I Am Joe the Plumber, in some unfathomable way
Over at The Corner, Mark Hemingway complains about CBS News coverage of some GOP-sponsored protesters outside an Obama rally. From the CBS article:
The Republican National Committee is sending around this Associated Press photo of overall-clad McCain supporters standing outside an Obama rally, clutching plungers and a sign proclaiming “I Am Joe The Plumber”:
The only problem? At least two of the members aren’t quite as similar to the newly famous Joe Wurzelbacher as they might like you to think. … the man on the right does say he’s an actual plumber – though he is from Melbourne, Australia … And the man on the left, plunger thrust high in the air, is Charlie Smith – the National Chairman of the College Republicans.
Hemingway moans:
Wow, thanks for the fact check CBS! Also, it turns out that not all of those guys crucified after that slave uprising were named Spartacus either.
Oh, COME ON. The guy wearing an “I Am Joe the Plumber” shirt and angrily waving a toilet plunger around as part of a supposed populist demonstration is actually the National Chairman of the Young freakin’ Republicans! That fact is more than ludicrous and hilarious enough to warrant comment from CBS News, is it not?
The nerve of CBS News, asking questions about a PR photo of a bullcrap staged Astroturf GOP rally!
But the Republicans are being more honest than they realize by pushing this photo. Doesn’t this crude sham-populism perfectly encapsulate the direction the McCain campaign has taken since the addition of Palin to the ticket? Let’s make the National Young Republican Chairman in a plumber’s outfit the new GOP mascot!
