The prizefare theory, as enunciated by David Frum, says pacifist manipulation:
That Nobel was not a gesture of Obama-worship by left-leaning Norwegians. It was the very opposite: It was a pre-emptive strike against Obama, an attempt to neutralize him. How can a Peace Nobelist strike Iranian nuclear plants? Or wage a protracted war in Afghanistan? Or tell the Palestinians, “Sorry, that’s the best offer, take it or leave it”? The hope of course is that he cannot.
RealClearWorld’s Kevin Sullivan dissents :
While that may have been the committee’s intention, I don’t know that their track record validates such a strategy. To my recollection, the 1906 award didn’t alter President Roosevelt’s strong-arm policy toward Nicaragua regarding the Panama Canal. Same goes for President Wilson.
Did the Nobel Prize change Kissinger? Not really. How about that champion of peace, Yasser Arafat? Enough said.
Really? A Kissinger or an Arafat may be immune to the Nobel’s charms, but it’s hard to imagine a committed liberal internationalist like Obama not feeling some obligation to “earn” the prize that he claimed he didn’t deserve in his acceptance speech.
Update: Conservatives still grinning about it at the end of the day.
As funny as all the goofs today are, I feel some sympathy for him insofar as he didn’t campaign for this the way he did for the Olympics…The Nobel is more like a flaming bag of sh*t left on his doorstep: He didn’t ask for it but now he has to deal with it, and no matter what he does he ends up a bit soiled.
Yep, there is no way this could have helped him.
Except, of course, if he’d rejected it.