Sunday, November 1, 2009

Obama? Peace Prize? Who? did What?

If Obama thinks he's now under pressure to prove that he is worthy of his not-so-hard-earned prize, he should come and talk to me!

October 4th I woke up to a buzz coming from every little gadget in my house. TV was on, smses were flooding in and so were a few early calls. Who? did What? Where? I tried to understand what was going on with groggy eyes and a dry throat itching for it's first taste of hot coffee.

The mood coming in was quite unanimous. But unlike the foreboding gloom that permeated all my airways right after 9/11, my callers (well maybe not the TV anchor who gleamed with patriotic pride) were laughing. Obama won the Nobel peace prize.

OK, So????

Everyone expected an answer, an intelligent one. They all wanted to know what I thought.
And the pressure was on....
I went straight to the papers, then to the blogs, then to my politically savvy husband hoping I can borrow an intellectually fitting opinion. But I found none...

Almost a month later, the pressure hasn't wained and neither has my non-challence.

I read an interesting post by a blogger who was in Jordan at the time. He said people were ambivalent. They like America's new president but they feel that the prize was premature. Not that he doesn't deserve it, especially if good intentions count. But people in Amman were "baffled". Palestinians/Israelis are still viciously fighting. American youth is slowly withering in Iraqi deserts and Afghan caves and judging from all the GREEN talk these days, in a few years we will all be dead meat anyway.
http://lynch.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2009/10/10/jordanian_takes_on_the_obama_peace_prize
But in another place I read that in a few short months, Obama managed to yield Iranians to international power and that- by international standards, seems to be a great leap forward towards peace!

Really... Who am I to judge whether he deserves it or not? And why should I care so much? if any at all?

I just put a fresh disposable diaper on my daughter's little butt and for a split second I thought, would that be the final straw that tips the balance and lead my whole world prematurely to doom??? I waited there in dread...

Thankfully, it hasn't. And though more conscious about the environment today than I was before I came to the US two months ago, I'm not willing to give up on baby diapers yet.

3 comments:

  1. You'd think we could take all of those disposable baby diapers and use them in some arm of the military. I know it drives most civilian men out of the room, imagine if we used them for evil!

    I think Obama has a very hard job and I get a bit misty when I think of all the optimism and sense of renewed hope we felt when he came into office. I hope he will look at this Peace Prize as a promise... a way to live up to his potential.

    ReplyDelete
  2. That's a fabulous idea. Drop dirty diapers instead of bombs! As for Obama and the Peace Prize I don't have a clear opinion. I think he has accomplished a great deal, becoming President as a Black man, with a Moslem name to boot, shifting the U.S. approach form cowboy to collaborator, even admitting to some of this nation's ill behavior in the past (putting it mildly), but in terms of accomplishing change in any of the hot conflicts in the world, he is not yet a Nelson Mandela or Desmond Tutu.
    thandiwe

    ReplyDelete
  3. I think that in some ways, he is being rewarded for being an honorable man who was elected by playing fair and not lowering himself into the muck of politics as usual (although he may have disappointed some people who voted for him). He's being rewarded for not being bush (or palin). America is also being rewarded for voting for him.

    ReplyDelete