson County (which includes Louisville.

1984 – Present: U.S. Senator from Kentucky.

Only major Senator to oppose campaign finance reform on Constitutional grounds.

Republican Whip: 2003 – 2007; Republican Leader 2007 – present.

Married: Elaine Chao, Secretary of Labor under George W. Bush.

My Health Care Bill

If I could do my own health care bill, here’s what it would have:

1) Lawsuit costs lowered. Limiting the scope of lawsuits would have an impact beyond just the costs insurance companies have to pass on to doctors (who pass those on to consumers). It would lower

.. a)health insurance costs because less medical care costs the less the insurer has to pay – and the less premiums they would need from consumers.
Defensive medicine (i.e. the extra treatment doctors/nurses have to do to cover their butts in case they are sued.)

.. b) Legal fees. Even when patients win lawsuits, you know who wins really, don’t you? The lawyers, of course.

2) More medical schools to address the doctor/nurse shortage in America. We’ve been covering that through our immigration policies but every doctor we steal from the rest of the world means that someone out there has to do without. There’s plenty of Americans who want to be health professionals, who would be good at it, but there’s no place for them because our nation’s medical schools are so limited. That’s the bottleneck.

We can build more – lots more – but that costs money. Spending health care money on doctors and nurses instead of lawyers and bureaucrats is a spending program we can understand. It puts our health care priorities right.

It will also ultimately address doctor fees. - Law of supply and demand: shortages drives prices up; abundance drives them down.

3) Insurance portability across state lines. Maybe the Department of Commerce will have to do some regulating but the ease on the insurance pressure on a mobile America will be worth it.

Now for something really, really radical . . . (Drumroll!)

4) Start New Health Insurance Companies. Why not? This is something those limosine liberals could easily do. Obama wants to give the insurance companies some “competition”. he calls their profits “obscene”. Then just reducing profit margins to the “spectacular” level so they can produce more generous insurance provisions would quickly transform the industry. – And they wouldn’t have to worry about Republicans, filibusters, or even Senate reconciliation provisions.

Icing on the cake (listen up Charles Rangell, Christopher Dodd, et al) you can make yourselves a whole pile of money, to boot! - Of course, this last presumes that Obama’s rhetoric against the insurance companies were true.

- Alright, so 3 out of 4 ideas isn’t such a bad batting average!

Non-Political Jack 3/10/10

When (like most people) I stop thinking about politics, I write about other things. For example,

Twitter eye-opener
Can Sam Sloan ever be respectable?
Foundations of Investment
Herodotus in Egypt

These are linked here.

and don't forget my first Youtube video ever!

What's the Goal in Space Now?

Obama’s policy is most notable for the lack of his visibility in it. One gets the sense that his officials came up with it and he just went along, if indeed he gave any attention to it at all.

One has to wonder about a “Progressive Movement” that just wishes the entire Space Age would just go away. “Hope and Change” for space policy seems to have become “give up and stay the same”.

The one big advancement (no not the Mars manned landing – that’s just a mirage) is the commitment to encourage commercial space launches. – But to what purpose? What is the goal here?

More information: Space Policy Institute

CNN vs Fox 3/7/10

Tonight, the Oscar Awards:





I liked the back stage info from Fox, but once again CNN does the better summary.

CNN wins!

Krauthammer 3/6/10

Obama's Last Desperate Healthcare Push

My take on Charles Krauthammer's latest. His column was published in the Washington Post.

Summary: The Democrats are reversing their previous positions on reconciliation and are going to push the bill through on a straight party-line vote while ducking questions of its cost.

Quote:

Late last year, Democrats were marveling at how close they were to historic health-care reform, noting how much agreement had been achieved among so many factions. The only remaining detail was how to pay for it.

Well, yes. That has generally been the problem with democratic governance: cost. The disagreeable absence of a free lunch.

My Views: It is a shame that they could not do something to pass a common-sense bill than going for the big ideological rush. The basic problem isn't all the complexity; it is the lack of trust, something which Obama first began to loose when he changed his position of campaign finance to grab that big money in the spring primaries of 2008. People have to wade through the conflicting claims of the two parties. They would side with Obama and the Democrats, if only they could trust them more.

---

Charles Krauthammer is a more establishment columnist. He came to punditry by way of psychiatry (at Massachusetts General Hospital) via the New Republic Magazine. He appears on TV where you never see his wheelchair. Here's his Wiki bio.

He wrote a book which is pictured at the right. I am drawn by the substance and the thinking than any particular writing flair.

The New Season by George Will

A Spectator's Guide to the 1988 Election

ABOUT
Written before the election began, here are the large issues facing the nation in 1988.

WHAT I THINK
This is one of those unfortunate books that are timeless in their wisdom but, because they ostensibly covered a specific event, public interest waned. - Wasn't 1988 a long time ago?

Will's thoughtful comments on such topics as social divides, the national debt, and national security - together with the pressures politicians face, are as current today as they were then.

QUOTE

Prometheus had a hard career. An egal nibbled his liver for thousands of years. Running for President is sort of like that.

AUTHOR'S APPROACH
5 Chapters: Introduction, Ronald Reagan, Republicans, Democrats, and Conclusion.
The middle 3 chapters approach the election from their respective points of view. The Ronald Reagan chapter talks about his legacy in history as well as the impact of that upon this particular election.

THE GOOD POINTS
The timeless nature of the content. How this election related to elections that came before and speculations on future elections.

THE BAD POINTS
Social issues did not get the treatment they deserved. Spending programs got all lumped together. Not enough on what programs mattered and what did not. Also, government overhead was hardly discussed at all.

CONCLUSION
I've re-read my copy every few years since I bought it in 1988.

Krauthammer 2/28/10

US Retreats from Space


My take on Charles Krauthammer's latest. His column was published in the Washington Post.

Summary: Obama and today's Democrats seem supremely indifferent to the opportunities in Space. His budget cuts most manned missions in favor of helping private sector launches. The current policy also substitutes Mars for the Moon as the goal for human flight. There are no concret plans for either supporting the private sector support or manned missions to Mars.

Quote:

For the first time since John Glenn flew in 1962, the United States will have no access of its own for humans into space -- and no prospect of getting there in the foreseeable future.

My Views: The Space Age is probably the most significant issue of our era. It continually amazes me how folks can call themselves "progressives" and fail to see the long term opportunities that exists for our civilization from Space exploration. K is probably right that Obama's policy is just smoke and mirrors to disguise a full retreat from Space.

Sad, so very sad.

---

Charles Krauthammer is a more establishment columnist. He came to punditry by way of psychiatry (at Massachusetts General Hospital) via the New Republic Magazine. He appears on TV where you never see his wheelchair. Here's his Wiki bio.

He wrote a book which is pictured at the right. I am drawn by the substance and the thinking than any particular writing flair.

Health Care Summit

I watched most of the summit Thursday. Obvious points:

1) Obama wasn't really looking for agreement. It was just an act. Else, why would he try to refute every single one of the Republican statements, no matter how sincere, and trivialize the statements of even the most senior R leaders?

2) The most egregious D statements he let pass without comment.

3) He wound up the meeting with D only speakers, cutting the Republican leaders out of any role in ending the meeting.

This meeting was run to make O and his Democrats look good and R's look bad.

CNN vs Fox 2/27/10

My best vid picks: CNN wins.

Quote of the Day 2/24/10

At least they served beer at the last White House summit this stupid and pointless.

- Ann Coulter, talking about the Health Care Summit tomorrow.

Quote of the Day 2/20/10

But if I had a choice of the Republican Party's problems right now or the Democratic Party's problems, I think you could triple the Republican Party's problems and I'd still rather have their problems than the problems facing Democrats.

- Charles Cook, in National Journal.

Quote of the Day 2/17/10

It is a collapsed soufflé in an unused kitchen in the back of an empty house.

- Peggy Noonan in the Wall Street Journal, writing of the demise of the Health Care Bill.

Sarah Palin and the Media

Here's a silly article from Politico titled, Why the mainstream media loves Sarah Palin.

All this research and the reporter still misses the central point: The Media don't love Sarah Palin; they love to hate her. There is a difference.

Obama on Campaign Finance

If actions speak louder than words, then Obama's actions on the issue ought to outweigh his words supporting campaign finance laws and the Supreme Court rejection of them. Why did he opt out of the campaign finance system for his Presidential campaign in 2008? If he hadn't done that, he would be in far better shape on this issue today. The problem is that everyone is wondering how sincere he is on this issue.

Barone 1/30/10

Democrats Heading for Epic Disaster

My take on Michael Barone's latest. His column was published in The Washington Examiner.

Summary: Polling shows Republicans doing better than ever mostly due to opposition to the Democrats.

Quote:

Nonetheless, what we have here are the makings of an epic party disaster. Whether it comes to pass is still uncertain. But it certainly could.

My Views: Let's assume that all of the Democrat's policies are good ones for the moment. I think that Obama's behavior over the last month will become the classic case of someone stepping on their own brand. Obama and his supporters in party, country, and in the media have spent much effort in developing the image of a careful, non-partisan, and thoughtful political leader. His biggest misstep recently was the Boston speech in the special Senate election where he tried to cast it as between ordinary persons and the "big Wall Street bankers".

His best (and most quoted) line in the speech was also his worst. "Anybody can buy a pick-up truck but you've got to look under the hood." That last clause was pretty good but it was belied by the first. How many poor voters heard that and thought, "I wish I could buy a pick-up."

The problem with the speech was not that it wasn't so very bad but that it was so very ordinary. Virtually any Democrat politician anywhere in the country could have made that speech. They've been making variations of that speech for years. Same-o, same-o.

Then there's the visual image. Why's he appearing around the country (like in Ohio last week) without the tie? A small thing, true. But the visual, together with the demogogic speeches, and the jarring policies create the wrong impression. To citizens who need reassurance that they've got competant, thoughtful leadership (the old Obama brand would have given them that), they're getting the image of a left-wing radical.

So, what can Obama do (assuming that he does not want to change his policies.)

First, he can put that tie back on and look Presidential. He's the President of the USA, for crying out loud. There is not more advantageous spot to be in, no matter how unpopular a pol may be. Stop diminishing that advantage and use it!

Second, explain what he's trying to accomplish and how his policies are going to accomplish those goals. En-passent, he can say that's why he needs those Democrat votes in the Congress.

Third, stop demogoging. This stuff only hurts the Obama brand. - And if you're going to criticize Supreme Court over-reach, go ahead. But not just when they make Conservative decisions. And be thoughtful in your criticism. His State of the Union speech wasn't thoughtful at all.

Fourth, he's just got to answer the public's concerns about his policies. Meaningfully answer, not clever evasions.

This last point is probably the one that spoils everything I wrote above. For if he cannot meaningfully address the concerns, then maybe he should just face the fact that his policies are just all wrong. Go back to demogoging becasue that's all he has left.

---

Once, while flipping through tv channels, I stopped at C-Span when I heard someone say something like, "The most discriminated-against group in America today are Right-Wing Christians. The Press doesn't understand them and what little they do understand of them, they don't like." The moderator of the panel discussion quickly cut him off and said something about getting back to the topic of discussion which was discrimination in the newsroom. Another panelist began speaking, saying the things you would expect and I turned the channel. But before doing that, I marked down Michael Barone as a man I would watch in the future.

He has written a remarkable series of books, the most widely known and used is in the banner.

World Wide Web - World

This means we need to start subtracting the word "world" from the term "world wide web". China and other totalitarian countries countries are increasingly restricting internet use. We're moving from a true world wide web to a nationalized web.

That is, until new software hacks can be invented to circumvent government controls.

More information: Investors Business Daily.

Interesting Reads 1/20/10

News articles that I think were interesting, so I'm passing them along.

WHERE OBAMA WENT WRONG at RealClearPolitics.com discusses the 3 big strategic decisions that made the Democrats so unpopular. Quote:

To put it bluntly, the Obama White House has been politically inept in the last year. It has made serious miscalculations, and today it is paying a price.

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OBAMA'S EEOC NOMINEE: Society Should ‘Not Tolerate Private Beliefs’ That ‘Adversely Affect’ Homosexuals at CNSNews.Com says that the nominee wrote that government ought to persecute Christians and other religeous people for private beliefs that conflict with gay rights. Quote:

“Just as we do not tolerate private racial beliefs that adversely affect African-Americans in the commercial arena, even if such beliefs are based on religious views, we should similarly not tolerate private beliefs about sexual orientation and gender identity that adversely affect LGBT [lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender] people,” the Georgetown law professor argued.

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MASSACHUSSETTS STILL A TOSS-UP FiveThirtyEight.com is now outdated but I like this article as a good lesson in how to analyze polling. Quote:

It should be kept in mind that a lot of Brown's support is pretty new, which would ordinarily imply that it is pretty soft.

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DEMS' LOCK ON SENATE IS MIXED BLESSING FOR OBAMA by Michael Barone says that Obama would have been better off if he had been forced to work on a more bi-partisan basis by the lack of the 60 votes in the Senate. Quote:

The 60th seat was a temptation, and like Oscar Wilde, the Democrats were able to resist anything except temptation.

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HOW COAKLEY WILL STEAL THE ELECTION FROM BROWN in the Washington Examiner discusses how recent elections were manipulated by lost/found ballots and other counting manipulations in recent years. Quote:

How best to steal the election from Brown and the people of Massachusetts? Absentee ballots.

But Enough of MLK, Vote for Me . . .

This is the Democrat's candidate for U.S. Senate from Massachussets speaking at the MLK Day event in Boston.



The Republican candidate was invited by a private attendee and was seated at Table 84 in the back. He was not allowed to speak; only the Democrat's candidate was.

Sad that this day is treated as a holiday for the left and for the Democrats instead as a national holiday. I'm sure this is why so many people in America don't honor it. The promoters of this holiday send the same message year after year: this isn't for MLK and certainly not for you or your values but only for us and ours.

I wish they would allow the rest of us in the tent. Step 1: allow the Republicans to speak. End the political predjudice against them and be more tolerant of non-left-wing ideas.

Mass. Senate Race

It is difficult to overstate the importance of the race for the Senate in Massachussets. Barrack Obama is dropping everything - Haiti, Healthcare, everything - to campaign here today. For most of the last half-century, when we think liberal, we think Massachussets. When we think Democrat, we think Massachussets. This is the state that the Democrats must hold.

It is just fascinating to see a party monopoly getting challenged; it is also fascinating to see the underdog getting a chance.

Late-night observation. Tried to find Obama's speech on the internet. No coverate at CNN, or Fox. Minimal coverage at Boston Globe, New York Times, and Washington Post. What does this mean? Obama's rally fell flat?

Just saw - Fox News reported that Obama spoke in an auditorium that seated 3,000. The audience was only 2,500. Republican Brown held a competing rally on his own and drew a similar size crowd.

Questionable Tea Party Convention

Here is an interesting essay from one of the leading Conservative Bloggers on one of the leading Conservative blogs. (Okay, I admit it. I post there, too.)

Here's the important facts I gleaned from the piece.
1) The Convention is organized by folks no one has heard of before.
2) They are charging $500 a pop entrance fee.
3) They are a for-profit organization.

This is starting to sound like some hucksters are wanting to cash in on the tea party protesters. It started out as a grass-roots movement for ordinary folks to have their voices heard. Now, it is starting to have over-tones of a Ross Perot style third party.

Sarah Palin is going to be the keynote speaker at this convention. Why did she pass up other, more important speaking opportunities - such as the Guest of Honor at the House Republican's annual dinner last winter? - Or the Ronald Reagan Library event?

Her presence at this event may just wind up legitimizing a rip-off of a legitimate movement.

Steyn 1/9/10

Anti-Terror System Still Not Working

My take on Mark Steyn's latest. His column was published in the Orange County Register.

Summary:Airport measures taken since the Christmas terror attack have made things worse for passengers while not hindering more terror attacks.

Quote:

First, the bureaucrats at the TSA swung into action with a whole new range of restrictions.

Against radical Yemen-trained Muslims wearing weaponized briefs? Of course not. That would be too obvious. So instead they imposed a slew of constraints against you. At Heathrow last week, they were permitting only one item of carry-on on U.S. flights. In Toronto, no large purses.

Um, the Pantybomber didn't have a purse. He brought the bomb on board under his private parts, and his private parts weren't part of his carry-on. . . .

My Views: Valid point - National Security thinking needs to get away from all this politically correct, no profiling stuff. Clearly, the Fort Hood shooter should never have been promoted to Major in the US Army. It wasn't that his problems were unknown; it was the fear of official retribution if he was denied promotion - or (ahem!) kicked out of the army, entirely. Kicking him out of the country would have been too sensible.

Not valid point - the criticisms of Obama. Yes, he ought not have allowed the Christmas Terrorist a civilian trial but once he did, his remarks couldn't prejudice the prosecution. So the reliance on the word "allegedly" and so on. More significant are the President's latest statements on how the system failed and how things need to be improved.

Steyn's column is correct in critizing the President's actions; not so correct in criticizing the President's words. Sadly, actions still speak louder than words.

---

Mark Steyn is a syndicated columnist from Canada. Here's his Wiki bio.

His latest book is on the right. This is the book that got several Human Rights Commissions in Canada hot and bothered. With free speech under unprecedented attack, Mark Steyn managed to pull out a badly needed victory. This was the first time a Canadian Human Rights Commission found a defendant innocent.

2009 Year in Review

Try JibJab Sendables® eCards today!

I've always liked JibJab's work. This is a funny video about 2009. I notice that they went real light on Health Care! I wonder why. It was too explosive, even for them.

The Peace Prize

Now for a story I missed in 2009. Almost everything to be said about Obama's Nobel Peace Prize has been said except for the elephant in the room. Why have a Nobel Peace Prize at all?

There's now been a century's worth of annual winners of this prize. How many among them made a real difference in World Peace? Many of them were great humanitarians. Many of them did lots of good deeds. But in settling the wars of the century, in preventing wars, how many of these winners ever did anything major?

The problem is that real peacemaking means doing things that automatically disqualify the person from ever getting the Nobel Peace Prize. Let's take up a couple cases of people who were not awarded the Nobel Peace Prize - as a direct consequence of their peacemaking.

1) Franklin D. Roosevelt. He could have got it. In those darkest days of World War II, he could have announced that he was making peace with Hitler. H would have demanded a lot, but as long as FDR wanted to give him whatever he wanted, he could have got a peace treaty. Instead, he declared that the only peace he would accept with the Nazis was Unconditional Surrender. Warlike, true. But consider how much less peaceful the world would now be if the Nazis remained a major power in it.

2) Dwight Eisenhower. He ended the Korean War but that act precluded him from winning the Nobel Peace Prize. First, he got tough with the Communists. Told the Chinese that if they did not get serious about peace, he would start bombing them. Then, he accepted a truce (instead of a formal peace agreement). The U.S. army is there to this very day. But he stopped the fighting.

Now, let's look at the last few people who did win the Nobel Peace Prize (skipping Obama):

1) Mahtti Ahtisaari of Finland. What did he accomplish? His Wiki bio lists offices and awards, but what did he ever actually accomplish with any of them? He was the U.N. negotiaton on the Kosovo peace talks which failed. That's the noteworthy achievement.

2) Al Gore for his climate change work. Let's assume Gore is correct on every particular. Give him a Nobel Ecomomics Prize or even a Nobel Other Prize, but this work's relation to settling or preventing any war is tangental at best.

3) Grameen Bank is a banker who pioneered new banking methods for poor people. Give him an Economics Prize.

I could go on. Great humanitarians, great dedicated people but very few really made a direct contribution to World Peace.

And this is my problem with the World Peace Prize. Only those who act on the edges of the issue can get it. They're like the customer service reps at the Auto Service Centers who sit at their desks or wander the floor but who never crawl under the car and get their hands dirty. The mechanics who actually step into the gunk and are willing (and able!) to get dirty with the real decisions of War and Peace do not get awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

I propose a Nobel Humanitarian Prize. That would be far more descriptive of what those dedicated individuals really did.