This Nobel is "Prized" No Longer

On Friday, October 9th, 2009, it was announced by the Nobel Committee that President Obama was the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize. This is quite an accomplishment for anyone to achieve, especially our President.

But something is amiss here. How could a President who has been in office for less than a year receive an award that is based on the actual work of an individual to bring peace to the world? Did I miss something? Did President Obama help diffuse racial problems in East Chicago? Did he solve the conflict-diamond problem in Africa? Did he personally propose and champion legislation as a Senator that removed the United States from all foreign wars? Is he the reincarnation of Mother Theresa?

There's a lot that we don't know about President Obama, but I seriously doubt that we missed his appearance in the movie, Superman IV: The Quest for Peace. Quite frankly, I think Superman or even Christopher Reeve deserves the Nobel Peace Prize before President Obama does.

What has President Obama done to promote peace in his relatively short time as our Nation's leader? He may have traveled across seas to talk to some heads of state and walked out of a United Nation's address by President Ahmadinejad (so did a lot of other world leaders), but that's normal business for the President (even Bush). So surely these cannot be the criteria for the Nobel Peace Prize!

President Obama is currently in two wars. Doesn't this seem to be a disqualifying characteristic for the Nobel Peace Prize. Granted they are inherited, but nonetheless, should you win a peace award when you are Commander in Chief of a nation at war?

When you look at Nobel Peace Prize Laurettes, one name that is missing and should be included is Mahatma Gandhi. He never won a Nobel Peace Prize and he starved himself for India's independence from Britain. That's a lot more work towards peace than just succeeding President Bush (which I assume is the reason Obama is receiving this award).

It has been publicized that the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to President Obama based on the "potential" he demonstrates to bring peace. I'm sorry, I didn't know that awards were made based on how good you "might" be. I guess that means competitive sports are finished. We can just award a trophy/championship to the team that starts their respective season ranked above all other teams.

And what's more damning is that the Nobel Committee's deadline for Peace Prize candidates is February 1st. President Obama would have been in office for less than two weeks. That's hardly enough time for Obama to clean the Oval Office and settle in. This further justifies my believe he received the award simply because he succeeded Bush.

The point is, currently we don't know what type of legacy President Obama will leave behind, but I do know that there hasn't been enough done to justify him receiving this award. I don't care if he began making friendly with Muslims; he has just started his work and nothing has come of it. In my opinion, this is just proof that the Nobel Committee either has a severe Liberal bias or a severe Obama bias. Quite frankly it tarnishes the Nobel Peace Prize to award it based on the "potential" someone has to do good rather than the actual good he or she has performed.

I'm not saying that President Obama doesn't have the potential to win the award, I sincerely hope he is capable of establishing peace in the Middle-East. But until that work is done, awarding this prize to President Obama is disrespectful to the work of the men and women who received the award in years past.