Like many people, when I first heard the news that President Obama had received the Nobel Peace Prize, my first reaction was shock. What possible reason could there be for awarding him the prize? The Nobel prize committee, made up of members of the Norwegian parliament, cited the president's support for international diplomacy, efforts toward nuclear disarmament, and outreach to the Islamic world. Well, these may all be desirable things, but at this point, the president's "efforts" in these areas have been entirely rhetorical. There simply aren't any concrete accomplishments by Obama in foreign policy to point to. At the very least, the decision to award President Obama the Nobel Peace Prize seems premature. If in the future he succeeds in brokering an Israeli-Palestinian peace accord or bringing about a major reduction in nuclear weapons worldwide, then it would seem appropriate to grant him this type of honor. Just giving a few speeches, no matter how beautifully phrased or presented, should not be the criterion for becoming a Nobel laureate.
   Furthermore, does one really want to argue that President Obama belongs in the company of such prior prize winners as Mother Teresa. Nelson Mandela, or Aung San Suu Kyi (the Burmese opposition leader)? These Nobel laureates not only accomplished something of value, but also made considerable personal sacrifices to do so. To his credit, the president did express some humility about being included in the ranks of celebrated prize winners such as these, but the contrast between their accomplishments and Obama's mere words still seems too great.

   On the other hand, consider some of the more recent Nobel Peace Prize recipients: former President Jimmy Carter (2002) and former Vice President Al Gore (2007). Notice anything they have in common with President Obama? That's right--they're all Democrats. In fact, of the four sitting or fomer U.S. presidents that have received the Nobel Peace Prize (Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, Jimmy Carter, and Barack Obama), only one was a Republican--Theodore Roosevelt--and that was in the early 1900s!. Furthermore, recall that the Nobel committee was quite candid about why Jimmy Carter received the Peace Prize in 2002--it was intended as a slap at President George W. Bush, presumably for his alleged unilateralism in foreign policy. Al Gore was the man Bush defeated for the White House and a prominent critic of U.S. policies under Bush on "global warming" (now styled "global climate change" since the average global temperature hasn't increased in eleven years!). Barack Obama has almost consistently portrayed himself as the "anti-Bush." In short, as many have pointed out, a case could be made that the decision to award Obama the Nobel Peace Prize was to some extent an expression of the widespread disdain for President Bush among many (Western) Europeans. In fact, in awarding the prize to President Obama, the committee could be said to be honoring him for being more like a European than a traditional American leader.

   Whatever the actual reasons for this award, in light of his obvious lack of actual accomplishments at this point, it would seem to me that the honorable thing for President Obama to do would be to decline the Nobel Peace Prize. Certainly among the many others who were nominated for this year's prize, there should be someone who is arguably more worthy of it. However, I think it highly unlikely that Obama will decline the honor. After all, isn't he such a symbol of hope for many in the world, at least in his own eyes? Besides, perhaps we should think of it as a consolation prize--for not winning the Olympics for his adopted hometown Chicago!