The Most Powerful Men In The World

[Fast Gunn]

Well, I have to admit that it is quite humbling to read Forbes list of the most powerful men and women in the world and discover that the leader of your country is no longer considered the most powerful man in the world.

So when exactly did China make it to the top of the list? Hu Jintao?

I know they have a lot of people, but don't most of them live in poverty and their form of government already shown to be self-destructive and basically obsolete in Russia?

Even that elusive madman, Osama bin Laden made the list.

I wonder what set of qualifications Forbes uses to come up with such a list?

http://www.forbes.com/wealth/powerful-people/list

[charlestudor2005]

As the dictator of a country with 1.3 billion people, he has ultimate control over roughly 20% of the world's population. The US has only 310M people and only 4.5% of the world's population. And we saw this week that BO doesn't have ultimate control. This is a republic. Apparently, one of the factors could be that China now owns the US.

[jk543_1]

Just check out the methodology page. It explains it all.

link

[Fast Gunn]

Yes, I saw the methodology link after I posted, but frankly in my own mind some of the people on the list are irrelevant.

Personally, I don't think that the pope has any real relevance in today's world at least with independent thinkers.

After what the church did to Galileo in 1616 with their idiotic papal command for his theory on heliocentrism and after all the never-ending sex scandals they have against them even today, I am surprised the Catholic church has not imploded yet the way Russia did.

As for Osama Bin Laden, when was the last time we even heard from him?

He may be dead in some cave for all we know. He has a lot of health problems aside from his insanity and hatred of the USA.

Personally, I sure wouldn't miss that bearded lunatic and the world would be much better without him and he may be dead already for all we know, but I'm sure Al Qaeda would want to keep a lid on that information to prevent demoralizing their troops.

[Tiffany Cums]

I believe the most powerful man of the world is the one laying naked next to me in bed at the moment!

[daty/o]

Gee Tiff, how can one argue with that kind of logic?

[Maggie McNeill]

Originally Posted by Fast Gunn

As for Osama Bin Laden, when was the last time we even heard from him?

He may be dead in some cave for all we know. He has a lot of health problems aside from his insanity and hatred of the USA.

As you rightly point out, he had many health problems and looked very bad in the last verified videos of him, then there were no videos at all for a long time and when they started appearing again "Bin Laden" was visibly younger and healthier, with a face biometric analyses have shown is different (particularly around the nose) and a different voice-print and idiom pattern in his speech. Many thinkers in Europe, moderate Muslim countries like Egypt and Turkey and the Far East consider him to be dead.

So we have two possibilities: One, that an old, sick man who is a fugitive from 90% of the governments in the world has managed to survive living in a cave for nine years, actually becoming visibly healthier and more youthful in the process; and two, that he died when the videos stopped and was replaced by one of the several lookalikes he was known to have in order to keep his myth alive for his followers and keep the U.S. chasing a wild goose. Since the US needs him as a bogeyman nobody in the CIA will discuss this, but you can bet they know one way or the other. And you can believe whatever you like, but Occam's Razor provides only one logical conclusion.

[Whirlaway]

These lists "The Most" ____ (you fill in the blank), are a journalistic gimmick to get you sucked into reading the corporate content. Yahoo does it all the time as well as USA Today and other light weight publications.

I always skip over that junk.

[Fast Gunn]

I will admit that you do have to read such lists with a grain of salt as there is naturally going to be some subjectivity in there and maybe even some politics.

However, there is a natural hierarchy that develops between countries. Some are poor and backward and some are rich and advanced.

Rome used to be the most powerful country and it's leader was then the most powerful man in the world back in the day.

Later, it was England and Spain who used to rule the world.

Today it is the USA or at least was the most powerful country in the world, but I am still not so sure about China's might and I am certain they do not "own" the USA, but we do owe them more money than we should.

I will admit that the USA has been in a slump thanks in large part to the cowboy we had in office, but we are digging ourselves out of the hole.

[Anna Symon]

Originally Posted by Whirlaway

These lists "The Most" ____ (you fill in the blank), are a journalistic gimmick to get you sucked into reading the corporate content. Yahoo does it all the time as well as USA Today and other light weight publications.

I always skip over that junk.

I agree with you, it is the same sensationalism that Star or US Weekly often use to sell magazines. What I never understand about these lists is why anyone cares. I mean, does Obama, or anyone else on that list, actually read the article and give a damn? I can't imagine Obama crying in his oval office because Forbes bumped him for someone else. He's got other things on his mind.

And why do we, the public, care? Information is power, true, but if we can't use the information then it yields no power. So why waste the time/brain space? Much like someone knowing the different types of lace when they don't in fact deal with lace in any way...

However, I will concede that despite all my ranting above, I would take this list over the "Celebrity 100" list any day- talk about completely useless information :-)

[Cpalmson]

WTF does Forbes know? I'm THE most powerful man in the world

[macksback]

Where was left wing fire starter George Soros?Surely he has more power then little timmy geitner.

[Fast Gunn]

I think you are partially right. I think that is a definite omission.

George Soros should be on the list; maybe instead of the deputy prime minister of Russia.

Timothy Geithner may not personally have the money that George Soros does, but he still has substantial political clout to influence monetary policy.

Maybe Paul Volcker should also be on the list. He still has influence behind the scenes.

I don't know what Mark Zuckerberg is doing on the list either and above The United Nations, at that!

. . . Does anybody besides kids really think Facebook is important?

[Guest080312-1]

Gotta wonder how President of Russia Dmitriy Medvedev feels about being ranked 8 places below Vladimir Putin -- who "stepped down" from as President a few years ago!

[charlestudor2005]

Originally Posted by GaryVee

Gotta wonder how President of Russia Dmitriy Medvedev feels about being ranked 8 places below Vladimir Putin -- who "stepped down" from as President a few years ago!

Putin is still the real power.