'Joe the Plumber' Strikes Back at Media

Sunday, October 19, 2008 12:00 AM

"Joe the Plumber" is lashing out at the media for analyzing his personal life since he suddenly became a focal point of the presidential race last week.

Joe Wurzelbacher, a plumber from Holland, Ohio, told Mike Huckabee on his Fox News talk show Saturday that he is upset by the attention and has been unable to work with reporters crowded on his front lawn.

"The media's worried about whether I've paid my taxes, they're worried about any number of silly things that have nothing to do with America," Wurzelbacher told the former Republican presidential hopeful on his show, "Huckabee."

Wurzelbacher said he felt terrible after reading some of the criticism of himself posted online.

"I felt about that small," he said. "I mean I really did."

Republican presidential candidate John McCain has been portraying Wurzelbacher as emblematic of people with concerns about Obama's tax plans.

Wurzelbacher became famous after he met Obama and said the Democrat's tax proposal could keep him from buying the two-man plumbing company where he works. However, reports of Wurzelbacher's annual earnings suggest he would receive a tax cut rather than an increase under Obama's plan.

"You know, I am a plumber," Wurzelbacher said. "Just a plumber."

Wurzelbacher said he agreed to appear on the show after he received phone calls from friends serving in the military who voiced their support.

"You know, when you can't ask a question of your leaders anymore, that gets scary," he said.

On Sunday, McCain was to travel to Ohio, where he might appear with Wurzelbacher.

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I saw Joe on Huckabee's show last night. He was very cool for being on TV for what I assume was the first time. He's just your average "Joe": a single father, a plumber, middle class American with a dream to own his own business. I think most of us at one time or another have dreamed of having our own business. For some, it's still a dream; others have actually lived it. Some successfully, some not. Some continue to live their dream.

It doesn't matter if your dream is to own a business or something else. Anyone who wants it badly enough can live their dream. We just hope that the government will allow us to have our dreams and not tax us out of them. 

Obama has said that he won't tax anyone under $250,000. Let's remember one thing: it's not always the owner who is taxed. Much depends on how the business is set up. If Joe sets up his business as an individual, then he will be subject to whatever the business makes. If it's set up as a corporation, then the business will have to pay. Of course, we all know that businesses do not pay taxes; taxes are passed off as a business expense to the customer. 

Remember, businesses do not pay taxes. They may file a tax return and write the checks, but it is the customer who pays the taxes as part of their bill. Think of it this way: the business collects the tax from customer Smith, At the end of the tax year, the taxes are calculated and what Smith paid is added to the taxes collected from all the other customers and sent in as part of the taxes "owed" by the business

Obama, and for that matter, all politicians, don't mention this. It's much easier to tell the voter that the politician will cut your tax, but raise the tax of companies who make more than whatever the amount is, in this case $250,000. 

Let's think about something else. Just because a business "makes" $250,000 doesn't mean there is $250,000 in the bank. Think of your own situation. What do you make in a year? Is that the amount that is in the bank? Probably not. You have expenses just as a business does. So, just because a business makes what seems to be a large amount of money, doesn't mean it isn't struggling to succeed. 

Back to Joe. The liberals have attacked him because he represents the average American. He asked Obama a question, and Obama gaffed and revealed himself by saying he wanted to "spread the wealth". Anyone with an education knows that phrase and where it came from. I won't go into it, I already did in another post. But now the Obama camp, the liberal media, and everyone else who supports Obama, has to prove that Joe is something other than what he seems to be. 

He must have been a plant for McCain. How in the world would the McCain team have any idea that Obama would make a slip like that? Sure, they could have hoped for it, but there was no guarantee that it could happen, so there is no percentage in even trying such a thing. Obama wasn't duped into saying what he did, he slipped up and now the spin doctors have to do damage control.

The Obama camp is concerned that this could get out of control and make people start thinking. I have seen where Obama was going with his tax cuts. It's what every liberal, every Democrat wants whether it will ever be admitted or not: to get votes. The question is: can he deliver on the promises he makes? And honestly, every politician will make promises, no matter what his or her party affiliation to get votes. 

Under a Democratic Congress with a Democratic White House, he could come through on a lot of promises. Or, with the economic conditions of today, he could say, well, gee, I guess the tax cuts will have to wait. We just can't do it in this environment. 

We have to remember that promises made today, may not become reality later on. I remember one year when the head of our agency was up for re-election. He gave the employees a raise of, as I recall, 3%. We got 1.5% immediately with the promise of the other 1.5% after the election. Bribe? He didn't think we were smart enough to see it that way. Well, it didn't work, he lost in a landslide. And a lot of the votes for his challenger came from within the agency. We didn't take kindly to being bribed, and honestly, it wasn't nearly enough, considering how much he was disliked. The challenger chose to give us the rest of the raise we were promised and continued to carry through on promises made in that and subsequent elections. Some, he couldn't do, but most he did. We were better off in the coming years and he was elected four more times until he retired last year.

What am I saying? Remember the Joe's and Jane's of the world. That's who we middle-class voters are.

Remember us, because we will remember what you promise us.