It’s not the accustomed stance of a writer or blogger. But this one does have me at something of a loss for words. I notice the condemnation of the Taliban, the edged snark of the superciliati. But I also see Ana Marie Cox’s first-off Twitter: “Apparently Nobel prizes now being awarded to anyone who is not George Bush.” And while less than generous, I think she’s on to the root of the matter. But perhaps not precisely in the way she thinks.
This is an odd award. You’d expect it to come later in Obama’s presidency and tied to some particular event or accomplishment. But the unmistakable message of the award is one of the consequences of a period in which the most powerful country in the world, the ‘hyper-power’ as the French have it, became the focus of destabilization and in real if limited ways lawlessness. A harsh judgment, yes. But a dark period. And Obama has begun, if fitfully and very imperfectly to many of his supporters, to steer the ship of state in a different direction. If that seems like a meager accomplishment to many of the usual Washington types it’s a profound reflection of their own enablement of the Bush era and how compromised they are by it, how much they perpetuated the belief that it was ‘normal history’ rather than dark aberration.
Olympia Snowe is feeling lonely as the sole Senate Republican vote in play on health care reform. That and the day’s other political news in the TPMDC Morning Roundup.
We’ve set up an open thread at TPMCafe to discuss Obama’s Nobel Peace Prize.
I don’t expect Republicans to be cheering for Obama. And notwithstanding my comments below I can totally understand their having their collective noses a little bent out of shape over a first year president of the opposite party winning a Nobel totally out of the blue. But I honestly would have predicted a short window of semi-graciousness at least in official statements. But check out Michael Steele’s official response from the RNC.
TPM Reader BJ nominated for TPM Email Excessive Literalism Award which was created to bring attention to on-going research in snark impairment …
Please correct your flatly incorrect statement that Hitler won the Nobel Peace Price, or any of the Nobel prizes for that matter. He was briefly nominated and that nomination swiftly removed. He later signed a law forbidding Germans from accepting the Nobel prizes when winners were regularly anti-Nazi. Some were arrested for even responding to the committee. Your incorrect and unreferenced statement is the kind of thing that the right will take out of context (of which you provided none as there was none to provide) and make it into one of their echo-chamber facts.
This should be done immediately.
We’ve got all the Nobel Peace Prize reaction and commentary you could ever want — and more — in our automatically updating “Reaction Wire: Obama’s Nobel Win.”
White House reacts on the fly to unexpected Nobel announcement.
President Obama will travel to Oslo, Norway, to accept his Nobel, the White House confirms.
A long-time reader chimes in …
My boss is a Nobel Laureate (Physics). So of course I was interested in his reaction because he is fairly plugged in to the thinking of the various Nobel committees, even those outside his domain. Anyway, he was absolutely elated by Obama’s win. He sees the award not so much a recognition of anything Obama has accomplished yet, but rather as a very strong statement of support for his agenda, and an endorsement of his approach to international affairs.