How much?

How much will the President’s trip to accept the doubtfully deserved Nobel Peace cost the American public?

In tax money?

Self-esteem?

Will Nobel Prize and Academy Award winner Al Gore comment on the carbon off-sets flying POTUS and all his stuff over there?

About Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Fr. Z is the guy who runs this blog. o{]:¬)
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25 Comments

  1. Girgadis says:

    He should respectfully and gracefully refuse to accept this honor. It seems a consolation prize for losing the Olympics to Brazil. What used to be a prestigious award is now a joke. Even the MSM seemed to be questioning the validity of awarding a peace prize to a president who hasn’t even completed his first year in office, let alone first term. On the other hand, I like to see everything as an opportunity. Perhaps some enterprising technical assistant can load Mother Teresa’s acceptance speech onto his teleprompter.

  2. Jack Hughes says:

    nice one Girgadis,
    BTW Ed Feser (Excellent Thomist) has an short, funny and insightfull commontary at
    http://www.whatswrongwiththeworld.net/2009/10/in_other_news_edward_feser_has.html

  3. Malta says:

    Yasser Arafat won the Nobel “Peace”(!) prize; ‘nuf said….

  4. Ioannes Andreades says:

    Even President Obama has essentially come out and said he doesn’t deserve it, but that’s the Nobel committee’s blunder and not anyone else’s. Does his reception of the prize further American interests (utilitas)? If I weren’t exhausted, I would argue that it does, and therefore I don’t mind my tax dollars’ being spent.

  5. Kerry says:

    Perhaps next an Academy Award for Best Dramatic Actor in a comedy role…?

  6. Kerry says:

    Oh, also, somehow Monty Python’s Dead Parrot is relevant here.

  7. LarryD says:

    I’m going to write The Great American Novel soon – it will involve eliminating nuclear weapons, reconciling the nations and ending the scourge of climate change. Because my intentions are noble, I happily and humbly accept the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. Thank you. I really don’t deserve it, but thank you.

  8. Ed the Roman says:

    It’s not a consolation prize. It’s another shoe thrown at GWB, applause for the apologies delivered so far, and encouragement for further reduction of American exceptionalism.

    It’s also being roundly mocked in many, many quarters. Including people who REALLY like Obama.

  9. Ed the Roman says:

    I’ll add that even some Norwegian MPs, the people who select the Peace Prize committee, are on record as saying “huh?”, or words to that effect.

  10. Heard from CNN’s American Morning that this was some sort of political “reminder” to President Obama that he should be pursuing peace — which is a good thing. However, he’s only been there for nine months! And I don’t think lack of experience was the requirement of the Nobel Prize this year.

    Oh, and speaking of peace, he’s still leading a war in Afghanistan. Does anyone call that peaceful? Come on! It just seems as if those distinguished committee members aren’t being as smart as the rest of the world because they’ve gotten googly-eyed over him. Shame on them for acting so rashly.

  11. Peter says:

    Dear Fr Z, at the risk of raising your ire …

    It is the Nobel Peace prize.

    [levity alert] I know that there is a cross Atlantic battle between Her Majesty’s English and the American spelling of many words, but personal names [should] get the same treatmen in either dictionary ;-)

    And on a serious note, I for one in the Antipodes was shocked at this result. I’ve got noble (!) aspirations too, perhaps I can be nominated for a Nobel ?

  12. Relax. That’s what happens when you type on a phone that corrects spelling as you go.

  13. catholicmidwest says:

    Welcome to post-modernity. The Nobel Prize is no longer an award for doing something. Rather it’s an tool for stupid crazy little Sweden to try to run world opinion. However, it only works on the postmodern crowd who value words without action; bluster without reality.

    However, it doesn’t matter and I can prove it: Quick-Who won the prize for Chemistry in 2003 and what for? No fair looking it up. Don’t know, do ya? I’m a chemist & I don’t even know. That’s because it doesn’t matter anymore. The world has changed in a lot of ways.

    Sweden needs to be told to go back to its dog-sledding, ammonia-laced fish candy & lutefisk and behave like the little backwater country they are.

  14. Ellen says:

    I aspire to find the cure for cancer. Now where is my Nobel Prize – I deserve it as much as Obama.

    Actually, for me the prize was irrevocably tainted when Arafat won it and I no longer care.

  15. Yesterday I heard Bill Krystol suggest that the Nobel Committee was going to rethink the prize for Literature and give it instead to Sarah Palin because her new book will eventually have good sales.

  16. TNCath says:

    As for the cost of this trip, after the Europeans eventually catch on to the fact that this man is a phony who is unable to accomplish anything, the cost of embarrassment to the United States will outweigh any monetary expenditures.

    Moreover, the value of the Nobel Prize has plummeted, and the days of genuine, committed Catholics ever being considered for it are long gone. Nobel Peace Prize, requiescat in pace.

  17. EXCHIEF says:

    Ioannes
    I’m not exhausted as you are..but I am tired. Tired of the mockery this president and his administration are making of Catholic/Christian values and tired of his rejection of well over 200 years of the Judeo-Christian basis upon which this nation was founded. How does this “award” serve the nation’s best interests? What is the basis for this award? Certainly not any action this president has taken. To reward politically correct speeches, which Obama has made too many of, is to reward nothing. Had BO taken a firm stance on the oppression of Christians, women and the poor–occuring daily in dictatorships around the world–maybe. But he hasn’t. In fact he has done his best to downplay those abuses by giving positive recognition to the perpetrators. The list could go on and on. The man is not deserving of the office he holds much less the granting of an award which, by its being bestowed on him, is now even less meaningful than it was before.

  18. Henry Edwards says:

    Will Nobel Prize and Academy Award winner Al Gore comment on the carbon off-sets flying POTUS and all his stuff over there?

    If I understand correctly that these carbon off-sets provide a major source of personal enrichment for AlGore, then one might assume that he would at least offer publicly his thanks to everyone involved.

  19. Sedgwick says:

    Maybe this was a consolation prize for being rejected with the Olympics. But seriously, this “prize” has turned into another variant of the endless rounds of Hollywood awards, where all the narcissists gush over each other in recognition of their stupendous achievements. This variant has to do with international socialism/communism/Marxism/liberalism attempting to make itself more prestigious. Just think of it as a kind of credential incest.

  20. PJ says:

    Let’s not be surprised by this.

    It is not a prize to celebrate anything he has done; it is not a prize to reward him for anything positive.

    That would be silly.

    Rather, it is a prize to reward him for what he is not – or should I say, who he is not.

    It is the “congratulations on not being President Bush” prize.

    In the eyes of many people in Europe this is something worth rewarding.

  21. robtbrown says:

    How much will the trip cost?

    I was in Rome when the Clintons came c. 1993. The word was that the trip brought some 28 planes to Ciampino. That included fighter escorts and at least one cargo plane to carry the Presidential limo and other vehicles.

  22. PJ says:

    The Nobel Peace Prize 2009, to the tune of the Teddy Bears’ Picnic

    If you thought plaudits were scarce today,
    You’re sure of a big surprise;
    If you have lots of nice things to say,
    You could win a Nobel prize!
    For every speech that ever there was
    Could win a prize for certain because
    Today’s the day some platitudes won the peace prize.

    If anyone wants to improve on this then go ahead (there’s lots of room for improvement!). For a start, I think I’ve been a bit generous with the assertion that he has lots of “nice” things to say.

  23. at3p says:

    Actually, ashamed as I am to admit it, begin of Norwegian ancestry myself and not thinking very highly of the Swedes who dominated Norway for all too many centuries, the Nobel Prize Committee is Norwegian, not Swedish. The party is in Sweden, but the prize is given by Norwegians, as Nobel himself wanted it.

    And yes, this prize was given for “not being George Bush Sr. or Jr.” And it is really an attempt to influcence American government policy. I know that from agents in Oslo (not).

  24. Supertradmom says:

    Oh my goodness-a prize in order to influence US policy? This did cross my mind, as Obama would feel he has to live up to world expectations of him, as he is not the same type of set character as some other governmental leaders, who would be less swayed by public opinion. It seems to me that this ploy is not only inappropriate, but coming out of the belief in a world government which overtakes the sovereignty of individual nations.

    How sad that the Nobel Prize committee no longer sees itself as merely a group recognizing achievement, but as a manipulator of that which is out of its provenance. Unelected people, however, do seem to have an inordinate influence over Obama, whether here or abroad.

    Conspiracy theorists can have a hay-day with this, but, there seems to be a whiff of truth in what at3p is stating.

  25. Jane says:

    There is nothing noble about a Nobel Peace prize that is given to an abortion minded politician. At least they gave it to Mother Theresa once. She is the opposite to Obama. Her words are: the fruits of abortion are nuclear war.

    Note to President Obama and the committee awarding the Nobel Peace prize to him, there is no peace for an aborted baby.

    Losing the Olympics is nothing. I was really hoping that my city, Sydney would not be picked for it, but it was. Getting picked for World Youth Day was great, that is something you would want to get your city picked for.

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