For some people, Obama’s Nobel Peace Prize will never be as good as the one Bush deserved after invading Iraq.
There was an incredible amount of commentary on the event in the punditocracy today. Look at Memorandum and be amazed. Josh Marshall gathered up the sleaziest and Andrew Sullivan looked for the most witty.
I Twittered a little bit about it, as you can read on the right hand column of my feed.
I had a personal reaction to news he won the prize: I felt like all of us had won it by turning our backs on the past four years of the neocons. It’s a big reason why I voted for him.
You had to know that his election with his proletarian background and Muslim name would make the world see us as more grown up and less like trigger happy cowboys. People who care about peace worldwide must have breathed a sigh of relief at his election. Think about it. He may not yet have ended the two wars he was handled, but he’s darn less likely to start any elective wars and that must seem like a blessing from Norway’s point of view.

The congnitive dissonence of being a patriotic Republican who thinks America losing the Olympics is a good thing and an American president selected as Nobel Peace Laureate is a bad thing. My country, right or wrong. My country over party. Boom! Heads explode.
Watching little internet snippits of Fox commentators has amused the hell out of me.
But, I couldn’t help but notice that the putative grown ups in the GOP, the elected officials, kept it short and gracious.
And, last week, Bob Dole and Bill Frist endorsed Obamacare.
I think someone is starting to read the right polling.
I think the American people have lost their taste for abortion, gays and guns because they think war, the economy and health care is more important. I don’t think most of us have time to worry about the birthers and racist blather from the fringes.
I’m proud of us and I hope we do more and more to earn the honor, it’s a task that can’t be completed, as it should be.
Blogblah

P.S. I loved this from the Obama State Department. Don’t mess with Hillary.

10.09.09 — 6:37PM

Snarking It Up In Foggy Bottom
A State Department spokesperson, commenting on the Obama’s Nobel:

Certainly from our standpoint, this gives us a sense of momentum — when the United States has accolades tossed its way, rather than shoes.

Rimshot, please.

–David Kurtz