As the politicians continue to pontificate, and the baby-kissing and ribbon-cutting continues in the run-up to the forthcoming election, any breath of fresh air is particularly welcome. One such arrived this week in the person of Joe Wurzelbacher, more familiarly known as Joe the Plumber.
What happened was this. Joe was outside tossing a football with his son when Barack Obama showed up in the neighborhood. Joe later told Katy Couric: “And, you know, neighbors were outside asking him questions, and I didn’t think they were asking him tough enough questions, so I thought, you know, I’ll go over there. You know, I’ve always wanted to ask one of these guys a question and really corner them and get them to answer a question of – for once instead of tap dancing around it. And unfortunately I asked the question but I still got a tap dance.”
Joe asked Obama why, if and when he made over $250,000, he should have his taxes increased. The answer he got was that Obama apparently believes in a progressive income tax which “shares the wealth”. Joe explained his own position in an interview with Diane Sawyer, who apparently also supports Obama’s tax policies. She seemed to be very familiar with the percentage details of the plan at any rate.
Sawyer: “Well if people making $250,000 should not be taxed additionally – by the way, it’s 3% from 36% to 39% under Senator Obama’s plan. If those people should not be taxed additionally, even though they’re in the top 5% of America, what about people who make $1 million? Or $5 million?”
Wurzelbacher: “Well, I mean, quite honestly, why should they be penalized for being successful. I mean, that’s what you’re telling me. That’s what it sounds like you’re saying. That’s wrong. Because you’re successful, you have to pay more than everybody else? We all live in this country. It’s a basic right. And Obama wants to take that basic right and penalize me for it, is what it comes down to. That’s a very socialist view and it’s incredibly wrong. I mean, $250,000 now. What if he decides, well you know $150,000, you’re pretty rich too. Let’s go ahead and lower it again. You know it’s a slippery slope. When’s it going to stop?”
For his pains Joe is now being pilloried by the mainstream media. They claim he’s not a "licensed" plumber, Joe is only his middle name, he owes back taxes, etc. etc. as if any of this detracts from Obama’s answer to his question. Whether Joe is his real name, or he’s a plumber, or a Republican plant or even a Martian rutabaga is irrelevant. The point is that a candidate for President of the U.S.A openly supports socialism. Someone ought to explain to Obama that the “wealth” in question is neither his, nor the government’s, but Joe’s, and that he, Obama, has no right to spend it in any way.
Now remember Joe is a plumber but he sees things more clearly than most University professors. He’s not a Washington elitist. He works with his hands. He looks at things in a practical way. He’s of the group who built the country while the elite crowd were building their success in Washington and academia on other people’s money, contrary to the Constitution.
Joe, like the vast majority of people, has an innate understanding of what is right and what is wrong. And he knows that taking money from people who have earned it without their consent is wrong. It is theft, or perhaps robbery. But it is not right.
People generally know what’s right and wrong. They do, however, convince themselves, or allow others to convince them, that common sense must be ignored in favor of persuasive political language such as “sharing the wealth”, “compassion” or “fairness”.
Prior to the first election to be held in South Africa after the end of the Apartheid era, journalists descended on that country to cover the affair. One TV news crew found an old black man living in a thatched hut in the countryside, tending his small patch of corn. In all probability he couldn’t even read or write but he had the wisdom of the common man.
The interviewer questioned him: “Aren’t you happy that you’re going to be able to vote now? You will be able to have a black government!”
The old man spoke with the wisdom of ages. “Black government, white government, what’s the difference? They all take your money.”
October 18, 2008
