Yes, President Barack Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize. But why didn’t he win the Nobel Prize for Medicine, seeing as how he is trying to reform American health care? And the Nobel Prize for Economics, since he is trying to fix the collapse of the economy. And the Nobel Prize for Literature for his book and speeches. And the Nobel Prize for Physics for trying to make something out of nothing. And the Nobel Prize for Chemistry for his chemistry with foreign leaders. I’m personally offended that our president is not getting the international respect that he deserves.
Christianity, Culture, Vocation
Lucas Cranach, self portrait c.1530.
-
Site Statistics
{ 25 comments… read them below or add one }
Gene, until the Nobel committees award Barry all the other Nobel prizes he equally deserves (or until he is awarded the Nobel Peace Prize next year), your personally being offended will have to be ameliorated with the other reportedly headlined awards and honors bestowed on the 0bama:
0bama wins the Cy Young Award
0bama named Motor Trend’s Car of the Year!
Mount Rushmore renamed Mount 0bama
Barack 0bama wins the National Spelling Bee!
0bama Receives Academy Award
0bama declared MVP Super Bowl 41!
0bama named the NEW James Bond! Will become agent Double-O-Bama!!!
0bama wins “Dancing with the Stars”
0bama is “Smarter than a Fifth Grader”
0bama awarded Medal of Honor.
0bama wins Tour de France.
0bama to be the new Jack Bauer on “24”
This month to be renamed Baraktober
White Smoke over Vatican, Cardinals Elect 0bama as Pope!
0bama receives honors for finding Waldo
0bama destroys Deathstar; saves Endor
0bama catches Roadrunner.
0bama prevents tooth decay in children
0bama’s image clearly visible on Shroud of Turin
0bama named “Father of Our Country,” Washington stripped of title
Since my ideal politician is one that does nothing, I am glad to see the Nobel Committee coming around to my point of view.
The only potential problem is that the President will misinterpret his award and be inspired to do something, or least not enough nothing.
Given that Obama has won the Peace Prize for essentially screwing things up–say by telling allies to go you know where while sucking up to our enemies in Poland, Czech Republic, Honduras, etc..–we really ought to award him only prizes where we has, or intends, to really make things go south.
So he should be a shoo-in for economics and medicine.
I’ve been saying he ought to get the Nobel Prize for Physics, on account of his tremendous personal magnetism.
The truth about Obama so far is that he has a soft ear for his liberal base in the country and world. He has vacillated with North Korea, Iran, and Honduras and appears to be shaky on his earlier statements that Afghanistan is a war of necessity.
Vacillating leaders usually end up causing not preventing wars, the most striking example being Chamberlain in the Thirties. Should Obama continue to listen to the siren songs of the Nobel committee pacifists and isolationists, we will probably end up with a really nasty war.
add to #1 great list:
Obama wins this season’s Survivor.
Carl stole a bit of my “thunder”. Since Obama played basketball with some of the Tarheels during his campaign, I think he’ll be a shoe in for the Basketball Hall of Fame, both at the collegiate and professional levels. He threw out the first pitch at the All-Star game this year, so you know he’ll get into the Baseball Hall of Fame. Football is one sport I’m not sure if I’ve seen him reported as playing, but he’s just gotta bet into Canton and the NFL Hall of Fame. I wonder who will do his induction introduction?
My favorite pithy comment on his award was, “What’s next, the Heisman?” The masses who so ardently support this president must surely understand collegiate football a good deal better than international peacemaking. They know the criteria for awarding the Heisman, they know the players who have earned their eligibility, and if the president were to somehow achieve first place in the Heisman voting, they would expect him to have the decency to decline the trophy. They would be absolutely outraged if he accepted it. Even though the president has done as little to earn the Nobel Prize as he has done to earn the Heisman Trophy, apparently he believes he can accept the medal without any of the negative ramifications that would most certainly attend his acceptance of the trophy. Personal decency demands that he decline this award, but he thinks he can safely accept. Is he right about that? I’m not sure. In the long run I think the medal will be a great deal heavier on his neck than it would be on the shoulders of one who had actually accomplished something in making peace.
You know, I almost think it’s worth it for him to get the prize just to watch conservatives have conniption fits.
Because I pretty much don’t believe this has anything to do with a sincere respect for the Nobel Peace Prize and everything it stands for. Sorry. As if you’re all Nobel experts, and really, this is all too much, and now, now the prize has become meaningless to you.
No, sorry, this is just another way to carp about Obama. You carp if he doesn’t win something (having made the Olympics thing all about him, even while complaining that he did the same thing), and you carp if he does. Waah. There is no headline that can’t be made to serve your purpose of complaining about Obama, and it’s proven time and again. And what does that prove? That you largely have it out for Obama. Which, frankly, isn’t nearly as newsworthy as the stories you’re commenting on.
Did he “deserve” it? I don’t care. Who else cares? When was the last time anybody truly respected the Nobel Peace Prize and its winners? I’ve thought it was a joke at least since Kissinger won it, and that was before I was born. Believing that the Nobel Peace Prize is actually indicative of some actual quantifiable merit is just as naive as believing that the Olympics only go to the city that most deserves it, or that the person who wins an election is actually the most capable person for that office. Please.
Actually Todd, the conservatives are rather more amused and baffled by St, Obama winning this prize than having conniption fits. You’re the one who is taking a conniption fit.
Liz Cheney yesterday came up with the most salient idea on who should have won the Nobel Peace Prize.
I think what he ought to do, frankly, is send the mother of a fallen American soldier to accept the prize on behalf of the US military. Frankly, to send the message to remind the Nobel committee that each one of them sleeps soundly at night because the US armed forces, because the US military is the greatest peacekeeping force in the world today.
Sure, Peter (@11), it is as you say. There’s just no end to the chuckles apparent in the comments on the several threads on this topic. You can cut the bonhomie with a knife.
“You’re the one who is taking a conniption fit.” Ah, the old “Whilst my substance is that of rubber, I think you’ll find that yours is that of a kind of mucelage, whereby any derogatory comments you would aim at me are, paradoxically, rebounded off my corpus, reversing their trajectory and, subsequently, adhering to you” retort. Clever.
I bet Obama was picked because he’s Commander in Chief of the U.S. armed forces, actually, now that Cheney mentions it.
Also, how many troops do we have in Norway, anyhow?
Not too many American troops in Norway of late. We took care of that European nation’s problem, among others, during which Norway of necessity surrendered and overall in which about 417,000 America warriors were killed.
We, also, protected Norway from the mercies of the Soviet Union during the Cold War, which we won by a combination of military power and hard diplomacy, including the key Kissinger gambit of shredding the Soviet balance of power by our alliance with China. Unlike the feckless soft-power advocate, Obama, Kissinger was a man of substantial accomplishment who deserved his Nobel Prize.
Pardon me. In the above first para., the reference is to WW II.
It’s Obama’s fault.
Whatever it is, whatever the issues…
It’s Obama’s fault.
To be serious, tODD does have a point that (Le Duc Tho, Arafat, Kellogg-Briand authors) the peace prize never has been about peace. However, it does carry the prestige of the Nobel name, so whether we like it or not, a message is being sent. Probably that Sven, Ole, and Lena had a little too much aquavit before making their selection.
And if you look at the actual criteria, it’s also true that real peacemakers–like Reagan and the Marines–don’t have a chance. Nobel simply wanted peace congresses and disarmament, policies that gave us the second world war and greatly prolonged the Cold War.
Peter, you noted (@13) that there are “Not too many American troops in Norway of late.” Okay, so when you approvingly quoted (@11) Cheney saying that “each [member of the Nobel Peace Prize committee] sleeps soundly at night because [of] the US armed forces”, you just meant, well, what? That Norwegians are eternally indebted to the United States military because of what we did that one time?
Which would mean, of course, that all Americans sleep soundly at night because of the French military, as in the American Revolutionary War, so perhaps, using the transitive property, Mrs. Cheney actually meant to praise the French military and suggest that they get the Nobel Peace Prize?
And Bob (@15), until Obama has accomplished more, I think we should all continue to blame everything on Clinton, as we did during the Bush administration.
What I meant is that America since becoming seriously active in world affairs during WW I, has essentially protected Europe during WW II, the Cold War, the wars in Bosnia and Kosovo, and recently the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and in general against the fanatic Islamic terrorists.
France at one point aided America during the Revolutionary but has since then become a cipher in world affairs, other than to have surrendered precipitously to the Germans in WW II.
You and your spineless, whiny liberal friends may denigrate American power in the world, though that will change soon enough when the next serious terrorists attack visits some American City or other interest.
The reality is, Obama didn’t award himself the Peace Prize. I TOTALLY disagree with the award but the conferring of it is not his fault: it is the prerogative of a group of five politicians who have previously suggested that they award to whom they will and especially NOT George W. Bush.
So, the Nobel Peace Prize is just another Ole and Lena joke? Uff da!
Huh. I think that tODD is on the right track.
To be perfectly honest, I am tired of anti-Obamites getting their early-morning Drudge Report fix and then, as tODD so aptly put it, “carp” about how Obama lost the Olympics for us, or got himself the Nobel Prize, or has been on a ridiculous amount of magazine covers lately!!!
How sad! Republicans complained incessantly about how the anti-Bush movement seemed to make up excuses to criticize our previous president, and yet these anti-Obama fellows seem to think their petty grievances are perfectly legitimate. Please! It’s just as childish, silly, and sad even if it is on the other side of the aisle.
Plus, I’m tired of the taglines that people find so clever: “Obamunism, Nobama” , etc. And I’m just as weary of that as I was all the “I’m tired of the Bushit” bumper stickers.
tODD, you are right that the right leaning people spend an incredible amount of time carping on everything that Obama does, or in this case, happens to Obama.
But what you miss, or actively ignore (and you are unfortunately not alone in this), is that there is good reason to be screaming from the rooftops that our president is not to be trusted.
I know that you will immediately dismiss that statement as hyperbole, but seriously consider the people that Obama has appointed to positions of power. It is not that they are a questionable group – they are in fact a group of people who have a desire to destroy the moral, spiritual, economic, legal, political, and social systems systems of our country. They are a group who couldn’t care less about the constitution (and lest you also view it as simply a nice piece of history, be reminded that it is what governs us and keeps us from demagogues, tyrants, and anarchy), approves of every vice imaginable (I can now safely say that with the appointment of Kevin Jennings), wants to put an end to capitalism (which, although not chosen by God, is the only effective means for fallen and diverse humans to live in social, economic, and laborious harmony), and approves of the slaughter of children created by God for the sake of convenience.
There are two of Obama’s many statements that I think are worth noting. One is the desire to levy excess taxes on all those making over $250K. I cannot imagine a simpler way to urge people to poverty and mediocrity instead of industry, success, and diligence. The other is that he wouldn’t want his daughter “punished” with a child. I cannot imagine a lower view of the value of human life.
I hope (and pray every Sunday morning) that Obama’s heart will be changed. First, in terms of valuing human life. Then, in terms of caring about the diligence and freedom that make this country possible.
I allow myself to hope, however, and this reveals my cynicism, that he will never do anything that he says. He has been, thus far, an inefficient president, which I guess makes him normal.
In all your criticism of the right, which I mostly agree with, don’t allow yourself to be deluded into believing that this president cares about the welfare of America. His actions reveal two loves: power and the furthering of his political and social agenda.
Todd #10 has a point.
The nobel prize is a joke; Not an outrage, not even a sham–It is a joke. The only outrage is pity for the association of the truly brilliant and contributing honorees with the nepotistic marquee honorees.
He also has a point about “carping” on Pres. Obama. It may be fun. It may be entertaining, but the issue is not whether he deserved this award, or gaffed the olympics, or fill in the blank with the chatter of the day. Pursuing this course will merely reduce debate to mindless complaining and thoughtless animosity.
The real issue–take sides as you please–is that the current president is seeking to fundamentally and irrevocably change this nation. The principles that he espouses are incompatible with the founding principles–read his book(s), for crying out loud.
That is not a personal attack. He is free to think as he pleases and pursue the policies that he thinks best. The current state of politics, however, put him in a position to enact his beliefs from opinion into law–law that will effect every citizen and their children.
That is worth debate, and it is certainly worth opposition.
Oh, and in response to Dr. Veith’s question: why didn’t he win all the other prizes?
(Pause to insert tongue in cheek)
Racism!
You forgot one more prestigious award:
SYTYCD, or America’s favorite dancer!
At least, he can do Irish Dancing.
http://www.metacafe.com/watch/2162693/theres_no_one_as_irish_as_barack_obama/
(couldn’t resist, sorry…)