Good News For Good People

by Bryan

The BBC reports that Malala Yousafzai wins EU’s Sakharov human rights prize

Pakistani schoolgirl and campaigner Malala Yousafzai, who was shot in the head by the Taliban, has won the EU’s Sakharov human rights prize.

The 16-year-old activist was shot a year ago for campaigning for better rights for girls.

The Sakharov Prize for free speech is awarded by the European Parliament annually in memory of Soviet physicist and dissident Andrei Sakharov.
…

The 50,000 euro ($65,000) prize is considered Europe’s top human rights award.

And the CBC reports Alice Munro is 1st Canadian woman to win Nobel literature prize

Alice Munro wins the 2013 Nobel Prize in Literature, becoming the first Canadian woman to take the award since its launch in 1901.

Munro, 82, only the 13th woman given the award, was lauded by the Swedish Academy during the Nobel announcement in Stockholm as the “master of the contemporary short story.”

“We’re not saying just that she can say a lot in just 20 pages — more than an average novel writer can — but also that she can cover ground. She can have a single short story that covers decades, and it works,” said Peter Englund, permanent secretary of the Swedish Academy.

Both are extremely qualified for their awards. Sakharov would have certainly admired Malala’s courage, and Alice Munro has been a good read for the last 40 years.

11 comments

1 Kryten42 { 10.11.13 at 12:56 am }: Yes! Well deserved certainly. 🙂

Now… Let’s see the Nobel Peace Prize committee redeem itself and prove they are not on the take or just stupid.

However, in other “Good News Awards”, we have Edward Snowden! 😀 Wahoo! 😉 😆

Edward Snowden given ‘integrity in intelligence’ award

Ohhh… What I wouldn’t give to e a fly on the wall at the Wh*reHouse right now! (Any of them, Washington DC, Langley, or Maryland). 😛 😀

And more good news:
GOP now the most unpopular political party ever measured by Gallup

(that probably wont make much difference in Apathy USA), and as TBogg remarks, certainly won’t make a bit of difference to the Insane TeePs:

The beatings will continue until our poll numbers turn around

We used to have a great TV show called “Good News Week”. It was kinda like TDS in some ways, where they primarily had a lot of fun at the expense of the media here and around the World. I wish it was still on air. It would be the only reason to turn on my TV (which I have no idea if it even works! Been a couple years since I watched anything on it). Via Wiki:

Good News Week was an Australian satirical panel game show hosted by Paul McDermott that aired from 19 April 1996 to 27 May 2000, and 11 February 2008 to 28 April 2012. The show’s initial run aired on ABC until being bought by Network Ten in 1999. The show was revived for its second run when the 2007–2008 Writers Guild of America strike caused many of Network Ten’s imported US programmes to cease production.

Good News Week drew its comedy and satire from recent news stories, political figures, media organisations, and often, aspects of the show itself. The show opened with a monologue by McDermott relating to recent headlines, after which two teams of three panellists competed in recurring segments to gain points.

The show has spawned three short-lived spin-off series, the ABC’s Good News Weekend (1998), Ten’s GNW Night Lite (1999) and Ten’s skit-based Good News World (2011).

Good News Week’s format is based on that of the British programme Have I Got News For You, although host Paul McDermott says that the idea behind the show, “of looking at the news in a satirical way, the week’s events, ‘this is the week that was’, goes back to early radio programmes.” Executive producer Ted Robinson has said that the show’s humour is usually less genteel than Have I Got News For You as the British series is aimed at an older, over-fifty audience whereas Good News Week is most popular among the 18 to 39 age group. “We are at the rabid mongrel end of the market,” he says.

McDermott opens each show with a scripted monologue in which he dissects newsworthy events in a humorous manner. He concludes by declaring, “and that’s the good news!” and throwing his newspaper clippings in the air, after which an air cannon expels more newspaper clippings all over the stage. The episode’s six panellists, divided into two teams, are then introduced. Teams are captained by the two regular panellists, radio comedian Mikey Robins and stand-up comedian Claire Hooper. The four guest panellists consist of a combination of comedians, media personalities and occasionally politicians.

It really was a great show! So, of course it had to be killed off (even though ratings were good and increasing). *sigh*

It seems that only the mediocre ever really have a long life, sadly.
2 Bryan { 10.11.13 at 12:40 pm }: The Nobel Committee chickened out and went with another UN agency – the chemical weapons guys in the news for Syria.

Good News Week is a similar format to Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me!, the NPR radio show where I first heard Charlie Pierce. We had That Was The Week That Was [that I seem to remember was a BBC import] on television, but all political humor has been banished to cable channels as the corporations swallowed up broadcast television and dumbed it down. John Stewart and Stephan Colbert aren’t nearly as biting as TV used to be in the 1960s and 70s.
3 Kryten42 { 10.11.13 at 2:33 pm }: The Nobel Committee has lost all credibility for good with me. If they offered me a Prize (not that that is remotely likely) I’d tell them to shove it where the sun doesn’t shine (and I would! I did that with the first Aus Design Award I was offered, unless they made some changes.)

Anyway, here’s a good news piece that had me LMAO! 😆

McCain breaks Fox anchor’s heart: ‘Defunding Obamacare is not achievable’

OMG! Can irony get any better than that??! Really! 😆

And another good piece in CSM:

How ‘reasonable Republicans’ could oust Speaker Boehner

PS. I had to post a comment there! 😉 I had to I tell ya! 😈

CSM Political Cartoons
4 Kryten42 { 10.11.13 at 2:40 pm }: CSM on the Peace Prize, which I kinda (partially) agree with:

This Nobel Peace Prize was only half right

BTW, The CSM Political Cartoons above are quite good I thought. I enjoyed the satire. 😉 😀
5 Badtux { 10.11.13 at 7:26 pm }: GOP now the most unpopular political party ever measured by Gallup

This shutdown sure is increasing their popularity, isn’t it? 😆
6 Bryan { 10.11.13 at 10:15 pm }: Kryten, with their decision on Obama, they totally lost their credibility. I think the Ig-Nobels are a lot more fun, and they don’t require white tie. [Turning down around a million bucks would be tough for a capitalist like myself.]

Yeah, Badtux, this must be the ‘popular uprising’ that Cruz the Confused predicted. He was a bit off on who was going to get tarred and feathered 😉
7 Kryten42 { 10.12.13 at 5:46 am }: And in typical, and SOP style, the Rethugs begin throwing McCain under the bus. And I’m sure even McCain knew this would happen.

Louie Gohmert tells Values Voter Summit: John McCain ‘supported Al Qaeda’

The more I think about it, the more I think Malala was lucky not to have won the Peace Prize. After all, she would then have forever been likened to Obama and Bush! She has won plenty of more legitimate awards, which those two cretins never have or will. And it’s amazing that she’s only 16! Very gracious in *defeat* (or win, depemding on one’s point of view, which I see is mirrored by many!)

Overlooked Pakistani schoolgirl Malala Yousafzai congratulates Nobel prize winner

Is Nobel Peace Prize winner Obama More Brutal Than Bush?

Many comments similar to “The Nobel Peace prize has lost its meaning and is no longer relative.”are found there and several other places.

And yeah, a Million $ would be nice, but as far as I am concerned, the price for getting that million is far too high! Apparently, one has to be at least a Sociopath, and a definite lack of morals, ethics and being a mass-murdering SOB help’s also. Sorry, the attached strings are far too strong and wrong for me.
8 Kryten42 { 10.12.13 at 5:50 am }: Blomberg have this opinion piece up, which I do generally agree with. But I still believe Malala is better off not being associated with some of the other *Winners*. Though, I am sure the money would have been a big help to her campaign. Still, I suspect she would agree, the price is too high!

Why Malala Should Have Won the Nobel Prize

The Nobel committee is developing a habit of offering the peace prize as a kind of advance payment on great deeds to come, which in such cases tells us more about the priorities of the committee members than the actions of the winners. President Barack Obama is the obvious case in point, when he was essentially awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2009 for getting elected and not being George W. Bush. True, Obama had already made a good speech about eliminating nuclear weapons, but that was a speech — he hasn’t been able to make much more progress on the substance than his predecessors.

I wonder whether the Nobel committee would give Obama the peace prize today, knowing what it does now about how he performed in office: That record includes a massive increase in drone warfare and revelations about the National Security Agency’s expansion of digital spying on his watch. It is certainly arguable that Obama still deserves the peace prize, but I doubt the Norwegians would be giving it to him now, knowing what he actually did as president, warts and all.

My guess is that next year the OPCW would have been a slam dunk for the prize. This year, though, I don’t see how they compete with the bravery of Malala and her family, who took such extraordinary risks to press for a cause — the education and therefore empowerment of that 50 percent of the world’s population who are women — that is no less important than eliminating chemical weapons.

I couldn’t agree more!

I think the Committee should be condemned and investigated.
9 Bryan { 10.12.13 at 3:27 pm }: It’s their money and their rules. As Professor Higgs pointed out, there were a number of people who weren’t recognized in the theoretical research that was the basis of his award, generally because they had already died before the award was given.

Rosalind Franklin wasn’t honored for her crucial work on the structure of DNA, because she died before the prize was awarded.

The rules tend to lessen the importance of the prize, and certainly don’t recognize the absolute best of science.

The prize committee doesn’t seem to understand the difference between the absence of open warfare and real peace. They keep buying into the process without waiting for the results. Destroying the chemical weapons isn’t going to end the war in Syria. It isn’t going to bring peace.
10 Kryten42 { 10.13.13 at 5:48 pm }: Congratulations, Malala, on failing to win the Nobel Peace Prize

Who wants to be forever associated with the EU or Kissinger? No, as with Gandhi, the real honor is being ignored by Oslo

You have to love the Nobel peace prize committee. No, literally you do – I think it’s an international law or something. Yesterday, they opted against awarding their honour to one of the most obviously inspiring and extraordinary people of the age, 16-year-old Pakistani schoolgirl Malala Yousafzai, instead conferring it on the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons. Still, even Malala’s most passionate advocates will concede the committee’s decision is an improvement on last year’s brave nod to the European Union.

I’ve certainly got nothing against the entirely admirable OPCW – but then, most of us would tick the “strongly disagree” box as far as chemical weapons go. And despite the immensely valuable and successful job the organisation does, it is, you know, their job. The Nobel committee has awarded the prize to an international agency for being an international agency, and while that doesn’t quite constitute bonus-culture-gone-to-Oslo, it feels rather thin on inspiration.

Yeah.

Also, for all the latest headlines about all the insanely stupid crap going on in the USA, I really can’t be bothered. Just look here:

Right Wing Watch

Here’s some samples of the wonderful examples of humanity in the USA:

Carson: Obamacare ‘Is The Worst Thing That Has Happened In This Nation Since Slavery’

Jim Bob Duggar Compares US To Nazi Germany During The Holocaust

Joyner: ‘Our Only Hope Is A Military Takeover’

Texas School Board Chair Hails Creationist Dietitian And Businessman As Biology Experts

Parenting Advice From Glenn Beck: Push Your Children Against The Wall To Teach Them That Rights Come From God

Parker: Gay People And ‘Enemies Of God’ Should ‘Keep It Private’

Jackson: Next To Jesus, America Has Been ‘The Greatest Blessing Given To Mankind’

Lila Rose Likens Her Anti-Abortion Activism To Malala Yousafzai

And so on! Those last two made me just want to vomit.

Quite frankly, and seriously, the only thing you can do is kill these fools (and all the others like these). They will never stop, and nobody sane will ever change them.

Anyway, I’m done. I have better things to do with my time now. Have fun.
11 Bryan { 10.13.13 at 10:06 pm }: We can certainly agree that the Nobel Peace Prize is no longer the honor it once was. I put it down to institutional dementia that seems to occur when endowments allow groups to exist well beyond their “use by” dates, and become parodies of themselves.

Kryten, these are the same people that started the American Civil War 150 years ago, who still refuse to admit they lost. They are attempting to seize by insanity what they cannot win at the ballot box.

One of Zero’s basic mistakes was not taking the link seriously, and thinking he could negotiate with them and settle their differences. The only thing that would satisfy them is total control of everything after a complete surrender. Ain’t going to happen. They reacted to the election of Obama, almost the same way that the South reacted to the election of Lincoln – they refused to recognize him as the legitimate winner, and they have gone nuts since his reelection.