Pirate's Cove

Not to steal any thunder from the earlier posts by John and Jay (this is being cross-posted to my site, Stop The ACLU, and Right Wing News), but, I just couldn’t let this article go to waste

That’s the screenshot from the front page of the UK Times Online

Barack Obama today sensationally won the Nobel Peace Prize after just nine months in office for returning America to a multilateralist foreign policy after eight years of going it alone under George W Bush.

Yeah, because there were absolutely no other countries involved in Iraq and Afghanistan. We never heard Lefties cackle when a country pulled their troops out of either country. No other countries were involved in rendition and stuff.

The Norwegian Nobel Committee said it was honouring the 48-year-old US President for “his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples”.

The five jurors, elected by the Norwegian parliament, also said in their citation that they had attached “special importance to Obama’s vision of and work for a world without nuclear weapons”.

The choice of Mr Obama came as a complete surprise – the frontrunners for the last Nobel prize of the year included the Chinese dissident Hu Jia and the Colombian senator Piedad Cordoba. It also prompted widespread controversy.

Are you ready for the punchline?

Mr Obama was elected America’s first black president last December and assumed office on January 20 – which means that he had been in office less than two weeks by the time nominations closed on February 1.

So, in those first two weeks he gave a bunch of interviews to magazines, gave some speeches, couldn’t figure out the type of dog to get, made a few more appearances on TV entertainment shows, and signed legislation to close Guantanamo Bay detention facility, which the Democrat Congress refuses to supply the money needed to close it, and Obama still has no plan, 8 months later, to actually close.

The decision was welcomed by other Nobel peace laureates, including Mikhail Gorbachev, Muhammad Yunnus and Archbishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa. Mohamed ElBaradei, who heads the UN’s nuclear watchdog and won the prize in 2005, said: “I cannot think of anyone today more deserving of this honour. In less than a year in office, he has transformed the way we look at ourselves and the world we live in and rekindled hope for a world at peace with itself.”

How about the Iranian dissidents? How about, specifically, Mohammad-Reza Ali Zamani, who is scheduled to be hanged for participating in the Iranian protests?

If he has rekindled hope, then why is Iran still working to achieve nuclear weapons? Why is Darfur still a mess (yes, I did criticize George Bush for giving speeches about it and doing nothing)? Why is North Korea still rattling their rusty saber? If the world is so full of hopenchange, why did the Olympic Committee slap Obama in the face with a cold, dead fish?

I’d mention the opinion pieceyou see in the screenshot, but, really, the Nobel Peace prize is already a joke, having become one the minute Yassar Arrafat was anointed as a recipient. And, while Carter may be a complete anti-Semite and a virulent America hater, at least he worked hard to create peace between Israel and Egypt, which still kinda holds up today. Obama? Maybe one day he will deserve the prize. Right now, “It was clearly seen by the Norwegian Nobel committee as a way of expressing European gratitude for an end to the Bush Administration.” In other words “f**c Bush.”

And, oh, the polls are not going well

I guess people from around the world have higher standards for actually having accomplishments than the Nobel Prize Committee.

PS: I do not want this to seem unseemly harsh towards Obama. It wasn’t his fault that the Nobel committee did this.

Double PS: What is the Nobel Peace Prize about, as set forth in his will?

According to Nobel’s will, the Peace Prize is to go to whoever “shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses”.

Maybe one day Obama will meet those standards. He sure didn’t meet them on February 1st, and, considering how he has treated our allies…….

• Cassandra: Obama’s actual achievements over the last year could aptly be summed up as a lot of lofty talk about visions followed by backing down on those visions and walking away with nothing.
• Nice Deb: At this point, if someone I liked  won the Nobel Peace Prize, I would be so surprised, I would actually be rethinking my admiration for him.
• Jules Crittenden: It also makes up for the gross slight to Neville Chamberlain in 1938.
• This ain’t Hell…..: I’ll bet Bill Clinton is angier than then anyone else on the planet about this though. Clinton actually campaigned for the medal.
• The Mahablog: BTW, here’s some background on President Obama’s non-meeting with another Nobel Prize Winner, His Holiness the Dalai Lama.
• This Blog Is Full Of Crap: The guy refused to talk to the Dalai Lama to appease human-rights violator China over Tibet. What kind of peacemaker is that?
• American Princess: Oh, well. At least he’s got something for the White House refrigerator now.

And you MUST see Christmas Ghost’s latest Lil’ O’Bama cartoon.

Triple PS (I feel Like Glenn Greenwald)

College Politico has the bumper stickers, to use with your Twitter has tag #nobelol. (Via Michelle M)