He's worth $15 billion and he's upset with Wall Street protesters for not appreciating his contributions to the U.S. economy.
Yo, John, appreciate this: You're a f^#@king crook who should be in jail for criminal fraud.
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The most befuddled Wall Streeter of all is - big surprise - the richest guy.
In assessing the spreading public protest against the rampaging greed of today's corporate and financial elite, John Paulson turns out to be as confused as a goat on Astroturf. Oh, he gets it that the people's anger is directed at hedge fund profiteers like him, but he claims that riff-raff like us are simply confused on the virtue of accumulated wealth.
While it's true that he raked in nearly $5 billion in personal pay last year (the largest single haul in Wall Street history), and while it's true that his riches flow not from advances to benefit humanity, but from rigged Wall Street casino games, he asserts that it's the amassing of wealth itself that serves the public good.
It's unfair, Paulson scolds, that protesters demonstrated in front of his 28,000-square-foot, $15 million mansion on New York's Upper East Side, targeting him as an exemplar of plutocratic excess. Don't they know that billionaires like him pay taxes, "providing huge benefits to everyone in our city?" Besides, he points out that he's not merely a billionaire, but one of those "job creators," as Republican leaders prefer to call corporate chieftains these days.
Paulson brags that his hedge fund "has created over 100 high-paying jobs in New York City since its formation." Wow -- 100 jobs in a city of over 8 million people. Thanks, John, our economy wouldn't be the same without you!
When it comes down to it, all that the Paulson-clique really wants is a little love -- a small show of gratitude for all that the richest 1 percent is doing for us 99 percent of Americans by making themselves ever-richer.
"Instead of vilifying our most successful businesses," he wrote recently in a plaintive press release, "we should be supporting them and encouraging them."
See, protesters, you're gonna make John cry. You should be ashamed -- except that he does have $15 billion in net worth to dry those tears.
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