RUSH: Have you heard about the Breck Girl? This is just too good to be true. The Wall Street Journal today: ‘As a presidential candidate, Democrat John Edwards has regularly attacked subprime lenders, particularly those that have filed foreclosure suits against victims of Hurricane Katrina. But as an investor, Mr. Edwards has ties to lenders foreclosing on Katrina victims.’ He does! This is the second time he’s stepped in it. Well, it’s more than that. He goes out and says that Hillary Clinton ought to give back any money that Rupert Murdoch has donated, and then we find out the Breck Girl’s made all kinds of money from Murdoch and his related company. The Wall Street Journal has identified 34 New Orleans homes whose owners have faced foreclosure suits from subprime-lending units of Fortress Investment Group LLC. Mr. Edwards has about $16 million invested in Fortress funds, according to a campaign aide who confirmed a more general Federal Election Commission report. Mr. Edwards worked for Fortress, a publicly held private-equity fund, from late 2005 through 2006.’ This is the hedge fund he went to, he said, to ‘learn about poverty,’ and what he learned was, it’s not good, and he doesn’t want to be part of it. ‘Asked about the matter, Mr. Edwards yesterday pledged that he would personally provide financial assistance to New Orleanians who are facing foreclosure by Fortress-affiliated businesses or have lost their homes already. ‘I intend to help these people,’ said the Breck Girl. I can’t let this go so quickly.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Folks, this is just too good to be true. He goes to work for this place called Fortress Funds. He learns. He says he wants to go there to ‘learn about poverty.’ Fortress Funds has offshore accounts. (laughing) They do all these other things, and they’re in the subprime lending market, and the Breck Girl, as you know, announced his presidential run in New Orleans. In fact, let’s go back. This is like on June the 4th. Was this his poverty tour? Whatever it was, this is June the 4th. This is Edwards, and I think it’s on a Faith and Politics special on CNN.
THE BRECK GIRL: This cause of New Orleans is also very personal to me because you may know that I announced my campaign from the Ninth Ward of New Orleans.
RUSH: Yeah, we knew that.
THE BRECK GIRL: The single biggest thing to be done is the president of the United States needs to put one person, a very high-level, competent person —
RUSH: Yeah.
THE BRECK GIRL: — in the White House.
RUSH: You!
THE BRECK GIRL: — in charge of New Orleans, and that person should be in the president’s office —
RUSH: Can foreclose on their houses!
THE BRECK GIRL: — every morning telling me what you did in New Orleans yesterday. What has happened in New Orleans is a national embarrassment.
RUSH: (Laughing.) Yeah, and the company you have $16 million invested and worked for has foreclosed on 34 New Orleans homes, whose owners have not been able to pay. By the way, this is not a blind trust thing. This all happened before he had to put his investments in a blind trust.
Now, there’s a great column today by George Will on this whole thing, the Federal Reserve’s role and so forth, but I want to read you a couple of quick paragraphs here, because what the Breck Girl and Hillary Clinton are both doing is taking this subprime mortgage meltdown and blaming the lenders, of course, and of course the poor people who were credit risks to begin with are the usual victims. It’s a class envy opportunity. Blame Wall Street and blame the rich guys for exploiting these poor people and foreclosing on their houses. Well, throw the Breck Girl in there because his company is doing it. Here’s how George Will writes about it: ‘Many banks, hedge funds and other institutions have pocketed profits from their dealings in the subprime market. The losses are theirs, too. [Hillary] Clinton leapt to explain the subprime problem in the terms of liberalism’s master narrative — the victimization of the many by the few. In a speech favorably contrasting a ‘shared responsibility’ society with an ‘on your own’ society, she said, in effect, that distressed subprime borrowers are not responsible for their behavior. ‘Unsavory’ lenders, she said, had used ‘unfair lending practices.’ Doubtless there are as many unsavory lenders as there are unsavory politicians. So, voters and borrowers: caveat emptor.
‘But this, too, is true: Every improvident loan requires an improvident borrower to seek and accept it. Furthermore, when there is no penalty for folly — such as getting a variable-rate mortgage that will be ruinous if the rate varies upward — folly proliferates. To get a mortgage is usually to commit capitalism; it is to make an investment in the hope of gain.’ His point is that when you have a loan, you’ve got a lender and you’ve got a borrower, and they’re both culpable, and they’re both taking a risk, and they’re both trying to make this work in an investment sense. But when it goes south, the liberal narrative steps up to blame the few wealthy guys running these subprime loans to these poor, unsuspecting dummkopfs who have no business. If you bail them out and there’s no penalty for the loss, this is just going to keep on happening. So this is how the Breck Girl is attempting to cover and explain his own involvement. Also, the Breck Girl said what he’s going to do, is he’s going to help these people out in the subprime markets. Let me find the quote here. He ‘pledged that he would personally provide financial assistance to New Orleanians who are facing foreclose by Fortress.’ Well, guess what? The number of New Orleanians facing foreclose is going to double once they hear that the Breck Girl is going to bail ’em out personally. But the problem is in this case he’s gotta do it with his money. He’s going to be a one-man welfare state with his money. Well, don’t say it will never happen. Well, let’s get the quote. I know he’s a liberal, it doesn’t matter, but still here’s what he said. He said he would personally provide financial aid. (Breck Girl impression.) ‘Well, what I mean by that, Limbaugh, is I will deliver it. I will personally take it there.’
END TRANSCRIPT
*Note: Links to content outside RushLimbaugh.com usually become inactive over time.