Has Barack Obama warranted his Nobel Peace Prize?

The Nobel Peace Prize awarded Barack Obama in 2009 seemed to pre-empt any concrete action and even declared policy. At the time Ben Pershing wrote in the Washington Post:  that when he was elected a year ago, not even Mr Obama's aides would have thought the president would be spending 10 December in Oslo picking up the Nobel Peace Prize. However, Mr Pershing writes, it has turned out to be an award that "has probably spawned more headaches in the White House than pride".

"And now the president and all his men are trying to make the best of a politically awkward situation," he continues.[i]

The perception that Obama was different to his predecessor was world-wide and yet any elected President had to have some of the same agenda as well as carry on some of the legacy of his predecessor.

            There is no doubt that George W. Bush was held in universal disdain (although I’ll be interested to see how he is viewed with the advantage of hindsight; especially his second term) and that Obama seemed to be heralding a new era in American foreign policy. Ben Feller writing in the Huffington Post wrote: "Obama refused to renounce war for his nation or under his leadership, saying defiantly that 'I face the world as it is' and that he is obliged to protect and defend the United States," he says.[ii]

In an editorial for the New York Daily News Josh Greenman wrote: "They wounded two doves with one stone. No matter how much you like Obama and his foreign policy, it is patently ridiculous that a man who's served less than nine months as President should earn a prize that eluded even Mahatma Gandhi."

But Mr Greenman does not blame Mr Obama for what he calls this mockery:

"It's not Obama's fault he attracts such absurd knee-jerk adulation from the world's elites, all for a series of compelling speeches and pledges to cooperate with the world community... Now, the prize is officially a late-night joke. And like it or not, Obama is part of the punch line."[iii]

And Greenman pretty much hits the nail on the head. Obama’s election was rejoiced the world over, much more so than in his own country, which still remains a country very divided.           “The committee said it honored Obama for his "extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples."

Obama said he viewed the decision less as a recognition of his own accomplishments and more as "a call to action."[iv]

So how is the Prize allocated?

The Nobel Peace Prize winner is chosen by a five-member committee of lawmakers elected by the Norwegian parliament. Specially appointed advisers weigh in.

More than a year before the prize is awarded, the Nobel committee seeks nominations from members of governments and international courts, heads of universities, academics and previous Nobel laureates. Self-nominations are not allowed. The nomination deadline is in February.

The committee makes its final vote in October. The winner is determined by a simple majority vote.[v]

 The reason given by the committee for choosing Obama perhaps underpins the problems we have in the world, "His diplomacy is founded in the concept that those who are to lead the world must do so on the basis of values and attitudes that are shared by the majority of the world's population," the committee said of Obama.[vi] What they really meant was values and attitudes held by the majority of Europeans. So perhaps the real problem is that the Nobel Peace Prize is not really relevant anymore; nevertheless I intend to discuss whether Obama has met those expectations.

A very good article quoting 9 different Foreign Policy experts opinion of how Obama has fared in his first term can be found at: http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/01/23/grading_obama_s_foreign_policy  Here the views vary from mildly successful, to not quite up to it. My summation of the article is that in very few areas has Obama taken a leadership role due to not having defined policies.  I tend to concur that Obama tends to react to situations rather than lead. On the positive side he hasn’t made many serious errors.

Fox News is proudly right wing and is definitely not a supporter of the president, yet I present their take on his Foreign Policy in his first term:

[vii]

            I believe any goodwill that Obama had engendered early on in his administration has gone by the wayside. America’s name in the Middle East is not good. America has left Iraq to what seems to be sectarian strife. It has muddied its name in Afghanistan and is being asked to leave a year earlier than planned. Pakistan is an ally in theory only. The Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations are more moribund than ever. The Americans perhaps reluctantly supported the rebels in Libya yet are not too keen to intervene in Syria. In fact the Arab Spring has been a massive headache for the U.S, with most of the dictators falling being stalwarts of past American policy; Obama’s appeal to the Muslim world having been made from Mubarak’s Egypt.

            China is certainly establishing itself as a superpower and a possible alternative to the U.S for many countries. The old enemy, Russia has also started to show its teeth, with Putin painting the U.S. as the bad guys in every situation. The Korean situation is an unclear as it has been with Obama using the same stick and carrot techniques of his predecessors.

            The biggest concern in the world today is Iran, who with potential nuclear capabilities will be a threat to not just Israel, but the whole western world. Obama’s tactic seems to be a Robert Dulles form of brinksmanship. Scary stuff.

            I don’t think Obama has justified the Prize he was awarded in 2009. However we in Australia will continue to support him, or more correctly, the U.S.A and follow them into any theatre of conflict.

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[i] http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8406023.stm  (Thursday 10/12/2009)

[ii] http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8406023.stm  (Thursday 10/12/2009)

[iii] http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8406023.stm (Thursday 10/12/2009)

[iv] http://edition.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/europe/10/09/nobel.peace.prize/index.html (9/10/2009)

[v] http://edition.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/europe/10/09/nobel.peace.prize/index.html (9/10/2009)

[vi] http://edition.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/europe/10/09/nobel.peace.prize/index.html (9/10/2009)

[vii] http://video.foxnews.com/v/1496135232001/judging-obamas-foreign-policy/ (9/3/2012)

Vindicated?

71-31 is a convincing win in anybody’s language, with the exception of Tony Abbott (who defeated Malcolm Turnbull by one vote for his party’s leadership). What has, for all intents and purpose, been a lead weight around the government’s neck has been removed. Kevin Rudd or as he likes to refer to himself, K-Rudd (I have a serious aversion to people who refer to themselves in the third person), was that lead weight. The so-called coup of 2010 has now been explained to the public (readLaurie Oaks article ) and government members no longer need to walk on egg shells. Today’s vote was a massive blow to K-Rudd.

Kevin Rudd’s ego is massive and his need to control everything is legendary. However as I found out in an article posted on MichaelDanby’s website he was a famously faceless man as far back as 1992 who pedalled influence and showed his tendency to be a control freak. Since the 2010 election Rudd has carefully avoided two things: Firstly he never refused to rule out a leadership challenge and secondly he could never pledge loyalty to the Prime Minister. In the wake of today’s vote, he ruled out a challenge and promised to loyally work towards the re-election of the Prime Minister. He said he accepts the judgement with “no rancour and bearing no grudges”. It must be said that he was gracious, if not a little bit long-winded, in defeat.

Tony Abbott proved that he is a man with a very selective memory. In his press conference immediately before question time he said that Australians want an election, because they want a chance to vote for their Prime Minister. He seems to forget that there was an election in 2010 that voted in Julia Gillard. Maybe he forgot, because he lost that election. As the master of the sound bite or slogan Abbott came up with a reasonably good one during this press conference when he said “This was not a good government being hampered by a rotten apple, but a bad government exposed by a whistle-blower”.  Unfortunately for him it is not one he can use again, because the rest of us have already moved on. He will try though and this prompted one ABC journalist to say that he needed to come up with a “big new slogan”.

Now there is 18 months to the next election and the public will once again be faced with the choice of Gillard or Abbott for Prime Minister, but this time Julia won’t be undermined from within. The Coalition will be doing their own polling trying to find out why despite the malaise that been eating Labour they can’t surge ahead in the polls. The conclusion will be a possible leadership spill for them. If they want to have half a chance to be elected they have to remove the unelectable Abbott. Newspolls still show Malcolm Turnbull as their preferred candidate.

How much of a bad taste has the last 18 months left in the minds of the voters will be the major concern for the Labour party. There is no doubt that it did, but a few little sweeteners should be able to turn that around. My personal opinion is that come July with the beginning of the Carbon tax and the increase in the minimum taxable income and increase in the pensions, we will see a surge of Labour in the polls. But of course, only time will tell.

Why they hate Kevin Rudd so much | Herald Sun

A must read before the Monday ballot for leadership

Why they hate Kevin Rudd so much | Herald Sun

The Battle for Labour

Kevin Rudd had my support in 2007.  Not that K-Rudd or Kevin 07, however you want to remember him, struck me as an appealing character, more that I thought one J. Howard had overstayed his welcome as Prime Minister.  Rudd campaigned well and won a huge victory for Labour.

Whether it was the size of the victory or just his unbelievable self-confidence, but on that very night, K-Rudd made his first autocratic decision and it was about being autocratic. He announced at his acceptance speech to the campaign team that he and he alone would decide who the ministers in his cabinet would be.  Remember that the Labour Caucus (the parliamentary members) selected the ministers. 

Perhaps the time had come for the leader to choose his own cabinet; it makes sense. Yet I’m pretty sure that a few jaws dropped when he made that speech. It was a sure sign of a fairly autocratic approach to leadership. It seems, in retrospect, that that was a fairly good indication of the style of leadership he was to employ as Prime Minister.

There is no doubt that K-Rudd is an intelligent man and yet if you accept the “in” theory of multiple intelligences, he seems to lack in social intelligence. It is difficult to believe that he was very popular at school. He is in fact your classic nerd. Is that a reason to discount him as PM? Well that is something I wish to explore in this article.

Rudd had popular support and came in with a challenging program of reforms and projects. By 2010 his popularity was waning and the truth is that he had not achieved very much. I distinctly remember at the time that I, as an outside observer, could not understand why with such a comfortable lead in the polls, K-Rudd was constantly apologising for not achieving.  The fact was, that he had achieved very little in 3 years of government. In his defence he had a minority in the senate, which made things difficult.

The “overthrow” of K-Rudd was a quick coup that took the nation by surprise. There were no real signs of it coming, which means to the credit of the coup leaders, there were no hints of disloyalty in the public arena and no leaking to the press.

At that particular point of time, I felt great sympathy for Kevin, despite the fact that I actually believed it was a good move. I thought it was a good move for several reasons. The Rudd government was not managing to get much of its political agenda through the parliament, and it started to look unsure of itself. I believe had the coup not come when it did, The Rudd government would have imploded or at the very least, fallen at the next election.

Now some people think Julia Gillard is a “Bogan” a derogatory term for working class Australians. While it is true, her accent would support that contention, I know her to be anything but. What is true is that she is closer to the working class than Kevin in background and identification. She is also far less pretentious than Kevin.

No-one expected Kevin to accept the decision easily, but since then he has been like a little boy who wants to stop the game, because it’s his ball and he’s not being invited to play. Going so far as to sabotage the election campaign of 2010. It was never said, but it was clear. Kevin saw himself as bigger than the party and more important than the party.

Those who believe that “where there is smoke there is fire”, will understand that Kevin has been smouldering for the last year and a half and has been very careful never to deny he wanted the leadership back. That lack of denial was always enough to make it a fall-back position for the Coalition whenever they had run out of something negative to say about the government. 

 So to borrow a term from an ex- Prime Minister, this is the leadership battle we had to have. Kevin’s claim to be a “happy little vegemite” as foreign minister never rang true.

P.M. Gillard has taken the initiative away from K-Rudd by calling for a leadership ballot on Monday.  She also made it quite clear that if she is unsuccessful she will go quietly to the backbenches and relinquish any claim to leadership ambition and that she expects the same of Kevin.

Truth can be damaging. The vote is a caucus vote and Labour would be advised to tone down the vitriol in public and keep in house.  However in order to win, Kevin needs to convince that he would be a better bet than Julia come election time. It is in his interest and not the party’s, to keep the battle in the public eye. Once again self interest ahead of Party interest.

Because of the sabotage in the last election campaign, Julia has had to work with a minority government, dependant on the independents in the parliament to keep power. It has been an extraordinary balancing act and she has done it with aplomb.

It is worth noting that the independents in the lower house will do everything to ensure that there will not be an early election as that would certainly endanger their own seat in parliament. These independents have found it easy to work with Julia and have made it particularly clear that they wouldn’t like to work with Tony Abbott. One imagines that if push came to shove, they could work with Kevin. Oakshott and Windsor are fairly committed to Julia. Bob Katter couldn’t care, because he thinks he’s a “shoe-in’. 

The Tasmanian, Wilke, is starting to make noises about how he could work well with either Rudd or Abbott. Funnily enough I don’t think they could work with him, but I guess he’ll have to find out for himself.  One can be sure that he will vote against everything that a Gillard government brings to a vote.

Well now I’m going to call it for Julia. She has the numbers in Caucus where it counts. As far as I’m concerned she comes out of this smelling of Roses.

Why We Need Words Like 'Islamist' :: Middle East Forum

A very thought provoking article that challenges conventional wisdom on the subject

Why We Need Words Like 'Islamist' :: Middle East Forum

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This is scary in an of itself, however whatever you think about it, it is clear that Iran is going to be the conflict of importance this year.

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