Hello, My Friend, Hello

It's been too long since I posted, so here's a quick thought to remind the Phils they still love it in the can.

Old campaign stunts never die, or even fade away

I don’t know why I still go to Drudge Report; Newswer is more fun, and has more dinosaur stories. It seems every time I’m there I find a story that pisses me off. Since Ann Coulter has a new book out, he’s been linking to a whole lot of shit. Well, today was no different, as Drudge linked to seven infuriating sentences.

Seriously, Joe the Plumber is going to be a war correspondent? On one hand, I suppose this is good for him, as maybe he’ll get around to paying his back taxes. But other than that, I don’t see how anyone is going to benefit from this.

Joe says that he wants to let “Israel’s Average Joe’s share their story.” I can only presume that he said Average Joe rather than Joe Six-Pack because he’s unsure of how many bottle of manishewitz come in a case.

But seriously, what possible qualifications could this guy have to serve as a war correspondent? I understand that he’s a staunch supporter of Israel, but that doesn’t mean he knows, well, anything. Is he going to tie this conflict to the Six Day War, or how the Oslo Accords have pretty much let Israel isolate the Gaza Strip?

It’s clearly not ok that Hamas just lobs rockets into Israel whenever they feel like it, and refuse to acknowledge that Israel even has a right to exist. And by sending tanks into civilian areas Israel is clearly blowing past all possible chance of keeping its response proportionate. There’s so much going on here, and there has been for years, that I think the public deserves a better war correspondent than Joe the Plumber, one who is able to decipher some of the subtleties of the situation and not merely spout right-wing hate rhetoric.

Joe the OH GOD JUST GO AWAY

On my way to class the morning I walked by a taxi stopped in front of a hotel. The cab itself was fairly unremarkable; I’ve seen dozens like it in the last week alone. The advertisement on top of the cab, however, bothered me a little. It was for some guy or business calling himself Joe the Jeweler. I just rolled my eyes at this, annoyed by it but not especially infuriated, and forgot about it until I got to class.

In class, a little bit bored with contracts, I went to CNN.com, and the first story on their political ticker brought back a flood of fury. Joe “The Plumber” “Appalled” by McCain. Who fucking cares? Seriously, why is anyone still paying any attention to this guy? I won’t lie, I thought his conversation with Obama was interesting; a politician was giving honest answers to a voter, even when that wasn’t necessarily what the voter wanted to hear. It was almost refreshingly honest.

Of course, with 24 hour news, and McCain’s desperately flailing campaign, this had to be beaten into the ground, and it was, spectacularly. After the election it seemed like Joe, or Sam, or whatever, was going to go back to plumbing and not paying taxes in Ohio. But I guess there’s a media whore in everyone, because he just won’t go away.

Why does anyone care what this guy thinks about McCain’s support of the bailout? Do people actually change their opinions because of what this dumbass says? Why is Glenn Beck still talking to him? As frightening as it is to consider, would more people actually listen to Beck’s show to hear what Joe the Plumber things? And why is CNN.com writing about this? Why can’t he just go away?