If you want it, earn it

Jay Tea blogged on Wizbang On Friday, I tossed off a quick piece that ended with a link to the number of Nobel Prizes that have been awarded to Jews. I'm not sure why I chose that particular yardstick, but I did.

I found it an interesting piece of information, and in fact bookmarked it for possible future use.

Later that day, Ken McCracken of willisms.com (with whom I was privileged to co-blog over there for about a month or so) wrote a piece that took the same notion, and ran like hell with it. Showing the research chops and insight that are required to share a page with Will Franklin, Ken found an interview with an Iraqi "researcher" who is extremely upset with the disproportionate numbers of Nobel Prizes awarded to Jews vs. Muslims.

167 Jews vs 4 Arabs, and all four of them are considered traitors to Islam.

According to what Samir 'Ubeid says, the Nobel Prizes should not be awarded strictly on merit. They should have quotas on them, to make sure that all peoples, all faiths, are appropriately represented.

Accoreding to the Nobel Foundation Every year since 1901 the Nobel Prize has been awarded for achievements in physics, chemistry, physiology or medicine, literature and for peace. The Nobel Prize is an international award administered by the Nobel Foundation in Stockholm, Sweden. In 1968, Sveriges Riksbank established The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel, founder of the Nobel Prize. Each prize consists of a medal, personal diploma, and a cash award. In other words, as the old Smith Barney ads used to say: We make money the old-fashioned way. We EARN it. If Arabs think they are not getting enough Nobel Prizes, perhaps they should stop spending so much time killing Jews (not likely to get them the Nobel Peace Prize), but study, and develop something worthwhile. I know they developed the Arabic Number System, but they did that before they invented Islam. What have they done RECENTLY that would earn them a Nobel Prize.

I suppose to him, that in 1989 the Prize should not have gone to J. Michael Bishop and Harold E. Varmus for their work in retroviral oncogenes (which has something fairly important to do with cancer research), but perhaps to Dr. Mohammed Durka-Durka Jihad for his ground-breaking work in the application of electrical stimuli to various portions of the human anatomy, and its consequent effect on human memory. ("If we apply the proper voltage to the genitalia for the right amount of time, the subject suddenly remembers their treasonous acts and will freely admit to them.") Perhaps Dr. Jihad can split the prize with Dr. Bishop, since he's not Jewish.

Arabs are seldom willing to split anything with anyone. They certainly are not willing to accept the two state solution in the middle east, for example. They are greedy basterds who want it all for themselves, even though they have not earned it.

You know, we've pretty much trashed the notion of "social promotion" in our schools, and are moving back towards actually requiring the students to achieve measurable progress before they advance out of a grade. But like a bad penny, it seems that this idea has not died the death it so richly deserves, but has merely moved on. I have very little respect for the "soft" prizes,

I agree, particularly the Nobel Peace Prize, which is usually awarded as a jab against the USA.

but the "hard" ones -- especially chemistry, physics, and medicine -- really ought to stand out. And Samir 'Ubeid's notion of cheapening them just so his (and, by extension, his fellow Muslims') feelings don't get bruised just irritates the hell out of me.

Their feelings seem very easily bruised.

You want a Nobel Prize, Mr. 'Ubeid? Feel free to earn one.