Well, it’s out. The annual Forbes 400 list denoting the richest men and women in the Known World. (The good old USofA). Not to go on a tangent, but I need to mention that I have nothing but love for my country, it, I feel is still the best place for an extremely (emphasis on extremely and getting more extreme) ambitious person to make it with a suitcase and a dream. At least on paper, we offer opportunities not found elsewhere, ahem. But I want to save that subject for later, as I believe it merits more than a side note on the subject at hand. America’s Rich.
I am not going to be a leftist flogger blogger, so save your sigh. My point of view is from another quite spatially separate point of view. I don’t see much of this point of view unless I am walking the halls of Metaphysics. And save that sigh too, for I believe that even the most hard wired bible toter’s will see some of themselves in my comments. As for the ‘save the sigh’ kind of flippancy, I have too large of a streak of sarcasm to change my writing style, because no matter how enlightened I become, how much I want to be calmly sage, eminently wise and completely fair and loving toward a subject, which is by the way, what I preach, and in most cases practice, I still don’t feel the need to lie back and keep quiet when I see the things that need changing if our world is ever to heal.
So, enough about me. This Forbes List. I got up today, turned on my computer, as normal, and as usual, my Yahoo! homepage was there. Homepages are a habit, by the way. I can tell you I pretty much have no desire to hear some hackneyed entertainment writer widening her journalistic eyes over the latest Lady GaGa disastrous clothing choice. And yes, I would not even know who Lady GaGa was if I did not have that Yahoo! homepage…so just back off, it is a wellspring of extremely pertinent information. (I used to write ads for websites in the ‘blue box’ area of Yahoo! and had some years of misery trying to find ways to make this persons roofing business sound extra appealing and the absolute best with the use of no superlatives and only 190 characters).
Okay Dana, Forbes already. The thing is…I was looking at the array of possible reading material to wake up to when I noticed a woman in the top three, sandwiched in between Warren Buffet and Bill Gates. So, I click. This is not about her, but she is why I opened it, I was curious. Turns out she is just another Noveau Riche…this time of Walmart Fame. And a hillbilly to boot. You should have seen that family. (I am so kidding…not :)) I am so sorry, a tiny, tiny part of me really is not kidding. Blame my mom.
The list offered pictures next to the text so I was willing to follow the list for a while. I often affirm my own impending wealth with details of how it will benefit others when I am using words and images to speak to my Creator about the future. Now, I am going to have to insist that you not sigh. That is my way and I ain’t gonna defend it to nobody, hear? Besides, I don’t do that to try to schmooze God, (as if it could be done) but out of my pure desire. I once stayed up all night writing up a business plan for a from the street to the office type of rescue operation, complete with basic computer classes, comportment, (for those that were out there too long) and that business plan was GOOD. Notice I say was: it was in the computer before this one that somehow lost all of its data.
In any event, I was not really reading any of the blurbs next to anyone’s picture, having started with Sergey Brin and seeing his most notable human trait listed was peppering the Google campus with Goats, because they “are better than lawnmowers”. Applause, everyone! And having gone back to see what Christy Walton, who I saw in the Buffet-Gates sandwich had to offer humanity, nada, as a matter of fact, the entire Walton family does nada for no one. So, I started reading these blurbs, as Yahoo! was kind enough to have photos and stats of the top nineteen richest people in America, including ties. So, I started reading the last bullet point in these mini bios. That of course is the place of honor the writer had given humanitarian works, leaving top honors to things like how much money was lost, how much they made, how many people were fired, etc.
And I was Amazed. Sad. Nodding my head knowingly. And for the first time in recorded history, sat down to write about something that bothers me in a public forum. That is when I get some traffic flowing toward this baby. I have many things I would like to write about. I am the finder of the infected blister. And I am finding, found, duh, it took me my entire (almost) adult life, that not many people #1: Care, #2, Care, but are too desperately in need of the ‘illusion’ that they flat won’t discuss anything like this or #3: Would love to talk about it. So they can be smarter than me because they sit and watch talking heads on T.V. all day, or listen to them on the radio, and know just about everything about everything and then I am just too stupid to continue and walk away with my head down and my tail between my legs, duly chastised for daring to speak of something I don’t spend my entire life listening to other people talk about all day. Oh, and what would that be? Oh, right, Other People and then twenty five or so Other Peoples in boxes next to each other arguing about what that Other Person did (or didn’t) do. Nope, I just notice things and am capable of independent thought, abstract thought that, oops, I did not spend 90 hours so far this year watching the O’Reilly Factor scanning for ways to defend the greedy rich of America and other types of people I don’t like. I am a bad, bad, bad! Dana. I ought never open my mouth again. I simply have not got the hours in. Nor do I have enough politicians names in my lexicon to even be taken seriously. My God, where do I get off, anyway? Okay, rampage over. I do however feel the need not to edit it out, because it’s true. If you read me, I won’t be dropping any names, statistics (unless statistics is why I am here), obscure events so and so was involved in, etc…just to make me sound Informed. I am probably very uninformed, I don’t care how many people sit on T.V. and bleat about the same subject, I don’t care how many subcommittees voted, and who hates who, I have not got one name memorized from today’s movers and shakers in the Other People zone, I can’t even tell you the names of the two pink men with light colored hair that dominate the kind of T.V. I am speaking of. I actually did not even watch T.V. for twenty years. I hated it. Now, I have relaxed that stance, there are somethings that run as repeats that I like, NCIS, Las Vegas, The Closer, Saving Grace, and that is only if I remember to watch. I personally like to read.
So anyway, Forbes, Dana, Forbes! Aye Chingow, what am I to do with you, you are breaking all the journalistic rules! People will know you did not go to four year college and get a writing degree! So, anyway, as I scrolled I thought, ‘hmm…I am going to see which of these folks do help others. I have read over and over that the rich, at least the ones not in Entertainment, help the poor, the animals, etc, in fact, all of the Ladies in the DAR and on the Main Line do nothing more than organize benefits.
Finally, I saw one. I was so encouraged, I pumped a fist in the air and said Yeah! There we go! Bill and Melinda Gates Rock!!! They have a foundation, he stepped away from Microsoft to focus on giving, “…dedicated to fighting hunger, improving education in America’s high schools, developing vaccines against malaria, tuberculosis and AIDS. Endowment: $30 billion.” Now, that is a real smile~the kind you get when
you help others! Let’s see…Warren Buffett, nada, Lawrence Ellison, nope, in fact I think it all went to plastic surgery…look at this guy~!
He is 65 years old! Oh, and I am sure some of the money goes into his Yacht, the one he runs in the America’s Cup. Ooh, enough editorial Dana, you are definitely starting to sound petty.
Oh, this one sounds good. Michael Bloomberg, number 8: “Donated $235 million to charity in 2008.” Let’s hope he is not crying poor mouth for the year 2009…onward, ever onward, ah, number 13, Michael Dell, has and education foundation with his wife, now she is probably one of those cool ladies that organizes fund raisers! You go, Susan. Then to number 16, Donald Bren, from my very own Orange County. At 77, he looks to be another plastic surgery afficiando, however he is forgiven (for what, I have had it…) because…”Has permanently protected more than half of 93,000-acre Irvine Ranch, creating public parks and trails.” And that personally affects Lil ol me. I love that he did that. If he had not…this place would be uninhabitable. Well, for me, socially Orange County basically is uninhabitable, except you do see Meet Ups for people of my ilk, but I am afraid I will just find a bunch of very self aware, keeping up with the Joneses types of meta-physicians, who wear designer clothes, as they should, as they should… don’t get me wrong, I just would not feel comfortable.
Well, that is if folks. There were four. Actually percentage wise, it was not bad…but I will note that I have noticed over the years, what with the publics mania for anyone mega rich, so of course the media catalogs the every move of entertainers, that I usually just notice a really tacky, selfish approach to the millions these folks have. Unless of course, everyone is so classy that they are anonymous…hmm. In a country that pays ball dribbling men over 6’5 who can throw a ball at a wire hole and sink it more that it’s teachers, a chick named Jennifer $75,000 (that she even demanded, yes, demanded such an amount made me throw up in my mouth a little) per episode of Friends, at the end of the run on that show…I don’t know. I feel the shoe is on the wrong foot. And backward, too.
Link to story:
http://finance.yahoo.com/career-work/article/107859/the-forbes-400.html?mod=career-leadership
It made me think... 
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