Oh man, I’m almost afraid to say this.

Ok, here we go.

*deep breath*

I am…in agreement…with the Republicans…on Barack Obama’s winning the Nobel Peace Prize.

*shudder*

Sorry.

But really, it does seem a little premature. So far, aside from the achievement of restoring international respect to the office of US President, Obama has done very little to aid or to damage world peace. The only examples on either side of the fence I can think of are the closing of the Guantanamo Bay prison and the escalation of the war in Afghanistan.

His greatest contribution to getting the prize seems to be not being George W. Bush (a tweet is going around at the moment that reads “All of the world’s population to be rewarded with Nobel Peace Prize in 2010 because we’re not George W Bush either.” (via @loveandgarbage), and it should be remembered that Bush had started a war by this stage of his first term.

It’s true, as the awarding committee has said, that he possesses a “vision of and work for a world without nuclear weapons,” which is both noteworthy and good, and that

Obama has as President created a new climate in international politics. Multilateral diplomacy has regained a central position, with emphasis on the role that the United Nations and other international institutions can play. Dialogue and negotiations are preferred as instruments for resolving even the most difficult international conflicts

but this was largely true in the pre-Bush era as well.

I don’t really think that a strong case can be made for Barack Obama deserving a Nobel Peace Prize. At least not yet. I think that his ideals are certainly inclined in the direction of world peace, and he clearly has made diplomacy the most important cause of his international relations, but – aside from talk about it – he hasn’t really done anything yet. He’s only been in office for nine months.

I think he should turn the prize down at this juncture. Perhaps he will receive it again at a more deserving future juncture.

Perhaps also, the Nobel committee are merely trying to avoid another incident like Jimmy Carter’s award, which he received decades after he earned it, or merely demonstrate that the international community cannot afford another Bush-esque catastrophe, no matter how much the Palinites want one.