Java, Python, C++, SQL. Languages that get you jobs
(been job searching the whole week, and a little annoyed that I don't know Java or SQL).
I heard Haskell was nice too, never gave it a run.
Also, while C++ is a little annoying to make games with, it's still great with more limited machinery like mobile phones and things that directly connect with the hardware. There is no "best" language, what you want is the language most suited to what you intend to do.
I'm of the belief that if you're trying to make games or something, you might as well just pick up Game Maker and not bother with programming languages until you hit its barriers. That way, you skip the annoying low level stuff and focus on actually trying to make things. An analogy is that you're picking up the language to make ugly, pidgin conversation instead of focusing on annoying grammar rules, but later on pick up a proper language when you've grasped the grammar rules and want to move on to poetry and novel writing.
It's like learning to paint or draw, with the exception that painting and drawing is intuitive and use of a pencil is learned very early on; programming, however, is more alien.
Programming is hardly alien. It's a lot easier than most real world languages, just that a grammatical mistake is fatal. Or rather painting isn't all that intuitive. I learned to program long before I learned to draw.