Here's something worth noting. Aging Cuban dictator Fidel Castro said something that actually made sense.

Reacting to the bizarre awarding of the Nobel Peace Prince to neophyte U.S. President Barrack Obama, Castro said it wasn't really in recognition of anything that Obama has done but was more of a repudiation for his predecessor George W. Bush.

As mean-spirited and counterproductive as that motivation is, it's really the only thing that does help to explain it.

Obama may or may not end up being a terrific president. Who knows? He certainly gives good speeches, but beyond that he hasn't done much.

To be fair, he's only been president for nine months, so a reasonable person - or even an unreasonable one - can't really expect him to have wracked up a string of significant advances.

But it's hardly a state secret that the European elite - and the Canadian elite too - hated Bush with a passion. Next to Michelle Obama herself, the European leaders were probably the happiest people on earth when Obama managed to get himself elected and when Bush exited the White House and headed back to his Texas ranch.

Whether Bush really deserved such widespread animosity is, at least in this space, still open to debate.

He certainly made mistakes, but then who doesn't?

But on the other hand even the things he did right - take his record of helping to fight AIDS in Africa, for example - were rarely if ever acknowledged by the hostile media.

But we can argue the merits and demerits of Bush another day.

This is about Obama who, despite speech after speech demonizing Bush and his foreign policies, seems to be walking down the same path.

Remember all those promises about getting American troops out of Iraq and closing Guantanamo Bay?

Well, so far at least, they're empty promises. As for Afghanistan, Obama has overseen a U.S.. military which is getting deeper and deeper into that war-torn country.

The Nobel committee says it gave Obama the award because "He has created a new international climate."

Oh yes, and he has also "captured the world's attention and given its people hope for a better future."

And just how, exactly, has Obama done this?

By making fancy speeches.

By adopting fashionable stances which please the European and Canadian U.S. haters - not to mention the bureaucrats at the United Nations, to whom Obama has also dispatched kind words - Obama has apparently made the world want to gather in a giant hug and live happily ever after.

Mind you, he hasn't done anything to calm things down in the Middle East. Iran is still Iran.

In Asia, North Korea is still North Korea.

And - with the one exception of Sri Lanka, which had nothing to do with Obama or the U.S. - in every part of the globe where wars were underway when Bush was president they are still going on. In some cases, particularly the aforementioned Afghanistan, they have escalated.

And he wins the Nobel "Peace" prize? Really, it's a sham.

Mind you, the Nobel gang are the same people who felt that Yassar Arafat and Jimmy Carter - arguably the most pathetic president in U.S. history - deserved the "peace" prize, despite the fact that no "peace" actually broke out as a result of either of these men holding meetings, signing pacts and giving glowing speeches.

So it's not without precedent that somebody who hasn't accomplished anything worthwhile would get the prize.

In some ways, it's actually a bit unfair to Obama to put him in this position.

Fact is, he could have recognized the absurdity of it himself and refused the prize, but he too opted for the glory even though he must know in his heart that he doesn't deserve it.

Not yet anyway.

Even if they awarded Obama the prize for what he may do in the future - although that's not supposed to be the reason someone gets it - a person could argue that the current president has a lot of potential and may end up being great.

But that's not why they did it says Nobel Committee boss Thorbjoen Jagland.

"We are not awarding the prize for what may happen in the future., but for what (Obama) has done in the previous year."

Which is - exactly - what?