Bounties

No, not this one ...

You may have seen this headline on CNN's website yesterday: Somali Islamists Offer 10 Camels As Bounty for Obama.

Apparently, as a jibe against the American practice of offering multi-million dollar bounties for information leading to the capture or death of wanted terrorists, the radical al-Shabaab group in Somalia is offering bounties on American leaders which are geared more to the needs and wants of the local population. After all, if you are a dirt-poor farmer in Somalia, chances are that your opportunities to spend a million-dollar reward are fairly limited ... there aren't any Best Buys or Macy's outlets in Berbera, Starbucks hasn't made it to Mogadishu yet, and the average Somali woman probably wouldn't shop at Juicy Couture even if there was one in Kismaayo. Camels are probably a more useful reward, and are easier to eat than blocks of hundred-dollar bills once their usefulness has been exhausted.

The story points out that the average cost of a camel in Somalia is about $700, meaning that a ten-camel reward only costs al-Shabaab about 7 large ... an amount well within its budget, which derives largely from the huge ransoms paid to recover ships hijacked by Somali pirates. From the perspective of the American taxpayer, this is a pretty good deal, as most of us who are not CEOs or major political campaign contributors can't augment our flat or declining incomes with large-scale piracy.

The Somali reward structure is interesting, with a bounty of ten camels for President Obama and two for Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. One wonders what other meaningful bounties al-Shabaab might offer to starving Somalis for lesser luminaries ...

500 pounds of manure for Rush Limbaugh or an equivalent useless political gasbag;

1-10 pigs* for a pork-barreling member of Congress (number of pigs depending on the success of the member in steering pork to his or her district);

One or two bulls each for Nancy Pelosi, John Boehner, Harry Reid, or Mitch McConnell (the lesser number is okay, because the bull will generate its own BS, which increases the value of the reward); and,

Five peacocks for Donald Trump ... because it just seems appropriate.

The possibilities are endless. What bounties do you think would be appropriate on certain individuals or groups? Leave me your suggestions in the comments.

Have a good day. Reward yourself appropriately. More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

* This one may not work out as well, ham sandwiches and BLTs not being overly popular in Islamic countries, but it sounds good.