President Obama is doing a good job. Although he wasn't my choice- I wanted to see a race between Giuliani and Clinton- I have to admit he's performed well so far; he hit the ground running, and has had a good 8 1/2 months. Yes, I oppose some of his programs, but they are the programs he ran on, and he won; he has every right to push them. But that doesn't explain today's surprise announcement: President Obama has won the Nobel Peace Prize.
Heavens to Hecate. The Nobel Peace Prize? I don't understand. Guantanamo is still in business. We're still at war in Iraq and Afghanistan. Iran and North Korea are still pursuing nuclear weapons. He hasn't re-submitted Kyoto to Congress, or negotiated a replacement. He hasn't negotiated a peace treaty to settle anyone else's war. He hasn't negotiated a new Middle East accord. He didn't improve our national image enough to even get Chicago to the second round of voting for the Olympics. His only peace accomplishment has been to get a hotheaded college professor to sit down with a hotheaded cop to share a beer. That must have been some beer.
I realize I'm out of step with the world today. Everyone else is singing songs of praise to Obama. Celebrities are pledging to be a good servant to him. And the Nobel committee has such faith that they have awarded him a prize for what he will do. It's ridiculous of me to ask why; nothing I say will stop the chorus. If every tongue were stilled, the songs would still continue- the rocks and stones themselves would start to sing. Obama, Hey Bama, Bama Bama Obama, Hey Bama, Obama...
UPDATE: Turns out it wasn't the beer after all. The Nobel nominations have to be in by February- President Obama had been in office only 12 days.
8 comments:
Increasing expectations for Obama doesn't do him much of a favor. The Nobel committee didn't help him much here.
(((That must have been some beer )))
I totally made that joke on Facebook hours before I saw this post. But you phrase it better.
Obama wouldn't have been my choice, but I don't see him as any worse than some of the other folks who have won.
CC
Yeah, he's doing a good job so far. But Nobel Prize good? A more cynical man than I might suspect they're trying to meddle in our politics.
(((A more cynical man than I might suspect they're trying to meddle in our politics.)))
That cynicism might be tempered by the notion that if that were the goal, the logical time to award the prize would have been three years from now, when it would come less than a month before Obama's re-election or lack thereof.
CC
Unless they cared more about the agenda than the man, in which case now, to give him more clout to push things through congress, would be better than later.
I think you have to take the Nobel Committee at face value. They agree with Obama's message however they may be hearing it (and people hear a lot of different things from Obama) and they want to help the guy.
Problem is they haven't helped him a whole lot except inflate the already stratospheric expectations for the guy to the point even his supporters think it's a bit too much.. Read Ruth Marcus, Richard Cohen, and some others today.
Obama is going to have to make decisions sooner or later and all he has are bad choices. This inflating of him is just going to make the fall that much harder.
When you run as a rock-star you really need to watch a few episodes of E Hollywood Story and you'll learn all the stars have very predictable tractories with the end being a might crash.
Our problem is Obama's crash could well be a very big crash for the world.
I've told my Peace Making group friends --always met with incredulity-- that waiting for the war of last resort means waiting for a brutal war of retribution and anniliation and a Democratic Liberal very capable of delivering just that sort of war.
Obama becomes precieved as week and feekless leader, he is going to lash out at some point in response to an American defeat and it is going to be a very painful thing for someone. We have amatures know in the WH. The world sees it. It is a dangerous moment in history. Iran mocks us as being incapable of doing anything to stop them.
Reckless dictators underestimating the United States is very bad. Americans very slow to rise in anger but was unleashed we can be very unforging.
Even so, giving it in two or three years to ensure more time with the agenda would have been a better move.
Shocking. After all these years of US administrations NOT meddling in the politics of other nations, to imagine that someone might want to meddle in ours...
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