Wall Street's well isn't completely dry: The New York Times reports that, last year, the top 25 hedge fund managers made $11.6 billion. Leading the way was James Simons of Renaissance Technologies, who made $2.5 billion. John Paulson of Paulson & Company was next, with a rake of $2 billion. John D. Arnold, who is in his early 30s, made $1.5 billion, while George Soros made $1.1 billion. Wall Street may want to hold the champagne, however: "In a year when losses were recorded at two of every three hedge funds, pay for many of these managers was down by several million, and the overall pool of earnings was about half the $22.5 billion the top 25 earned in 2007." (The Daily Beast Read it at The New York Times)

LIMBAUGH: After they have made it doubly tough for anybody to run a profitable business, then they can go in and seize it, when you can't make a profit, when your business isn't doing -- this is all part of a plan. This is not a rescue. This is a plan. They are focused on the destruction of the private sector. They -- this is an all-out assault on capitalism.

LIMBAUGH: The poor and the middle class, this is a bunch of people that believe a bunch of things. One of the things they believe is that the nation's achievers and so-called wealthy have acquired their wealth by stealing it or not allowing others to have it, and this has created the middle class and the poor. And so we've got to go get that money back, and that's what we're in the process of doing.  (Media Matters.com)
                            

You ever find yourself speechless? I mean you read a couple paragraphs from different sources, and the truth just grabs you around the neck so that you have a little problem inhaling and then exhaling.

I carry with me certain beliefs like my fat gut these last couple of years, or the little carry all I hang over my shoulder, or my many and heavy sins of the past.  These beliefs are self-evident to me.

The day is 24 hours. Every year or so, somebody in Greenwich adds a second or two based upon measurements I will never comprehend. But I believe there are 24 hours in a day.

I believe that in about a year or so, I will reach 60.  That kind of truth troubles me greatly. Although when Shaw was 75 he once said: Oh to be a young man of 55 again.  This was only trumped by Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. who at the tender age of 93 said: Oh to be a young man of 75 again.

Regardless of issues surrounding a birth certificate, Barack Obama is President of the United States of America.

And I believe, as Al Franken once pointed out that Rush Limbaugh is a big fat liar. That words cannot  exit from rush's mouth and form patterns that could be categorized as truths. It is an impossibility.  And yet, today my entire world seemed to fall from order into chaos.

Because the two paragraphs reproduced by Media Matters contain truths. Stark realities.

RUSH LIMBAUGH TOLD THE TRUTH. And not once, but twice. Bold and beautiful truth. There for all to see. Incontrovertible Truth.

Let us examine my first example.  Rush would have us believe that now true capitalists will have to work twice as hard for their money.  And there it is, in black & white from the New York Times, the symbol of truth in this country. (At least when they are not employing shills who really work for w and reproduce lies issued from the WH in the first place!)

The New York Times as declared that the billionaires are making half of what they did. I mean, their income has fallen off by a factor of 50% from 2007 to 2008.  Again, incontrovertible. So it is doubly tough for these giants of industry to make a buck.

But it is the second example that really made me breathless. I am sorry but I have to, just have to recite it here again:

The poor and the middle class, this is a bunch of people that believe a bunch of things. One of the things they believe is that the nation's achievers and so-called wealthy have acquired their wealth by stealing it or not allowing others to have it, and this has created the middle class and the poor. And so we've got to go get that money back, and that's what we're in the process of doing.

While I might take issue with his first paragraph in terms of tone, hidden meanings, accusations against the current administration, I cannot take issue with one word here.

Now this giant hog of a man (sorry Miguel) has signed two contracts over the last five or six years totaling something like 700 million dollars to speak three hours a day, five days a week. He is certainly not poor or middle class. And yet his listeners are poor and middle class.

Watch these prison documentaries sometime on MSNBC on the weekends when my favorite source for news saves money by not airing any news. There are prisoners I have met back when I was practicing law that were republicans.  There were people working for five bucks an hour who had to score weed to get through the month who were and are republicans. It makes no sense, I know. But it is a truth I have discovered over the last half century.

Now Obey has published a short blog that has taken me hours to review. Obey has supplied links that describe Geitner's plan.  Scores and scores of pages written by the best economic minds in the world. Take some time to read it.

Not only do I not understand most of what is written there, but Obey, after reading my fine comments; comments I made after taking notes while reading the links, told me to go away and never some back.  Obey could tell right away that I knew not what I was talking about.

But I will tell you this. I know what rush is talking about.  rush is speaking to poor and middle class people. He is telling them that they are idiots. That they have no right to question the rich about their uncountable wealth. They have no right to ask the rich where or how they received their monies.

Now I used to say that while I watch the nightly NBC news, I am a moderate Democrat. And when I am watching David Brooks discuss an issue, I am a left wing Democrat. And while I watch bill orally, I become a socialist. And when I hear rush, I start thinking that Mao's little red book contains a lot of truths.

Rush is drawing a line in the sand, so to speak. He is actually saying: here I am, on this side and there you are on that side. 

Now, I figure there are 300,000 people in the country who are really on Rush's side. They own and control 40% of the entire wealth of this country. One tenth of one percent of the population.That means there are over 300 million people who should see that this relatively small group holds interests that are counter to the majority's interests.

And I believe they stole that money. And I want that money back and I want it back now. NOBODY EARNS A BILLION DOLLARS. NOBODY.

I believe that this oligarchy needs to be taken down and replaced with a real democracy.

I think it is time to develop a new communism. A new socialism.

And rush has shown me the way, the light and the truth of it.

CITIZENS OF AMERICA UNITE, THE ONLY THINGS YOU HAVE TO LOSE ARE YOUR CHAINS.