I am going to be driving most of the day, and I wanted to have something worth reading (assuming anything here is worth reading, about which reasonable minds disagree) for you while I am prevented by life’s adventures from posting new commentary. I thought it might be instructive to re-post this, which was published at a time that few knew of Ethics Alarms’ existence. In light of all that has happened since, all we have learned, and all that I have written about the leadership of President Obama, it provides useful, and perhaps wistful perspective. I re-read it just now, wondering if I would write the same today, even knowing what I know now.
And I would.
There are several ethical issues raised by the stunning announcement that President Barack Obama had won the Nobel Peace Prize. More, perhaps, were raised by the reactions to it.
Imagine, if you will, that you are a cast member in a Hollywood movie of dubious quality. Personally, you think the director is in over his head and that the movie is an empty, pompous failure. To your amazement, however, critics like the film. It is a surprise winner at an international film festival, and the director wins the “Master Film-maker” prize. Are you outraged, or pleasantly surprised? Do you congratulate the director for the honor, or do you tell him he is an undeserving fraud? Do you feel pride for your own connection to the award—you were in the cast, after all—or do you feel resentment? I would think the answers to all these questions are obvious. The civil, fair…
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Ethics Alarms 
Frankly, I’m not sure why he received the Peace Prize. It may, and I hope it was, because he, a black man, had just won the Presidency of a nation who, just 150 years ago, enslaved black people and in more recent times, have treated black people abysmally. If that is the case, however, I would think the American electorate should have gotten the prize, and not Obama.
Nope. From http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/10/world/10nobel.html?_r=0 “But the committee, based in Norway, stressed that it made its decision based on Mr. Obama’s actual efforts toward nuclear disarmament as well as American engagement with the world relying more on diplomacy and dialogue. ” It is difficult to see it as meaningful, since none of his diplomatic efforts had any time to bear fruit by the time he got it. I agree with those who think it was mostly awarded because he was less aggressive than Bush.
As for Jack’s initial post, I’ll just note that sufficient time has passed that I don’t feel the least bit bad about criticizing the choice to award it to him, and it’s fair game to point out that the prize committees hopes for his presidency have not borne out.
Sadly, what “actual efforts”?
Being a Leftist following immediately the unfairly manufactured portrayal of Bush being a super-villain.
So the “actual efforts” were also manufactured, right? Boy, these are just manufacturing fools.
Consider the idiotic or despicable characters that have won the Nobel Peace Prize in the last few decades. Arafat, Tutu, Gore… other con men and psychos. You just have to assume that the Nobel committee operates either in an ethical vacuum or are completely divorced from reality. The two are often difficult to differentiate.