Today Politico.com tells us that the Toledo Blade reporting that 'Joe the plumber' isn't even licensed in the State of Ohio and has an apparent tax lean. Of course we've all heard by now that McCain's Joe is also a registered Republican. Now to find out that he isn't a plumber because you must be licensed in Ohio to work as one.
One has to wonder how and where McCain got the Joe the Plumber story. He told a long and detailed story about Joe. McCain claimed Joe makes more than $250,000 a year and would therefore have his taxes raised by Obama. This increase in taxes would then, McCain tells us, make it impossible for Joe to buy the company he works for.
Just maybe Joe has fixed (and not is a good way) the John.
Did John McCain, or someone in his campaign, create this story from whole cloth? Did they know Samuel Joseph Wurzelbacher before he even asked Obama his tax question? Did Joe tell them that he was a licensed plumber and that he made more than $250K?
Did Joe tell the campaign this fantastic story? If so, why didn't anyone think to check? It didn't take the local Toledo paper long to get the facts. McCain could have gotten in his 'spread the wealth' quip without the long story so why do it at all. My guess is that he just could resist a twofer - taxes and wealth spreading.
All this points to a larger problem. Yes, believe it or not there are problems bigger than Joe. The issue that should be troubling us is that regardless of what Joe did or didn't say or do - John McCain went off half-cocked again. He didn't do his home work and he decided to fake the book report again. We've seen this behavior from Bush and McCain time and time again. It is just one more thing McCain has in common with Bush - let's call it the Oops Factor. Oops, I thought ____ but I was mistaken because ____ and therefore can't be held accountable.
The country and the world cannot afford another US President that doesn't have critical thinking skills or at the very least the curiosity to find the facts before they go off half-cocked. The guy with his finger on the nuclear trigger just can't have an Oops Factor like John McCain.