My Dutch colleague Dr. Stan Veuger is often entertaining. Here, he discusses some likely candidates — by his estimation — for this year’s Nobel Peace Prize.

The most obvious candidate this year is the World Health Organization, for failing to prevent or control the outbreak of Ebola in West Africa. Its claim to the prize is strong: much like the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons won it last year after the Syrian Assad regime used chemical weapons against its own population, it has been prominently in the news for not accomplishing its goals.
But there are other serious contenders: President Obama, for example, for ending the war in Iraq, especially now that he has not won the Nobel Prize in Literature for his series of autobiographies, Russian president Vladimir Putin, for bringing stability to Syria and Ukraine, or Pope Francis, for sounding more liberal than his predecessors.

Whom does he think will win? Click here to find out.

— Michael R. Strain is a resident scholar and economist at the American Enterprise Institute. You can write to him on Twitter at twitter.com/MichaelRStrain.