Obama Wins Nobel Prize for Optimism: Today's Outrage

NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- President Obama won the Nobel Prize for Optimism -- er, I mean the Nobel Peace Prize.

In announcing its surprise pick (Obama's name really hadn't come up as a contender), the Nobel committee said that Obama is giving people "hope for a better future."

That puts the freshly inaugurated leader of the U.S. in the same company as Woodrow Wilson and Theodore Roosevelt, the only other sitting presidents to receive the award. Former President Jimmy Carter won the Peace Prize for his peace brokering and humanitarian efforts after he left office.

Some have already argued that the choice is a bit premature since Obama hasn't even completed his first year in office, but the Nobel committee defended its choice, saying the award is based on his work over the past year to improve "international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples."

The Nobel pickers also cited Obama's stance on reducing nuclear arsenals around the world and a willingness to allow the United Nations and other international institutions to play a bigger role on the global stage.

In other words, Obama is willing to play nice with the rest of the world. We all know how much the Nobel Prize committee disliked former President George W. Bush after its public criticism of his unilateral military actions, so it seems that Obama won on the merits of not being Bush.

The committee made no secret of the fact that it hopes to provide support for what Obama is trying to accomplish. The rules of the award apparently don't preclude political bias.