“The Superintendent refuses to enforce admissions standards or the cadet Honor Code, the Dean refuses to enforce academic standards, and the Commandant refuses to enforce standards of conduct and discipline,” the letter charges. “The end result is a sort of malaise that pervades the entire institution.”
As you can see in the video above, Obama told the same joke that Bush did during his 2002 West Point commencement address last weekend. Bush tells joke, cadets roar. Obama tells same joke, cadets respond with, shall we say, restraint. We blame Dick Cheney.
In George W. Bush’s 2002 West Point commencement address, he said:
West Point is guided by tradition, and in honor of the “Golden Children of the Corps”, I will observe one of the traditions you cherish most. As the Commander-in-Chief, I hereby grant amnesty to all cadets who are on restriction for minor conduct offenses. (Applause.) Those of you in the end zone might have cheered a little early. (Laughter.)
Because, you see, I’m going to let General Lennox define exactly what “minor” means. (Laughter.)
As you can see in the video above, Obama told the same joke during his West Point commencement address last weekend.
Bush tells joke, cadets roar. Obama tells same joke, cadets respond with, shall we say, restraint. We blame Dick Cheney.
Jeffrey Immelt, General Electric’s (GE) CEO attacked other business leaders in a speech at West Point. Immelt neglected to mention, however, that he took home $14,100,000 in compensation last year.
Jeff Immelt hates greedy, overpaid executives. Unless their name is Jeff Immelt.
Jeffrey Immelt, General Electric’s (GE) CEO attacked other business leaders in a speech at West Point, saying that his generation “had succumbed to ‘meanness and greed’ that had harmed the US economy and increased the gap between the rich and the poor.”
Immelt neglected to mention, however, that he took home $14,100,000 in compensation last year. Guess he was talking about all those other greedy execs.
“We are at the end of a difficult generation of business leadership … tough-mindedness, a good trait, was replaced by meanness and greed, both terrible traits,” Immelt said, “Rewards became perverted. The richest people made the most mistakes with the least accountability.”
Immelt’s didn’t stop there. According to the Financial Times, he also linked bad leadership to growing inequality.
“The bottom 25 per cent of the American population is poorer than they were 25 years ago. That is just wrong,” he said. “Ethically, leaders do share a common responsibility to narrow the gap between the weak and the strong.”
Two problems with Immelt’s attack. First, he’s one of the highest paid U.S. executives. And second, although GE took $80 billion in TARP funds, Immelt somehow used his connections to the Obama administration to get GE exempted from executive pay cuts that hit similar firms.
Here’s how Business Week spells out Immelt’s 2008 income:
TOTAL COMPENSATION in 2008
Total Annual Cash Compensation $3,300,000
Total Short Term Compensation $3,300,000
Other Long Term Compensation $7,233,137
Total Calculated Compensation $14,096,603
Contributing to Immelt’s pot calling the kettle black syndrome, the non-greedy CEO somehow got GE and himself exempted from pay restricitions imposed on other companies by Obama’s pay czar.
Yes, the enemy camp. Home of hate speech like “Duty, Honor, Country” and evil stuff like that. And you wonder why the military doesn’t love the President?
Yes, the enemy camp. Home of hate speech like “Duty, Honor, Country” and evil stuff like that. And you wonder why the military doesn’t love the President?
