Surprise Award

Surprise Award Provokes Mixed Feelings President Barack Obama won the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize on October 9th. The award has brought immense attention to the modest President. This is an immense accomplishment for Barack Obama as well as for anyone who is privilege enough to win such an award. The argument throughout this article is if Obama is truly justified in winning the Nobel Peace Prize. Scott Wilson does an impressive job of creating an argument within his writing. Both sides are expressed with claims, grounds for the claims, warrants that act as an inferential leap, and some backings to give even more support. The Nobel Peace prize is awarded to individuals who exhibit a pursuit for peace in the world, the recipient has the interest of tranquility in mind for all the world, Barack Obama, his actions, and his critics will be analyzed to see if he is worthy of such an award.

President Barack Obama is only the third sitting President to win the Nobel Peace Prize. During his campaign for presidency, Obama claimed to provoke change and be different than the old administration of George W. Bush. “The Norwegian Nobel Committee praised the President’s cooperative approach to global issues.” The warrant for that ground is simply Obama clearly rebukes the Bush administration’s aversion to Harrington2 international organizations and treaties. The past eight years the world could count on the United States to not make a lot of international moves towards issues involving other nations. The United States might have entered the country without the permission of the government, but we would not sit down and talk about solutions to global problems. Barack Obama is about a different philosophy.

The prize comes after Obama has been in office for less than nine months, the claim is that Obama has not been in office long enough to receive such an award. The grounds for this claim are that the two previous sitting U.S. Presidents who won the prize did so in their second terms in office. “Theodore Roosevelt won in 1906 for his role in ending the Russo-Japanese war, and Woodrow Wilson won in 1919 for founding the League of Nations and helping frame the post-World War I peace.” President Obama is also faced with critics grilling him on his thought about possibly sending an additional 40,000 combat troops to Afghanistan. This can potentially expose him to criticism that he is not measuring up to the embodied principles of the award.

A claim has been made that Barack Obama is too inexperienced to get the Nobel Peace Prize. One grounds for this claim is that he selected from two hundred and five nominees which inflamed U.S. conservatives and drew criticism abroad across a political spectrum. The warrant is that the spectrum ranges from the Afghan insurgents that Obama is fighting, to Israeli hawks he is trying to bring to the peace table with

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Palestinians. Critics say that such a move should have been detrimental to him getting the award.

Obama claims that he does not view the award as an affirmation of his accomplishments. Obama said, “to be honest, I do not feel that I deserve to be in the company of so many of the transformative figures who’ve been honored by this prize—men and women who have inspired me and inspired the entire world through their courageous pursuit of peace” This warrants the claim stated by Obama. Barack uses one of Aristotle’s proof. Pathos is used to illustrate an emotional appeal to the values of the award. And yet, he said: he knew that the “Noble Peace Prize has not just been used to honor specific achievement. It’s also been used as a means to give momentum to a set of causes.” The enthymeme is that he knows concretely not enough has been done to get the award. There is particularly strong backing for support of this warrant. The backing also acts as secondary grounds. “Obama is pushing to restart Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations, stop Iran’s nuclear enrichment program, pass legislation to slow global warming, and strengthen international nuclear nonproliferation protocols—all of which require broad international cooperation.”

Critics claim that in some respects, the prize could make his approach more difficult on issues as diverse as climate change and Afghanistan. Grounds for this argument are that Obama has largely failed to secure significant new resources from NATO allies. The warrant supports the idea that it has been eight years into the war and Harrington4 still no significant new resources have been brought between NATO allies and the United States of America. Decisions might become complicated because of this exacting standard.

Obama advisers claim that his foreign policy as based on “mutual interest and mutual respect,” and on the idea that global diplomacy functions on the principle of “rights and responsibilities” of a sovereign nations. Evidence of this is the speech Obama gave in Prague. “The speech in Prague was one of four major addresses this year in which he has discussed those themes.” This argument shows great support for why Barack Obama could possible be worthy of the Nobel Peace Prize. Obama’s warrant for his advisers claim was that he was “well aware of the expectations that accompany my presidency around the world.” Thus Obama is putting the burden of responsibility on himself for obtaining peace wherever he can in the world.

Roshanak Wardak, a member of parliament from Wardark province claims that the Americans are killing 75 Pashtuns a day in Afghanistan. Therefore he is saying why would the Norwegian Nobel Committee give a prize to Obama? His warrant is that he feels as though Obama should be called a criminal. The extent of domestic opposition to the choice suggested an antipathy that could undermine his ability to carry out some of his most ambitious foreign policy goals.

Harrington5 Michael S. Steele, chairman of the Republican National Committee claims that “it is unfortunate that eh President’s star power has outshined tireless advocates who have made real achievements working towards peace and human rights.” The grounds for such a blasting statement like that is the work Obama has done for the nation. Steele goes on to say, “President Obama won’t be receiving any awards from Americans for job creation, fiscal responsibility, or backing up rhetoric with concrete action.” One can argue a statement like this is warranted because reactions around the world appeared to be swift much like Steele. For the most part the nation is supporting the idea that Obama has not even been in office for more than a year, thus making Barack not deserving.

In my final analysis of this article I can conclude that the Norwegian Nobel Committee seems to have been saying, in the last eight years the United States has not had strong leadership in regards to peace. Thus, they saw President Barack Obama as an inspiration of hope for peace and unification in the world. President Barack Obama deserved the Nobel Peace Prize for the works that he has in proposal, as well as the vast things he has already accomplished.

Reference:
Wilson, Scott. “Nobel for Obama Brings Praise, Ire.” The Washington Post 10 Oct. 2009: www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/10/09/AR2009100900914.html