DISQUS

A Sales Guy: What Has Been Lost?

  • aaronklein · 2 months ago
    I guess I would turn it back and ask the question: why is questioning something considered anger?

    Saw on Bloomberg this morning a really good point: nobody would have questioned giving the President the Nobel Prize for Economics. Agree with him or not, he's done a tremendous amount of work in that field and accomplished a great deal in this first year of his presidency.

    Sure, some are reacting about President Obama because they don't like him and they feel like they can't afford to let him look good.

    I don't think Joe Klein or Thomas Friedman fit that category. The rest of us are just wondering why the Nobel committee did what it did. They certainly did the President no favors.
  • Keenan · 2 months ago
    this is a very interesting discussion.

    Don't think the "questioning" is something to be considered as anger.
    It's the Michael Steele and Rush Limbaugh type comments.

    Look at it this way. If your Mother had won "Mother of the Year" and
    you thought Mrs. Jones down the street should have won it. You
    wouldn't have called it an "embarrassment"? You wouldn't have openly
    and vehemently said "What has my mother done to deserve this?" You
    would have humbly accepted it as an honor to your mom who you love and
    respect. You might have quiet discussion with her and those close to
    you but you would have never, EVER yelled aloud in a fashion that
    would have embarrassed her and suggested she wasn''t worthy. This is
    what many of the Obama detractors are doing and what my post was
    addressing.

    It's not the questioning, it's the how some are doing it. Don't think
    we are too far off from one another.
  • aaronklein · 2 months ago
    It is a good discussion, and thanks for making it an interesting and civil one.

    I really do understand your point, and I'm not a big fan of some of the comments that have been made.

    That being said, your analogy is a bit off. Let me try one on for size. I have two brothers-in-law. One who is 15, and the other who is 25 and is a great dad to his three kids.

    If they gave the father of the year award to the 15 year old, I think I'd be awfully critical of that committee for snubbing the actual father of the year.

    Another American, this one named Greg Mortenson, was also nominated for this year's Nobel Peace Prize award.

    From TIME Magazine: "Son of a missionary, a former army Medic and mountaineer, he has made it his mission to build schools for girls in places where opium dealers and tribal warlords kill people for trying. His Central Asia Institute has built more than 130 schools in Afghanistan and Pakistan — a mission which has, along the way, inspired millions of people to view the protection and education of girls as a key to peace and prosperity and progress."

    It's too bad the Nobel committee chose to make this year's award about George W. Bush and politics, rather than awarding $1.4 million dollars to build more schools for girls. And it was a slap in the face to President Obama to use him to try to insult George W. Bush -- just my opinion.