Awarding Nobel Peace Prize to Obama was premature

The Nobel Peace Prize just awarded to Obama is premature. No offence to the president, whose efforts and goals in foreign policy are truly praiseworthy, but he has only been in office for 8 1/2 months. In that short a timeframe, no president can achieve a substantial body of work, especially in the slow world of international affairs. While he did work hard to bring countries together in political issues such as Iran, and global issues such as climate change, thus far the results are still forthcoming and much can change in the upcoming year. Additionally, some credit must also be given to former president George W. Bush, whose policies in his later years paved way for what Obama has recently accomplished, such as more multilateral approaches toward belligerent nations. Given the eminence of the Nobel Prize and its traditional recognition of substantial accomplishments, I believe that the Nobel Committee made a poor decision in recognizing Obama.

I would like to congratulate a Penn Alum, C'55, George Smith for his Nobel Prize in Physics! Read about it here in the Penn Current.