Eric Owens of the Daily Caller reports on an interesting development involving the folks who hand out Nobel Prizes.
The Nobel Peace Prize committee demoted chairman Thorbjoern Jagland on Tuesday.
The Oslo, Norway-based committee gave no reason for downgrading the former Norwegian prime minister and respected diplomat from his perch.
At the same time, as German media conglomerate Deutsche Welle observes, Jagland was widely condemned in 2009 when his committee bestowed the prestigious award on then-newly elected President Barack Obama.
Jagland, 64, was serving his first year as Peace Prize chairman when his committee conferred the international award upon Obama for his “extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples.”
The committee announced that Obama would receive the award in October 2009, just over eight months after he became president.
In response to a barrage of criticism, Jagland proclaimed that the Nobel committee’s goal was to hail Obama’s oratory about removing nuclear weapons from the world. Jagland also said he hoped to symbolize “the spirit of the times, the needs of the era,” according to Deutsche Welle. …
… Jagland’s ejection from the chairmanship marks the first time that a sitting Nobel Peace Prize committee boss has been demoted in the history of the prize — since 1901.
