New York Times Hates On Joe The Plumber
Conveniently ignoring the increasing socialist bent of both major parties (and their presidential candidates), the New York Times went after “Joe The Plumber” with guns-a-blazing this morning, portraying him as a “complainer” who, among other sins, occasionally does plumbing jobs even though he doesn’t have a plumbing license.
Jeezamaneti, people. The mainstream media in this country has officially gone ’round the bend.
Let’s see here … our government just trampled all over its own Constitution and free market principles by passing a bullsh*t $700 bailout of its own politically-correct interventionism and all of a sudden some bald guy’s plumbing license is what the Times wants to rail on?
In launching what appears to be the first-ever journalistic hit piece against a guy whose only crime was to ask a presidential candidate whether or not he was going to have to pay more taxes, Times writer Larry Rohter rips the bark off of “Joe The Plumber,” a.k.a. Joe Wurzelbacher.
Here’s an excerpt from the reaming:
Thomas Joseph, the business manager of Local 50 of the United Association of Plumbers, Steamfitters and Service Mechanics, based in Toledo, said Thursday that Mr. Wurzelbacher had never held a plumber’s license, which is required in Toledo and several surrounding municipalities. He also never completed an apprenticeship and does not belong to the plumber’s union, which has endorsed Mr. Obama. On Thursday, he acknowledged that he does plumbing work even though he does not have a license.
First of all, the local “plumbers’ union” has endorsed Obama? Really? We never would have guessed that, Mr. Smartypants.
Of course the local union has endorsed Obama. He’s a friggin’ socialist who wants to “spread the wealth around.” What union anywhere is going to oppose that?
But the lengths to which Rohter’s article goes to discredit “Joe the Plumber” are amazing, including a search of public records to find out how much he owes in back taxes and the rather stunning conclusion that Wurzelbacher has thusfar provided “only vague information on his and (his) company’s finances.”
Say what? The last time we checked, “Joe the Plumber” isn’t required to tell the New York Times jack sh*t about his personal or his business finances.
Neither are you. And thankfully, neither are we.
In fact, if some jackass New York Times reporter ever asked us to provide information on our finances, there’s a better than average chance they would get tossed into some furniture.
But let’s be honest, people. When was the last time you can recall that level of scrutiny about somebody’s personal finances who wasn’t actually running for president himself.
Look, we’re not saying “Joe the Plumber” is an angel. He’s not. And it’s obvious at this point that John McCain (who missed his opportunity to distinguish himself from Obama’s socialism earlier in the campaign) is callously exploiting the guy to try and bridge an electoral gap that many observers believe has already slipped out of his reach.
But for crying out loud, all “Joe the Plumber” did was exercise his constitutional right to ask a presidential candidate “what’s up with your tax plan?” A question the candidate answered poorly, for what it’s worth.
Of course the New York Times wants you to believe “Joe the Plumber” is a nuisance who imposed upon Obama’s right to have everyone kiss his ass 24/7/365, not to mention a guy who was worthy of a smear job that reminds us of some plumbers from another era … Watergate.
Remember what Daniel Ellsberg got from President Nixon’s goons after he leaked the Pentagon Papers to the New York Times?
That’s exactly what the Times did this morning to “Joe the Plumber.”
Comments
By Bill on October 17th, 2008 at 6:29 am
Your article reinforces that we gotta stop giving money to the media types. Cancel your cable TV, cancel the people mag subscription, take a couple of years off from the movie theater…and cripple that bunch of fat assed arrogant pointy heads.
People go on and on about the right to vote, so important and all that. Of course I agree. But as long as we conservatives put money into the bank accounts of people THAT HATE US, and then those people use that money to push thier agenda, we will continue to slide further and further into socialism. The media establishment is far more important than the democrat party…
But those actions listed above require sacrifice. And from my experience, conservatives love to bitch and moan, but are shy about self sacrifice.
By josephbbl on October 17th, 2008 at 7:52 am
Why would Joe the Plumber get in front of a camera, lie about his actual income, lie about paying taxes, especially when there are REAL people suffering from the current economic crisis?
The above poster (Bill) is absolutely right. Cancel your cable TV, and don’t pay attention to the media.
By rick on October 17th, 2008 at 7:57 am
You may well be right Bill. Joe the Plumber works for an employer that carries the license, so he doesn’t halve to, he owes $1188.00 in back taxes to Ohio. Now this is supposed to remove Joe from his right to ask the mighty one a question. Lets extrapolate for a moment….if this is the criteria, then Charlie Rangel and his evading 75,000 in back taxes should remove him from Congress, Nancy Pelosi’s buying Mesa and then to shore up her profits has a no drill policy, Mahonney out of Fla. bribes his girlfriend to keep her mouth shut, Chris Dodd takes money not only from Freddie and Fannie, but a loan from Countrywide, Hussein takes money from Freddie and Fannie and gets a sweetheart deal from Countrywide….I don’t know, sounds like the standard Bumbocratic tactics since their God was stupid enough to call for the redistribution of wealth….
By CL on October 17th, 2008 at 8:38 am
“But let’s be honest, people. When was the last time you can recall that level of scrutiny about somebody’s personal finances who wasn’t actually running for president himself.”
You are half right. You should have said “a Republican running for president himself.” The press has done a more thorough investigation into Joe the Plumber’s background than they ever did into Obama’s. The NYT just ran its first Obama/Ayers article a couple of weeks ago. They just mentioned the GD America quote from Rev. Wright in the news section within the past month or two.
Did you know Obama’s campaign treasurer has liens against him? That Al Franken is running for the Senate and hasn’t been paying his taxes? How did you miss the media frenzy over those scandals? Oh, right.
By T4 on October 17th, 2008 at 8:58 am
Right on with this article! Joe has fallen into a very undeserving mess. I respect the New York times, but Joe is not the issue. It would be nice if someone instilled a sense of pride and respect in many of the jounralists at “The Times”. Joe’s a simple man, with a simple question. And now he’s being chastized for someone else’s shortcomings. WTF!?
By the way, excellent selection of tuneage! The Who ROCK and GO COCKS!
By mijeel on October 17th, 2008 at 9:24 am
Hmmm…I wonder how the integrity of Joe the Plumber (a.k.a. Joe Six-Pack, Average Joe, Working-class Joe, etc.) would compare to that of the sanctimonious, disingenous, and, at times, dishonest mainstream media? Politicians? Presidential candidates?
No, Joe is no angel. It is so typical, though, that the mainstream media would rather focus on trying to aggressively destroy Joe’s reputation than focus on the real story and the facts. Does Joe currently make $250K. Nope. Would he be impacted by Obama’s tax plan if all things stayed the same? No. But the question Joe the Plumber quite eloquently asked, hypothetical as it may have been, was IF he became a small businessman by buying the plumbing business for which he works and IF he made more than $250K would he be impacted by Obama’s tax plan. And the answer was…YES! But there was more to Obama’s answer and THAT was the story – not Joe the Plumber’s integrity!
The story was Obama – in his own words – letting the cat out of the bag and confirming that he believes in the core of his being in marxism and socialism. Obama wants to tax success in order to “spread the wealth” and employ class envy and warfare to accomplish his goal of turning the republic that is America into the United Socialist States of America (USSA).
It’s a crying shame the media haven’t even vetted Obama as vigorously as they have Joe the Plumber (much less Joe the Senator!).
By CL on October 17th, 2008 at 9:48 am
Josephbbl,
You have got to be kidding? Why would Joe “go on camera”? He was minding his business when Obama came up to him in his yard. Joe then committed the unpardonable sin of asking the Messiah a question that elicited a stupid answer from the one. The issue is Obama’s answer, not the asker of the question.
By CL on October 17th, 2008 at 9:49 am
Corrections:
Joe said “get in front of a camera”
I said “stupid answer” when I should have said “uncharacteristically truthful answer”
By Darkknight on October 17th, 2008 at 10:40 am
Isnt it interesting that someone DARES ask Obama a question and falls under this scrutiny – yet if someone who asked McCain a similar question would NEVER have his/her background checked. That would be called an invasion of their privacy… but its ok for the Pro-Obama people to do that….
Wow – that speaks volumes about how low they will sink to get him elected.
By b on October 17th, 2008 at 12:15 pm
Joe the Plumber is a prime example of what is wrong with America. Joe, a man of meager means, presents a question about how he will get screwed over by a tax policy that does not apply to him. When asked about his income, he responded, “Well, I hope to make that much money at some point.” Really? Who doesnt? I hope to be a friggin’ millionaire, does that I mean I can start bitching about all these “taxes” that I “might” be paying. Joe needs to go back to his double wide in Toledo, give some serious thought to his finances, and figure out how to buy this plumbing company. Then, he needs to doubles the profits of this company. Then, judging from the news shots of his house, he needs to either get a vasectamy or sneak his wife some birth control, THEN, when he makes enough to get hammered by this tax plan, complain about it. And the GOP, as is typical, blames the media when they do something stupid like rely on “Joe the Plumber” to change the election.
By rick on October 17th, 2008 at 1:46 pm
Well B,
So, you’re ready to deprive Joe the right to ask a question because Hussein was stupid enough to ask and then answer in a manner that told the world that he’s all for wealth redistribution. As far as his family planning is concerned, I guess what you really want to know is “why didn’t he just abort those crumb crunchers” and save a few bucks? By aborting them he could now have the money to buy the business. While that may or may not be the truth(the part about his having the money, since we don’t know his savings habit), we do know that like most Americans, he’s having a hard time meeting all of his commitments. And like most Americans he’ll dream and hope and work to make those dreams come true all the while struggling just to make it through one more day intact. For me “I thank Joe for being honest enough and straight forward enough to ask the hard question”, which your buddies in the Lame Stream Media haven’t seen fit to do. Don’t worry, keep after Joe…that way Hussein isn’t asked anything more substantive than Boxers or Briefs? Oh wait, that was our first black pres wasn’t it? Keep getting them confused.
By CL on October 17th, 2008 at 1:53 pm
B,
So Joe is “a prime example of what is wrong with America [because he complained about a] policy that does not apply to him.”
Martin Niemoller is rolling over in his grave at that one.
By b on October 17th, 2008 at 2:04 pm
Rick,
Your comment, not surprisingly, makes no sense. What was Joe “honest” about? His prospective business purchase? Maybe the income he will make from this business? This guy just like many is lying to himself about his finances. Im sure he has a 60″ flat screen in his doublewide and a 2008 F-350, with stacks of credit card bills to match. It is perfectly healthy to “dream” big, but living outside your means and dreaming that you already are big is irresponsible. You and your GOP friends encourage your supporters to live irresponsibly by encouraging them to play the blame game. Its gotta be the media’s fault. Or Congress, or my next door neighbor, Sic Willie, somebody!!! Because it cant possibly be my own fault.
And as to your left field abortion comment, I was referring to future children, not his current children. Although, from the looks of them, he might want to consider cutting the cord or finding a new mate.
By CL on October 17th, 2008 at 3:02 pm
B,
Allow me to edit to show your hypocrisy:
“You and your [Democratic] friends encourage your supporters to live irresponsibly by encouraging them to play the blame game. Its gotta be the [greedy corporations'] fault. Or [George Bush], or my [racist] next door neighbor, Sic Willie, somebody!!! Because it cant possibly be my own fault.”
Your comment is a joke. The Democrats created the victim culture that is strangling our country. One of the key components of conservatism is personal responsibility. RINOs often deviate from this to be sure, but Dems don’t even pretend to care about such issues.
By rick on October 17th, 2008 at 3:13 pm
Gee B, Do you have any proof that Joe was being dishonest? In the America I was raised in we were taught we were allowed to dream big and use that dream as a basis for accomplishment. What do you think built the Corporations of today? Dreams and hard work. Since you don’t know Joe, whats your basis for you’re allegations? I guess in your world everybody should just exist until somebody as smart as you comes along to tell them what to do? Blame game? B, since you’re worried about the blame…blame Hussein for being stupid enough to ask the question…..after all Joe didn’t approach “The One”, the one approached Joe. So blame Joe, make fun of him, tell him he has no chance of success, belittle his existence, just remember, he has a set of balls that your envious of…..
By Aaron Wilson on October 17th, 2008 at 4:28 pm
The problem with “Joe” is that his question was presented as personal. In fact it was a hypothetical question as a result he was in essence he lying. He isn’t going to buy the business, the business doesn’t make that much money, and he’s not a licensed plumber. The NYT article can’t say he’s a “liar” this without editorializing so they responsible collected all available information about “Joe” and presented it to their readers. Interestingly enough this guy doesn’t even pay his taxes. If McCain wants to surround himself by the likes of Palin and Joe then I hope he’s not elected.
By rick on October 17th, 2008 at 5:07 pm
Aaron, none of us know Joe’s intentions. As for paying his taxes…alot of people are having trouble with that….Charles Rangel perhaps……And listening to the NYT is like playing russian roulette with 5 chambers loaded…they love Hussein and will do anything to help him get elected. Vote for whomever you want but don’t blame you’re inability to be fair and honest as something thats John McCains fault….might like to look at Hussein and his 2 years of lies with the help of you NYT.
By rick on October 17th, 2008 at 5:08 pm
sorry Aaron, forgot an r at the end of you. Wouldn’t want to overly task you with critical thinking.
By humanist on October 18th, 2008 at 5:05 pm
Hey, interesting stuff. Always good to get a new perspective on the issues. (A lot better than contemplating the issues themselves.)
I also find it extremely interesting how practically everyone is sure that the media is against them. The liberals complain that “the media” has been giving John McCain a free pass for most of his campaign. The conservatives complain that “the media” is lauding Obama as some sort of Messiah.
Farther out, you get stuff like this on the left: “White privilege is being able to make fun of community organizers and the work they do–like, among other things, fight for the right of women to vote, for civil rights, or the 8-hour workday, or an end to child labor–and people think you’re being pithy and tough, but if you merely question the experience of a small town mayor and 18-month governor with no foreign policy expertise beyond a class she took in college and the fact that she lives near Russia, you’re somehow being mean, or even sexist.”
And on the right, you get people complaining about headlines (related to the bailout) reading: “Capitalism triumphs over democracy.”
It suggests to me that people are unconsciously selective when they talk about “the media.”
Of course, the other answer is that everybody’s right in thinking that they’re being disenfranchised. Most mainstream media, left-wing, right-wing or independent are principally interested in maintaining the status quo, which is in hardly anybody’s best interests.
I must laugh though, at this notion that Barack Obama is a socialist or a Marxist. It’s as ridiculous as accusing John McCain of being a right-wing libertarian. They’re both political moderates. Their politics are the politics of the status quo, with some slight changes. You’ll notice how even mildly radical reformers like Ron Paul, Dennis Kucinich, and Mike Gravel got bounced off their respective tickets early in the game. The more radical would-be politicians sign on with a third party, which is even less likely to get them anywhere.
As I side note, don’t you think it’s a little immature to refer to try to conflate Barack Obama with a former Iraqi dictator just because they share a name? With all the good ways to criticize him out there, why settle for such a totally irrational and meaningless one?
As to Joe … sure, he had the right to ask Senator Obama about his tax increase, although if he was speaking hypothetically, he should have made that clear. (Does anybody happen to have any figures on just how many small businesses do make $250,000 or more per year?) Does he warrant this much media attention? On either side of the aisle? I doubt it.
The thing about Presidential politics is that both sides are on the lookout for any missteps (or something that can be successfully construed as a misstep) from the other party’s candidate, and then milk it for all that it’s worth. Obama was pictured wearing a turban, and he’s darker than a tanned Caucasian. He’s a Muslim! (And therefore a terrorist, as those two terms are, of course, interchangeable.) McCain referred to Obama, a person of color, as “That one.” He’s a racist! And so on ad nauseum.
CL, personal responsibility is a great concept. “You are personally responsible for the reasonably predictable consequences of your own actions” is a great motto to live by.
However, would you agree that not all negative circumstances we encounter are our own fault? Were the Africans in the 1600s-1800s responsible for their own slavery?
Here’s a little more complicated example. After the abolition of slavery, many southern states passed segregation laws to keep Africans and other people of color disenfranchised. Often, when the blacks tried to stand up for their rights, they were harassed, beaten, even lynched by poor whites. Now certainly, what the whites did was wrong, but was it their fault that they’d grown up in a society that had taught them from the cradle that blacks were vicious, stupid, lazy, no good, and generally inferior?
Or a let’s take a more contemporary example. Am I responsible that Congress passed the bailout? For that matter, am I responsible for being born in a country which has such a crazy economic system as to bring about either the bailout, or the circumstances which led to it? I can’t see how. But will I have to deal with the consequences (including the taxes to recoup from this monumental spending spree)? You bet I will.
So what’s your perspective there?
By Timothy Waddell on October 20th, 2008 at 8:00 pm
This is all so typical of the conservative perception of reality. An attempt is made to make a point and when your point is shown to be flawed you can’t face the truth of it and insist that the point is still valid even if your evidence is not. This is the argument with the Iraqi war where any attempt to drive you to acknowledge that an error was made is twisted into a long tirade of justifications such as isn’t the world better off without Saddam in power or its pointless to debate the cause of the war let’s just deal with the facts that exist now.
Joe the plumber is another example of the same. Joe’s notoriety wasn’t caused by Obama supporters but by McCain’s decision to refer to him 20 times during the debate. It is only to be expected that the media even acting appropriately would check out Joe’s story. Undeniably, the media will go overboard as well, but that is not the fault of either campaign but the readers and watchers of the media sources that specialize in that kind of conduct.
But the simple thruth is that Joe’s story does raise questions about whether he really had a point at all. Of course, Joe had the right to ask the question no matter how he came in contact with the candidate and he didn’t have to be factually accurate in its presentation, though that would have been the decent thing to do.
It would be nice of the defenders would get their facts right and try to defend their positions from some degree of truth. Clearly Joe cannot function as a plumber for his employer if he is licenced to do so as Ohio requires. But that doesn’t concern us. It is also not true that Obama invaded Joe’s property to talk to him. Joe himself said that he approached Obama because he wanted to hit them with a question face-to-face to avoid the dancing that he has heard them do previously. The alleged tax lien and the assertion that he does not have the resources ar near term intent to engage in this hypothetical business purchase is also his business and I don’t realy care about these details of his life. If he was on the up-and-up there is no problem with anything he did and if you want to complain about his notoriety blame it on McCain who made him a household name.
What I do question and want investigated is the odd nature of this whole story. Let’s see. A guy who is not in a position to have to worry about an increase in taxes from Obama’s plan in the next year or to at least takes his one chance to talk to a potential president to express a concern about people much richer than he. His question is conveniently recorded while Obama’s responce is missed. Oh yeah, he’s a republican. And conveniently, this gets back to McCain in time for him to make a point of it for the debates. I find it suspicious and suspect that he was a plant. But so what if he was.
Having said all of thi none of it really matters. It was a valid question to ask and Joe’s personal details don’t impact the legitimacy of the question or the need for a valid answer to it. Of course my answer is that if somebody needs to pay a larger percentage of their income to proveide the funds to do the things our government needs to do the the richer citizens should do it since they won’t be as severely hurt by the loss. Of course, that’s my view.
By humanist on October 21st, 2008 at 10:00 am
Timothy,
Another example would be this economic crisis. It pretty much proves that a certain kind of neoliberalism doesn’t work, but the economists who pushed for the polices which created this mess still keep pushing their plan, saying “this time it’ll work.”
But it’s not just conservatives who are guilty of this. Whenever anybody gets too steeped into their own ideology, they’ll ignore quite a lot of contradictory evidence. Thus both McCain and Obama want to continue Bush’s “War on Terror” strategy, even though that imagery and those policies are ridiculous when going up against a foe that’s spread out among dozens of countries around the world. You might as well pursue the “War on Crime” by invading Chicago or New York.
Thus, people are still convinced that we just need to find the “right kind of violence” to put an end to violence.
Everybody is, potentially, guilty of this fundamentalist thinking, conservatives, liberals, independents, and radicals of every flavor.
“Of course my answer is that if somebody needs to pay a larger percentage of their income to provide the funds to do the things our government needs to do the the richer citizens should do it since they won’t be as severely hurt by the loss. Of course, that’s my view.”
And mine, as well. Better still, though, it should be the people on Wall Street who were gambling with other people’s money for so long. Personal responsibility includes facing the consequences of your actions, right?