The Non-Proliferation Treaty commits its nuclear-power signatories to work toward the abolition of nuclear weapons. Under Cold War conditions, that goal seemed merely aspirational, with no immediate practical implication.
But after the Cold War, with U.S. conventional forces overwhelmingly superior to those of any potential rival, it became very much in the security interest of the United States to reduce or abolish nuclear weaponry, and Bill Perry, Sam Nunn, Henry Kissinger, and George Shultz proposed exactly that.
Last month at the U.N. Barack Obama committed the United States to that program, which (among other good effects) strengthened our hand against Iranian and North Korean proliferation efforts; it was hard to denounce their violations of the NPT with a straight face when we weren't even pretending to try to live up to ours.
Hmm. Well. Call me crazy, but I think that maybe to earn the Nobel prize, a million dollars, and all the associated prestige, you ought to have made efforts somewhat more heroic than chairing a meeting in which you said that you thought we ought to have fewer nuclear arms--even one in which you said that the US also thought we ought to have fewer nuclear arms. You should, I don't know, deliver a deal or something.
As for the notion that this strengthens our hand when dealing with Iran and North Korea, I'm really skeptical that this does anything at all. The leaders of Iran and North Korea do not, to put it mildly, look up to us. They don't want us to think that they're nice, moral people. They want us to think that they are terrifying military forces whose desires must be assuaged. The people of North Korea and Iran don't like us either, but even if you thought that this was likely to have a big impact on their opinion, this would be purely hypothetical, because both countries have very tightly controlled media which will report whatever the leaders want them to think.
If the best you can come up with is that he made some impressive-sounding statements at the UN--well, I think a majority of the world's leaders are equally deserving. I don't see any actual foreign policy scholars advancing the theory that this was a landmark achievement on par with say, SALT or the Camp David accords.
Well the other question that springs to mind is, if Obama gets a Nobel Peace prize now, for this, what about the rest of his presidency? Is he going to get 3 more Nobel Peace Prizes, or 7 more if he's re-elected?
Well, he has yet to receive the Nobel prizes for economics and literature. These are often considered less distinguished than the peace prize, but the sum of the two might be greater, and would do very well for 2010.
For 2011, perhaps they could name the prize for him. "The Obama Peace Prize" sounds very well in my own mind, and his visage would make a distinguished, handsome medal.
In 2012, perhaps they could make him King of Norway. Harald V, is to be honest, a bit stodgy-looking, and there would be the added benefit of Europe, like the US, enjoying its first post-racial leader.
For 2013, I am not sure, but the throne of Sweden, or perhaps making him President of the EU come to mind.
boring boring boring. i was hoping for something on the nobel for economics. from the world's tallest econoblogger.
Yeah, I second the boredom. I mean, Obama himself already said he didn't really deserve it.
Yes, so how bad is it that Mark Kleiman is willing to argue that Obama deserves an award that even Obama agrees he doesn't observe?
It's an important job, marking for public, and permanent, ridicule all the left-wing hacks who try to defend this excreable award.
It's of course bonus fun to get to mock the left-wing commenters who, like you two, rush to the defense of the left wing hacks who try to defend this award. Thanks for rising to the bait and showing your true colors.
What? Make some sense dude. Why do I care what Mark Kleiman says? I don't even know who that is, and in what way did I rush to his defense?
There's always someone on the internet willing to make any argument -- you can spend all day prolonging this stuff. My point was, when the man himself says he didn't deserve it, why does somebody need to spend three paragraphs making the same point? This is a Friday morning post on Monday morning.
Can you read, Greg Q? Your comment, in response to the first two, makes absolutely no sense, since Daniel and waviglakis neither tried to defend the award nor "rush to the defense of the left wing hacks who try to defend this award."
They merely said it's a boring subject since pretty much everyone is on the same page about it, including Obama.
i had no idea my desire to hear megan's thoughts on the prize for economics revealed so much about my politics. i guess i'd better keep it closer to the chest in the future.
Please, people. It's the common defense of the indefensible: "hey, that's boring, why are you talking about it?"
Kleiman is making an ass out of himself trying to defend the prize. You want to go over to Kleiman's place, and tell him he's an idiot for doing that, and it's a waste of time because Obama already admitted he didn't deserve it? Great.
But bitching at Megan for mocking Kleiman is concern troll BS from people trying to defend the indefensible. Nothing more.
i think all that could be said on the issue had been said by friday afternoon. notice, i didn't say what i said today on friday morning.
anyway, here's the point i was making, with some help (thanks!) from your template: "hey, that's still boring, talking about it seems like a waste of time 3 days later."
finally, let me ask: you've really never become bored with something that made you mad? and if you really haven't, well, then try and account for my boredom with something other than wild speculations.
Agreed. Can people address their complaints directly to the tiny number of people who actually think the award was merited, or, better yet, to the Nobel committee? Because I live in a place that's lousy with Obama lovers and I still don't know anyone who's arguing otherwise.
But the NPT isn't the reason he was awarded the prize, because the decision to award it to him was made 6+ months before his speech...
Why do you not think that the decision was made a couple of weeks ago? Maybe I missed something in all the news and analysis. Nominations were closed some time ago, but that's a different issue.
Can't win without being nominated.
Arguing that actions Obama took between the date nominations closed and the date the prize was announced affected the decision are nothing more than arguing the Norwegians have a crystal ball.
Can I say they should have rejected him because he ordered additional troops to Afghanisatan in February?
I'm not sure what you're saying, DerHahn. There were hundreds of nominees, as usual. I have no reason to believe, nor I have I read anything to the contrary, that the O Team even knew that O had been nominated.
One article I read indicated that typically the choices are made in mid-September.
It's unsurprising that someone was so gooey with anticipation in February that they nominated him. The nominations are a very open process, despite the secrecy, and a person in Obama's position getting a nomination takes no special skill or accomplishment. The surprise was that it wasn't dismissed offhand.
OK, Class, please answer as a group:
"The pathway to hell is paved with ______________________." ???
We don't give out prizes for New Year's Resolutions, either.
"...funds provided by gasoline taxes."
It damned well better be paved with union-provided cement and asphalt! And it damned well better run through West Virginia and John Murtha's PA district!
Cliches?
Sweet chocolate nuts.
Plainly, Megan, you just hate America.
It's not as though Obama's the first modern president to call for rolling back the number of nuclear weapons. Ronald Reagan and Bush II both took substantial steps. So did George Bush Sr. and Bill Clinton. But I guess they just weren't as non-George-Bushy.
"The people of North Korea and Iran don't like us either"
I'm not sure that's true.
The people of North Korea have been turned into serfs, being slowly worked to death by their overlords. They don't have the luxury of spending a lot of time thinking about and discussing world affairs.
The people of Iran, on the other hand, were hoping for some support from Obama, and all he gave their protests was a lukewarm ho-hum before turning his attention back to the leaders he wants to please. I don't know how the Iranian people feel about the American people, but they're not likely to be thrilled with our leader at this point.
Do you have anything else beyond conjecture and anecdote to make your point?
First off I'd agree that we don't know what the Iranians think of us. They certainly aren't going to publicly announce adoration for the USA. That would most likely get them sent to prison or death.
North Korea is a much clearer case. Generations have been raised on state run propaganda and nothing else. Accounts from the few westerners to visit paint a chilling portrait of a population in mental and physical servitude. Now maybe some of them can see through the propaganda but even if they do where can they turn to for real news? At best the USA is a giant question mark in their minds and at worst they fear and hate us. Liking us is an impossibility.
I agree that it seems most likely that the average poor soul in North Korea has no opinion at all (which was also Ann's point). That's different than Megan's conjecture that "The people of North Korea and Iran don't like us either".
I've been all over the world in the past decades, and have always been pleasantly surprised that most of the foreigners I've met like Americans (or are fascinated by the idea of us, or what have you). That doesn't translate into love for our government or policies, but on a personal level, I've found it to be quite different.
Jbahr:
""" That doesn't translate into love for our government or policies, but on a personal level, I've found it to be quite different.
"""
If that's the test for "Likes us", then I'd assert that at any given time 35%+ of American's don't like us either.
I think the Nobel award was a lot more about the Nobel Committee's needs than about Obama's accomplishments. The committee is made up of politicians - anybody want to examine their decision thru the lens of Public Choice theory?
LMAO!! Bravo!
It might be politically prudent
to donate the $1M to a charity,
or better to a PC NPO, to avoid
the appearance of bribery.
He's giving it to charity.
Come on, this was a bribe - or, if you want to be polite about it, a down payment. They gave him a prize he hasn't earned yet, in the hopes of influencing future policies. This is the most annoying aspect of Obama getting the reward - a transparent and clumsy attempt to meddle in our affairs.
No kidding about clumsy. Anyone who follows politics in America knows that by far the most likely outcome is that the prize will have no effect on our foreign policy. But if it were to have an effect, it's far more likely to make Obama slightly more hawkish. If their intent was to strengthen Obama and meddle in the domestic debate about our foreign policy, this was as ham-handed and counterproductive a move as I can think of.
I realize this is unlikely, but consider this:
1) Most of the leaders of Europe KNOW that Islam, at least in the form of "Radical Islam" is a threat. They know this because their ghettos are no-go zones for the police, because riots are breaking out, because women are getting beaten or killed in "honor killings" in major cities etc.
2) They know that the the political postures that have kept their parties noses in the trough...I mean in power for DECADES make any sort of adult, which is to say stern and decisive action, impossible.
3) The last President, for all his flaws, was willing to do whatever heavy lifting required, either alone or with whomever showed up.
4) This president is at best a moral coward.
5) So knowing that doing something like this would "force" Obama to be more hawkish, they gave him the award hoping that at minimum it might stiffen his resolve in Afghanistan, at maybe even convince him to continue to role that America has shouldered since the end of WWII--that of the protector of Europe and the Free World.
I would much rather politicians in a foreign country meddle in American domestic politics by giving our President a very prestigious award than, say, invading us, occupying our country, and precipitating a civil war which leads to the death of thousands. If this is the future of intervention in the affairs of other countries, bring it on!
Yes, there is an obsequious quality to the Nobel committee's move. And, their stated reason is understandable. It may well be that if they had waited, then in three more years Obama could have been too tarnished by real-world experience to remain deserving. But as a Finn, I believe I am entitled to say that arguing with a Norwegian is fruitless. In your other comments, though, something bears comment.
For nearly thirty years, we have avoided the problem of what to do with our high-level nuclear waste from commercial power plants, because it has been thought that reprocessing it would set an example for nations like Iran and North Korea. In the reprocessing, bomb-grade material is a byproduct, so the reasoning has been that if we did it, they could claim a right to do it too, and in fact be encouraged to do so. This is notwithstanding the fact that the bomb-grade stuff would be reused as mixed fuel and not to build more bombs. I agree with you in the sense that countries like Iran and North Korea will do what they will do and are not influenced much by our nuanced policies regarding non-proliferation. However, vigorous diplomacy, as in the case of influencing South Africa to disarm its nuclear weapons, has worked.
Why do you take Kleiman seriously on *anything* other than drug issues? He's almost the poster-boy for Bush Derangement Syndrome. So of course he thinks the Nobel Committee did right, *because* they gave him the prize for "not being George Bush".
The good news nerds is that ve 'havv finally cracked the code of World Opinion. Looking very carefully I will read it to you... It's says here, "We are (like) a, a, an American High School." ' That's the OK news. The bad news is that that blonde girl, the 'popular' one with the straight straw hair who would make your life if she said, "Hi' and went out with you. Sorry, she's just not into you.
If these guys, when talking to Kim Jong Il or Ahmadinejad, don't have a good answer when they say, 'well, you have them', maybe they should stay home and send someone else.
Derek
Not the main point of the post..
Not the government (at least the president)
But the people of Iran are one of the most pro western/USA people in the middle east (relatively).... They are not very religious (at least in the Urban areas)
They are not isolated by the media (The get Voice of America and the Internet)..
My wife was born in Tehran...
North Korea I can believe a different story..
>>>>>>>>>>
On the main point of the post.. I think Obama's foreign policy is excellent however... give me a break.
Not Iran and North Korea; but everybody else. It matters to the international community that we practice what we preach. When it comes to the NPT, we need the cooperation of third parties to impose meaningful sanctions to non-complying signatory countries, since we practically don't have trade relations with Iran and North Korea.
But the Russians and Chinese have reasons to ignore calls for sanctions that are independent of the US. No matter what Obama does he's not going to get a tough sanctions regime in place on either Iran or North Korea.
At least he's given up that odious USAian habit of threatening any small Central American country that he fancies. Eh?
Yeah. Except for Honduras.
Honduras doesn't count. Costa Rica and Belize are small Central American countries. Honduras is a large Central American country. :~)
It is very difficult for some people from the diffi cult to understand when the big ship of state has received an order to change course.
It is easier to see from another ship of state more often than not.
There is just blue sky and water out there ... how do you know we are changing course? It is still blue sky and lotsa water dude ...
Yep. That's the ticket, "take a heading toward a state of peace". Yes sir.
As the kiddies question "are we there yet?" ...
So deep.
About 2mm I'd say...
It matters to the international community that we practice what we preach.
I doubt very much that this is true, or has ever been true. Did India develop the bomb because we weren't working diligently to eliminate nuclear weapons, or because they have a long-running border war with Pakistan? Is Germany really going to refuse to cooperate on Iran because they think we're terrible hypocrites? Has Japan sat out of NK talks on the grounds that the US is the only country to have ever used nukes? Was any member of NATO moved to embrace the USSR by American oppression of blacks? What consequences did "You must go to the UNSC before invading Iraq" France suffer for its unilateral invasion of the Ivory Coast?
Other countries are just as capable of cold-hearted realism as we are, and indeed probably more so.
Rob, you make this point frequently and with eloquence, and I don't think you're wrong, exactly. I agree with you that simply being well-liked globally is not enough, on its own, to get other countries to ignore the pursuit of their own interests.
But your logic often seems to lead you to conclude that being liked in the world is of no value whatsoever. And I really don't see the case for that idea. It seems that being well-liked is a function of having reasonably productive working relationships with other countries, and that those working relationships are one of many things that help us to achieve our goals. Which, after all, is the whole point.
UN Ambassadors like Holbrooke or Richardson don't seem particularly effective, until you compare them to Bolton. Clinton foreign policy isn't all that terrific until you compare it to Bush's.
Maybe it's just that you find the if-only-the-world-liked-us-we'd-all-hold-hands-and-dance-together-in-the-spirit-of-unity-and-harmony crowd so annoying that you start seeing all calls for more international cooperation as aligned with that group. And man, I agree with you, they are incredibly annoying. But they're also irrelevant. Susan Rice isn't one of them, Hillary Clinton isn't one of them, Barack Obama isn't one of them.
It is better to be feared than loved.
The other nations of the world may
fear us, but they will never love us.
Rice, Clinton, and Obama want to _be_
other-worldly rulers; Good Shepherds.
Paying lip service to useful sheeple is
easy; Words are just air, and air is free.
P.S. Talking about Rulers of Nations,
not powerless individual other-worlders
with US envy.
I would like to see those who place such a premium on being liked tell me exactly what the tangible benefits are.
Iran sending its enriched uranium to Russia?
What? You think Iran is sending all of their enriched uranium to Russia?
Far from it. They're sending a batch of low-enriched uranium (3%) from one facility — Natanz — so that it can be further enriched to 20% for use in one medical isotope production facility.
The diplomatic double-speak for this scheme is called "confidence building."
Right. Only for the willfully blind and ignorant.
Nutella: Why exactly are we worried about the Russians getting their hands on enriched uranium? They already have quite a lot of it, I hear.
Nutella - Iran sending its enriched uranium to Russia?
Are you so sure this is a positive developement? Maybe they are getting the Russians to do they're work for them. It all rest on how easy you think it is to extract the Uranium from the fuel rods once they get them back.
Also, how do we know this is all they have?
Also, they haven't sent anything _yet_, have they?
Also, doesn't this get the threat of sanctions lifted - for no real cost to the Iranians?
So, in terms of real, honest to God, take it to the bank, tangible benefits - nothing yet.
I'm still waiting.....
All this talk of international cooperation is very simply the Administration saying they want to do nothing. The talks provide plausible denial.
Derek
I think that implying there is some sort of strategy or reason to what all those Norwegians did is a bit much. The committee is made up of bien pensant types, StuffWhitePeopleLike White People, as is Kleiman, and Obama is a cultural icon for them, so they just gave it to him for being so wonderful. I saw someone in the other thread say that lot's of Frenchman are sporting Obama t shirts and giving him a Nobel prize isn't any different. In an aside, if Obama replaces Che Guevera on t shirts, that would be a fine thing, as silly as the people who wear Obama tshirts are, Obama is certainly a step up from Che Guevera, wearing a Che Guevera t shirt is like wearing a Himmler t shirt.
The really weird thing about all this is that if Obama's head is screwed on even slightly tightly, Obama must feel quite a bit of bemused contempt for such people. This is not to imply that every Obama voter/supporter is such a person, but the basic fact is that a lot part of Obama's political power/mojo comes from such people, he wouldn't have gotten elected Pres without them, to be sure. If he has bemused contempt for such people, he cannot really let it be known, he'd wreck his power base, so that fact that he doesn't radiate it doesn't mean it isn't there.
If that bemused contempt isn't there though, which him being the object of lot's of silly adulation should lead to far stronger feeling of bemused contempt for such people than they inspire in me for instance, Obama's head is not screwed on right, and the near future will probably be somewhat interesting.
In addition: If he won it for nuclear non-proliferation, why would he not share it with Sam Nunn, who laid more groundwork and worked hand-in-hand with Obama on the issue?
Sorry, but I take the President at his word on this one: he doesn't deserve it, and the best way to look at the award is as a call to action not just for him but for the world to follow his lead.
Well Megan,
I think you get to the crux of why people like yourself think Obama is undeserving of the peace prize. The things that Obama did to earn it were not hard to do as the most powerful man in the world. Nonetheless, despite the ease of these accomplishments, his predecessors(or predecessor) were unable or unwilling to do these things.
Beyond that, a symbolic peace prize is not uncommon. A lot of people were rooting for Neda. Since Obama has actual accomplishments in addition to symbolic ones, you've suddenly decided that he needs to be held to a higher(double) standard.
As I noted above, at least in regard to the nuclear-nonproliferation element of the Committee's stated rationale, his predecessors DID do these things, and substantially more. They are ALL MORE DESERVING based on this reasoning. It appears you (and the NPP Committee) are the one with the double standard.
The best that can be accomplished is to slow the spread of nuclear weapons. A nuclear-weapon free world is a pipe dream, and can be a dangerous pipe dream if it leads to unilateral disarmaments.
I forgot what genius wrote it, but I concur, give the Nobel to the bomb! The nuclear bomb has prevented more wars and death than all the Nobel winners put together.
You lost me here, Megan: "The leaders of Iran and North Korea do not, to put it mildly, look up to us. They don't want us to think that they're nice, moral people. They want us to think that they are terrifying military forces whose desires must be assuaged."
I have a hard time believing that the leaders of those countries want us to think they are "terrifying military forces." They probably want their own people to think so, for sure. And maybe their neighbors. (I mean, after all, that is why Sadaam Hussein kept playing out the string on WMDs in Iraq: He wanted Iran to think he had all those weapons.)
If they really convinced us, as a people - including our military and political leadership - that they were terrifying military forces, they'd reap a whirlwind harvest that I'm pretty sure they, for now, would rather avoid.
A more interesting question is who within the US, and why, would like us all to be terrified of Iran and North Korea? Hmm.
No, it makes good enough sense. If a military force is nasty enough that you don't want to tangle with it, it becomes a lot harder to send in that whirlwind you speak of. There's a reason we invaded Saddam "Look guys, we're being really secretive about weapon programs!" Hussein, and not Kim "Give me 20 minutes, and I'll flatten a major city of yours with artillery" Jong-Il. The cost of the latter was too high.
But your logic often seems to lead you to conclude that being liked in the world is of no value whatsoever.
Well, two things. 1) I think being liked is an effect, not a cause, and 2) I don't think it's actually possible for us to be liked.
To lead is to decide, and to decide is to piss off the people who wanted you to do the opposite. If everyone already agrees, then there isn't much need for "leadership." So to the extent that the US is actually leading the way on anything, we're going to be disliked by somebody, and most likely everybody to some extent, because everyone will have some little thing they wanted done or not done. Plus there are always malcontents who want to snipe at the big guy regardless of what he does. Everybody talks about the boss behind his back.
I also personally value plain speaking, which tends to make one disliked in any company, especially diplomatic company.
Finally, I reject the notion that everything anyone anywhere does is a result of something we do. We could have been kissing Russia's ass since 1946 and India and Pakistan would still have developed the bomb (Iran, too, although maybe not NK if we had just let them have the whole peninsula). Their arms race is not the result of anything we did (more like the result of what Imperial Britain did, the bastards). Certainly we have an outsized effect on the world, but not that outsized.
Susan Rice isn't one of them, Hillary Clinton isn't one of them, Barack Obama isn't one of them.
Hillary Clinton isn't, but I haven't been convinced that Obama isn't yet.
Oh, yeah and this:
I agree with you that simply being well-liked globally is not enough, on its own, to get other countries to ignore the pursuit of their own interests.
I don't think it's possible to get other countries to ignore the pursuit of their own interests. It's only possible to get them to do something they believe is against their interests by bribing them with something worth more. Indeed, it often seems to me that it's only possible to get them to do something they probably believe to be in their interest by bribing them.
And I think it ridiculous that the US should ever be asked to abandon the pursuit of its own interests.
"And I think it ridiculous that the US should ever be asked to abandon the pursuit of its own interests."
And ridiculous that an intelligent party would believe us to do so, even if we claimed to. It's not just a matter of national character or anything like that, it's fundamental to our form of government. There is no policy that Obama can make which would completely rule out the possibility of someone like Bush being elected four years from now and completely changing or reversing those policies.
America can not promise to play nice for 50 years because America is not a person. The intelligent thing to do is expect America (and indeed, most nations) to act in its own best interest, as it's current elected officials perceive that interest right now, and try to find an arrangement that benefits all parties involved. Any expectation of "well, we'll be really nice and selfless now, and I'm sure they'll repay the favor later" may work on an individual human level, but does not work at a national level.
How about rather than saying "being liked" I change it to "not being hated"? Less punchy, but more descriptive of the point I've been making all along and less likely to cause misunderstanding. Would you agree that it's possible to "not be hated"?
Also, you're picking individual points to disagree with, and I'd agree with several of your clarifications. For example, I was sloppy when I wrote "get other countries to ignore the pursuit of their own interests". What I meant to say was that there are usually several ways for any country to achieve its goals, a complex trade off of variables that they weigh in trying to figure out which course of action to pursue. When we have civil working relationships with them, we are more likely to be able to persuade them that the course of action that we prefer is the best one for them. But when we deliberately provoke them, or ignore them, or fail to engage with them at all as we did consistently during the early Bush years, we ensure that they pursue these suboptimal courses of action because we offer no alternative.
That's my overall point, one that I still don't think you've yet addressed. Also, I don't see this as being nice, I see this as the most effective way of getting what we want as a country, and a clearly superior means of doing so than the alternative.
Anticipating straw man counter arguments that don't invalidate the point: no, you can't pursue these relationships at all costs and may need, at some point, to assume a more bellicose posture, developing these relationships won't ensure success, they won't get countries to ignore their own interests, they won't make them love us, and they don't make us suddenly able to control the arc of history. They just give us a much better chance to influence all those things than the alternative.
Eliminating nuclear weapons is one of those nice concepts that everyone can agree with (hence the perfect Big O crusade) -- but the realities make it nothing more than a pipe dream.
The reality is that when countries who more or less play by the rule of law eliminate nuclear weapons, it only makes those weapons that much more valuable to those countries who don't.
Would anyone gain any assurance on a North Korean signature on some "I have destroyed all my nuclear weapons" treaty?
Is that really the position the US wants to find itself in?
Great -- we eliminate the already incredibly small likelihood of a nuke from Russia or China vaporizing a US city, and increase the larger likelihood of a nuke from some rogue state or movement doing so.
Great -- we eliminate the already incredibly small likelihood of a nuke from Russia or China vaporizing a US city, and increase the larger likelihood of a nuke from some rogue state or movement doing so.
Warmongering neocon brute.
Perhaps we could all agree that since 1) nuclear weapons have actually made the world safer and 2) Obama has only made meaningles gestures towards reducing worldwide nukes that might only have a meaningful application towards Iran-type of states, 3) Obama deserved the Nobel Peace Prize afterall.
Warmongering neocon brute.
...but you repeat yourself.
Henry Kissinger and other dreadfully serious people have argued, e.g. in the WSJ, for a nuclear weapon free world. I'm not against that, but I would have preferrd Obama agreed with his defense secretary and went with modernization, for now, of our nuclear weapons. The fact of the matter is that Obama's popularlity is of potential benefit to us. A large part of that popularity is that he is not WASP or Catholic or only of European extraction. In other words, for many of his critics, he is not 'one of us' and that is an advantage potentially for us. He is likely, as in health care, at times to be a danger but at other times, for instance in his recent statements on 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell,' to be a very good bridge beween aspirations and what works.
Would you agree that it's possible to "not be hated"?
I'm not sure it is. It happens that most of my overseas experience came during the rule of Clinton of blessed memory, and there was a lot of hate going around at the time: for Rwanda, for Kosovo, for Palestine, for Kyoto, for the ICC, for Okinawa, for some dumbass kids who threw rocks off an overpass, for whatever. And as I've said in other forums, frequently the hate is directed at a cartoon US that exists only in the minds of the haters. That's not something that you can deal with by better engagement, or really at all. It just is. Trying to placate the perpetually outraged is pointless.
When we have civil working relationships with them, we are more likely to be able to persuade them that the course of action that we prefer is the best one for them.
I think this is definitely true for relatively rational powers. Please don't understand me to be arguing for an end to all diplomacy. Flip side: I'm not sold on the merits of engagement for nutcase states.
But even given the value of engagement and mutual respect between the US and traditional allies, I often get the feeling it's a one-way street. Americans (well, a tiny minority of them) sit around fretting about whether we were rude to the French. I am not aware of much worry on the French side about being rude to the Americans. Mutual respect has to be mutual, and if we are to suffer adverse consequences for slights (to the extent that we really do), there's no reason the other side shouldn't, as well.
That is to say, it's all well and good to worry about being liked, but maybe we should occasionally make the other guys worry whether we like them or not.
"That is to say, it's all well and good to worry about being liked, but maybe we should occasionally make the other guys worry whether we like them or not." Yes, Vladimir, somebody needs to talk sense now and again. Now you want us not to build those missile interceptors in Poland, and we hope that you will be able to help us out in sanctions/ reprocessing with Iran. (So, 'well and good,' "popularity" can help).
One can hope that the Nobel committee is giving us Pelonius' advice in Hamlet. Pelonius, the father-in-law (to be), advised his new son, 'Be true to yourself (take your love Ophelia), and thou canst be false to no man (that is not avenging your father will not be treasonous to him).' For us, our present life does not require us to be loyal to Mr. Bush (insofar as he was unloved).
Funny how this has drawn so much more comment that the award Bush gave himself for having won Gulf War II back in 2003.
You mean the throwaway propaganda banner that is still being lampooned five and a half years later by random commenters in a current events blog? I'd say it drew plenty of comment, and as you have proven, still is. The Obama NPP will be lucky to become even half as famous.
> Funny how this has drawn so much more comment
Agreed. "Seems to me" -- for what that's worth -- that all the complaints re: others' favorable opinion of his *potential* should be weighed vs. the brushing-off of others' condemnation of the last guy's *actions*.
For what that's worth.
This is lame. Why not something on the Nobel in Economics? Wasn't Eugene Fama a front runner? I wonder why he got passed over. But if you must spar with another blogger, why not address Thomas Levenson's four part critique of your work?
http://inversesquare.wordpress.com/2009/10/07/its-not-that-mcardle-cant-read-its-that-she-cant-wont-think-part-one/
You really think you are showing good manners to show up at Megan's blog and insult her personally? In my country, we call that an "insult to honor" with all the repercussions.
Does anyone agree with Netanyahu who has vowed that no Israeli will ever be prosecuted for war crimes in Gaza as long as he is in power?
Inflammatory rhetoric can and does cause wars, but peaceful talk of the kind Obama has travelled to many nations to deliver can cause peace.
Which is a rewarding endeavour. Obviously.
So an Israeli PM thinks that the UN is out to get him, and doesn't want to play along? Considering that the UN is out to get him, and Israel has never played along, this sounds rather unsurprising. Business as usual, really.
I certainly agree with him. Netanyahu would be committing political and diplomatic suicide by turning any Israeli over to a UN kangaroo court.
Just out of curiosity, are you making similar calls for Palestinian rocketeers in Gaza? War crimes trials and what not?
Then give the prize to Reagan/Gorbachev who actually cut nuclear weapons.
Gorbachev got one, to be fair, though Reagan didn't.
Why another round of this? Because libertarians are people who have no use for either major party and continually repeat Republican talking points.
Yes, libertarians are well known for repeating Republican talking points on the War on Drugs, prostitution, religious issues, and(depending on the libertarian), foreign policy.
Libertarians often agree with one party or the other on one issue or another, and when they do they'll sound quite a lot like the party that they agree with. With regards to this transparent farce, we're pretty naturally going to agree with the Republicans. And to be fair, that's probably the case for me on about 3/4 of the issues out there(your mileage may vary). But that's hardly the same as being the sort of mindless flunky you seem to be suggesting that I am.
You don't have to be a Republican to think that the Prize is wacky. 90% of the Democrats I know think that too. But obsessing about it is purely partisan.
@ Michael on Hamlet and Polonius
but 'twas Polonius got the point :)
Plain text message of the play:
Hamlet should have killed his Uncle,
seized the throne, and prepared for
war against the aggressor nation
next door.
Obama should stop campaigning for
Liberal legislation, and address
the economic and foreign policy
threats facing by the US.
Not at all. Shakespeare has Hamlet kill Polonius who was to stand in place of his father thus suggesting that Hamlet had murderous thoughts toward his father. He should have accepted this part of his ambivalence and gone on. The tragedy of Hamlet is that the lovely Ophelia died rather than became his bride. If the parents kill each other, you honor the new king. The king was too strong a target for Hamlet to attack, QED the result of the action of the play. This is the Nordic political sensibility. You accept the king; chaos may result if you don't. You honor the department chairman/woman and you are given instruction and resources to create and a prize is a possibility. If you need our instruction and are pacific, we'll send you Gunnar Myrdal. If you'd kill us, we'll give you Quisling.
Here I always thought the point of Hamlet was "Grow a pair". If he'd just stepped up and offed Claudius as soon as he had reasonable proof, none of that nonsense would have happened. Of course, it'd make for a terrible play, but there would have been one death, not a dozen.
Where does the notion that Megan McArdle's opinion about who might deserve the Nobel Peace Prize and for what, or mine or anyone's here, are relevant to who gets it or should get it come from? Are we the committee's auditors?
Beautiful thing about free speech - we have the right to mock stupid people, no matter who those stupid people may be.