Barack, We Hardly Know You

After John F. Kennedy was assassinated after the fabled 1000 days, the refrain was, Johnny, we hardly knew ye. It appears that in retrospect, he was in office forever.

Barack Obama, whose accomplishments in the field of international peace include delaying his promised troop withdrawal from Iraq, sending additional fighting forces to Afghanistan, NOT closing the U. S. prison in Guantanamo, supporting most of the PATRIOT Act, shaking hands with Hugo Chavez, and bowing before the ruler of Saudi Arabia (that noted human rights haven) has been named as the recipient of the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize.

Mr. Obama's other peaceful accomplishments include dropping missiles upon buildings and villages in a country with which we are at peace, Pakistan, killing civilians and "militants" alike.

It used to be that one actually had to accomplish something to receive a Nobel Peace Prize.

Even though it is arguable that fighting for the scientific cause that burning fossil fuels is causing and will cause significant and dangerous warming of the planet deserves a Peace Prize rather than simply being a "Good Thing" (depending on your point of view), at least Al Gore's 2007 Nobel Peace Prize came after many years of effective advocacy for his cause.

The Nobel Committee has now shown itself to be a full partner with the left wing of America. It is encouraging us to Europe's Middle Way, not that we are not there already. Investors may want to consider the business and financial ramifications of the transparent efforts by foreigners to shape U. S. internal and external behavior.

Barack Obama gave a speech to the U. N. in September. In that speech, he asserted wrongly that he had been in office 9 months. Actually, he had been in office exactly 8 months. He is now in the third week of his ninth month of his Presidency. A Peace Prize after less time in office than a full-term pregnancy?

Personally, I think that Ronald Reagan or George Herbert Walker Bush would have been more appropriate recipients of the Nobel Peace Prize for working with a worldwide coalition to bring democracy to Eastern Europe and death to the Soviet Union--peacefully-- than a president who we hardly know and who hasn't even "done healthcare" yet.

Or, pre-Iraq War, what about a 2001 Peace Prize for George Walker Bush, who responded to the 9/11 attacks by leading a global coalition to organize against al-Qaeda and who partnered with the remnants of the Afghanistan opposition to drive the Taliban out of power?

This is not a decision that moves markets on a minute-t0-minute basis. But it may be more significant than changes in inventory levels of finished or raw goods, as we are in a highly political age, where governments have been intervening in financial markets and economies of late.

This decision fits the Econblog Review theme that caution in the financial markets is the best strategy for now when more and more things just don't make sense, such as a liberal columnist defending Roman Polanski with the argument that when he raped a 13-year old, it wasn't really rape because she really wasn't a child because for some reason one magically ceased to be a child when in Hollywood, or Barack Obama rewarding Big Finance after it helped to create a worldwide economic depression.

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