Barack Obama to win Nobel Peace Prize

[Valynth]

Wait, the Democrats are holding pretty much every section of the government....  Remind me again, what exactly is keeping him from following through?

Well, I suppose he could declare that tomorrow is the last day for troops in Iraq and fly all 124,000 troops home immediately.

Does that sound smart to you?

Isn't the declaration of an extraction date and obeying said date one of the many promises he made to get into office?

[superluser]

Isn't the declaration of an extraction date and obeying said date one of the many promises he made to get into office?

Yes.  His deadline is the end of 2011.

[Valynth]

Isn't the declaration of an extraction date and obeying said date one of the many promises he made to get into office?

Yes.  His deadline is the end of 2011.

not exactly what he promised.

[superluser]

not exactly what he promised.

I'm sorry.  I must have misinterpreted ``After this redeployment, we will keep a residual force to perform specific missions in Iraq.'' to mean that a residual force would remain in Iraq after that redeployment.  Combat troops will be removed by August 2010.

[Valynth]

not exactly what he promised.

I'm sorry.  I must have misinterpreted ``After this redeployment, we will keep a residual force to perform specific missions in Iraq.'' to mean that a residual force would remain in Iraq after that redeployment.  Combat troops will be removed by August 2010.

From what I'm reading it WAS going to be 2010 before he got elected and now he and his staff are saying 2011.

Bit early to tell, but he may be pulling pages from Bush's strategy book....

[superluser]

From what I'm reading it WAS going to be 2010 before he got elected and now he and his staff are saying 2011.

Bit early to tell, but he may be pulling pages from Bush's strategy book....

As of Sept. 30, The BBC reports that the US is on track to have all troops out by August 2010 and is in fact accelerating the withdrawal.

Unless you have a more recent report...

[Valynth]

hmmm, from what I can gather (and bear in mind the sources are questionable):

The Iraqi PM has offered to allow troops until late 2011, hence the confusion about the date.

Obama, on the other hand wants to get out by 2010.

Given Iraq's position I can't blame them for wanting us to stay.

[rabid_fox]

I remember when John Hume won one.

[Alondro]

Nominations for the Peace Prize closed less than two weeks after Obama took office, which means he was likely considered for nomination even before taking office.

This whole thing makes less sense the more I learn about it. 

[superluser]

Nominations for the Peace Prize closed less than two weeks after Obama took office, which means he was likely considered for nomination even before taking office.

I guarantee that every head of state (or at least most heads of state) is similarly nominated every year, ``just in case.''

[Sunblink]

Nominations for the Peace Prize closed less than two weeks after Obama took office, which means he was likely considered for nomination even before taking office.

This whole thing makes less sense the more I learn about it. 

I need to check someplace just to make sure, but if this is true then color me confused.

(I mean, this is coming from someone who has a relatively positive opinion of Obama and I still am perplexed.)

[Corgatha Taldorthar]

Nominations for the Peace Prize closed less than two weeks after Obama took office, which means he was likely considered for nomination even before taking office.

This whole thing makes less sense the more I learn about it.  

I need to check someplace just to make sure, but if this is true then color me confused.

(I mean, this is coming from someone who has a relatively positive opinion of Obama and I still am perplexed.)

Call me a cynic, but the pursuit of something like "peace" isn't as objective as an advance in chemistry, or physics. In all honesty, Obama probably won the peace nomination because of his staggering popularity in Europe, not because of any steps taken to promote world peace.

[Turnsky]

up in arms about all this?


bear in mind who Alfred Nobel WAS.. he invented TNT, after all.

in the vain hopes of making a weapon so horrible, that nobody wanted to go to war because of it.

then Oppenheimer and the Manhattan project came along, quite literally blowing that away.

a little prize like the nobel is just a wad of metal and a title, and the subject of trivia conversation down the road... those who truly earn it, the repecussions of their actions will be felt for decades to come. Ghandi, Mandela, just to name a couple.

[ShadesFox]

I don't know, the Nobels in the hard sciences tend to go to people who do make a real difference.  That wad of metal and title also comes with a check and usually offers for a fellowship position.  Fellowship positions are usually come with job descriptions such as, "What ever you are doing, just keep on doing it, will cut you a check every so often".

But again, this is in the hard sciences, where your reputation is your life and death and your achievements are all written down and published and prizes are handed out by a jury of respected peers in the field.  The peace prize tends to be handed out by a hand full of Norwegian parliamentarians, apparently with no resources to judge accomplishments outside of cable television.

[Omega]

"It's gonna be hard to be a president of war with a prize of peace."
-Corner West

link

It's a political prize, granted, but it might be placed into the right place for once. It might prevent some conflicts if Obama has some merit under his belt when he tries to negotiate with something-something.

I just hope that this does not diminish the value of the Nobel peace prize, since my old president, Martti Ahtisaari, won it last year. He really earned it too. Many years of almost constant work in Europe, Asia and Middle-East with good results in nearly hopeless situations. Compared to him, Obama is still a greenhorn. To compare his efforts to Ahtisaari's is almost insulting.

almost...

[Alondro]

Maybe this Peace Prize was simply a ploy to twist Obama's arm to sign that environmental UN treaty in Coopenhagen; the one that includes language essentially setting up a world governmental (it has the phrase 'government' in several paragraphs where it talks about the body to be created to oversee all the stipulations in the treaty) authority with incredible power over any nation that signs it, and to make the West accountable for what they call 'climate debt'... which as always the US will end up paying the lion's share.

The treaty will, in effect, eliminate national sovereignty for any nation that ratifies it, by making many of their laws and agencies subject directly to UN regulations.

It would make the US answerable to the UN.  This treaty could trump our laws and Constitution (if 2/3 of the Senate approves it and/or they simply ignore the Constitution, as they are increasingly apt to do).

I wondered from the start if the medal was just another trap, a carrot to lead the already willing Obama into full-fledged socialism.  Now I'm sure.  He won't dare refuse to sign so soon after receiving the medal, not even with massive public objection.