Barack Obama's peace prize starts a fight Catherine Philp, Diplomatic Correspondent 234 CommentsRecommend? (145) Gasps echoed through the Nobel Hall in Oslo yesterday as Barack Obama was unveiled as the winner of the 2009 Peace Prize, sparking a global outpouring of incredulity and praise in unequal measure. Mr Obama was sound asleep in the White House when the Norwegian Nobel Committee made the shock announcement. It said that he was being honoured for his “extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and co-operation between peoples”. In a clear swipe at his predecessor, George W. Bush, the committee praised the “change in the international climate” that the President had brought, along with his cherished goal of ridding the world of nuclear weapons. “Only very rarely has a person to the same extent as Obama captured the world's attention and given its people hope for a better future,” it added. Expert View Scrap the Nobel Peace Prize. It’s an embarrassment and even an impediment to peace Bronwen Maddox Related LinksPrize fools America incredulous over Obama’s Nobel Prize Why Obama should have refused the Nobel Prize International reaction ranged from delight to disbelief. The former winners Kofi Annan and Desmond Tutu voiced praise, the latter lauding the Nobel Committee’s “surprising but imaginative choice”. But Lech Walesa, the dissident turned Polish President, who won the Peace Prize in 1983, spoke for many, declaring: “So soon? Too early. He has no contribution so far.” Mr Obama’s domestic critics leapt on the award as evidence of foreigners fawning over an untested “celebrity” leader. Rush Limbaugh, the US right-wing commentator, said: “This fully exposes the illusion that is Barack Obama." Speaking later, Mr Obama said that he was “surprised and deeply humbled” by the unexpected decision and…

 Obama's WarU.S. officials say Pakistani spy agency released Afghan Taliban insurgents
By Greg Miller
Washington Post Staff Writer
 The recent capture of the Afghan Taliban's second in command seemed to signal a turning point in Pakistan, an indication that its intelligence agency had gone from helping to cracking down on the militant Islamist group. But U.S. officials now believe that even as Pakistan's security forces worked with their American counterparts to detain Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar and other insurgents, the country's Inter-Services Intelligence directorate, or ISI, quietly freed at least two senior Afghan Taliban figures it had captured on its own. U.S. military and intelligence officials said the releases, detected by American spy agencies but not publicly disclosed, are evidence that parts of Pakistan's security establishment continue to support the Afghan Taliban. This assistance underscores how complicated the CIA-ISI relationship remains at a time when the United States and Pakistan are battling insurgencies that straddle the Afghanistan border and are increasingly anxious about how the war in that country will end. The officials spoke on the condition of anonymity and declined to identify the Taliban figures who were released, citing the secrecy surrounding U.S. monitoring of the ISI. But officials said the freed captives were high-ranking Taliban members and would have been recognizable as insurgents the United States would want in custody. The capture of Baradar was "positive, any way you slice it," said a U.S. counterterrorism official. "But it doesn't mean they've cut ties at every level to each and every group." Initial reports said the arrest was made in February, but U.S. officials say that it occurred in late January. U.S. officials think that Pakistan continues to pursue a hedging strategy in seeking to maintain relationships with an array of entities -- including the U.S. and…

  Huckabee commuted sentence of suspect in Washington police slayings By Garance Franke-Ruta
Former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee started Sunday morning by dialing back expectations about his political future, but by evening, it was his past that was at issue when the Seattle Times broke news that the suspect in the slaying of four police officers in a Seattle suburb was a former Arkansas resident who had had his sentence commuted by Huckabee and who was wanted on an outstanding Arkansas warrant.In response to the revelations, Huckabee released a statement seeking to cast some of the responsibility onto the parole board that freed the man, 37-year-old Maurice Clemmons, and the criminal justice system that repeatedly failed to properly handle the convicted felon. Said Huckabee:The senseless and savage execution of police officers in Washington State has saddened the nation, and early reports indicate that a person of interest is a repeat offender who once lived in Arkansas and was wanted on outstanding warrants here and Washington State. The murder of any individual is profound tragedy, but the murder of a police officer is the worst of all murders in that it is an assault on every citizen and the laws we live within. Should he be found to be responsible for this horrible tragedy, it will be the result of a series of failures in the criminal justice system in both Arkansas and Washington State. He was recommended for and received a commutation of his original sentence from 1990, making him parole eligible and was paroled by the parole board once they determined he met the conditions at that time. He was arrested later for parole violation and taken back to prison to serve his full term, but prosecutors dropped the charges that would have held him. It appears that…

 “I think Northern Californians are generally more informed voters,” Mr. Merksamer said in an interview. “The people in Southern California are far more remote. Northern Californians historically have been viewed by political professionals as more cognizant of the issues.” Translation: white papers for the north; 30-second television ads in the south.