Forbes Magazine yesterday dropped their annual 100 Most Powerful Women list and although their wasn’t much chocolate or caramel on the list but Oprah Winfrey (#36) and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice (#7) made the cut.

I’m a little surprised by the list.  Keep  in mind its an international profile so many of the honorees are presidents and prime ministers from far away places.  In researching the criteria of how the ladies were ranked Forbes had this to say:

Our annual ranking of the most powerful women in the world measures “power” as a composite of public profile–calculated using press mentions–and financial heft. The economic component of the ranking considers job title and past career accomplishments, as well as the amount of money the woman controls.

Given that as the criteria I would have to put Oprah in the top 5 if not top 10.  She was beat out by Hillary Rodham Clinton (#28) who at this point is simply a Senator from my home state and one time presidential hopeful who happens to be the scorned wife of our ex-President.  That’s not exactly exuding power.  Power is INFLUENCE!  When you say something’s good the entire world agrees and endorses it.  That’s what Oprah has.  Barack Obama wouldn’t have even got a wiff of that stage in Denver last night if it were not for the very early support of Oprah.  If these are truely power rankings I’m sorry Condee but you aint moving mountains like Ms. Winfrey.
Anyway, for the third year running Germany’s chancellor, Angela Merkel, was touted the world’s most powerful woman. Take a look at the complete list here while I try and figure out this mess they created.