That's not a "tooltip". It's more like a dialog which is opened by hovering a cursor.
By and large, we don't want tooltips that hang around indefinitely, since they clutter up the screen and may block input. However,
you should be able to get the effect you want by using a however JavaScript event to make a <div> containing the "tip" visible and put a clickable area within that for a close box (I'd appreciate "ESC" key closing as well, myself).
The closest thing actually built into RichFaces that I can recall is their Dialog capability, but that will block input to the underlying page and fuzz out the background as well (except in IE).
However, there may be something more suitable and I just haven't noticed it.
The secret of how to be miserable is to constantly expect things are going to happen the way that they are "supposed" to happen.
You can have faith, which carries the understanding that you may be disappointed. Then there's being a willfully-blind idiot, which virtually guarantees it.