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[Orrex]

Against my better judgment, I listened to about 10 minutes of Radio Hannity during my commute home yesterday. Chuck Rangel was the guest-target, and Hannity unloaded everything on him, literally ranging from FDR to Al Gore's father to the current condition of Harlem. In the course of his spastic-shotgun style of rhetoric, Hannity threw out a few doozies that I wanted to check on. I couldn't take good notes because I could only write while at stoplights, but here's what I got:

According to Hannity: In the past sixty years, we've spent $7 trillion dollars on programs for the poor. He didn't mention if that was federal, state, local, or private money, or if it was some combination of the above. Any truth to it? That number seems pretty damn high.

According to Hannity: Mayor Nagin refused to let Amtrak into New Orleans to assist in evacuation efforts.

According to Hannity: 1,000 buses that could have been used for evacuation were left in the parking lot. I'm pretty sure that this underlying claim has been refuted, but Hannity is still happy to parrot it.

According to Hannity: Nagin refused to allow water into the city. This was a flat claim without much context.

According to Hannity: The top 10% of the wealthiest Americans pay 50% of the taxes. This sounds like a clear example of lying with statistics, most obviously because Hannity omits the fact that the top 10% earn some huge fraction of the national income, so 50% of the taxes is actually quite a bargain. Am I on the right track here? Where's a good refutation to Hannity's claim?

According to Hannity: Up is down, black is white, and 2 + 2 = 5.

Honestly, it's a miracle that Hannity's brain doesn't explode on-air. The staccato bullshit flying from his mouth is so frenetic and overwhelming that I can't imagine how anyone can be a fan. I suppose it's possible that people mistake his avalanche of garbage for actual, informed rhetoric, but anyone able to make that mistake must clearly be insane.

Any help in rebutting his assertions is greatly appreciated.

Thanks!