Pajamas Media

142 Comments

1. Gman:

Obama’s Trickle Up Poverty

Oct 16, 2008 - 8:37 am 2. tom:

Joe the plumber will be the tank that Dukakis rode in on.

Finally someone shows up in plan language and shows America who OBAMA is, heir socialist senator government

many dumb Americans who think $250K is elite, will still vote for their handout, but working class people who get it, will now vote McCain

brilliant and well overdue!

Oct 16, 2008 - 8:55 am 3. Mike T:

I wish McCain would have done the following, to show how Obama’s policies really are screwing the middle class. Let’s use a doctor, for example:

Assume $500K/year for the business to be generous.

$80K-$100K for all of the costs associated with employing the staff.
$25-$50K for building, utilities and equipment-related costs.
Up to $150K for all insurances, including malpractice.

I’m just using ballpark figures, probably even being conservative on the staffing costs, and we’re already looking at up to $300K in expenses to run a private practice if the doctor does anything that is in danger of malpractice suits, such as OB/Gyn work or anything pediatric.

When you factor in the taxes on the remaining money, the doctor is actually just living an upper middle class lifestyle. Yet, I seriously doubt Obama is really going to care that by squeezing the self-employed and small business owners, he’ll be harming the people in the lower economic echelons who depend on the work they do.

The fundamental fallacy of Obama’s policies is that Socialism cannot work because most of the people who receive the redistributed wealth are consumers, not producers. The economy may benefit from the increased consumption in some respects, but it won’t benefit the way it would if wealth producers had the money to allocate to their projects.

Oct 16, 2008 - 8:56 am 4. JKB:

Well said.

Although I would quibble with comparing Obama’s salary to Joe’s income. Obama is an employee who presumably does not reinvest part of the profits from his income back into the business. He does not increase the capital assets of the business which requires hiring more employees.

Joe on the other hand, as the owner of a plumbing business, will either save and invest some of the profits to grow the business or keep the “emergency” fund to cover unexpected business costs, such as an accident, unexpected increase in fuel or plumbing supplies, need to train inexperienced helpers, etc. Both of these uses of profits do not contribute directly to Joe’s consumption but rather to his ability to keep making income and keep employees on the payroll. Also, both of these actions will for the foreseeable future require more retained profits as getting that loan from the bank is a lot more difficult these days.

Obama has demonstrated again his inexperience with the functioning of the American economy and also his inability to empathize with how others, who have not been the beneficiaries of public money make their livelihood. It is quite apparent that Obama has no idea how those tax dollars he likes to spend are created in the first place. He knows you take them from “patriotic” citizens but he hasn’t a clue where they get the money he wants to take in the first place.

Oct 16, 2008 - 8:59 am 5. cfbleachers:

How much money are we talking about, in terms of “spreading wealth” around? Is Senator Obama going to give $50,000 to every person who is presently not paying even 4% of our yearly tax load? $25,000? $10,000?

Because, if what he intends to do, is give the folks who pay 3.5% of the annual tax burden, something like $500 each…utilizing a billion dollars to implement it with bureaucratic red tape, patronage hirings and cronyism and jackbooted enforcement policies against small businesses as well as large, then this is a scam on everyone. Senator Government will swell the ranks of “treadmill walkers”…people who expend a lot of empty calories going nowhere and walking in place.

$150 million dollars to indoctrinate our schoolchildren in radical extremism, while not improving their basic learning skills one iota? NO problem.

20% of the profits from the Franklin Raines and Jim Johnson cooked books rescue to go to ACORN for establishing the the voting rights of Jive Turkey and Mickey Mouse? NO problem.

However, giving $500 to a person making two or three thousand dollars per month in wages, isn’t going to “spread wealth” around, it’s simply going leave them bitter and disappointed. So, how much more would have to be given to them…before it made an impact. And, at what cost?

And how much would have to be taken from Joe the Plumber and the rest of middle America, before that wealth was “spread” enough…because you won’t get it by continuing to dip into the pockets of small businesses, you will break them before you can ferret out enough of their money to distribute to your “spread” of wealth.

The “soft sell” of “I’m not coming after you, I’m going after that rich guy over there”…depends upon the duplicity of the hidden message. “I’m not coming after you….today”

Under NO “spread the wealth” regime in history…has an entrenched government ever…ever…stopped at the top 5%, while “spreading” the wealth to the remaining 95%. That is simply a sham. A canard. The mathematics don’t work that way. The economics don’t work that way. The underlying politics don’t work that way.

Joe the Plumber is being boiled like a frog. Not thrown into a pot of scalding water, but placed in a comfortable bath, while the temperature is raised one degree at a time. “We aren’t coming for you…today.”

Just the same, watch your wallet, Joe.

Oct 16, 2008 - 9:02 am 6. Ed Wallis:

Dear Neo-Neocon,

No, you’re NOT wrong or just playing with semantics. I just use different words to say (what I consider to be) the same thing:

The “Orwellian” nature of the Democrats’ words and intentions over the last 15-20 P.C. years is finally being voiced…and rapidly becoming their Achilles’ Heel:

“equal opportunity” = state-sponsored bias/prejudice giving individuals employment or school positions based essentially on race, gender, or other “identities.”

“social justice” = ad libbing and pseudo-interpreting the Constitution as one sees fit to arrive at a subjectively predetermined desired outcome.

“spread the wealth…good for everybody” = YOU are NOBODY except the chump paying the tax bill.

Oct 16, 2008 - 9:10 am 7. Self-hating boomer:

Problem is, Joe the plumber is unwittingly conceding the 0bama talking point that his tax increases will in fact only hit people making over $250k. The real issue is that this campaign promise is impossible to keep, and the tax increases will hit people making much less than $250k. So I’m not sure that this is the smartest strategy; Joe is essentially confirming the absurd claim that 0bama’s tax increases will only hit those making over $250k. Maybe Joe’s really a 0bama plant?

Oct 16, 2008 - 9:12 am 8. gradchica:

I can’t see how this squares with the Democratic congress’s “college access” act that wiped out (no grandfather clause here, just pull the rug out from under you) loan deferment for medical residents. Here you have people (like my husband) who didn’t come from wealthy families and who took out loans to pay for college and medical school, and who thought they could defer those loans until they started making more than $40k or so (all the while starting families, trying to buy a house, etc). Instead, they’re either scraping to pay the loans while making little money or are watching the interest mount up and capitalize if they forbear. Oh, but I’m sure Obama thinks these folks are just “rich people in training”, so why should we do anything to help them?

Oct 16, 2008 - 9:15 am 9. Someone75:

Joe the Plumber was amusing, but as a man, he’s a fraud. For starters, he admits that he doesn’t expect his plumbing business to make anywhere near 250k. Second, he doesn’t pay taxes anyway! He owes over $1,200 in unpaid personal income tax.

This all feeds the myth that small businesses are the backbone of America. What America? The America I live in is completely dominated by massive corporations – the ones the trade on the stock market – the ones that I am bailing out with my tax money. If small businesses really were the backbone of the American economy, why do we never hear about them, unless some politician is pandering to them?

Oct 16, 2008 - 9:21 am 10. fred:

There was a period in our history when redistribution and very generous monetary policy were combined in an attempt to spread opportunity and pump up the economy: from Lyndon Johnson’s administration through Jimmy Carter’s administration.

History Lesson for the College Kiddies of Today: go and do research on the history of this time frame. You must obtain figures such as – unemployment rates per year, total capital investment, money supply growth (all of the targets), interest rates, inflation rates, rates of productivity growth, growth of small businesses/entrepreneurship, and oil prices. Just for starters. Do NOT ask your professors about this information, and some of your parents may be in denial about what happened.

Don’t be surprised if you come across characterizations of this period such as “stagflation,” stagnation, inflation, and capital flight.

This is what’s in store for us going forward. Most of the very people Obama is bribing to vote for him are not going to benefit from his policies. Ask those of us who were the younger Baby Boomers who graduated from high school and college after 1973. It was not a good time at all.

Oct 16, 2008 - 9:28 am 11. Sarah:

The Right is interested in preserving America on the foundations it was founded on – limited government being at the top of that list, peoople were looking for a “New World” for a reason folks!
The Left is only interested in increasing the “welfare nation” at the cost of those that pay taxes. It sounds really good until the actual policies actually kick in and then everybody realizes what a lemon they were talked into.
Of course Obama has a huge following, he’s promising them a handout at the taxpayers expense. They could care less where that handout comes from as long as they get it, and they’ll keep screaming for more becasue they’re too lazy to get up off their fat a*ses and work for a living. I don’t know about anybody else but I’m sick and tired of paying taxes to help people on food stamps eat better than I do so they can drive a nicer car and have a nicer house.
GET A FREAKING JOB! OR TWO! OR THREE! IF THAT’S WHAT IT TAKES! Stop stealing the food from my mouth and the clothes from my back to support your lifestyle of gluttony and excess!

Oct 16, 2008 - 9:29 am 12. Quincy:

I just love how Obama is taking away Joe’s ability to spread the wealth in the way he sees fit, by growing a business, paying employees, and providing services people need, in favor of spreading the wealth in the way the left sees fit, by full employment for two-bit bureaucrats.

Ladies and gentlemen, this is Barack Obama’s America.

Oct 16, 2008 - 9:32 am 13. Ed Wallis:

“Self Hating Boomer”,

I find the most potent aspect of Mr. Wurzelbacher’s words to be his plainness, directness and clarity. No BS, no wishy-washy vagueness. THAT in and of itself could reach and influence many, including those earning well less than $250k.

As an aside, here’s another “plainly” written article:

http://townhall.com/columnists/LauraHollis/2008/10/16/time_to_use_the_c_word

Oct 16, 2008 - 9:34 am 14. Peter the Sub Guy:

Self-hating Boomer, the problem isn’t that Joe makes less than $250K and thus would not see an increase in taxes. The problem is that Joe’s business, the one he wants to buy, woud almost definitely make more than $250K. Out of that comes employee saleries, insurance, upkeep, all the things that keep a business running and Ol’ Joe is only taking home $100K but is still being charged the higher taxes on his $250K business. So next year Joe not only can’t hire a new trainee, but has to let go one of his long time employees. He can’t afford that new van to make service calls and has to pour more cash into his old van to keep it on the road or else he has no business. He can’t take a vacation next year, ’spreading his wealth’ in Florida or Las Vegas or wherever he likes to go because this year’s vacation fund was eaten up by the new taxes that ‘only 5% of the population’ will be forced to pay. A small business isn’t a small business because it doesn’t make a lot of money. I work for a ’small business’ (definied as such because there are fewer than 300 employees) that was just awarded a near $20 Million government contract this week. How will Obama’s taxes effect our ’small business’?

Oct 16, 2008 - 9:48 am 15. Valerie:

I’m one of fred’s Baby Boomers. Graduated high school 1973, college ‘77, divorced, and house went back to the bank in ‘83 or ‘84. Our entire subdivision was mowed down like grass. When a housing bubble bursts, it’s the people of modest income and those who are just starting out that are hit the hardest, because they are the ones who lose their jobs first. I took out a loan, got into graduate school, got a job, and worked my way through graduate school as a single mom.

My (new) husband and I each have advanced degrees, and we have each worked our butts off, as in a steady history of 60-hour weeks for him, for about 20 years, and for me for about 12. We’ve got one kid graduated from college, and two coming up. We lost 300K on paper so far in the stock market crash. And we are in what passes for good shape, for this economy.

The Obama Campaign right now is taking the position on the talk radio that people in my income range will only see about $111 tax increase. That sounds odd to me, because my husband ran the numbers, and it came out to 30K.

I’ve seen how Obama spent education money via the Annenberg fiasco. I can do it better myself.

Oct 16, 2008 - 9:59 am 16. The Right To Free Plumbing:

Have you been to countries where men squat in public to defecate on street corners? Have you walked down streets that smelled of human urine and feces? Have you lived through a cholera epidemic or typhoid?

If so, you understand the absolute human right to free plumbing. Joe the plumber should be ashamed, for denying such basic human rights. Under President Obama, Joe and those like him will be put in their place very quickly.

What are the other absolute human rights?
The right to free health care.
The right to free mental health care.
The right to free housing.
The right to free food.
The right to free heating and air conditioning.
The right to free electricity.
The right to free education.
The right to free income.
The right to free transportation.
The right to free entertainment.
The right to free companionship and sex.
The right to free legal representation.
The right to free accounting.
The right to free cigarettes.
The right to free legal and illegal drugs.
….

There is no limit to the basic rights of men and womyn. Go ahead. Add a few items to the list. It’s all free.

Oct 16, 2008 - 9:59 am 17. NeoconNews.com:

Unfortunately our candidate isn’t willing to be half as direct as Joe has been about the disaster that looms if the Messiah wins. McCain nibbled last night when he needed to chomp. The man has been through so much in his personal and professional life, we couldn’t afford to give him some steel dentures for one night? Couldn’t he have just dusted off the pair he was using during the primary debates?

Either way, we’re in a slightly better position than we were at 5 PM yesterday.

Oct 16, 2008 - 10:06 am 18. neo-neocon:

If anyone’s interested in reading some of the other ironies of the election referred to in the last sentence of the article, please take a look.

Oct 16, 2008 - 10:07 am 19. CALIndie:

Neo-Neocon – “…the Right is interested in fostering equality of opportunity, while the Left is interested in equality of outcome,”

“Transferring some minor amount of money from one person who has it to another who lacks it may indeed enable the latter to buy a few things,”

You are quibbling over semantics and you are missing the point entirely. Barack Obama isn’t about “transferring some minor amount of money” from one person to another. Oh yea, the tax credits will flow all right, and the $500, $1000 and $1500 checks will be added to the tax credits that are all ready handed out to those with no tax liability. That’s just buying votes. What Obama wants is top down socialism by transferring money to government programs not to the average person.

Barack Obama is about transfering money, little by little, step by step, nickle and dime, quarter and dollar with NO END IN MIND to grow the GOVERNMENT BUREAUCRACY! The trademark of socialism is CENTRAL CONTROL, SINGLE PAYER ecomomics that create government jobs, government programs, government bureaucracy and government waste to grease the wheels of socialism.

Joe the Plumber and the millions like him are the ones that Obama could care less about. Barack Obama is the quintessential politician. Obama’s words dont’ match his actions or his record. Obama wants to spread Joe’s wealth around to the inner-city money sucking programs that buy Democrat votes and ultimately control the electoral votes that disenfranchise all the Joe the Plumber’s in America. California is the perfect example of how millions of voters get trumped by inner-city socialism in the massive LA and San Francisco populations.

We are in a civil war against the socialized government programs that want to build inner-city entitlements on the backs of small business owners in middle-America that drive innovation, industry and tax revenue. Obama wants massive government beauracracy and the massive government jobs that come with it. The beauracracy is the goal and it takes our tax dollars to fund it. The tax handouts to individuals are just icing on the socialist cake for buying votes.

Oct 16, 2008 - 10:10 am 20. trangbang68:

Obama is basically endorsing once again the sub prime fiasco. You could paraphrase his comment to say, “we just want the people below you to have a chance to succeed at home ownership”. This ruinous policy totally ignored human nature and character. Anectdotally, I sold a house in Alabama two years ago to a girl from the hood who I was frankly pretty amazed she could get a loan. Within months she was arrested for dealing crack out of the house.

Oct 16, 2008 - 10:17 am 21. attorneygirl:

There are millions of “Joe the Plumber.”

I am “Joe the Plumber.”

He has said exactly what I think.

Our country is being stolen from under us.

Why don’t we just split the country in two?

The conservatives can keep the actual land, and the liberals can take all the politicians, everyone on wall street, and the entire hollywood community, and start their own country somewhere else.

Oct 16, 2008 - 10:18 am 22. JKB:

I see the attacks on Joe the individual have started. They do this without the realization that Joe was just the match that lit the tinder. Check out the posts of Kathryn Jean Lopez over at The Corner. She has two letters up, one from the wife of Mack the Trucker and one from Joe the Lawyer. This firestorm is rapidly growing for a sweep across middle America.

Question is: Are there more small business owners and their employees than their are those who meekly ask “Please Sir, can I have some more?” Note to the latter, keep your eyes down when you ask your betters for the handout.

Oct 16, 2008 - 10:19 am 23. attorneygirl:

I have just read the previous 18 comments.

Let me say how happy I am to be able to share comments like this with my fellow citizens on this thread. It’s really great.

I’m also happy to see that folks are using “Joe the Plumber” to really analyze how a small business works.

I own a small business: a law practice.

And from the gross amount that my practice earns every year, you start subtracting–and you start subtracting big time. (Operating costs (yes, Martindale Hubbell and Lexis are ridiculously expensive), rent, insurance (including expensive malpractice insurance), capital expenditures (computers are expensive folks), client costs (which run into thousands of dollars per case), hiring workers (paralegals, attorneys, private investigators, court costs, deposition costs…). It’s expensive to run a law practice.

So, when I’ve got funds, those funds go right back into the business–to feed it–to support it–to grow it. Repeat: TO GROW IT.

What’s left over gets taxed at the highest possible rate from both the feds and the state. If I’m taxed any higher, I cannot make capital expenditures, I cannot fund cases, I cannot hire workers. So business slows down. How is that good for the economy?

Obama does not care about this. He is a socialist to the core. He will work to destroy this economy in his belief that he wants to reshape this country into a socialist society. This is very dangerous.

Oct 16, 2008 - 10:27 am 24. Wolla Dalbo:

Now I see that today “Scranton” Joe Biden–who has never lived in Scranton since he was ten, sometimes also called “Lunchpail” Joe–although he held his last working class job when he was 18 and has been eating–and doing a very good job of it, too–at the public trough for the last 35 years,told reporters that “Joe the Plumber” was not a real plumber, ‘caus none of the plumbers around his neighborhood make $250K. Hell, the prices plumbers charge me, they’ve probably hit 250K before July rolls around!

I found it hilarious that for ol’ “Scranton,” Lunchpail” Joe, the “around here” is the area full of mansions around the Biden family compound, his mansion on the water included (http://gatewaypundit.blogspot.com/).

Oct 16, 2008 - 10:37 am 25. jane:

Maybe someone will get a letter from Bob the drug dealer, or Susie the welfare mom or Mike the professional student and we can hear about how great an Obama presidency will be for them.

Oct 16, 2008 - 10:41 am 26. Steve P.:

Nobody said it better than Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes: “I like paying taxes. With them I buy civilization.”

If you want to live in a crappy country that doesn’t produce anything, has a failing education system and a failed economy because the vast majority of people don’t have the money to buy anything, then fine, go ahead. But I’d like to live in a country that creates jobs and wealth by producing things that the rest of the world wants to buy. What we need is new ideas, products and services, and tax breaks for the wealthy has not accomplished this. In order to do that, we need to educate the next generation who will create our new products and services. We also need to rebuild crumbling infrastructure required to be a producing nation again. This requires sacrifice and investment. And to hear you folks whine about how being taxed a few dollars more is going to ruin you, well, it’s more than just pathetic, it’s unpatriotic. Do you live in America because you love America, or because you love money? It sounds to me that the latter reason holds more true for many of you. I love this country. I want to work to restore her former greatness. And I’m willing to pay a few more dollars if that’s what it takes. The fact that many of you are so vocally opposed to this just speaks volumes of your phoniness.

Oct 16, 2008 - 10:52 am 27. The Right To Free Plumbing:

None of you understand. To make on omelet one must break some eggs, no? To create the Obamutopia one must break a few plumbers, and doctors, and lawyers, and accountants, and family farmers, and so on.

You people think this is about you. It’s not! It’s about Obama and what he can do for the little guy. Stop being selfish! Ayn Rand went out of style decades ago-my professors all agree.

So get onboard the bandwagon of The One, and ride-for free!-to Obamutopia.

Oct 16, 2008 - 10:55 am 28. Sarah:

Steve P. you are delusional! Why don’t you be the first to give up all you work for and I’m sure that like-minded people who are less “selfish” than the rest of us will be happy to do the same. Why don’t you lead by example! Patriotism has NOTHING to do with the amount of taxes you pay. You are the reason the “welfare nation” has prospered, move to Russia where your socialist agenda will fit right in and you won’t have to worry about everyone complaining about being raped by big government.

Oct 16, 2008 - 11:16 am 29. Peter the Sub Guy:

Okay, Steve, there’s a difference between paying taxes (which I’m more than happy to do) and being penalized with higher taxes because I work hard and earn more money just so it can be taken from me and given to Debbie the Welfare Mom or Bobby the Drug Dealer who are either too lazy to support themselves or actually make 10 times the money I do selling illegal drugs but (of course) doesn’t report any of it.

Oct 16, 2008 - 11:19 am 30. Peter the Sub Guy:

A posting I saw on another site explains it perfectly.
(Special thanks to Ziff)
Years ago I worked with a Russian who defected from the USSR. He explained how manufacturing work, and by extension most other work, was done under socialism. Every worker was given a monthly quota of what was to be achieved. Not much was done during the first week because everyone was recovering from hangovers. During the second and third weeks everyone busted their rumps to ensure that the monthly quota could be achieved. The fourth week was spent on cruise control, finishing up what was left of the quota and getting sloshed. Making the quota ensured no penalties or punishments. Exceeding it resulted in your quota being raised, because obviously you could do more. Due to these two facts everyone worked only to achieve their quota, because hard work was “punished” by having a heavier load put on you without more reward. Why work harder only to gain the same compensation as the person next to you who only did what was required? The point of all this is that if you punish those who reach for success you discourage them from even trying, and we all suffer as a result.

Oct 16, 2008 - 11:27 am 31. fred:

SteveP,

The fact that our education system is failing to turn out kids who don’t need remedial math, science, and writing/grammar/English courses in their freshman years is due, in large measure, to an education system that brilliantly indoctrinates and poorly educates. If you would but look under the hood at the educational pedagogy for the past fifty years in public schools across this country, what you will find is a steady dumbing down of standards and content. ALL UNDER THE CAREFUL SUPERVISION OF THE LEFT.

Don’t blame the teachers for this, because they are only carrying out their orders. They are told what to teach, how to do it, and how to endure in the classroom by professors and apparatchiks who know very well what they are doing. The theoreticians want to blow up the system, and the best way to do it is to undercut the solidity of the foundation. They have succeeded at this beyond their wildest expectations.

If you want there to be a more deep and widespread base of talent in this country again, support vouchers and choice in education. Let parents decide and the abilities and motivations of their kids decide where to get the education they need.

Oct 16, 2008 - 11:30 am 32. fred:

I forgot to mention that William Ayers is one of the foremost practitioners in the new pedagogies that emphasize Marxist liberation and equality of outcomes, rather than hard course content that challenges kids and, quite naturally, sorts them by ability and motivation along the way.

Oct 16, 2008 - 11:32 am 33. dan:

steve p., you don’t seem to understand how a nation becomes a nation of innovators and producers where the masses can afford to buy crap. it’s called capitalism, and, in a perfect world, the government doesn’t do anything but enforce contracts.

and can we please stop hearing about “crumbling infrastructure” and all the other thin-air characterizations of the hopeful socialists-who-dont-seem-to-understand-theyre-socialists.

and why don’t they know what they are? because they aren’t educated. and why aren’t they educated, although we have compulsory schooling and the best private schooling in the world?

because the schools are taken over by absolute blithering morons like yourself and everyone who stands at an assembly line making bolts can’t figure out why Mr. Big Corporation would rather pay a Korean or an Indian $13 a day rather than $67 an hour to do the same thing. But i guess they probably don’t teach “mathematics” in your communist re-education camp either.

Oct 16, 2008 - 11:34 am 34. sydney jane:

I’m glad you mentioned that line about giving people a “chance for success,” because I was thinking about that part of it myself. What are people going to do with these “rebates” or whatever they’re called? $500, or $1000 per family? If you’re Michelle Obama, you’ll go out and buy a new pair of earrings. If you’re my sister, you’ll go out and get an Ipod. It’s not like most people are going to use this for anything except something that they don’t really need. How is that giving them a chance for success? Boy, I really wish the McCain people would pick up more on things like this.

As for Joe, I feel really sorry for him this morning. I hear the Obama attack squad is digging up every piece of dirt on him they can find, trying to “Palinize” him.

Oct 16, 2008 - 11:37 am 35. I R A Darth Aggie:

The America I live in is completely dominated by massive corporations

Really? who built your house? which corporate entity sends you an electrician/plumber/carpenter to work on a job for you?

Do you eat out? you always go to corporate establishments? you’ve never tried the mom & pop pizza joint down the street? and even with the corporate names, the local estabilishment is likely a franchisee, owned and operated by someone living in your city.

Oct 16, 2008 - 11:50 am 36. Charlie (Colorado):

And the attacks have already started. Politico has a reporter out looking into Joe’s tax records and plumbing licenses.

Oct 16, 2008 - 11:55 am 37. CALIndie:

Neo-Neocon – Ironies? Calling these important issues that you listed in your follow on piece “ironies” is like calling Mt. Everest a casual hike.

The real questions is, why does 47% of America think these issues aren’t ironic but factual representations of the truth and the other 43% are perfectly comfortable with calling them ironic?

I’ll tell you why. The liberal socialist MSM has unprecedented psychological influence on shaping American impressions and perceptions. I’ve spent most of my adult life developing high impact marketing campaigns for U.S. companies large and small. I am proud of my work representing products and services of value. But the fact of the matter is, Americans are sold a boat load of crap, day in and day out with intentionally misleading and deceptive messages… because they work! Their lies generate the appropriate response; sickening amounts of revenue paid to liars, cheats and cons. The MSM and socialist pundits employ the same lies and deception to produce their desired results; mindshare that grows socialist viewpoints and willing participants in redistribution of wealth.

So here we are, as hardworking Americans losing our life savings, calling Barney Frank’s lying, cheating, pathetic, sexually overt conflict of interest in “Fanny” Mae and Freddie Mac’s implosion a Republican deregulation problem ironic.

It may just take 8 years of Obama socialism to communism (little c), 3-4 Obama Supreme Court Justices for social re-engineering, millions of active duty Obama community organizers whose budget rivals the U.S. military pounding the streets like ACORN in the name of “fairness”, billions of tax dollars funding “La revelucion es de educacion” to radicalize government schools and billions of creative tax increases heaped on American producers in industry so government beauracracy can finally create an irreversible socialized populace to get us to call these “ironies” what they really are… lies, cheats and cons and the liars, cheats and cons that perpetrate them criminals embezzling America’s wealth one business at a time.

As you pointed out in your follow on link, in the Book of Ecclesiastes, the writer who many believe was King Solomon the wisest man who ever lived, clearly describes in easy to understand terms, what is and is not truly important in God’s economy and plan for humanity. Matthew exhorts us in the same fashion, and now we’ve built our house on the sand and the storms are raging against it’s foundation. It all may have to collapse for sober, honest thinking to re-emerge. God help us!

Oct 16, 2008 - 11:55 am 38. Jeff:

Joe the Plumber,

You’d better get those Red Box movies back to Walmart now or else Obama is going to roast you in the press! Why can Obama dig up things on others but hide the fact that he has been a member of a racist church all of his adult life? I guess his connections with the liberal illuminati run very deep.

Oct 16, 2008 - 11:56 am 39. newton:

The digging in on this man is one of the reasons why many good people who could enter politics and change things… simply decide it’s not worth their time or trouble. And I don’t blame them one bit.

Oct 16, 2008 - 12:04 pm 40. Markus:

Everyone had higher taxes back in the Clinton years, yet the economy was doing much better than it is now. Also as I recall, it was very easy to find a plumber.

Oct 16, 2008 - 12:07 pm 41. CALIndie:

Steve P. – Nobody said it better than Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes: “I like paying taxes. With them I buy civilization.”

Answer this question Steve P., what government program, beauracracy, entitlement etc. creates a better, more effecient, less wasteful civilization? Name one government program that reduces waste, reduces fraud while improving outcomes. I dare you.

I’ll even give you a head start, start with how increasing the billions of tax dollars given to the Dept. of Education has improved test scores and American competition and reduced the high school drop out rate which hovers around 50% nationally?

Educate us oh wise Steve P. we can’t wait to hear your wisdom. How is civilization improved with more government beauracracy and waste? We’re ready to drink the kool-aid if you can give us measurable, definable examples of federal government serendipity.

Oct 16, 2008 - 12:22 pm 42. jen:

I had a small business, a hair salon, during the Clinton Administration. We where voted number one in our local paper 5 years in a row. The taxes killed it. I hope there is an America left after Obama’s done.

Oct 16, 2008 - 12:22 pm 43. Eric:

Here is another example of Dems wanting to kill the free market and spread the wealth around. This one shoule even rile up Democrats.

Dems want to end tax deduction for 401k’s and enact a government retirement program in its place: http://www.investmentnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20081012/REG/310139971

Oct 16, 2008 - 12:24 pm 44. always right:

One of the more ridiculous comments from yesterday’s Ask Dr. Helen column was -

“If ‘Joe the Plumber’ makes more than 250k a year, then he is no longer ‘Joe the Plumber’.”

I could just imagine a classic ‘class envy’ from some lonely “professor” on social sciences who couldn’t believe a high-school-diploma Joe more successful than himself.

/thought I bring up some comedy relief

Oct 16, 2008 - 12:26 pm 45. jb:

Markus,
That was due to the computer industry and the Internet bubble. In other words it was because on the American worker NOT the government. Clinton was too busy with interns and cigars to screw it up.

Oct 16, 2008 - 12:28 pm 46. sydney jane:

“Second, he doesn’t pay taxes anyway! He owes over $1,200 in unpaid personal income tax.”

Well, just because you OWE taxes, doesn’t mean you don’t pay taxes. I pay over $10K a year in taxes, based on my salary…but, at tax time, I always wind up owing about a grand more. I suspect it’s the same way for Joe. Not everyone’s tax obligation is satisfied from what is taken out in payroll taxes. So, to say he doesn’t pay taxes just because he owes money to the government is a silly argument.

Oct 16, 2008 - 12:30 pm 47. jb:

Our government, both parties, don’t know how to take care of the money we give them now and some of you people want to give them more. Now that really makes sense. We shouldn’t say we don’t want to pay more taxes, we should say we dont want to waste more taxes.

Oct 16, 2008 - 12:35 pm 48. Eric:

Steve P. it isn’t a question of Americans not wanting to make critical investments in infrastructure, education, defense, etc that benefit ALL Americans but rather the socialist’s stated intent to take from the “rich” to redistribute to those not defined as rich. That benefits no one. And it is fact that most tax dollars spent by the Federal government are wealth transfers in the form of Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid food stamps, free lunch programs, welfare payments, SCHIP, and countless others. Our government wastes untold trillions of dollars annually on programs that aren’t even within its Constitutional authority to have developed int he first place. If Liberals want to give more money to the government there is a line on all tax forms that provide the opportunity to give more. You do n ot have the right to enslave the rest of us in a grand redistribution scheme. I work for me, not for the guy behind me. Money confiscated from me to GIVE away to someone else is money I don’t have to voluntarily support some other person’s business or a charity I prefer. Government is the ultimate form of evil and must be fought vigorously.

Oct 16, 2008 - 12:52 pm 49. notutopia:

I heard the “chance for success” loud and clear!
Success is not priority based on chance! It is based on determination and single sighted focus on an outcome. Neither is possible in the equation that Obama is presenting in our current Capitalistic Democracy. But, being granted the chance to succeed is intended to be doled out to his chosen subset few in his depiction of a Socialist government.
We also need to err from heralding too much import on one individual who becomes a posterman for our American Dream. He was assertive and honest in his query and response to Obama. We don’t need another touted Hero. We already have two Mavericks, lets tout their potentials and get this election won!

Oct 16, 2008 - 1:22 pm 50. Marc Malone:

Markus – Clinton’s tax hike was at the beginning of his term, and they DID hurt the economy. There was a downturn in ‘93. Thats’ what prompted the Republican revolution in ‘94.

The economy really took off after the Pubs took over Congress in ‘95, and passed the balanced budget. The Internet boom happened in the late 1990’s. That’s when most of the wealth and jobs were created (after the Pubs took over). Clinton had nothing to do with it. The Pub Congress did it.

You’ll notice that the slowdown in the economy happened with a Dem controlled Congress. Through 2006, things were going very, very well economically. The biggest deficit hikes occurred with the Dem Congress. We’re about to see more of the same, only much worse. It really doesn’t matter who’s Prez, because the Dems may have a veto-proof majority.

Most Americans are so dumb when it comes to economics and civics.

Oct 16, 2008 - 1:35 pm 51. Wolla Dalbo:

The economy is swirling around the toilet bowl, headed for the sewer and the great Obama wants to raise taxes and kill job formation and the possibility of economic expansion, by taking money from successful, productive members of society and transferring it, via “refundable tax credits” to those who pay no taxes–many of whom, I’ll wager, don’t work because they have found ways to game the system, and in the process, Obama creates what he hopes will be an army of grateful and dedicated supporters.

What was it that Saul Alinsky wrote? That the main tactic of the “community organizer” should be to agitate by trying to “rub raw the wounds of discontent” i.e. “class warfare” and that the organizer’s central goal should always be the “seizure of power”?

Even before this current economic meltdown, we were already headed for catastrophic economic problems in the near future. If you take a look at chart 8.3 from the FY2009 Budget’s Historical Tables (find 8.3 here http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/fy2009/hist.html), you will see that in 2009 the Federal government will devote an estimated 55% of all government expenditures to mandatory social programs, programs like social security, medicaid and various types of welfare–food stamps, childcare and/or housing subsidies for the poor, WIC, etc. Moreover, because of population growth and the fact that the inflation-indexed family income threshold for eligibility for these “entitlements”–the “poverty line”–is set higher each year to compensate for inflation , more and more people will have incomes below the “poverty line”, thus, making them “eligible.” This black hole, voraciously consuming an ever greater percentage of our entire federal budget each year, was already in play before this meltdown.

Imagine what Obama’s tax increases and massive expansion of social programs will do to our economic future.

Oct 16, 2008 - 1:36 pm 52. Red Blooded American:

Joe the plumber? Who isn’t registered to vote, owes taxes, and will not be negatively impacted by the proposed Obama tax plan. Yeah, right. The anecdotes about Joe are the same type of b.s. typically pulled out whenever one side wants to smear the other.

What the nutjobs don’t get is that if the Republicans had actually exercised some restraint in managing government instead of more than doubling the national debt in about 7.5 years and destabilizing the entire world’s financial system in the process, they would have a decent argument about being able to reign in government spending and restore fiscal discipline. But as it is they have zero credibility on this issue, as reflected in every poll you can name. The same hard-core 23% who believe Bush has done a good job are the only ones buying that argument. I would suggest they form a new party based on completely dismantling the government except for the military/national security apparatus as well as a firm devotion to moral rectitude per the literal interpretation of the bible. Sarah Palin might well be a good standard-bearer for this new party. Only then will the Republican party be able to position itself as a mainstream party that can attract a broad range of support.

PS, if Obama were a socialist about to wreck (the already shipwrecked by Republican mismanagement) U.S. economy, the world’s most successful investor, Warren Buffett, would not be a vocal supporter of his. Think about that fact while drinking the far-right kool-aid.

Oct 16, 2008 - 1:40 pm 53. Marc Malone:

Someone75 – You’re still at it, spreading your subtle disinformation. You really must be a paid pro.

“Joe” admits no such thing. The business makes $250-280K was his claim. He also said that it doesn’t matter, because who’s to say the cutoff won’t be $150k, later?

I find it interesting that suddenly you know about Joe’s actual situation right away: his taxes; his actual expectations. You’re right atop the news stream on this.

The thing is, the actual person doesn’t matter. “Joe” is emblematic of the wrongness of the Obama proposals. He simply humanizes an abstract: the abstract of the American Dream. He works long hours and hopes to have his own business someday. Like most men in their late-20’s to late-40’s, he dreams of wealth. The guy he works for talks to him about someday owning the business. That’s how it’s supposed to work. Obama’s policies would only interfere in this process.

Oct 16, 2008 - 1:46 pm 54. Do Americans Care What CEO’s Think? : The New Nixon: News and Commentary about the President, his Times, and his Legacy:

[...] Neo-Neocon cites this important, yet irrelevant statistic in this election cycle: Perhaps that’s why 74% of CEOs [...]

Oct 16, 2008 - 1:47 pm 55. Will Becker:

To Someone,you haven’t heard about small business being the backbone of America because,if you listen only to the mainstream media,they never mention it.The truth is small business is the backbone of America. Take it away,and we’ll be like China,a communist country.Sadly that’s where we’re headed.

Oct 16, 2008 - 1:47 pm 56. glc:

Can’t we just break into two countries?

We conservatives can build our own country–ourselves–and reward hard work.

Democrats, liberals, socialists and other victims can build their own country–by standing around and begging someone else to do it for them.

Oct 16, 2008 - 1:53 pm 57. glc:

The mainstream media are all in the tank for Obama.

Our country is changing before our very eyes.

I am surrounded by idiots and victims.

Oct 16, 2008 - 1:54 pm 58. Markus:

jb and Marc — You misunderstand me. I wasn’t claiming that the Clinton tax hikes caused the excellent economic growth of the nineties. All I meant was that they did not IMPEDE tech-boom driven growth, including the entrepreneurship associated with it.

Any tax increase under Obama is likely to have the same effect: negligible. Nobody who I respect claims that fiscal policy (taxes, spending) is primary engine of growth or recession. The purpsoe of taxing and spending is to pay for essential public services without burdening future generations.

Oct 16, 2008 - 2:00 pm 59. Vincenti e crisi americana : mariosechi.net:

[...] Media W. Is an Insult to 62 Million VotersAnd the Winner Is… Joe the PlumberEuro-Snobs Slight American LiteraturePJM Political Plumbs the Last Presidential Debate of [...]

Oct 16, 2008 - 2:03 pm 60. Red Blooded American:

GLC: Break into two countries…I guess along the red-state blue-state division in the 2008 election? One problem with your scheme is that the red states are pretty much all net recipients of federal expenditures, where the blue states get less back than they pay in taxes. Probably something to do with all those roads and expensive services in rural areas. If you were an actual conservative you would recognize that the country is stronger as a unified whole with all its warts, and that building the infrastructure of roads, ports, dams, as well as schools and other public services is what allows actual hard work to pay off. Without this shared commitment to a strong country, we will go the road of every other formerly great nation that has allowed its infrastructure to deteriorate while favoring only the parochial interests of those monied enough to buy influence.

Oct 16, 2008 - 2:03 pm 61. Someone75:

Marc:

Thank you for the compliment. You’re correct – I *am* on top the news stream on this matter. It’s been widely reported and I’m surprised you hadn’t heard about it. Actually, it’s all over the net. Go to any major news source (even Fox) and you can see Joe admitting on the air that he makes nowhere near $250k. I’m sorry, but if you think he does, you’re wrong. The facts do not support that. Joe said it himself.

The slippery slope is a common logical fallacy. I’ve read many of your posts and I think you’re more intelligent than that. I am not a paid pro. I’m a centrist (not that you believe it) who is probably voting democratic this time around. The things I like about the republican party are not present in McCain’s campaign. I don’t want liberals running the country, but I’m a believer in the two party system self-regulating the government. It has to go back and forth.

Anyway – I realize that Joe is a symbol of the “common” man. But, the common man doesn’t make 250k. Nor does the common man own his own business. And, what do you know! Neither does Joe! He doesn’t own his own business, and he doesn’t make 250k per year. Don’t take my word for it – go watch his interview.

Oct 16, 2008 - 2:21 pm 62. tim maguire:

Sad to see the attack forces are out already. A decent citizen asks a politician a hard question and he is vilified by that politician’s worshippers. Joe doesn’t make 250 G’s? So what? His quesiton was about more than just him, it was about middle America.

And let me let you in on a little secret Obamabots–most Americans will defend the wealthy because most Americans hope to one day be wealthy. And enough of them will make it that they’re not crazy to hope it. At least not yet, since the Democrats haven’t had the chance to destroy the American dream just yet.

Joe may not make 250 G’s, but it’s not out of reach for him, nor for most of us. Most of us can imagine being in that position, that’s why Joe’s question and Obama’s answer hit home.

You can’t change reality and no matter what you do to Joe.

Oct 16, 2008 - 2:29 pm 63. SGT Ted:

What is telling in all this is that when this ordinary guy stands up to Obamas BS, him and his supporters go all out to destroy him. Who even knows that whats being thrown up around the internet about Joe by The One and his zombie followers is even true?

One more proof that Obama and his droolers can’t stand dissent and won’t allow it.

Oct 16, 2008 - 2:41 pm 64. Clyde:

When I was watching the debate I kept thinking of things that I wish McCain would have said. Like when Obama compared him to Bush, I would have replied “Senator Obama, you and your policies are more like Jimmy Carter’s then mine are like George Bush’s”. And when Obama was trying to trivialize Ayer’s again, I would have replied, “Let me just say this…There is no way in hell that I would serve on even a PTA with someone who tried to kill servicemen and women at the Pentagon. And if I was to walk into a church and the preacher started to curse at this great country, I would have walked out and certainly not returned for 20-years in a row”.

John McCain could be a great President. Unfortunately he is not a good match against a smooth talking liberal lawyer from Harvard who could also have gotten O.J. acquitted.

Oct 16, 2008 - 2:50 pm 65. SGT Ted:

Joe never said he made 250K and the leftard smear merchants know it. Joe said he WANTED to make that much by owning a business and He doen’t trust Obama to let him keep his mone.

But, it just shows that the lefts claims of championing the “working man” is all hot air. They sure love the working man, as long as he keeps his motuh shut, his head sown and doesn’t complain when his Progressive betters want to take his money and give it to the failed businesses that donated to their campaigns. Claims about not wanting to support infrastructure are an attempted distraction. Obama isn’t talking about taking Joes money to pay for roads. Obama himself said he’s about taking peoples “extra” cash because that would be “fair”.

Oct 16, 2008 - 2:55 pm 66. Someone75:

If you’re making over 250k a year, I think you can afford to help out those who are struggling. It’s in the bible. We are to help the widows and the poor. Maybe you don’t want it going to the government, but there’s nothing wrong with someone making a six figure income to contribute more to the greater good. It’s the Christian way. Jesus did not say “Hoard all your money and never let anyone touch it”.

Oct 16, 2008 - 3:18 pm 67. RE:

Someone75,

You’ve got your books confused. You are thinking Animal Farm, not the Bible.

Nowhere in the Bible does it say you have any say whatsoever about another person’s charity and finances. Charitable contributions are personal, voluntary decision – and conservatives voluntarily contribute billions of dollars annually. Lefties like yourself are just upset that it’s done in such a way that you don’t get a chance to skim off of it.

Oct 16, 2008 - 3:45 pm 68. JimCap:

Well, I had some hope before last night. McCain blew a golden opportunity in the final debate. This morning at work, everybody’s laughing at McCain, like he’s some sort of joke now. These are the same people who were saying a few weeks ago that they admired him.

Why did he have to go into that “Joe The Plumber” crap? I didn’t understand that? Joe was supposed to be the “average guy” but then later, McCain says, “Congratulations Joe, you’re rich!” What was that about? Most Americans don’t want to hear about some rich guy when they’re struggling.

Now I hear McCain’s just trying to hang on to West Virginia and North Carolina and North Dakota. This is a nightmare. I’m not going to put any more energy into hoping for a late in the fourth quarter miracle. McCain looks like a loser

Oct 16, 2008 - 4:06 pm 69. RE:

Someone75,

But seeing as how you bring up the Bible, surely you must be familiar with this Bible quote:

“Why do you see the speck in your brother’s eye but fail to notice the beam in your own eye? -Matthew 7:3

Oct 16, 2008 - 4:15 pm 70. L. Steven Beene II:

And now, apparently the Dems want to abolish the tax breaks for 401k’s and have all people put money in GOV’T CONTROLLED/HANDLED retirement accounts (mandatory if I read it right) where you get 3% per year by being invested in GOV’T bonds.

Oh, and it’s to be administered by the Social Security People. The ones who keep adding people to Social Security, and whose “trust fund” is a box of IOUs.

Give me a freaking break.

Nah, there’s not a STRONG socialist bend in the liberal mindset now … nothing to see here, move along.

Oct 16, 2008 - 4:39 pm 71. Ed Wallis:

Folks, please remember one thing, as those like “Someone75″ or “RedBloodedAmerican” go off on their rants:

The message of Joe Wurzelbacher from his encounter with Obama REMAINS THE SAME – that Obama’s policies will bring higher taxes, and that Obama himself wants the “spread the wealth” that others have earned and that he thinks that’s “good for everyone.”

All the character assasination from the Leftists cannot change this.

Oct 16, 2008 - 4:43 pm 72. El Bruce:

Why is it that whenever a Republican administration cuts taxes for the richest 1% while raising them for everybody else (via overboard deficit spending) it’s viewed as the best thing ever, but whenever a Democratic administration proposes shifting the tax burden slightly off the middle class and back onto the rich, it’s decried as socialism? Aren’t I a part of the free market too? Or do only rich people count? And why should I feel so sorry for the plight of the rich? They’re doing fine – they’re rich, after all. I’m more worried about working families right now.

We’re just talking about shifting the burden by 3% from one group to another. In fact, we’re just talking about putting it BACK to the structure it had up to 2000. As I recall, the economy was doing pretty good back then, but them’s just facts, and facts have a well known liberal bias.

I’ll make you a deal: if you made net over $250K taxable income on your last year’s tax return, you go ahead and vote for McCain. I won’t even try to talk you out of it. If you made less than that, then vote for Obama. We’ll see how the election goes when people quit voting in the interests of other people who are exploiting them and start voting in their own interest. Isn’t that how markets are supposed to work – people acting in their own interest? Or again, do the interests of the rich get some kind of special exemption?

Oct 16, 2008 - 5:12 pm 73. Soccermom:

Someone,
My father had to struggle to pay for college. No one paid for his “chance at success” He became very successful. He donates much of his money and has taken in at least 3 children that were not his own and gave them the opportunity to go to school. The libs want you to believe that the “rich” are greedy and don’t want to help. In truth, they just don’t want to see their hard earned money wasted on people who have no intention of taking responsiblilty for themselves. You need to do some research and see exactly how much of your tax money is used to help the “widows and the poor” maybe you would chose to want to donate your money the way you see fit also

Oct 16, 2008 - 5:13 pm 74. fred:

Government cannot create jobs. That people still believe this is evidence that the myth of FDR still lingers and is even renewed. It is pure pandering, and this is an old cock and bull story that the mob swills going all the way back to Rome.

Our system works best when you provide the right climate for people and businesses to create jobs. When a candidate for office tells you he or she will create jobs, know you are being lied to and run the other way.

Oct 16, 2008 - 5:30 pm 75. "Joe the Plummer" May Be a Disenfranchised Voter - Snowboarding Forum - Snowboard Enthusiast Forums:

[...] Be Counted?

Oct 16, 2008 - 5:35 pm 76. Freeedom is just another word:

Joe the Plumber, as most small businesses are “S corporations”. S corporations are all around you, that chain of small movie theaters, that fast food franchiser, that agricultural company that used to be a family farm, that ice cream company. If you see a ‘family business’ it is most likely an S corporation.

The lure of an S corporation is the business and the owner together only pay tax on the net income once, and at the personal income tax rate. This avoids double taxation of income that happens with corporations that are owned by alot of people (aka Wall Street type companies).

The catch of an S corporation is that the owner pay the tax on the net take of the business regardless of whether the owner takes the cash out of the business. (The owner also has to pay himself a reasonable salary, paying all those payroll taxes). If we increase the rate to, say, 50%, it means that there is 50% less income inside the business to grow. Unless the owner has another income source, the owner will have to take money out of the business to pay Uncle Sam. The owner can not keep as much money inside the business bank accounts for a rainy day, for future expansion, etc.

In short, high tax rates of S corporations keep S corporations small. At $250,000, it will thwart the S corporation’s growth. Yes, some brilliant S corporations grow into large, publicly traded corporations employing millions of people. But, at the $250,000 tax threshold, we will be putting a dark cloud over the plant just as it gets its first flower.

Oct 16, 2008 - 5:48 pm 77. thegr8_1:

Hey Senator Government and all you dumb dopes in Washington Newsflash I am not interested in sharing my wealth with those below the food chain unless I CHOOSE to make a donation. Let them bust their butts like good Americans do.
Leave Joe the plumber alone don’t harrass him he is trying to make a living for his family unlike you idiots in the press and Congress. If anyone wants to pay more taxes write your own check to the Treasury typed as Glenn Beck was saying that.
I don’t want to lose my 401k I refuse to pay any extra taxes from losing this deduction. I do not want a government sponsored program to replace 401k, you have embezzled my Social Security and Medicare payments and of you were a corporation you would all be in jail .

Oct 16, 2008 - 6:36 pm 78. Chip:

The purest form of socialism is slavery.

During the Antebellum period, elitist Democratic slave-owners could easily manipulate local economies because they always had the ability to undercut any competition by controlling price levels with free labor. It made life very tough for the independent business owner or farmer.

Does anyone now see where this current trend is going? The main problem with having someone else control the decision making process of how much you get to keep from the fruits of your labor is that you have no voice and no recourse.

The very same reasons we rebelled against King George III are now being similarly manifested by supporters of Barack Obama who advocate for legalized theft.

Exploitation is the ugliest aspect of any form of socialism.

Oct 16, 2008 - 6:56 pm 79. kabud:

very interesting discussion

well, i’ve heard that an average IQ of USA voter is under 100

given that : people who can think and who wrote all these very good and smart comments here are THE MINORITY

`they` want to take our wealth and redistribute it away fom us(((

Oct 16, 2008 - 7:03 pm 80. bogie wheel:

The “class warfare” mantra of the Democrats is a shell game.

It isn’t (and hasn’t been, at least in its incarnation since the 60s) about eliminating poverty. It’s about creating jobs for government bureaucrats and, yes, “community organizers” to manage the underclass. Eliminating poverty would put the mandarins out of business … which is why, 40+ years and $7 TRILLION since the inception of the “War on Poverty,” whadda ya know, the underclass is not only still here, but some individuals are third- and fourth-generation members.

Naturally compassionate people are, unfortunately, suckered all the time into buying the propaganda about the aims and effectiveness of government social programs (esp the US federal gov’t kind). As opposed to, y’know, things like microloans (a *gasp* capitalist concept!), which actually have a proven track record in positively affecting people’s lives in places with the worst of the worst kind of poverty (see Muhammad Yunus, Grameen Bank, Nobel Peace Prize).

Make no mistake, though, the Poverty Management Poobahs know *exactly* what is going on. They are the primary beneficiaries of the system. Theirs are the power, influence, cushy salaries, insider deals, and veneer of moral superiority. Meanwhile, the poor people still rot & get shot in their crime-infested neighborhoods, while the middle-class is pickpocketed to pay for a deliberately futile enterprise.

Oct 16, 2008 - 7:11 pm 81. fred:

Freeedom is just another word

The best post of the day on this thread. All of these things I know, but you explained it lucidly and with economy. Anyone who cannot understand this should never have been allowed to graduate from high school, let alone college or tech school.

It has been my argument all along that small corporations are where our engine of growth comes from. If you cut back the water, fertilizer, and the soil, you cannot expect anything to come out of it viable and larger.

Economic policy in the hands of statists, collectivists, and lawyers is folly. Government should get out of the way and let the people thrive.

Oct 16, 2008 - 7:12 pm 82. fred:

Everyone take a look at France and the rest of the E.U. You see very little growth of small businesses and entrepreneurship. You either work for the government or you work for large, monopolistic corporations that are given government subsidies – IF YOU CAN FIND A JOB AT ALL. There is high, structural unemployment in Europe for a reason: the economic policies are – and I will use a politically incorrect word here – retarded.

If we don’t wake up we will find ourselves sleepwalking into a new environment that is like France’s economy.

“Social justice” and redistribution are not just at all. They harm the very people who most need opportunity. I say, let’s have a safety net that is not intrusive of the economy, so that people have a “hand up” when they need it and then can thrive and prosper on their own. But if we keep incrementally adding to that social safety net obligations that require more and more taxation, we will kill the very engine that provides the revenues to the treasury in the first place. This is not a difficult concept to grasp. My God, even Russia has lower taxes than we do!

Oct 16, 2008 - 7:18 pm 83. wes george:

Obama supporters want to parse meaningless details–Joe’s taxes would only rise by 3%, Obama was only 8 while Ayer’s was out trying to murder cops, blah, blah. They’ll argue anything but what really matters–the unmentionable 7000lb ethical elephant in the room. The plan is to sit on the ball while the clock ticks to game over.

All Americans want an honest, moral person, steeped in the American values that made this country strong and just, as their next President. We can disagree all day on policies, but we can ALL agree that the next President must be a patriot, incorruptible, honest and have the strength of character capable of making the right decision when that call comes at 3 am.

In this particular election character and values are the only thing that matters any more–not the meaningless debate about whose hot air talking points trump the moment.

We all know who John McCain is. This election and history itself will turn on whether the American people are intellectually honest enough to face up to the hard cold facts about who Obama really is, not who we wish he was. The nation has 2 weeks to gather the moral courage to rise above its fantasies and confront the reality of the decision they are about to make.

So let’s try a thought experiment. Imagine that Barry’s history of personal and career choices were John’s, only coming from the far right side of politics, rather than the far left.

Imagine–McCain raised his kids in a church where the preacher preached hatred against minorities and America.

Imagine–McCain launched his senate career at the home of ex-abortion bombers gone straight, but unrepentant in their malice. Worse, McCain collaborated with the former bombers turned academics to indoctrinate children into extremist, anti-American world views.

Imagine–McCain had counselled and funded a right wing group which was at this very moment secretly subverting our democracy with an interstate, organized criminal attempt steal a Presidential election. The FBI is investigating. McCain denies everything, but there are no answers to what he knew and when he knew it.

Imagine–McCain had cut his political teeth in a cauldron of corruption like Chicago’s Daly political machine.

Imagine–The McCain campaign tried to arrange the legal prosecution of its critics’ right to free speech in Missouri.

And finally, imagine if McCain’s resume was blank but for “right-wing interest group organiser.”

If this were the case, WE all would be intellectually, ethically, even morally, beholden to repudiate McCain. Why should the case be different for Obama?

It’s that simple. Nothing else in this campaign really matters but the basic, down-to-Earth moral truths that made America the greatest nation in history. This is all you need to know to cast your vote.

Ask all Americans who support Obama: Can you in good faith honestly ignore the emerging pattern in Barry’s life choices and declare that Barry Obama truly represents the American values that made this nation great? Could you turn a blind eye to a similar pattern from a Republican politician?

If you have doubts, you know what you have to do.

Oct 16, 2008 - 7:19 pm 84. Red Blooded American:

Folks, please remember one thing, Ed Wallis is a red-baiter, at best.
Contrast Ed Wallis with a real conservative and patriot: Warren Buffett. Buffett has a brilliant financial mind and is by no stretch of the imagination a socialist or anything but a fundamentally conservative businessman from Omaha who states that his faith is with the American people. And he supports Obama in this election.

Oct 16, 2008 - 7:26 pm 85. bogie wheel:

Every time a small business owner:

(a) hires from the community,
(b) offers a good or service at a competitive price,
(c) pays local taxes that support municipal services,
(d) buys supplies or services from other businesses,
(e) expands the physical premises of the business by either renting or building, and
(f) buys personal items (like a house and everything that goes in it) with the proceeds from the business …

That business owner is, de facto, “spreading the wealth around.”

Senator Government, for some reason, seems to believe that increasing the tax burdens on business owners will “spread the wealth around,” when in fact it will have just the opposite effect by hindering the business owner’s ability to do one, many, or all of the things above. You don’t have to have run a business to know this. It’s common sense for any nimrod who has ever worked in the private sector — i.e., outside government & academia. Which, gee, just happens to be where Mr. Obama has spent virtually his entire adult life. And he thinks (nay, is absolutely SURE) he knows better than the tens of millions of Americans who either run small(ish) businesses or work or them, what makes the economic choo choo run.

Oct 16, 2008 - 7:26 pm 86. Kiseta50:

I just read somewhere that the Toledo authorities found out that the Joe the plumber did not finish his master plumber degree, and they will stop him from working without a license. His boss has one, that is not enough? I think we are heading back to Stalinistic time, where you are a fraid to say anything to anybody.

Oct 16, 2008 - 7:32 pm 87. fred:

wes george,

Excellent points. I would further add a point of clarification. This election is about way more than just Barack Obama and John McCain. It is about US as a people and what we have become. And it is for that reason that I am fearful of what I am about to discover about the dramatic changes from the Greatest Generation to the current demographics (the WWII/Great Depression generation is dying off in buckets, to our great loss).

Whether or not most are aware of it, we are in a titanic struggle. Also, we are at a crossroads in Western civilization. The recrudescence of Islamic jihad after a period of several hundred years of somnolence is forcing the issue. Soon, the most aggressive, truculent member of the Ummah, the Islamic Republic, will have nuclear weapons.

If President Obama and his party have ended ballistic missile defense, how have their actions made us, our allies, and the world safer?

Yes, indeed. The cynic in me now questions the intelligence and the character of the people of my country.

Oct 16, 2008 - 7:38 pm 88. Wolf Pangloss:

I hope this displays.

If it doesn’t try here.

Oct 16, 2008 - 8:00 pm 89. Javelin:

What a talk show interpretation of some media stunt. If McCain is relying on cheap stunts like this then he might as well pack it in.

Oct 16, 2008 - 9:02 pm 90. crossover:

The Democrats were loving the stock market drops.

What they didn’t realize is the drop in oil prices.
Many of the average working ‘JOES’ will be getting half priced gas the day of the election, 2 dollars a gallon.
McCain wins.
The 401k- IRA drop is painful, but we forget about it and keep working.
A young man at the gas pumps asked me: “Is this drop in gas prices a Republican trick?” I told him NO, but that McCain would probably keep prices low.
He has now switched from Obama to McCain, but said he probably wouldn’t vote anyway.
If he does vote, it will be because of lower pump prices.

Oct 16, 2008 - 10:40 pm 91. kabud:

fred, dan, every one else:
MUCH RESPECT

it is getting serious and it feels in what you guys wrote and HOW you wrote it

I would like to add that the DOW should crash:

all the DOW companies are THE WORST and most corrupted

i know, i worked for years in one of the biggest of them

Oct 16, 2008 - 11:11 pm 92. Christine:

Hey everybody,

It turns out that Joe the Plumber, whose real name is Joe Wurzelbacher, is a close relative of Robert Wurzelbacher of Milford, Ohio. Who is Robert Wurzelbacher? He is the son-in-law of Charles Keating of the Keating Five scandal. Take a good look at these wonderful links below:

http://www.eisenstadtgroup.com/2008/10/15/joe-the-plumber-wurzelbacher-related-to-charles-keating-oops/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keating_Five

Oct 17, 2008 - 12:41 am 93. Dobie:

From each according to his ability to each according to his need. Doesn’t sound all that evil. History proves otherwise.

Socialism has been tried in America. Jamestown and Plymouth are the most well known: http://www.mises.org/story/336. Jamestown was abandoned after just 4 years. Almost all the pilgrims at Plymouth died the first year. Fortunately, Plymouth scrapped the ‘From each according to his ability to each according to his need’ BS and adopted a more capitalist model. The following years (and those after) was as good as the first was bad.

Obamarx, like all his socialist predecessors/contemporaries/pals, is convinced it just needs to be tried harder; a few (hundred?, thousand?, million?) killed to make it so.

More people have been killed by various governments trying to make socialism work, than by all wars combined. AND WE’RE EVEN DISCUSSING THE POSSIBILITY OF THIS DOUCHEBAG AS PRESIDENT?

Oct 17, 2008 - 1:37 am 94. Dobie:

Christine (92),

What’s your point?

Oct 17, 2008 - 1:42 am 95. Ed Wallis:

Regardless what “character assassination” the likes of “Christine” or “javelin” attempt, Joe Wurzelbacher’s message REMAINS THE SAME:

OBAMA’S POLICIES WILL RAISE TAXES, INCREASE UNEMPLOYMENT AS WELL AS THE PRESENCE OF INTRUSIVE GOVERNMENT IN EACH AMERICAN’S LIFE – OBAMA PROMOTES SOCIALISM.

To the moral relativists of the Left, SOCIALISM is “just another, equally valid system.”

WRONG.

Oct 17, 2008 - 2:32 am 96. Marc Malone:

Freedom is just another word – What fred said. Very nice post. You made me look bad. I hate you! That should be me!

Christine – Uh… so, what’s your point? Obama decided to go trolling for votes in a neighborhood. (Nice visual stunt, by the way, that went kablooie on him and may cost him the elction. He should never try to mingle with average… Joes! Sorry, I had to!) As God would have it, he ran across a guy in PA, who happened to, in some cosmic coincidence, to be related by marriage to Keating.

If you were just some guy on this site, I would say, “Interesting bit of trivia.” But, I know you are an ardent Obama supporter, so I know what you’re trying to imply. Let me ask you, does it really change anything? Isn’t this implied guilt by association that Obama supporters so decry? Is it somehow McCain’s fault. He’s never even talked to the guy, nor has his campaign. Shameless hypocrisy from the Left.

Javelin – This is no cheap stunt. Obama created this situation all by his little lonesome. Oops! He actually put a human face on his tax policy, and it’s not some evil rich guy. It is, literally, an average Joe, who dreams the American Dream… and did a little research. He didn’t like what he found, but reasonably, gave Obama a chance to explain his position.

Obama simply made the mistake of telling the truth, for once. Kablooie! Republicans across the country, and conservatives the world over, are howling in laughter! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Kabud – From all of us, thank you for the compliment.

Oct 17, 2008 - 2:33 am 97. Will The Vote Of ‘Joe The Plumber’ Be Counted? | PoliticsMuch.com:

[...] yesterday’s debate, Joe “The Plumber” Wurzelbacher has been warmly embraced by the right wing. Likewise, Wurzelbacher has adopted several of the movement’s talking points. However, [...]

Oct 17, 2008 - 2:54 am 98. Sheila:

For those of you who think this is, as Javelin calls it a “cheap stunt”, who cares if it is? If Obama is such a great politician, he shouldn’t have walked straight into that one. Again it proves Obama only shows his true colours when he doesn’t have a teleprompter in front of him.

Oct 17, 2008 - 3:03 am 99. always right:

First, they came for Hillary. Then her supporters and PUMAs. Secondly, they went for Sarah Palin and her family.

You can rationalize that Hillary and Sarah are running for higher office, PUMAs political activists.

But now they are after Joe the Plumber. We now know way more about Joe Wurzelbacher in 24 hrs than the dem presidential candidate in two whole years.

For what? A concerned private citizen, who has equal voting right just like you and me, asked a presidential candidate a question media and the left never mouthed.

Let’s face it. The exchange has nothing to do with Joe Plumber the person, it has everything to do with Obama’s revealing answer in an unscripted moment caught on camera.

Yesterday, both Obama and Biden mocked McCain and Joe the Plumber. Their surrogates went digging everything up on Mr. Wurzelbacher’s background. They have crossed the thin red line.

This can only be seen or believed in the old Soviet Union or Hugo Chavez’s thugocracy, never in US. Or so I thought.

There is this spontaneous “Spartacus” movement (on HotAir.com). If you are concerned, each one of us should stand up and announce that “I AM Joe the Plumber”. And if you are really concerned, spread this movement around.

Come on, join me and shout it out.

I am Joe the Plumber.

Oct 17, 2008 - 4:03 am 100. Freeedom is just another word:

Marc,

Don’t hate me, please. I fight for businesses against the IRS and Dept of Revenues. I’d love to be a Fox News Contributor on taxes. I sort of fit the Fox Babe profile, too.

Oct 17, 2008 - 4:48 am 101. Ed Wallis:

“always right” #99 –

I am Joe The Plumber (though I prefer Joe Wurzelbacher…!).

You got THAT ONE right! I’ve even got the Astroturfer “RedBloodedAmerican” calling me a “Red Baiter” here…HA!…and THAT from just another Digital Brownshirt….

To paraphrase (yes, I’m butchering it): STAND WITH JOE…OR HANG SEPARATELY.

The VIDEO EXCHANGE with ZerObama was THE “game changer.” NOT the debate, NOT an Obama or McCain ad, just plain old American life as it happens in its wonderfully chaotic, unpredictable way.

We all need to HANG THIS ON OBAMA’S THUGGERY. No, Mr. Wurzelbacher’s current turmoils cannot be directly hung on Obama, but CAN on his intolerance, arrogance, extremism, etc. etc..

In other words, on EVERYTHING THE MESSIAH STANDS FOR.

Toledo’s thugs are just riding the Obama Bandwagon. THEY are the criminals here, not some fellow who
doesn’t have a plumbing license (he doesn’t need one to practice residential work there, see: http://campaignspot.nationalreview.com/post/?q=ZDMxYjNmMzBiNDAyYWM0Y2JiZjdjZGVjNGZkNGVhNTM=)
- or -
has minimal liens (AS DOES OBAMA’S TREASURER, not that anyone of import cares about THAT…ahem).

But it is that BANDWAGON OF TERROR riding into town that will soon be riding over the liberties of each of us if we do not act now as each of us can.

LET’S MAKE THIS THE HORSE HE RIDES OUT OF TOWN ON.

Oct 17, 2008 - 5:39 am 102. WR Jonas:

When Obama says ” he wants to spread the wealth around ” he isn’t telling anyone HOW he wants to do that. If there are some qualifiers which are not based on income then this becomes reparations. I think that is one of the words which cannot be uttered during the campaign.

Oct 17, 2008 - 6:13 am 103. Dan Smith:

I’m a former small business owner. The business is a medical practice, and while it is thriving, we made the decision last year to sell ourselves to a large medical conglomerate. I, personally, had already decided to sell my shares to my partners before the group acted for the following reason: with the likely election of Obama or Clinton and the subsequent increase in mandates for toys like electronic medical records, our ability to keep the wolf from the door was eroded further. It has always been a struggle, given the confiscatory corporate tax rate of the feds plus the welfare state of Minnesota where I practice. Any surplus was turned into maximum profit sharing contributions and “bonuses” for partners, figuring that individual rates were smaller than the corporate rate. So we never could put away a rainy day fund, or try to save for an electronic medical record ($2 million for our practice, plus annual maintenance). Our large corporate partner will foot the bills from now on, with their margins cut back further by reduced Medicare payments that are programmed to go into effect in the future plus the promise of insurance and federal cutbacks if quality measures dreamed up in non-practitioner think tanks are not met. Welcome to the wonderful world of socialized medicine, America! Long before the Al Gore prophesied flooding of the world by global warming you will be waiting in line for your chance to be seen by a specialist.

Oct 17, 2008 - 8:05 am 104. tom:

Obama just had his Micheal Dukakis riding in the tank moment

they want to spin it as a plant
The One goes into a neighborhood to mix it up with the lowly middle class, Joe the Plumber asks him some genuine questions, Obama answers. Fortunately for us, it’s all on tape, and his socialistic ideals are exposed by his own answer

fear not, let’s trash Joe’s reputation, then mock him for having dreams of owning his own business on the campaign trail

Mr Elite who had everything handed to him by irreputable socialists has the audacity to attack a lowly plumber

Obama, you still have the plumbers union, lowlife deadbeats who want a handout, and the elite liberal snobs

but hard working American’s from the middle class you despise just saw your real agenda

your toast

Oct 17, 2008 - 11:07 am 105. AdrianS:

2nd lawsuit challenges Obama’s citizenship
Man demands state verify birth records or remove senator from ballots

Note: It is incumbent on ALL Secretaries of State in all of the United States to BOTH accurately verify Voters AND candidates. Barack Hussein Obama has sealed his “Hawaiian” birth records and also records in Kenya.

Failure to verify and certify qualification for ALL candidates in a general election by any Secretary of State may be a cause of action (dereliction of duty) and criminal charges may be filed.

http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=78111

Also:

The Video that could cost Obama the election

http://www.nextgenerationcorp.com/NextGenBlog/?p=68

Oct 17, 2008 - 11:39 am 106. Nate:

Someone mentioned the bible as justification for paying high taxes to benefit the “poor”. Let’s do that. The Law institutes tithing. There is a 20% additional cost if paid in cash rather than in kind. That’s 12% to support the temple, the widows and orphans, and the government. And that’s the whole government and levite caste and the widows and orphans. Tax rates above 12% cannot be justified biblicly.

Oct 17, 2008 - 12:57 pm 107. Pat:

“…spread THE wealth around…”

As if *the* wealth just somehow got here and so now it’s time for the McBamas to dictate what *they* want to do with it.

Wealth has to be created – by INDIVIDUALS – singly or in collaboration with other individuals – BEFORE it can be looted, mooched, taxed, redistributed (or destroyed by government interventions like the government-created business cycle and FED-created inflation).

I have the absolute moral right to every minute of my life – and that includes every cent of *MY* wealth that *I* produced or inherited from another producer. I am NOT your slave, and you are NOT my master. Until one of us initiates force or fraud, each of us must be completely FREE from government coercion. If YOU want to have some “wetlands,” bird sanctuaries, highways, etc. go right ahead – just don’t FORCE others to join you. Instead, appeal to their self-interested reason and voluntary exchange – like every great businessmen does.

If I want the properly limited functions of government – police, courts, military – then I should be free to pay for those functions without coercion (e.g., a voluntary insurance fee for contracts I sign which I want enforced by the government, etc.). All other functions (roads, electricity, mail, education) should be 100% private.

The McBamas are worse than thieves – at least thieves don’t try to get your moral sanction for their theft by claiming that what’s YOURS is really just communal property for THEIR seizing by force, kmorade!

Wake up, conservatives and start asserting the MORAL argument! Until you demand an end to the slavery of involuntary taxation and economic regulation, you’ll only continue arguing the merits of this concrete proposal/candidate/etc. versus that one – meanwhile conceding your opponents’ premise that the “public good” comes first. The public is just a collection of individuals – each with his own life, mind, and other values and the inalienable rights pertaining to them.

The conservatives’ failure to assert the moral argument has permitted the leftist intellectuals to pretend to hold the moral high ground for over a century now – as our Founder’s principled political achievement sinks into statism with no PRINCIPLED ethical opposition to the anti-concept of “the public good.”

Oct 17, 2008 - 1:28 pm 108. Jeff:

I am not Joe the Plumber and even Joe the Plumber is not a plumber since he does not have a plumber’s license. He is Joe the Gimmick.

Oct 17, 2008 - 1:40 pm 109. Jeff:

Oh and for all the other Jeffs,

Your opinions are shallow and idiotic. The true original Jeff is back at PJM. Thank you.

Oct 17, 2008 - 1:42 pm 110. Red Blooded American:

Ed Wallis:

Sorry to remind you of facts, but about the only “argument” I have ever seen you make is to damn any attempt to solve the problems of this country as “socialist”. You are certainly entitled to your opinions, and I’ll defend your right to speak them. How’s that for a “digital brownshirt.” You’ve previously stated you think I’m a paid operative. You are so far from the truth it’s truly ridiculous. I suspect you’re a retired schoolteacher drawing a government check. And your “conservative” values seem very selectively applied. In other words, you’re a hypocrite.

>>You got THAT ONE right! I’ve even got the Astroturfer “RedBloodedAmerican” calling me a “Red Baiter” here…HA!…and THAT from just another Digital Brownshirt….

Oct 17, 2008 - 1:45 pm 111. Jeff:

95. Ed Wallis,

I am glad that you have brought the topic of “character assassination” into play because all you have done since the beginning of this Presidential campaign has been to attack Obama’s character without any solid evidences. You are one true saint, Ed.

Oct 17, 2008 - 2:15 pm 112. Believer:

McCain should make an ad using the statement from the 2nd video linked by #88. BO at a rally saying:

“A PLUMBER is the guy he’s fighting for!” He sounded and looked like he was expressing a combination of disbelief, disgust and disdain.

To hear the crowd derisively laughing – as BO pauses for it – only makes the whole thing worse.

I think BO has forgotten a few things: like how much he needs a plumber in that mansion of his. If only we could deny him their services for the rest of his life…

Wouldn’t that put him up sh!! creek?

Oct 17, 2008 - 4:03 pm 113. fred:

Some people on this thread have lost sight of the really very simple fact that all this guy is guilty of is asking Barack Obama a straightforward policy question. He never said he made that kind of money. He never said he was a licensed plumber. He asked a question that COULD bear relevance for his life down the road. If he has plans to eventually get his license and even buy the business if he has the money to do so, he is wondering how the future tax structure is going to affect how he runs the business. There is nothing wrong with that question, folks.

And because it was an inconvenient question and the answer smoked out Obama’s position face to face with a blue collar guy who is ambitious, he has been viciously and obscenely raped in public by thuggish political operatives with ties to the Obama campaign. And neither Barack Obama nor Joe Biden have repudiated the public gang rape of Joe, who is a private citizen.

Is it ethical for office workers with access to information about Joe to give this information over to the Obama operatives? I contend it is not. Joe’s privacy has just been violated even if the law was not. Just because something is legal does not mean it is moral. I work in financial services and I would rather be personally brutalized than consent to give strangers information about people in my files. Clearly, we have a lot of people who believe in the Leninist ethics of expediency. God damn them. They will answer for their serious sins.

And to any who consent to this public gang rape of Joe, cheer it on, and think it is a good thing, you are swine and enjoy being down in the muck.

What this incident should do is send a chill down our collective spines. The man who is about to occupy the White House and the Party that will control all the branches of government will respect nothing about you. If you voice your opposition to them, they will destroy your character, your livelihood, and your future. Everything in the service of the revolution is right, according to their ethics. Even the Constitution can be changed or parts of it practically nullified if it serves their purposes.

If you consent to this criminal threat, you are sheep and deserve the perdition you are about to reap.

Oct 17, 2008 - 7:07 pm 114. catmouse:

Anyone who believes, in this stupid theory of any politician wanted to rob from the rich and give to the poor, believes in fairy tales. So much for this political electronic rag you are reading.

Really, if you want straight facts, don’t read from sites or papers that preach to your choir. Thought we all learned in college, how to be good critical readers.

I’ve never heard such dimwitted comments as on this forum, and think most are the ones who seek thrills through craigslist rant and rave section.

What is scarey is those of you who believe this article.

Oct 17, 2008 - 8:50 pm 115. fred:

catmouse,

Joseph Goebbels would have had a position for you in the Reich Ministry of Propaganda. That you deny the validity of the story only means you’ve been asking for more cups of grape kool-aid.

Now, get back down there in the muck where you belong.

Oct 17, 2008 - 9:16 pm 116. maryjane:

You people forget Joe bought it oin himself or rather McCain did when he tried to use the man,who is not mr Joe six pack .Mr Joe sixpack can’t afford to buy a six pack anymore and it is because of senators like John McCain.Fred you should get down in the muck with the rest of the liars abd cheats

Oct 17, 2008 - 10:42 pm 117. Christine:

I guess if PajamasMedia is correct, Obama will be taking money from the likes of Exxon Mobil, Microsoft, Trump Empires, Starbucks, and all other multi-rich corporations. Then I guess the rest of America can see stimilus checks for the next 4 years – WOOHOOOOOOOO! Am I still dreaming or is PajamasMedia on to something? Oh thank God, it was just a dream but darn it, I’m awake and still reading this rubbish on PajamasMedia.

Oct 17, 2008 - 11:27 pm 118. schnargley:

I just read a shocking report that one of Joe Wurzelbacher’s kids is really not his but his daughters, and that he once surreptitiously tried to get his boss to fire another plumber because he couldn’t thread a pipe very well.

I think this man is clearly not qualified to be Joe the Plumber.

Oct 17, 2008 - 11:56 pm 119. Christine:

Fred,

Are you part of my dream or my reality? I’ve seen characters like you in my dream and have always said to myself in the dream, “Wow, these people are from an alternate reality.” Then I wake up and see people like you in reality.

Joe the Plumber not only does not have a plumber’s license while working under the company and working under his boss’s plumber’s license, he is reported to owe backed taxes that were never paid to the IRS. It’s like a lawyer who’s defending his client that is charged with murder and the best witness that he can come up with for the defense is a convicted con-artist. What credibility does that con-artist have for the defense? What credibility does Joe the Plumber have on behalf of honest American citizens who work hard, pay for licensing when they take on a specific trade, and pay their taxes?

Oct 18, 2008 - 12:17 am 120. Believer:

Hoooray!!

George Voinovich – Republican, OHIO – has said BO’s a SOCIALIST!!!

Yep — check it out at gatewaypundit.blogspot.com.

*********

So long as Joe works for a plumbing company doing residential work, he doesn’t need to be licensed. The company for whom he works covers him with its license.

Should he decide to go out on his own, then he’ll need to be licensed.

One of BO’s own advisors is in the same situation regarding taxes as Joe.

Joe merely asked BO a question. And Dems are all upset because he blew the answer. And, oopsie — revealed who he is!

And I thought you guys were going to be really careful from here on out…

You know you can’t let him go OFF TELEPROMPTER!

Oct 18, 2008 - 1:04 am 121. RE:

So Obama’s government will determine who deserves what.

So the new secret to success with ‘American Dream v2.0′ will be bribing the right politician and never, ever saying anything critical.

Chicago organized crime goes national. On the corruption front, you ain’t seen nothing yet. It’s gonna be a hoot.

Oct 18, 2008 - 2:53 am 122. vivo:

If I had more money than I need, I would spread the wealth. There are logical limits to the human capacity for consumption.

I would spread it to people with positive ideas and real needs.

Oct 18, 2008 - 4:08 am 123. RE:

You are free to write a check at any time, vivo. Go for it.

Oct 18, 2008 - 4:55 am 124. Donna V.:

Christine: Joe the Plumber did not seek out Obama, Obama sought him out. Joe made the great mistake of not bowing to kiss the feet of The One and you hate him for that. A man who asked an honest question of the Obamamessiah! For shame! Let’s destroy this man, let’s insult him, let’s investigate him and smear his character! (But don’t you dare raise questions about Ayers or Wright – that’s “racist!”)

What a tool you are.

Oct 18, 2008 - 6:12 am 125. George007:

I love the way the ‘liberal’MSM has gone after a typical American worker who just asked Hussien a simple question!! No wonder they are going out of business.they have become just a house organ for the Socialist,Democratic party.

Oct 18, 2008 - 6:22 am 126. fred:

Christine,

You truly do not get the point about what is happening. You are saying that Joe’s life and background INVALIDATE HIS QUESTIONS to Obama. Your kind of thinking is a prima face example of why I am justified in worrying about the nation, since you understand not the rules of discourse. He asked Obama for his policy position on economic and tax policy. Joe couched his question in a hypothetical, since in his mind he aspires to own that business, expand it, and reap the rewards of his work and his risk taking. It can be truthfully said that he is in an apprentice phase of his employment. The fact is, you do not know when he is going to apply for the plumber’s license. Right now, he is working under someone else’s license and supervision.

None of that is relevant to his question. His life and background are not relevant to the question.

It is you who live in an alternate reality, not me.

And for his crime of asking an uncomfortable question that puts the candidate in a harder position, he gets his life ripped apart by the NKVD people of the Obama campaign. You are the one who approves of this.

And because you seem to not know that the question is perfectly valid and is in no way invalidated by Joe’s exposed life’s wrinkles, you indict yourself as intellectually defective, as well as morally reprobate. For you approve of the public rape of a private citizen by political operatives. That is why I call the people who destroyed him the Russian word “chekist” and the pejorative NKVD. You are just being a good, loyal, party member, Comrade Christine.

Oct 18, 2008 - 7:17 am 127. kevin c:

the “MEDIAS” NEW ARTICLES ON JOE THE PLUMBER(1) JOE THE PLUMBER IS TRIG PALINS “REAL FATHER” (2) JOE THE PLUMBER WAS SEEN IN THE SAME BATHROOM AS LARRY CRAIG. AS A RESULT OF THIS MASSIVE INVESTMENT OF MEDIA “RESOURCES”,NO INVESTIGATIVE “REPORTER” WILL BE FREE TO INVESTIGATE ACORN VOTER FRAUD OR OBAMINATIONS TIES TO BILL AYERS UNTIL OH,2014. JOE IS NOW THE MOST NOTORIOUS PLUMBER SINCE THE WATERGATE PLUMBERS. HEY COMMIE SCUM LIBS-THEY WERENT LISCENSED EITHER.

Oct 18, 2008 - 8:51 am 128. Believer:

Yep, folks, we’re getting a peek into the nightmare of an Obama presidency.

Thanks, Joe — I’m sorry it had to be you. But you may have saved a nation.

Oct 18, 2008 - 10:40 am 129. Pajamas Media » The Democratic Party’s Drubbing of Joe the Plumber:

[...] It seems like just yesterday that the party of Franklin D. Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy was talking about income equality and civil rights and worker protections and going to bat for the little guy, the blue collar laborer, the everyday Joe the Plumber. [...]

Oct 19, 2008 - 1:11 am 130. Marc Malone:

Well, “Joe” is a hot commodity, now! He may be getting torn down, but he is making some bank appearing on all these shows. The MSM can’t resist showing him. He’s too big a story! Their viewership goes way up every time he appears.

He’s the best campaign ad McCain could ask for, day in and day out. The story will last through the election. It’s too good. He’s now an American folk hero. He’s become the face of the American dreamer.

Anyone notice how he kinda looks like Mr. Clean? He could be their spokesman, instead of that cartoon, and really get paid! Joe the Plumber as Mr. Clean. Awesome.

Oct 19, 2008 - 1:34 am 131. Marc Malone:

Freedom is just another word – Smart AND beautiful? OMG! (pant, pant) Please tell me you live in Washington State! (stalk, stalk)

Oct 19, 2008 - 1:38 am 132. Marc Malone:

I really hope they get traction with this idea that “Joe” was a plant. Imagine the brilliance of McCain to happen to get the right guy in just the right neighborhood at just the right time. My opinion of McCain would go through the roof! Ha!

Oct 19, 2008 - 1:42 am 133. vivo:

123. RE:

“You are free to write a check at any time, vivo. Go for it.”

You need to wait, I said “If I had more money than I need”.

Oct 19, 2008 - 4:17 am 134. RE:

133. vivo

But aren’t you arguing that it’s Obama that should determine ‘your need’? Because in voting for Obama, you are forfeiting your right to make that call yourself. The government will do it for you.

Oct 19, 2008 - 12:54 pm 135. vivo:

134. RE:

Not at all. By paying some taxes, yes. I’m talking like if I have 20 or $200 million, I’ll be happy to keep a couple of million and share the rest (after taxes).

Oct 19, 2008 - 4:17 pm 136. Marc Malone:

vivo – Keep a couple million? Um, the threshold is far below that. 250k/yr is rich, per Obama. You’ll never get to a couple million. If you are old enough to have lived through the Carter years, you’ll know what I’m saying.

Oct 19, 2008 - 5:25 pm 137. vivo:

136. Marc Malone:

“vivo – Keep a couple million? Um, the threshold is far below that. 250k/yr is rich, per Obama. You’ll never get to a couple million.”

There are many ways to earn and keep a great fortune. Look at the poster boys Bill Gates, Warren Buffet, Oprah, etc. The idea is that you can just eat so much, drive so much, f*ck so much, travel so much, live so much so that you can help others with your excess fortune. Why should I keep huge amounts of cash sitting in secret accounts?

Of course, besides giveaways, there is always investment in worthwhile industries, businesses and causes.

Oct 20, 2008 - 3:56 am 138. Marc Malone:

vivo – I agree. The steaks only get so thick. It begs the question of why, in general, those on the left give so little to charity as compared to those on the right… especially when you get down to the lower income levels. You’re preaching to the choir. We on the right are truly generous in spirit and deed. Maybe that’s because we go to church (or temple) far more than those on the left.

We are simply against the idea of government taking the money, and wasting it on some useless, destructive, socialist program. When we are taxed more, we have less available for charitable giving or investing. It’s what happens when you tax away our disposable income. And like “Joe” says, we don’t want to benefit, either, from Obama’s redistribution. Does that make us so bad?

Oct 21, 2008 - 1:14 am 139. Jeff:

I am neither a Republican nor a Democrat but a true Independent who believes in facts and really believes in learning the lessons of our history.

So here is a simple fact for America -
1) During Ronald Reagan’s Presidency of 2 terms, between 1981-1989, we were at our economic best in a quarter of a century. We made the right choice in these 8 years as a country.
2) During George H. W. Bush Sr.’s Presidency of 1 term, between 1989-1993, we were at our economic worst in a quarter of a century. We made a huge mistake as a country but corrected it by keeping him in office for only 1 term.
3) During Bill Clinton’s Presidency of 2 terms, between 1993-2001, we were again at our economic best in a quarter of a century, even better than Reagan’s era. We made the right choice again in these 8 years as a country, despite his personal scandals.
4) Now, during George W. Bush Jr.’s Presidency of 2 terms, between 2001-this coming January 20, 2009; we have been at our economic worst in a quarter of a century, even worst than Bush Sr.’s era. We really made a huge mistake as a country on this one by not realizing that the apple really doesn’t fall very far from the tree. Yet we chose this apple again the second time around.

Now, really let this simple fact sink in America and take your time to think carefully this time around about how you want the direction of this country to go.

We made history with Reagan. We then made a mistake with Bush Sr. but corrected history by allowing him to only serve 1 term. We then made history again with Clinton, despite his personal scandals. Now, we have made 2 mistakes with Bush Jr. by allowing him to serve not once, but twice. So my last question to America is, guess which candidate shares the interests of both, Bush Sr. and Bush Jr.? I will let America answer this one. We are much, much smarter as a country to want to make history rather than make mistakes and to suffer yet again from our own mistakes by not using objectivity as our first and foremost agenda.

Oct 21, 2008 - 10:11 am 140. Jeff:

What people don’t understand is why some of us are so against the current Republican ticket, but we have an obligation to fight against history of ever being repeated again. Many of us out here are not fighting for the Democratic campaign but are fighting against an ideology.

1) An ideology that completely mirrors the ideology of this past 8 years.
2) An ideology that recognizes the few while completely disregarding the masses.
3) An ideology that believes in taking military action against Iraq, an incident that is completely unrelated to 9/11, without solidifying our claims beforehand. In the present, we have found no evidence of weapons of mass destructions or a tie to Osama Bin Laden. The devastation of this war has cost us over 4,000 of our brave troops and counting, over 1/2 trillion dollars of taxpayer’s money and counting, and over 1 million Iraqi lives unrelated to the terrorists or insurgency.

Cost of the Iraq War — http://www.nationalpriorities.org/costofwar_home

4) An ideology that still believes that the Iraq War is the right war on terrorism when the Afghanistan War should had been the right war on terrorism, where Osama Bin Laden actually was until he slipped into the mountains and into Pakistan’s territory now. The Iraq War also diverted our attention away from the Afghanistan War. We now have extended our resources in two separate places and have heightened our risk to our troops, our expenses, and creating another dilemma that will take quite some time to finalize. The Iraq War will not go away overnight and it is now our obligation to see it all the way through for God knows how many more years. This has also been the most unpopular war in the eyes of the world’s communities.
5) An ideology that believes that we are at our safest state since 9/11, when a recent terrorist plot was still trying to enter Great Britain’s airports with liquid explosives heading directly to us, but thankfully the plot was foiled. While in Afghanistan, the terrorists are regrouping and strengthening and we have recently suffered another high casualty to our troops yet again within this past month. We currently have the least amount of alliances in the world’s communities due to this unpopular Iraq War. True national securities are the ties that bind us to our world’s communities and the ties that bind them to us.
6) An ideology that vetted one of the most inexperience VP ticket in history, from foreign policies to national defense. If God forbids that anything happens to this President if elected and is stricken with illness, this VP will be running the country. For a more compelling look at Sarah Palin’s VP readiness, please look at these links below —

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=loUHRv3ipLE

http://www.salon.com/opinion/walsh/election_2008/2008/09/30/palin_gaffes/

7) An ideology that believes in “the fundamentals of our economy are strong” while we are facing the highest mortgage foreclosure crisis, high unemployment rate, and the largest collapse of our financial infrastructures since The Great Depression of 1929.

This is an ideology that many of us in America are against. Whether this ideology is in the Republican or Democratic ticket is not the main issue but the fact is that America does not want to fall into another 4 more years of devastation. We cannot afford this anymore.

Oct 21, 2008 - 10:12 am 141. Marc Malone:

PJM – Jeff’s spamming again. Can someone please boot him and delete his posts?

Oct 21, 2008 - 1:42 pm 142. vivo:

139. Marc Malone:

“We are simply against the idea of government taking the money, and wasting it on some useless, destructive, socialist program.”

It seems to me that one solution is to contact your Senator and Congressman and expose your views, preferably en masse. That’s what lobbyists do. Politicians insulate themselves and we need to figure out how to be seriously heard.

Oct 22, 2008 - 2:58 am

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