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Barack Obama wins the Nobel Peace Prize?

Fri, 10/09/2009 - 04:34 — Joel

That's insane. I know the Nobel committee spent the last few years awarding the prize to anybody they thought would piss off George W. Bush -- and I can't blame them for the sentiment -- but c'mon. The man hasn't been president for a year yet. I prefer his greater willingness to use diplomacy in foreign relations, but he doesn't really have a "win" yet. The Nobel committee is sending a message without regard to accomplishment, which cheapens the award. If I were the president, I'd be embarrassed.

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Fri, 10/09/2009 - 05:28 — David

Turn it down

Mickey Kaus has the best idea--Obama should turn it down.

Fri, 10/09/2009 - 05:37 — David

Great headline

As usual, Fark has the best headline: "Barack Obama linked to terrorist Yasser Arafat."

Fri, 10/09/2009 - 05:56 — ronaldalau

wait a minute.

Didn't the nominations take place about 1 or 2 weeks into his presidency?

Fri, 10/09/2009 - 07:06 — Dr. Zaius

My God!

I read yesterday a tiny item that mentioned that it was "not known" if Obama was nominated. I guffawed. I figured that was just some Obama-worshipping reporter engaging in some wishful-thinking — or even a reporter just having a laugh.

This is the most absurd thing I've ever seen. I know "the world" loves Obama, but maybe giving us the Olympics was the better way to go. At least it wouldn't have made an even bigger joke out of the Nobel Prize.

Fri, 10/09/2009 - 08:27 — Khabalox

Time b/w achievement and award

I know that the awards for the Sciences traditionally come decades after the accomplishment. This years Physics prized were for inventions done in the 60's. Does anyone know what the typical lag between accomplishment and award is for the other awards, such as Literature or Peace?

And yes, I realize the lag time in this case is negative. I think the Nobel committee is trying to hold his feet to the fire and get him to follow through on his promises.

Fri, 10/09/2009 - 09:19 — Ben

Re: Peace Prize time

Answer: It depends. I think this comment from Francis Sejersted, the chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee in the 1990s, puts today's news in the proper perspective:

"The prize ... is not only for past achievement. ... The committee also takes the possible positive effects of its choices into account [because] ... Nobel wanted the prize to have political effects. Awarding a peace prize is, to put it bluntly, a political act."

The quote appears in a fascinating primer on the Nobel Peace Prize at Foreign Policy (with a tip of the hat to this post at Taylor Marsh's blog).

I'd put it somewhat differently: Awarding a peace prize is, to put it bluntly, merely a political act. Look at the winners going back to, say, 1912 when Elihu Root won it. It's almost all lollipops and roses.

Fri, 10/09/2009 - 08:41 — Jason (not verified)

Grin and bear it

As someone who has won awards I felt I didn't actually deserve*, I think Obama said the right things in his speech today - spread the "honor" around and use it as a jumping-off point for actually doing things in the future.

*One year my web site won a "best web site" award. We hated it. We were completely redesigning it. It was not very good. And yet: trophy! So... thank you very much, this will make us work harder... blah blah blah.

Fri, 10/09/2009 - 09:26 — ronaldalau

All you need to know...

...about Liberalism and Liberals is contained in this issue.

Liberals applaud other Liberals for TALKING, not DOING. Results are irrelevant. Only the words and intent matter.

Obama was in office 12 days when he was nominated. 12 DAYS. He hadn't even started his America is Sorry Tour.

Fri, 10/09/2009 - 10:58 — Wry Mouth

Obama wins the NPP: Maybe the Reason is... ?

No; wait a minute.

It's not even because he's the first Black person to be nominated.

Consider me stumped! ;o/

Fri, 10/09/2009 - 11:03 — Wry Mouth

NPP insane? I'LL TELL *YOU* WHEN I'VE HAD ENOUGH INSANE

I jumped off the NPP fandom-wagon (and I used to be a fan, you know, liked the whole world award thing, tra-la tra-la) when they awarded one to that bastige Yassir.

If there were a Nobel Irony Award, the NPP would have won it several times over since then in landslide-style tallies. Pity the Nobel Prize industry hasn't thought of instituting an Irony Award yet. THink of the possibilities!

;o/

Fri, 10/09/2009 - 11:26 — Deregulator

Joel is partly right

The Nobel committee loathes W, and figured the best way to stick it to him was to give his successor the Nobel. I think there's also an issue of implied reciprocity here. The committee hopes to nudge the administration on a number of issues it considers essential: global warming, pacifism, softness toward despotism, etc. Now they've issued a direct challenge. How could Obama oppose the Nobelists after he's been recognized?

Of course, my initial thought was: Maybe he'll finally meet the Dalai Lama.

Fri, 10/09/2009 - 11:41 — Joel

Re: "Joel is partly right"

Those are the sweetest words you've ever written, Rick.

I'll go you one better and suggest that you're partly right that the committee is aiming to nudge Obama in certain political directions. I'd take issue with one of your suggested aims, though: "Softness toward despotism."

Let's look over the last 15 years of peace laureates and their credentials for a few counter-examples, shall we?

# 2008 - Martti Ahtisaari: In part for his role in helping Kosovo free itself, relatively peacefully, from Serbia's dominion.
# 2003 - Shirin Ebadi: For her role in promoting democracy and women's rights in Iran.
# 2000 - Kim Dae-jung: For his successful struggle for democracy against the American-backed military government of South Korea.
# 1996 - Carlos Filipe Ximenes Belo, José Ramos-Horta: For their work on behalf of the rights of self-determination for the people of East Timor.

And so on and so forth. That's the recent history; peace prizes also went to Lech Walesa and Andrei Sakharov back in the day, although they went to Henry Kissinger about the same time, so there's no accounting for taste.

Fri, 10/09/2009 - 12:06 — Ben

Kissinger's 'peace'

This passage from Angelo Codevilla's chapter on diplomacy in Advice to War Presidents is on point:

Kissinger touted the Paris Peace Accords of 1973 as the end of the Vietnam War and accepted a share in that year's Nobel Peace Prize for having negotiated it. But the other recipient, North Vietnam's Le Duc Tho, honorably refused the prize, knowing as well as Kissinger did that peace had not been the negotiation's result, but rather that the United States had agreed not to interfere in the North's military consummation of victory. The negotiations had really been the translation to the Vietnamese of an argument among Americans about how fast or slow, how thinly or thickly disguised, the U.S. surrender would be.

I thought of Kissinger earlier, and ran across his name in this post referencing past "conservative" recipients of the Nobel Peace Prize. It's an eccentric list to buttress a predictable partisan argument. The bottom line is some of us have never had much use for Alfred Nobel and the blinkered idealism his peace prize represents. And it's not Barack Obama's fault that he's been chosen to be honored in the same company as Yasser Arafat, Kofi Annan and Jimmy Carter.

Fri, 10/09/2009 - 12:14 — Joel

"Blinkered idealism"

The bottom line is some of us have never had much use for Alfred Nobel and the blinkered idealism his peace prize represents.

I love it when you use the word "blinkered." I really do.

That said: I did have the thought this morning that the Nobel Peace Prize really is liberal -- for lack of a better term -- in its conception. Conservatives will win from time to time, but it's not really for them, is it? To some extent, then, criticism from the right is like Steven Spielberg complaining about not getting a Tony Award: Sure, it would look good on his mantle, but that's not actually what he does, is it?

That metaphor nearly became much more convoluted than it is.

Fri, 10/09/2009 - 12:35 — Ben

Re: "Blinkered idealism"

"That said: I did have the thought this morning that the Nobel Peace Prize really is liberal -- for lack of a better term -- in its conception."

Well, yes, I think that's about right. I don't care for his headline, but John Podhoretz made a good point at Commentary's Contentions blog: "The Nobel Committee chose him wisely because he does, in fact, represent the organization's highest ideals."

Fri, 10/09/2009 - 13:32 — Dr. Zaius

RE: Blinkered idealism

You're both right, of course. The Nobel Prize is a liberal award that (by and large) celebrates those who best represent both the values of Nobel and the United Nations: In other words talk and symbolism. There have been exceptions, of course.

But Ronald Reagan ended the Cold War with victory for liberty and the preservation of the West. No Peace Prize — even though he signed a couple disarmament deals. Pope John Paul II was an incredibly inspiring man who worked for peace and helped bring it about (again, by giving moral authority to the peaceful destruction of communist tyranny). No Peace Prize. I'm guessing that Lech Walesa noted and thanked the Pope when he accepted his award.

Yet Al Gore gets one ... for producing a movie and urging the world to turn "green" (something that is happening to make him rich and will make him richer). Jimmy Carter gets one when the committee makes it clear that the purpose was to kick Bush "in the leg" (though I believe they were aiming for between the legs). Etc.

Obama being tapped is only natural. I predict he may be the only multiple winner when he's all done.

Fri, 10/09/2009 - 13:19 — ronaldalau

over and under

This award is not going over well.

http://illinoisreview.typepad.com/illinoisreview/2009/10/president-wins-...

The irony is that the five-members of the committee have now given the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize to an individual American politician who only a few days ago refused to meet the 1989 Nobel Peace Prize winner, the Dalai Lama, because Chinese Communist dictators told him not to.