President Obama Should Refuse the Nobel Prize

Winning the Nobel Peace Prize is likely to be more of a headache to President Obama than an honor. It reinforces the perception, held among many, that he is philosophically more European than American. And it's not hard to imagine the reaction should he decide to increase troop levels in Afghanistan - "Some advocate for peace!"

As a result, President Obama should refuse the Nobel Peace Prize. He should simply say, "I am honored and humbled by the decision of the Nobel Committee. But there are dozens, if not hundreds, of others who are far more deserving than I am." By doing so, he would reap the benefits (in terms of world opinion) of having been chosen for the award, but stymie critics by acting honorably and with humility and grace.

The Scots-Irish

An excellent analysis of the Scots-Irish vote by Cameron Joseph at The Atlantic:

The populist fury aimed at President Obama and his fellow Democrats may have roots much deeper than health care. In fact, it may be that it can be traced back to the emigration of the Scots-Irish, the first white group to settle interior America.They've been called rednecks, hillbillies and crackers. In the modern parlance of political correctness, they've been referred to as the Bubba vote. They live in Sarah Palin's "real America," and they make up the majority of Reagan Democrats. They count as distant relatives at least twelve U.S. presidents, from Andrew Jackson to Teddy Roosevelt and Ronald Reagan to Bill Clinton and even to Barack Obama, yet the Scots-Irish remain largely ignored as an ethnic group in America.