Obama Forfeits Peace Prize - A Satire
By Robert S. Becker
24 June, 2011
Countercurrents.org
Stuck between shame and chagrin, the Nobel Peace Prize Committee has for the first time in human history reversed a past prize selection. With high drama this week, the Committee notified President Obama his misguided 2009 Prize has been formally rescinded, requesting the $1.4 million payoff be returned.
"It's not about the money," conceded a press release, "we have a sacred obligation to protect the honor of humanitarian-arms maker Alfred Nobel. Plus, there's the reputation of renowned peacemakers like Henry Kissinger we need to treasure. Sadly, we are forced to conclude that since his '09 award ceremony Obama has qualified as nothing less than the world's greatest, pre-emptive warmonger. Frankly, outgunning Bush, with three new discretionary wars, contradicts humanistic notions of peacemaking. We are chagrined that, after the fact and in only two years, our winner doubled his war production. It's this reversal that triggers ours, despite all the office wall signage we have to change."
Apparently, killing civilians with unmanned predatory drones in Pakistan, Yemen, and Libya pushed the Committee over the line. "Unlike Obama or Bush, we at Nobel admit blunders," explained Bjorn Bjorn, "Obama's soaring rhetoric carried magic dust because we, too, got enthralled by demonstrably empty promises. What were we thinking? Instead of ending regional violence, Obama has notched his military credibility, again and again. Our worst fear is that our Prize provided cover for new assaults, thus deflecting anti-war outrage. The only good news is the Afghan surge wasn't a prelude to striking Iran."
Historically, Nobel choices have incited strong reactions, Bjorn continued, "like selecting hard-line, Vietnam cold warrior Henry Kissinger. But never before have we honored a leader blatantly wedded to pre-emptive bombing of civilians in non-attacking countries. What's the underlying Obama credo, "All we are saying is give war a chance"?
War at Any Price
In short, the Committee took responsibility for making one of history's most premature, ironic nominations, citing its own language honoring "extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples." Bjorn asked, "Where is one diplomatic effort despite countless theatres of war, one call for a truce? What about ten year wars that in fact recruit the disorder from more terrorism? We are astonished at both the magnitude of America's belligerence and the refusal by Obama to understand not winning, thus squandering soldiers, civilians and $3 trillion."
Historic ironies to this turnabout abound, as the Peace Prize was funded by one Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite who got very rich by finding, in one contemporary phrase, "ways to kill more people faster than ever." Anguished by a legacy of disgrace, this guilty "merchant of death" endowed the most prestigious peace, literature and science awards.
Rescinding the award is even more shocking than the initial surprise, even stunning the recipient: "Heck, I just got here," a senior staffer heard Obama say at the time, "and I get weighed down with world's top peace prize -- and just for not being Bush or McCain. There's still that 'dumb' Iraq war I have to end, Afghanistan to restart, and the Pentagon's hysterical about Pakistan and Yemen. What a bummer."
Timing a Factor
Nobel insiders communicated the timing was directly related to meager White House projections for troop reduction from Iraq and Afghanistan this week. The timing also overlaps outrage last week by U.S. House members, claiming Libya violates the War Powers Act that demands Congressional approval after 90 days.
Oddly, the reversal invokes what then RNC chair, Michael Steele, said in '09: “The real question Americans are asking is, ‘What has President Obama actually accomplished?’“ Fifteen months later, millions of disaffected Obama supporters are asking exactly that question, coming up with lots of overseas hostilities along with only watered down legislation at home.
Immediately, John McCain sounded off, as the global cheerleader for endless war, "For God's sake, can't those spineless socialists make up their mind? That half-assed, fake-peace candidate never deserved that Peace prize, and the only thing he ever 'won' was denying this war hero his rightful place at the top. Thank God, Iraq's no longer a 'dumb' war, and Obama snaps to when the Pentagon speaks. The more war, the merrier, and it's never too late to bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb Iran."
What's in a Name?
Cable comedians quickly started renaming the award -- the "Naïve Hope Springs Eternal" Peace Prize," or "Seduced by Sham Rhetoric Peace Prize," even "Boy, Were We Stupid Peace Prize." Norwegian politicians who oversee the award were hiding out, as twittered rumors described angry, roaming residents armed with tar and feathers.
The White House regretted the forfeiture of the Prize: "That's what happens when you look back, rather than forward, and we never do that. We get hammered for being forever adrift, but what sends a clearer message than missiles and drones and bombs? Think of countless warfare this way: if we ever end five wars, won't that surpass just ending two wars? No first term president declines the honor and duty of being a war president. Worked for Bush."
"To leftwing harpies," the White House spokesman concluded, "we say: if violence didn’t work, how come every empire in every era used it constantly? If today's complainers wanted to help defeat terrorism, why not sign up and join battle, on the battlefield, patriotically? So today's wars take two decades -- change takes time and that way we stay No. 1, the world's most exceptional, greatest super-power, destined to keep all evil-doers at bay. That's why we have a commander-in-chief, after all, with veto-proof authority even to define what is a war vs. a little, bitty NATO action, like Libya. Hail to the chief."
Robert S. Becker is a frequent contributer to Countercurrents.org
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