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Warren: Bush’s ‘Peace Award Was Not About Peace’

Earlier this week, Pastor Rick Warren presented President Bush with the first International Medal of PEACE from the Global PEACE Coalition for his work on the global HIV/AIDS crisis. During the award ceremony, Warren ignored the obvious irony of presenting a man who started two wars with a peace award. Last night on Fox’s Hannity and Colmes, however, co-host Alan Colmes asked Warren to comment on that irony. Warren explained simply that Bush’s “peace award as not about peace”:

COLMES: But to give a peace award to a guy who started two wars…neither of which are completed yet. […]

WARREN: Well, the Peace Award was not about peace in domestic — or foreign policy.

Sean Hannity, in contrast, failed to see anything wrong with presenting a peace award to Bush. Rather, Hannity suggested that Bush was promoting peace by attempting to “defeat evil.” Watch it:

According to a press release from the organization, however, the award was given in recognition of an “outstanding contribution toward alleviating the five global giants recognized by the Coalition including pandemic diseases, extreme poverty, illiteracy, self-centered leadership and spiritual emptiness.” The Coalition introduced its “P.E.A.C.E. plan” as a means to reduce the five “global giants.” The first tenet of that plan is to “promote reconciliation,” which cites the problem of international “war” and “conflict” specifically:

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As Colmes acknowledged, Bush’s attention to the global HIV/AIDS crisis is admirable, but to ignore his obvious disruptions of international peace and security diminishes the efforts of the Global PEACE Coalition.

Update:

Matt Duss in the Wonk Room notes that later in the interview Warren proclaims that stopping evil “is the legitimate role of government.”