(no subject)

[den]

Who the hell is Joe The Plumber and why is he taking up so much of my screen?

Comments

[zibblsnrt.livejournal.com]

Some Random Guy(tm) who was in theory idealized into The Average American in the last few days.

[dewhitton.livejournal.com]

AH! So Joe Public has given up his six packs and got a job?

[the-berrys-08.livejournal.com]

During the presidential debate last night Obama and McCain managed to mention Joe the Plumber about 23 times between them. He is an actual person, he has been all over the news tonight.

[zibblsnrt.livejournal.com]

If I remember correctly he's been interviewed more often than Palin has already. %)

[ceruleanst.livejournal.com]

More specifically, he's Samuel Joe Wurzelbacher, a well-to-do Republican business owner who was dispatched to be "some random guy" confronting Obama about his tax plan. McCain, in the last debate, tried to portray him not only as a struggling average American, but an undecided voter, so that when the media sought him out and he appeared to be won over to McCain's side, people would assume via his symbolic significance that the rest of the workaday American public had been won over as well.

It didn't work too well. Joe turns out to be related to Charles Keating (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keating_Five), a name from McCain's past which he was very much hoping nobody would be remembering today. Also, Joe is not a licensed plumber, is delinquent on back taxes from the many businesses he already owns, and has unwittingly highlighted one of Ohio's voter disenfranchisement schemes by having his name misspelled in the voter register. Some also find it suspicious that the conservative media were already publishing stories about him and in his house taking pictures on the night of the debate before he was mentioned in the debate.

Thanks

[(Anonymous)]

I'm an American and I didn't know all that, all I knew was that he owed back taxes and that he is not regestered to vote.