The other day I asked Who is Joe The Plumber and I also provided the answer.
I am Joe, you are Joe, every hard working American that has trouble paying their bills, but hopes for a brighter future by working their tails off, saving money, planning to buy a business and worries about what Barack Obama's socialist tax plans will take from us, is Joe.
Barack Obama went to Joe, his own home, his own driveway and Joe did something the left and the media found unforgivable, he asked Obama a legitimate question about Obama's tax policies.
Obama answered the question by saying he wanted to "spread the wealth."
Instead of focusing on Obama's answer, which considering he is the one running for president, everyone should have done, the left and the liberal media decided to go after "Joe", digging into how much he owed in taxes, his life, everything...instead of digging into Obama's policies, Obama's answers, Obama's associations with people like William Ayers.
Instead of vetting Obama, the candidate, they went after Joe, a guy who asked a simple question.
John McCain, in an interview with Chris Wallace, stated it perfectly, when he said people went out of their way to "savage" Joe.
McCain:
And Joe the Plumber — of course, Joe the Plumber is the average citizen, and Joe the Plumber is now speaking for me and small business people all over America. And they're becoming aware that spreading — that we need to spread the wealth around — it's not what small business people want.
And before we go into this business of, "Well, they wouldn't be taxed," et cetera, 50 percent of small business income would be taxed under Senator Obama's plan. That's 16 million small business jobs in America. And that's what Joe the Plumber's figured out.
And finally, could I just say, where are we in America, where a candidate for president comes to a person's driveway, he asks him a question, doesn't like the answer, and all of a sudden he's savaged by the candidate's people — I mean, savaged by them?
I mean, here's a guy who's a private citizen. What's that all about?
McCain also made this point, "You know what? American citizens ought to be able today to ask a president — candidate in their driveway a question and not have their whole life and everything..."
"Joe the Plumber" Wurzelbacher appeared on Mike Huckabee's show and he makes the same point:
Mr. Huckabee said that Mr. Wurzelbacher only asked a question when Mr. Obama happened to stop by his current neighborhood a week ago. Mr. Huckabee asked how Mr. Wurzelbacher felt about the scrutiny he'd received.
"It actually upsets me," Mr. Wurzelbacher said. "I am a plumber, and just a plumber, and here Barack Obama or John McCain, I mean these guys are going to deal with some serious issues coming up shortly. The media's worried about whether I paid my taxes, they're worried about any number of silly things that have nothing to do with America. They really don't. I asked a question. When you can't ask a question to your leaders anymore, that gets scary. That bothers me."
Mr. Wurzelbacher confronted Mr. Obama over his tax proposals, asserting that the Democratic nominee's plan would tax him more if Mr. Wurzelbacher bought a plumbing business.
In the course of their conversation, Mr. Obama said, "It's not that I want to punish your success. I just want to make sure that everybody that is behind you, that they have a chance for success, too. I think that when you spread the wealth around, it's good for everybody."
Mr. Wurzelbacher said some friends advised him to lie low and let everything blow over. But then he got calls of support from friends in the military who told him he asked a good question and didn't back down.
Israel Matzav, who generally doesn't write about these type of topics, did in this case and points to a couple interesting points of view:
But today I received a link to this post, which describes some of what Joe has gone through for having the chutzpa to ask The One whether he would raise Joe's taxes.
The media, well, the major media outlets, have had very legitimate questions of bias asked about them. They answered these questions in full force by descending upon and gutting an ordinary Amercican single father trying to make a living, who had the temerity to ask one of the candidates a question when the candidate went walking through his neighborhood. This person was eviscerated, lambasted by the media, and in the most distressing turn of events, by one of the candidate teams. Think about that. Now it looks like this guy is going to be thrown out of work, lose his drivers license, and who knows what else.
I am disgusted by this. I find this to be utterly and completely vile, beyond reprehensible behavior. Not just on the part of the media, whom have now demonstrated their bias so clearly and unequivocally. But by one of the candidate teams, who lambasted the man, and haven’t reigned in their minions in the media. One must call into question why this candidate team holds this American in such contempt. Because he dared to ask a question?
In an email to me, Joe the Blogger explained:
Synopsis is that McCain held up this fellow Joe as a typical person who would be negatively impacted by BHO's policies. BHO responded weakly on it during the debate, but his minions in the media descended upon this poor guy and ripped him several new ones. As a result of their probing, the guy is probably going to lose his job and his drivers license. Not because he is a bad person, but because, like many of us whom have ever lived hand to mouth (I did in graduate school), he had to make hard decisions about what to pay and when to pay it. Additionally it sounds like he took the word of his boss on whether or not he needed a plumbers license for the work he was doing.
...
The media descended on this guy, parked on his lawn and dug into his past. They found out he doesn't have a plumbing license, and after contacting the Toledo government, apparantly Joe will not be allowed to work as a plumber any more. They dug through his tax records and found out he is behind in paying income taxes, which they gleefully reported. They dug through his driving record and found some unpaid court costs which they gleefully reported, and will likely result in his license being suspended.
Think about this. Over the top was way long ago. This is outrageous, and I am outraged. I'd like to see more people put up an I AM JOE sticker on their blogs and other places.
I believe what the left, the far left liberals and the liberal media has managed to do for the right is to show that they will work to try to destroy anyone that dares ask Obama some legitimate questions, questions they never bothered to ask him. Questions they have done their best to avoid addressing about Obama.
Instead they go out of their way to "savage" Joe and to do anything possible to avoid and distract from the fact that it was Obama that said "spread the wealth."
It was Obama's answer that caused all the fuss, but where the left, Obama supporters and the liberal media made their biggest mistake was to ignore Obama's answer and let the American people see them attack, savagely attack, Joe...... simply because he asked a question.
Americans understand that it isn't the "rich" that was attacked when they went after Joe like dogs with a bone, it was an ordinary, hard working American that is being attacked.
It is them being attacked. It is you being attacked. It is me being attacked.
It is every American that wants to reach for that brass ring, buy a business, make it successful enough, by their own hard work, to earn over $250,000 and are scared that if they do so, if they work hard enough to accomplish their goal, Obama would take their hard earnings away from them and hand their money to someone who didn't earn it.
Yes, I am Joe, and folks, so are you.
How does it feel to be attacked and savaged?
.