So what do you do when you wake from your afternoon siesta to the scroll on the news channel reading "Manmohan Singh: I congratulate President Obama on his Nobel Prize"? You rub your eyes, resign to your Indian emotions (i.e say "hain?!") and wonder if there's a new category outside of deceased Alfred's will.
I then went on facebook, and I saw this status message- "Kanye West at Nobel ceremony: Mr. Obama, I'd let you speak, but Mayawati's the biggest jackass of all time". My friend at Columbia University tells me that there's a party on the streets, where there are free t-shirts on offer. Given that the Nobel has been reduced to this, our primary concern at this point of time is whether there is free food on offer as well.
Nonetheless, I was curious as to what reason on earth would the Nobel foundation would give for their choice. Being notorious for their rather arbitrary nomination process, such as the nomination of George. W. Bush last year, they had to come up with something good. Something better than "We wanted to give it to an American president and we couldn't give it to a man who said things like "They misunderestimated me" in public". The nice thing about the Nobel prizes is that they generate awareness. For a few years now, I have tried to keep myself informed about some of the Nobel prize winners (especially Physics) and their work. In this case, there wasn't really a need for that, since he's visible practically everywhere anyway.
However, I did go to the Nobel prize website to see how they reasoned it. These are the last 5 winners:
2008: Martti Ahtisaari for his important efforts, on several continents and over more than three decades, to resolve international conflicts.
2007: International Panel for Climate Change and Al Gore for their efforts to build up and disseminate greater knowledge about man-made climate change, and to lay the foundations for the measures that are needed to counteract such change.
2006: Muhammad Yunus and Grameen Bank for their efforts to create economic and social development from below.
2005: IAEA and Mohamed El Baradei for their efforts to prevent nuclear energy from being used for military purposes and to ensure that nuclear energy for peaceful purposes is used in the safest possible way.
2004: Wangari Mathai for her contribution to sustainable development, democracy and peace.
This is what this year's description says:
2009: Barack Obama for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples.
Swedish for "rhetoric".
The health care plan might just go through now!
I then went on facebook, and I saw this status message- "Kanye West at Nobel ceremony: Mr. Obama, I'd let you speak, but Mayawati's the biggest jackass of all time". My friend at Columbia University tells me that there's a party on the streets, where there are free t-shirts on offer. Given that the Nobel has been reduced to this, our primary concern at this point of time is whether there is free food on offer as well.
Nonetheless, I was curious as to what reason on earth would the Nobel foundation would give for their choice. Being notorious for their rather arbitrary nomination process, such as the nomination of George. W. Bush last year, they had to come up with something good. Something better than "We wanted to give it to an American president and we couldn't give it to a man who said things like "They misunderestimated me" in public". The nice thing about the Nobel prizes is that they generate awareness. For a few years now, I have tried to keep myself informed about some of the Nobel prize winners (especially Physics) and their work. In this case, there wasn't really a need for that, since he's visible practically everywhere anyway.
However, I did go to the Nobel prize website to see how they reasoned it. These are the last 5 winners:
2008: Martti Ahtisaari for his important efforts, on several continents and over more than three decades, to resolve international conflicts.
2007: International Panel for Climate Change and Al Gore for their efforts to build up and disseminate greater knowledge about man-made climate change, and to lay the foundations for the measures that are needed to counteract such change.
2006: Muhammad Yunus and Grameen Bank for their efforts to create economic and social development from below.
2005: IAEA and Mohamed El Baradei for their efforts to prevent nuclear energy from being used for military purposes and to ensure that nuclear energy for peaceful purposes is used in the safest possible way.
2004: Wangari Mathai for her contribution to sustainable development, democracy and peace.
This is what this year's description says:
2009: Barack Obama for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples.
Swedish for "rhetoric".
The health care plan might just go through now!
3 comments:
Exactly the thoughts of so many people. I'm thinking they should give him the Nobel for Chemistry too for his great "chemistry" with people.
PS: Thanks for the reference, though I'm not really sure what kind of light that shows me in. :P
You're quite welcome!
I just checked...election date: 8th January, last date of nomination for Nobel prize : 3rd February!
Nicely put forth.. I got an interesting view from my barrister friend. Acc. to him the Peace prize has always had a more political nature to it, than the others. And this one is for letting Obama know that his ideas of bringing the two wars to a close are steps taken in the right direction (whether that's gonna happen in the first place is a topic of anothe debate altogether).
I can see the Peace prize reduced to a mere recognition of great ideas rather than great deeds. Wud have been far appreciative had the Nobel committee given the Peace prize a miss.
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