Obama Should Decline the Peace Prize

The Nobel peace committee is a long-standing politicized joke. Witness the award to Jimmy Carter, whose sucking up to dictators while in office and complete bungling of the Iran hostage crisis likely set the entire tone for the relationship between the U.S. and tinpots and terrorist groups for the next 30 years.

Building houses for the poor and writing volumes of poetry does not make up for that.

But let’s be real. Carter was awarded for his anti-Semitism and his crusade to blame Israel for all of the world’s problem. That wins major points with the international community. Another Nobel case in point–Yasser Arafat, one of the winners of the 1994 Nobel prize and the ultimate symbol that the Nobel committee is full of sick people.

Actually, the bigger surprise here is that they didn’t give the award to Ahmandinejad for his heroic stance against Israeli aggression — and in secret hopes that when he does get his hands on nukes he won’t lob any their way.

If I didn’t know any better, I’d say the committee is as obsessed with sticking it to “right-wing” American (in their eyes, anyone to the right of Dennis Kucinich) as the right-wing is obsessed with portraying all of Europe as a bunch of cheese-eating surrender monkeys who would all be speaking German or Russian now if it weren’t for us.

And while Obama has shown some interesting parallels with Carter–extremely high IQ, a penchant for stiffing longtime allies while offering concessions to self-declared enemies, and a God complex–the man has no record, no accomplishments. Unless you count letting Iran take five more baby steps toward a nuclear weapon or giving the cold shoulder to the Dalai Lama accomplishments. Even Saturday Night Live has figured that one out.

There’s a lot of talk about him “healing” anti-Americanism. Bullshit. Anti-Americanism has always been and always will be. If anyone honestly remembered the Clinton years, perhaps they’d remember that even in those Halcyon days, such was the case. Why, someone even bombed the World Trade Center! I don’t care anymore what some college kid in Germany thinks of America than I do what some redneck thinks of France (or Barack Obama).

There’s also talk about diplomacy — again, show me where any of this diplomacy has worked. It’s failed with Russia. It’s failed with Iran. It’s going to fail again with North Korea.

And perhaps someone should ask the women of Afghanistan how they feel about relying on diplomacy rather than American troops to actually get things accomplished in their country.

This line might read like a joke or a cheap shot, but it’s neither: U2’s Bono has done more for world peace than Barack Obama.

And Roman Polanski has done more to unite Americans of all parties and faiths.

Ultimately, the prize has become tainted, a sham. Even if it did still hold any power, Barack Obama–regardless of what you think of his politics–is nine months into a first term that has promised much and accomplished little.

If Obama has any sense of shame or humility — or decency — he will decline this prize.

He’s a politician, so the chances of that happening are slim to none. But he’s surprised me before.