Shadow Government
Devaluing the prize
By Kori Schake It’s nice that the Nobel Committee wants to shower the president with approval — it’s a good thing for the United States — but it’s likely to remind Americans that the president is being rewarded for behaving in the world the way Europeans behave. It’s less clear to me that it will ...
By Kori Schake
It's nice that the Nobel Committee wants to shower the president with approval -- it's a good thing for the United States -- but it's likely to remind Americans that the president is being rewarded for behaving in the world the way Europeans behave.
It's less clear to me that it will improve the president's standing at home. I keep thinking of the comedian Tom Lehrer's explanation for why he stopped writing songs of biting political commentary: "When Henry Kissinger won the Nobel Peace Prize, political satire lost its meaning." That the president received the prize for just being rather than for any actual achievement is likely to devalue the prize.
By Kori Schake
It’s nice that the Nobel Committee wants to shower the president with approval — it’s a good thing for the United States — but it’s likely to remind Americans that the president is being rewarded for behaving in the world the way Europeans behave.
It’s less clear to me that it will improve the president’s standing at home. I keep thinking of the comedian Tom Lehrer’s explanation for why he stopped writing songs of biting political commentary: "When Henry Kissinger won the Nobel Peace Prize, political satire lost its meaning." That the president received the prize for just being rather than for any actual achievement is likely to devalue the prize.
Kori Schake is the director of foreign and defense policy at the American Enterprise Institute, a former U.S. government official in foreign and security policy, and the author of America vs the West: Can the Liberal World Order Be Preserved? Twitter: @KoriSchake
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