9 OCT 2009, Friday

1. President Barack Obama has won the Nobel Peace Prize!??
2. Hmmm...Prior US winners...President Carter, Vice President Gore and now President Obama.  Yup!  Seems to me that the Nobel Peace Prize has now officially been degraded to the point of complete worthlessness.  By the way, what exactly did Obama do less than 3 weeks into office that made him even eligible to be nominated for the award in February 2009?  "Nothing to see here folks...move along!"
3. But that's not the wackiest headline for the day:  Saudis ask for aid if world cuts dependence on oil
   There are plenty of needy countries at the U.N. climate talks in Bangkok that make the case they need financial assistance to adapt to the impacts of global warming. Then there are the Saudis.  Saudi Arabia has led a quiet campaign during these and other negotiations — demanding behind closed doors that oil-producing nations get special financial assistance if a new climate pact calls for substantial reductions in the use of fossil fuels . . .  “We are among the economically vulnerable countries,” Al Sabban told The Associated Press on the sidelines of the talks ahead of negotiations in Copenhagen in December for a treaty to replace the Kyoto Protocol, which expires in 2012.”This is very serious for us,” he continued. “We are in the process of diversifying our economy but this will take a long time. We don’t have too many resources.”  Saudi Arabia, which sits atop the world’s largest proven oil reserves, is seeing economic growth slide because of fallout from the global meltdown, but experts still expect the country, flush with cash from oil’s earlier price spike last year, to be better able than other nations to cope with the current crisis.”
   
4. Seriously — is someone pulling our legs?