The big story this morning is, of course, Obama’s ridiculous Nobel Peace prize win. As far as I can tell, even his supporters aren’t happy about this. Whether or not you think his ideas will work (or are even peaceful – which is an argument I don’t even think you can make) he simply hasn’t had enough time to do anything yet, to warrant a prize.
I didn’t agree with Al Gore’s win either, but at least the man noticeably accomplished things.
At Samizdata blog, they called it the community organizer’s Nobel because, lets face it, unless you count running for president and NOT getting bills passed through congress and trying to get more troops into Afghanistan (which would disqualify him, in my opinion) he hasn’t done anything else except community organization – whatever that means.
From JohnK in the comments section there:
all the Big O has done is fail to win the Olympics. Who would have thought that the International Olympic Committee, of all people, would have more moral integrity than the Nobel Prize Committee? We live in strange times.
Indeed we do. The Nobel Prize has become so political and, if Nassim Taleb is correct, even the science prizes are little more than socio-political exercises and we should stop giving credence to them. People who win them just get famous through luck, and take credit through skill. I think Obama is a perfect example of that.