John McWhorter  John McWhorter  10/09/2009 @ 12:17PM  Nobel
Laureate 'Not-Bush'  Is the Nobel Peace Prize an award or a
gesture?  A Nobel Peace Prize given to President Obama cannot,
for all that I wish him well, qualify as an award.  He made a
lovely speech to the Muslim world in Cairo, and he was behind
the United Nations Security Council’s summit on nuclear weapons.
But in the nine months the man has been in office, these things
have yet to bear fruit. That’s no knock on Obama–there just
hasn’t been time.  Asif Zardari has about as much control over
war-makers in Pakistan as I do. The Israel-Palestine conflict is
essentially stalled as always. The Revolutionary Guard
essentially run Iran, while the meaning of their olive branch
kabuki moves of late–allowing nuclear inspections and having
U.N. delegates meet with American ones–could easily lead to
little more.  Plus, the president is mulling the sending of
additional troops to Afghanistan. A few years ago when I gave a
talk in, as a matter of fact, Norway,