Tag Archives: Osama Bin Laden
An Average CEO At America's Big Corporations Earns 200 Times The Salary Of A Navy SEAL
Uh, who do you think is worth $11mm a year?
I'd vote for the Navy Seals if I had to vote for anyone….
This pay thing differential thing is really getting obscene….
After the killing of Osama Bin Laden at a compound in a suburb of Islamabad, Pakistan, much of the nation's focus has turned to the men in our military who were responsible for the raid. The combat team that attacked Bin Laden's compound was composed of an elite unit of Navy SEALS.
As economist Dean Baker points out, ABC News did a feature story about the SEALs to highlight the sacrifices those enlisted in the unit make. ABC compared their base salaries of $54,000 a year to the average annual salary for teachers. Baker notes that perhaps their salaries should be compared to Wall Street CEOs who earn tens of millions of dollars:
In the wake of their successful assault on Osama Bin Laden's hideout, ABC News did a short feature on the Navy Seals. The report tells us that the people who hold this highly demanding and dangerous get paid about $54,000 a year. It then adds that:
"The base salary level [of Navy Seals] is comparable to the average annual salary for teachers in the U.S., which was $55,350 for the 2009-2010 school year, according to the Digest of Education Statistics.' That is one possible comparison. There are other possible reference points. For example, the CEOs of Goldman Sachs and J.P. Morgan both pocket around $20 million a year.
Baker's query poses an interesting question. What would the numbers look like if the base salary of a Navy SEAL — who risk their very lives in their day-to-day work — was compared to the compensation of the CEOs of some of America's wealthiest corporations? Data from the AFL-CIO's Executive Pay Watch finds that the average 2010 CEO compensation at an S&P 500 company was $11,358,445…
It's important to note that the gap between executive compensation and average worker compensation has exploded over the past few decades. CEOs at America's largest companies now earn 343 times more than the typical worker. In 1970, the average CEO earned 28 times as much as the typical worker.
via ThinkProgress » GRAPH: An Average CEO At America's Big Corporations Earns 200 Times The Salary Of A Navy SEAL.
Filed under Politics, The Economy
Tagged as Navy Seals, Osama Bin Laden, politics, The Economy, The Military
How Osama Bin Laden Changed Us…
Just as Hitler had an impact, so did Bin Laden….
I'm very glad he's gone.
My biggest regret is how we let him change us.
Some of that is due to the fact that George W Bush was President when 9/11 happened. His cowboy mentality put us on the road to a police state and changed both the way the U.S. government operated and how it was perceived…..
He used our fear to drive political goals…
I'll never forget how everyone in the world was an American on Sept 12th, 2001. And how belligerence and posturing destroyed that feeling of unity.
The way Bush handled the horror that Bin Laden unleashed blew our chances at unity as a country and with the rest of the world…
I just wish we, as a Nation, could have faced the challenges driven by Osama Bin Laden's hate and horror with a little more intelligence and a little less fear-driven bravado…
We could have built a better country and a better world…
I'm afraid, in some ways, Bin Laden ultimately won.
In many ways, he made us change into something less than what we were before September 11, 2001….
Maybe with his death we can put aside the fear and start to look at the world with hope and unity again.
Maybe now we can start to remember what it used to mean to be an American- to be against hate and torture and for equality and justice.
But I'm not optimistic…
From the Kansas City Star:
Without him, there would probably be no Department of Homeland Security, no Patriot Act, no Qur'an-burning pastors.
Had Osama bin Laden never been born, there would surely be fewer memorials to slain firefighters, less need for prosthetic limbs for young troops, an American public still largely ignorant of the Muslim notion of martyrdom.
Our military probably would still be more interested in tanks and aircraft carriers, less wary of roadside bombs and suicide belts. The development of killer robot planes might not have come so far. The need to deal with asymmetric threats — battling an army not of battalions but of insurgents — would not be so pressing.
And America would certainly be a country with far fewer long-fading yellow ribbons.
The man who came to symbolize a bloody rejection of all things U.S. left a legacy among those he hated, and those he inspired to hate them. Little wonder that his demise brought so little sympathy.
"In the past few years, (bin Laden's) main military triumphs have been against such targets as Afghan schoolgirls, Shiite Muslim civilians, and defenseless synagogues in Tunisia and Turkey," wrote pundit Christopher Hitchens on news of bin Laden's death and dumping at sea. "Has there ever been a more contemptible leader from behind, or a commander who authorized more blanket death sentences on bystanders?"
In ways small and monumental, bin Laden's two decades on the world stage changed how America operated within its borders and with other nations. It may not have been entirely his doing, but his life had a profound impact on the nation he so loathed.
via Osama bin Laden changed us in ways minute, monumental – KansasCity.com.
Tagged as 9/11, george w bush, Osama Bin Laden, politics
VA AG Ken Cuccinelli Wants To Be One Of Bin Laden's 72 Virgins
I've always known Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli is one weird dude, but I never expected this….
For reference, here is his Tweet:
"How much would I give to be one of the 72 Virginans Osama is 'hanging out' with since Sunday?"
Here is how the Huffington Post examines this:
I"m really not sure if this is an example of a bit of tweet-snark gone terribly awry, or maybe an account that's been hacked, but Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli has sent one of the strangest tweets ever in response to the death of infamous terrorist Osama bin Laden.
For real: what is going on here? Why is Cuccinelli going all Mitch Albom on Osama bin Laden? Does he really want to service bin Laden, sexually, in the great beyond? Maybe he plans to give the dead terrorist the "blue balls?" And is Cuccinelli a virgin, or was he — perhaps more disturbingly — shooting for "Virginians" with this tweet? It's possible that Cuccinelli is trying to say that he wishes he had been part of the United States Naval Special Warfare Development Group, more informally known as "SEAL Team Six," who conducted the raid on bin Laden's compound and who are garrisoned in Virginia at the Naval Air Station's Dam Neck Annex. But this would be an odd way of communicating that desire.
At any rate, until I hear otherwise, I'm just going to assume that Ken Cuccinelli wants to make love to Osama bin Laden in hell. Keep calm and carry on!
via Ken Cuccinelli Wants To Be One Of Bin Laden's 72 Virgins, For Some Reason [UPDATED].
Filed under Politics, Virginia
Tagged as Ken Cuccinelli, Osama Bin Laden, politics, Virginia