Nobel’s prize
Members of the Nobel Peace Prize committee must have missed last week’s “Saturday Night Live” skit in which an actor playing President Barack Obama ticked off a long laundry list of non-achievements. No worries. The Nobel people awarded Obama the prize anyway, suggesting it was more for what Obama promises for the world than anything he’s achieved. It’s the only plausible rationale, because the Nobel application deadline came less than two weeks after Obama took office. Nobel’s highest-profile prize is its most political and often serves as a platform for its left-leaning views. “It’s the committee’s preaching to America — this is the way to go,” former United Nations Ambassador John Bolton told Fox News. The White House didn’t try to hide the fact it was caught completely off guard. Hours later, Obama offered humble remarks, saying he didn’t consider himself as worthy as other past winners. Still, not bad for a fledgling presidency more noted for flowery speeches than concrete accomplishments, which prompted one Web wag to ask, “What’s next? The American League Cy Young Award?” Funny.
Called third strike
Is it really all that surprising that Iran has had another nuclear fuel processing plant covertly under construction for years? Shouldn’t be. Iran’s nuclear intentions have been pretty thinly veiled. Still, President Barack Obama, France’s Nicolas Sarkozy and Great Britain’s Gordon Brown sounded dismayed as they accused the Iranians of cheating on international nuclear protocols for at least the third time.
The allies have known about the site for years but waited to publicly challenge Iran until after the Iranians tried to pretend the facility was a “pilot” project in a recent letter to the International Atomic Energy Agency. The leaders sounded tough but stopped short of threatening Iran with anything more than more economic sanctions if it doesn’t abandon its nuclear weapons ambitions. An Iranian official shrugged off more sanctions, telling Fox News that Iran has coped with sanctions for 30 years and will continue to do so.
So, there’s another line in the sand for Iran. Past usually is prologue, which means the Iranians probably won’t hesitate to call the world’s latest bluff.
The Bear’s growl
The Obama administration’s decision to cancel planned missile defense installations in Poland and the Czech Republic has opened a hot debate. Officials told The New York Times the administration no longer believes radar and interceptor sites promised the two U.S. allies are needed because the chief missile threat, Iran, is thought to be concentrating its efforts on medium-range weapons instead of long-range ones. Critics say the administration simply caved in to the Russians, who claimed they would be threatened by a defensive system — even though the planned installations would not have deterred an arsenal the size of Russia’s. “This is bad news for all who care about the U.S. commitment to the transatlantic alliance and the defense of Europe as well as the United States,” writes analyst Nile Gardiner in the London Telegraph. “It represents the appalling appeasement of Russian aggression and a willingness to sacrifice American allies on the altar of political expediency. A deal with the Russians to cancel missile defense installations sends a clear message that even Washington can be intimidated by the Russian bear.”
