Friday, October 09, 2009

The Nobel Prize Committee Jumps the Shark

In Surprise, Nobel Peace Prize to Obama for Diplomacy
For his first 10 days in office.

Even the MSM are stunned and skeptical. Me? I'm cynical.

What diplomatic efforts “so far”? He gave a speech in Cairo and … and … and … gave a few in Europe, too. That was the point of those questions from reporters; Obama has done little so far.

Barack Obama won the prize for not being George W. Bush. It's hard to have more contempt for this prize after this.

UPDATE: John Podhoretz gets it exactly right.
The Nobel Committee chose him wisely because he does, in fact, represent the organization’s highest ideals.

He is an American president queasy about the projection of American power. He is an American president who rejects the notion of American exceptionalism. He is an American president eagerly in pursuit of legitimacy to be granted him not by those who voted for him but by those who do not cast a vote and who chafe at American leadership. It is his devout wish that America become one of many nations, influencing the world indirectly or not influencing it at all, rather than “the indispensable nation,” as Madeleine Albright characterized it. He is the encapsulation, the representative, the wish fulfillment, the very embodiment, of the multilateralist impulse. He is, almost literally, a dream come true for the sorts of people who treasure and value the Nobel Peace Prize.