The Press and Obama Campaign

Attacking a Private Citizen

This week Joe Wurzelbacher, a prospective small business owner and plumber, ask ed Barack Hussein Obama:

“Your new tax plan is going to tax me more, isn’t it?”, complaining that he was being taxed “more and more for fulfilling the American dream.” 

“The One” our eminence answered Mr. Wurzelbacher:

“It’s not that I want to punish your success. I just want to make sure that everybody who is behind you, that they’ve got a chance for success too,” Obama responded.

“My attitude is that if the economy’s good for folks from the bottom up, it’s gonna be good for everybody … I think when you spread the wealth around, it’s good for everybody.”

This made news and John McCain used Joe during the third debate Wednesday evening 21 times and “The Messiah” brought up Joe 5 times. The snowball effect that occurred had nothing to do with winter weather on the Great Lakes (too early for that) but the press, pitbulls with and without lipstick, were quick to attack a private citizen who was suddenly thrust into the news.

Instead of questioning Obama on his “spread the wealth around” answer it became more convenient to continue shielding Obama from answering questions and defining his beliefs. Only the “new media” has spent any time uncovering the hidden past of Barack Hussein Obama.

“Mission Obama” has become a mantra to tear down Joe the Plumber and the press has been very helpful doing so.

“Six-term Sen. Joe Biden’s got some nerve going after citizen Joe the Plumber. But the entrenched politician from Delaware, who fancies himself the nation’s number one Ordinary Joe, had no choice. Obama-Biden simply can’t tolerate an outspoken citizen successfully painting the Democratic ticket as socialist overlords. And so a dirty, desperate war against Joe Wurzelbacher is on.

The Left’s political plumbers are attacking the messenger, rummaging through his personal life, and predictably wielding the race card once again. It’s standard operating procedure for the Obama thug machine,” writes Michele Malkin.

Biden launched the first salvo against the Ohio plumber on NBC’s Today Show, challenging the veracity of his story:

“I don’t have any ‘Joe the Plumbers’ in my neighborhood that make $250,000 a year.”

Next Left-wing blogs immediately went to work, blaring headlines like “Not A Real $250k Plumber!” Next, they falsely accused Wurzelbacher of not being registered to vote (he’s registered in Lucas County, Ohio, and voted as a Republican in this year’s primary).

Liberal blogger Joshua Marshall cast Wurzelbacher as some kind of rabid freak for calling Social Security a ”Joke” – as if no working-class Americans could believe that the federal government’s entitlement programs were a rip-off unless they were bought and paid for by the McCain campaign.

Hack newspaper the Toldeo Blade parsed the truth about Mr. Wurzelbacher writing that “Joe the Plumber” isn’t a plumber — at least not a licensed one, or a registered one. Mr. Wurzelbacher is working legally in the plumbing industry but the Toledo Blade would like to support Obama by twisting the statements of a private citizen. Why doesn’t the Ohio news rag write about Obama’s Marxist rants and his ”Marxist” ideas instead?

Byron York wrote at National Review:

“I don’t know anything about Joe Wurzelbacher, but I just have one bit of advice.  If you have anything in your past that you’re not proud of — a messy divorce, a DUI, an unpaid bill, an indiscreet comment, whatever — be prepared for it to become public knowledge.  The lefty blogosphere, along with allies in the press, will see to that.”

It didn’t take long as Larry Rohter wrote in the Left-Wing rag NY Times:

“As it turns out, Joe the Plumber, as he became nationally known when Senator John McCain made him a theme at Wednesday’s final presidential debate, may work in the plumbing business, but he is not a licensed plumber.”

For the union version of attacks Thomas Joseph, the business manager of Local 50 of the United Association of Plumbers, Steamfitters and Service Mechanics, based in Toledo, said Thursday that Mr. Wurzelbacher had never held a plumber’s license, which is required in Toledo and several surrounding municipalities. He also never completed an apprenticeship and does not belong to the plumber’s union, which has endorsed Mr. Obama.

The Left-Wing attack machine was taking a full-frontal assault:

Thursday’s “Nightline” breathlessly asserted that Joe “the plumber” Wurzelbacher isn’t really named Joe. Of course, his middle name is Joseph. Continuing to harp on this subject, reporter Jake Tapper alerted, “And it turns out Joe the plumber is not even technically named Joe…His name is Sam, Samuel Joseph Wurzelbacher.”

CNN senior political analyst David Gergen followed the liberal talking points about how Joe the Plumber’s real first name is Samuel and how he doesn’t have a plumbing license while speaking on Thursday’s Anderson Cooper 360 program.

U.S. News & World Report’s Bonnie Erbe declared “when one thinks of voter fraud, one usually associates it with the GOP,” she predicted “the McCain campaign could go down as the most corrupt and inept in history.

“Writing at her blog at the News’s website Thursday, Erbe joined the rest of the mainstream media’s attacks on Joe the Plumber, the Ohio man who recently challenged Barack Obama about his socialist tax plan.As she cited far-leftist websites including Daily Kos, Erbe sought to make the case that Joe is a Republican plant.

On Friday’s CBS Early Show, correspondent Jeff Glor reported on the role of Joe the Plumber, a.k.a. Joe Wurzelbacher, in the presidential campaign:

“The McCain campaign is using Wurzelbacher to say their opponent would raise taxes. Though it turns out, Wurzelbacher himself owes nearly $1,200 in back taxes and his annual tax bill would actually go down under Obama’s plan.”

At the end of Glor’s report, co-host Harry Smith asked:

“Yeah Jeff, we’re starting to learn a little bit more about Joe/Steven, the Plumber?” Smith mistakenly referred to Wurzelbacher’s first name being Steven, when in fact it is Samuel, and he corrected himself: “Samuel.”

Glor responded:

“A couple of more things about Joe the Plumber — Samuel, indeed. He is registered to vote. There were some questions about that. He does not have a plumber’s license, though. And it turns out his real first name is Samuel. Joe is his middle name.”

At that moment, an on screen Graphic appeared with the headline:

“The Real Joe the Plumber” and listed the details Glor mentioned.

When the heat goes up for Liberals and their canned talking points they erupt:

Liberal talk radio host Ed Schultz stormed out of a “Fox & Friends” debate Friday morning with conservative talk radio host Steve Malzberg that involved Barack Obama’s tax plan and the now famous Joe the Plumber.

Read more about attacks on Joe the Plumber:

The Press, The Plumber And The Liberal Poster Boy

CNBC Host: Joe the Plumber ‘Would be Huge’ Any Other Year

Joy Behar Dismisses Joe the Plumber’s ‘Fantasy’ of Owning Business

NY Times Blog ‘Spotlights’ Joe the Plumber with Left-Wing Attacks

ABCNews.com Pushes Obama Talking Points on Joe the Plumber’s Taxes

Enraged Leftwing Blogosphere Hurls Attacks Against Joe the Plumber

CBS’s Rodriguez: Joe The Plumber a ‘Pawn’ of the Republican Party

Joe the Plumber Calls Obama’s Tax Plan Socialist, Sawyer Defends It

With the press so busy chasing after Joe Wurzelbacher in his neighborhood why haven’t they spent time in the Hyde Park neighborhood of Chicago camped out in front of the house of domestic terrorists Willam Ayers and Bernadine Dorhn?

With the press so busy chasing after Joe Wurzelbacher in his neighborhood why haven’t they spent time at University of Illinois Circle Campus (UIC) in Chicago reading through and investigating the volumes of paperwork of the Chicago Anneberg Challenge? Stanley Kurtz found time.

With the press so busy chasing after Joe Wurzelbacher in his neighborhood why haven’t they investigated ACORN and voter fraud? The college network of journalists at Palestra have found the time.

It’s easier to sit in the news office or TV studio and attack a private citizen who asked a question of Barack Hussein Obama and Mr. Obama told him the truth about “spreading his wealth” when it comes time for Mr. Wurtzelbacher and other small business people to earn it. Why don’t they investigate Mr. Obama and ask him why he hasn’t provided written answers or how about a news conference off the teleprompter to discuss his medical records, his academic history at Occidental, Columbia and Harvard. And what about training and lawyering at ACORN and donations near $1,000,000 to ACORN and their clones?

That would take some work and exposure. Socialism, Marxism, indeed!

JTPDS Alert Source: Photoshop: David Lunde via Michelle Malkin.com

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