Barack Obama’s Surprise Nobel Prize Award

Global Politics, Current Events, U.S. Elections | Comments (10)

By MAJOR TOM | October 9, 2009

It’s being hailed by many as most pleasant surprise. U.S. President Barack Obama’s winning of the most prestigious humanitarian award brings forth a wind of very warm feelings across the world and as of now, the field is yet clear of any criticism.

Except for a few who sees the award as too premature, for a president who is just into his first year of office. They say, he has done nothing yet, at least, not on a long term basis.

Yet, this award is given mostly on not what he has already achieved but on what he intends to gain.

The Nobel Prize award committee in Oslo Norway, states that he is being given the prize "for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and co-operation between peoples."

While former Nobel Prize awardee, Mohamed ElBaradei, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna, sums up Obama’s award as:

"In less than a year in office, he has transformed the way we look at ourselves and the world we live in and rekindled hope for a world at peace with itself. He has shown an unshakable commitment to diplomacy, mutual respect and dialogue as the best means of resolving conflicts. He has reached out across divides and made clear that he sees the world as one human family, regardless of religion, race or ethnicity."

I fully agree with this.

President Obama’s style of diplomacy has won it all for him, reaching out to the Arab world with open palms, signifying am approach of dialogue rather than of rhetoric.

This despite that the irony remains intact, where as a U.S. President at these crucial times in global political environment, he is still so much embroiled in conflicts that has been left on his table by a former administration, with pressure in Afghanistan for surge in U.S. military presence, lest instability would inure in the South Asia region.

And just last month, Pres. Obama had to propose a missile shield of Western Europe, presumably from Russia and its allies.

The peace prize could in fact provide unnecessary pressure for Pres. Obama, now that he is seen as a global peace progenitor, when in fact as the leader of the strongest military power in the world, he is also involved in several wars and conflicts still appertaining today across the globe.

There’s so much good feeling with Obama’s winning the Nobel Peace, yet giving it to a very active and newly-installed U.S. President could bring forth some undeniable irony, if not now, then in some coming years.

The Missile Game

Global Politics, Current Events, News & Info | Comments (2)

By MAJOR TOM | September 19, 2009

Decades after the so-called “Cold War Era” had perceived to be ended; right about the time when the former U.S.S.R. was dissolved by Perestroika and Glasnost, here we are again hearing some kind of buzz about arms build-up from America and then from Russia, with U.S. President Barack Obama starting it all with an announcement of a missile defense system aimed at shielding Europe, purportedly from Russia and its close allies.

Isn’t this some kind of a nuclear déjà vu?

What comes to mind immediately is the almost mythical but flimsy “Star Wars” shield program or otherwise known as Strategic Defense Initiative of former U.S. President Ronald Reagan, a hollywoodish grand ambition of networking the skies with military satellites, those that could supposedly anticipate and neutralize any major nuclear strike against America.

Of course Russia immediately felt threatened by the Obama missile defense plan in Europe that it almost automatically announced that it would likewise be deploying Iskander missiles in Poland, in order to counter what it perceived to be as an apparent threat to its security.

President Obama had to cancel the missile defense plan so that Russia would backed-off from the missile deployment in Poland. Now, that’s more like it. Tensions would have gone high and relations between the two nuclear giants would have deteriorated to a great extent.

All’s well that ends well.

Yet, I could deeply infer on the whole situation as there could be more profane motives other than what we see on the surface of this issue. The fact that it was planned at all --- the Europe missile defense plan should be a high indication that volatility within that region is still high. Such plan could have probably been instigated and resultant of incisive intelligence data gathered or why else would America put it up over there if Russia is as lame as we all thought it to be at present --- harmless like a sheep. Just when we all thought that Russia was not an enemy but a friend of America, it’s coming up as if it is becoming a monster once again, threatening to gobble up Europe. For wealth or power --- we exactly could not know.

Or maybe President Obama just wanted to play the role of grand old American presidents of years past, talking big in terms of missiles and nuclear warheads, ala Reagan or Nixon. Could he be so inclined in opening old wounds with Russia?

America voted for him because the population there had gotten so turned-off by former President George W. Bush’s perceived warmongering in Iraq and elsewhere. Why would he be so careless in instigating an arms race --- that’s the least the world needs right now.

We hope President Obama chooses so well and very deliberately the international actions that he makes; and he shouldn’t be playing missile games.

Myanmar Gets Away with Economic Lip Service From China

Philippine Politics, Global Politics, ASEAN Issues | Comments (8)

By MAJOR TOM | August 13, 2009

For one, Myanmar has just become the most persistent customer of the United Nation Security Council today, as its sentencing of freedom icon Aung San Suu Kyi to an 18-month of reclusion has earned it another ticket towards official condemnation. It used to be Israel, staunch raiders of territories of its neighbors, Lebanon and Palestine.

Fortunately for Myanmar, veto-wielding countries China and Russia posed stumbling block to the United Nation condemnation with China issuing statements that the western world should respect Myanmar’s sovereignty. And accordingly, other neighbor countries like India and Thailand forms a belt of protection and easement with China and Myanmar rest comfortably on this. But this is pointed out to be most economic in nature as Myanmar remains to be among the few countries in the eastern hemisphere to have been able to preserved vast portion of natural resources, in terms of lumber and minerals, and definitely China depends on this so much that now it gives the global lip-service.

This must be what colonialism looks like nowadays.

Conspicuously, the ASEAN secretariat is mum on this latest political storm brewing from the land of pagodas. Perhaps, it’s starting to get tired of Myanmar’s troubled ways.

Everybody gets tired somehow. Maybe the United nation will soon get numbed on Myanmar’s irreverence that it may just leave the issue there stale and unattended, to keep a blind eye. I hope not.

President Obama's First Test Case on Race

Global Politics, Current Events | Comments (4)

By MAJOR TOM | July 25, 2009

Just as I thought it would be, race or race issues could and would become a thorn in the side of U.S. President Barack Obama’s administration. Just early into the White House, one such incident already threatens to blow over involving the inappropriate arrest of an African-American Harvard University professor on July 16, mistaken for breaking into his own house after being locked out upon arriving from a foreign trip.

It could have been just another simple and routine police miscalculation except that Harvard University professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. had accused the arresting officers for mistreating him on the ground that he was black. Of course, Cambridge, Mass. Police authorities had seriously denied this and contended even that the professor was eventually arrested for disorderly conduct, being unruly and uncooperative in the ensuing police proceedings. (Incidentally, Professor Gates, Jr. is the author of a book on the American race issue "America Behind The Color Line", Warner Books, 2004)

And then President Obama made the sparkling remark about how “stupid” were the police officers in making the arrest and it should not have happened in the first place. Of course, he most recently backtracked and apologized for this rather pedantic remark --- It’s all over the news today.

What I think is that President Obama should not have said that remark and should have sounded diplomatic all throughout, considering that he is a black president about to comment on an issue concerning race and race profiling.

He should realize that he was elected not because he was black but because he was keen and articulate (that’s what all those who voted for him had said).

Race issues are potential firestorms that unkindly remarks could unnecessarily inflamed what could be patently controllable situation, like this Cambridge case of simple mistaken arrest. Or we should be reminded how the Rodney King issue had caught so much wind that it pervaded into the racial psyche of the American nation.

Remember, President Obama is not there just for the African-Americans merely, he is the president of all American people in the first place. He should be erudite on these matters and act highly unbiased in controversial issues involving race.

And it is not merely enough that he should feel and act so neutral, but he should look so strictly unbiased in the public eye.

A Monster Rearing It’s Head

Global Politics, Current Events | Comments (8)

By MAJOR TOM | June 21, 2009

I’ve been closely following the steeply radical event unfolding in Iran (unfolding right before our eyes) and as the days go by, the entire chaotic situation feels and looks like a monster finally rearing its head. And it might just turn out to be a good monster that’s coming out.

The fallout in Iran’s recently held presidential election has just become so seriously grave and explosive that today, news account of Tehran contains dead bodies on the streets and fiery burning all over the city.

The widespread protestations of the election results---where re-electionist and declared winner Mahmoud Ahmadinejad won a nearly a landslide victory against political reformist Mir Hossein Musavi per official record---has gotten so reiterated that one could not help surmise that the motivations behind this public and often violent avowal of the Iranian people are deeply rooted and resolute, cloaked for years and years under a veil of forged orderliness and stability under Ahmajinehad, governing an administration that is so highly critical of the west and even unhindered loath of Israel.

Maybe, many Iranians are already tired of this antagonistic policies against the West and realized that this would be counter-productive for a country bursting with wealth and richness, mostly coming from their petroleum deposits, which among the biggest in the world.

It’s affirming to note that in the first place, Iran has gone to such extend as to practice democracy as elections are actually held there and the people has had enough voice in choosing their own leaders. But it seems that the people of Iran yearns more than the freedom of suffrage, maybe they need a government who does not battle almost every western country in the world, maybe they need a government that is more moderate and reasonable, much much more reasonable than Pres. Ahmajinehad who relishes and bask in every disparaging word he spew against the west and Israel, jeopardizing in every way efforts towards a more lasting peace in Palestine and the eventual creation of the Palestinian state.

Strong words often do not help the cause of peace.

Myanmar Does Not Belong In ASEAN

Global Politics, Current Events, ASEAN Issues | Comments (1)

By MAJOR TOM | May 15, 2009

There goes Myanmar once again, hugging the headlines not with any conceivable achievement nor gain, but for yet another unfortunate incident, with the re-arrest of Burmese freedom fighter Aung San Suu Kyi, two months before her house arrest was about to end, as promised by the military junta over there.

We do not condone intervention. But sometimes, enough’s enough. Some boundaries have been crossed.

This most recent talk about Myanmar involves a swimming incident where an American Vietnam War veteran who swam across the Inya Lake to reach her house where she was placed under house detention, for almost 19 years now. And it was about to end, just two months away, now she's being fully detained in a prison cell. I was asking about why would Ms. Suu Kyi allow some old grungy American person to jeopardize her eventual freedom? And why would the military government there thinks she would do such a foolhardy thing?

I think ASEAN should step in now and do something palpable and patent about Myanmar. Despite that political intervention into each member’s internal affairs is highly restricted as a matter of hard policy, yet I think such application of a policy long established had become so stoic and inflexible, allowing for an irrational political stance such as the ASEAN nonchalance over Myanmar, where even when the military there were already killing their own people, such as the orange-clad Buddhist monks during the so-called “Orange Revolution” last year.

And ASEAN keeps mum, deciding that it doesn’t want to antagonize and isolate Gen. Than Swe’s often bizarre administration. My bad, such foolishness and inanity, I don’t know what it is there for if it could not lift any finger against the notorious junta in Yangon. The European Union had just toughened its sanction against Myanmar and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had just strongly demanded the release of Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi. And what does ASEAN do, it says it does not want to isolate Myanmar.

Seemingly, the decision could be principled enough since a raucous Myanmar, especially with a patently murderous military junta reigning over there, could affect the overall peace and security situation in the Southeast Asia region, not good for political image outside while ASEAN is angling for EU-style economic integration in a decade or two.

But at least, ASEAN got to do something. ASEAN does not need Myanmar if it continues at this path of repression. When you anything about Myanmar, you’d thought you are transported back to a past and backward generation, where people work in slave camps without fees and eating porridge all the time and where human lives do not seem to have value at all.

EU had to make Poland and Turkey begged on their knees just to be included in the one-market system. But in this side of the world, it’s the other way around, ASEAN had to turn a blind eye so as just to keep Myanmar on its ranks. Now that’s entirely unheard of.

ASEAN should issue some final ultimatum to Myanmar, despotism has no room in ASEAN.

Pope's Visit to the Holy Land : A Historic Proposal for a Palestinian State

Global Politics, Current Events | Comments (3)

By MAJOR TOM | May 13, 2009

I saw Pope Benedict XVI holding a conference on CNN and my eyes was plastered to the area where Arabic text was written, just above him, while the Pope was relaying his words to a wide audience silent in attention. I thought there was some visual error on my part, but on second look it was really as it is. Well, in this modern age, it wouldn’t be as surprising to see an immense Christian personality like the Pope being seen around symbols that portrays another religion, like Islam.

In fact, Pope Benedict’s visit to the Holy Land is highlighted for his call for peace and unity among all faith, and among all men.

It is so dramatic that way, and despite that previously Pope John Paul II had done similar visit to Jerusalem, this occasion becomes ultimately historic as well, especially with Pope Benedict’s call for the eventual establishment of a long-delayed Palestinian State.

I say long-delayed because it is almost unimaginable now that Palestine could share one state with the Israel, like it was planned before. This might be disarming and discouraging but that’s just the fact. A state consist of a people with a unique culture and nuances, some kind of thread that binds across the population. Palestinians and Israelis do not share any singular thread that therefore, there could not be any sort of a singular society to be qualified as a population of one juridical entity --- such as a state.

Being that the case, there’s no more reason to deny the formal delineation of a singular Palestinian state. To this end, I second the motion of the Pope’s declaration on this issue.

Perhaps, this might just lead to a more viable peace situation in the area; if not entirely eradicate the vicious conflicts there.

Now, it should be true that this proposal for a Palestinian state would be easier said than done. But the path to peace should pursued with great determination and with a staunch thrust towards it, for any half-hearted attempt would be merely futile considering the various problems that could stonewall it among which are;

• 1. Jerusalem’s status is divided between Palestine and Israel and both entities are claiming it to be fully their own. How do we divide the city? To what side goes to whom?


• 2. Most Palestinians work in Israeli territory and there’s almost zero economic activity and opportunity as of this moment. These Palestinian workers could not just go back home for there are exactly no work there.
• 3. Militant Hamas controls most Gaza Strip and we all know how they are so hard to deal with.
• 4. Israel occupies sizable portion of Palestinian areas and mostly, the Israelis there wouldn’t want to leave the homes they have been allowed to build there.
• 5. Endless rocket attacks against Israel continues to pervade.

I have just enumerated the major headaches that lie ahead the plan to establish the state of Palestine. But these could actually be surmounted if the United Nations and G8 countries like America and Great Britain would earnestly help and desire the plan.

One good solution I have in mind is the establishment of a temporary administration of Palestine by the United Nation, a mandate similar to what it did with East Timor and Lebanon, and a Marshall Plan-like fund would be implemented to help restore civility and development in Palestine, towards a slow and gradual handover over a fixed period of time.