19 Days to RAIN Day

RAIN Minus 19

Item First – Let it RAIN: From now until the presidential Election Day we will begin each post with a review of the Remove All Incumbents Now (RAIN) campaign. A good rain washes clean all the road scum, dust and filth. We hope that a cleansing of Congress will result in the firing of the legislators who are part of the group that bailed out Wall Street with nearly a trillion dollars, at least 150 billion of which was blatant authorized pork by Democrats to appease Republicans who had previously rejected the bill then changed their vote allowing it to pass after being seduced by pork. We are not sure how much of the bailout, if any, was actually needed.

Hello, calling Joe the Plumber: Not since Jake Plummer the quarterback from Arizona State University was drafted by the hometown Cardinals has a Plummer received so much attention. Joe the Plumber was mentioned 23 times in last night’s debate, 20 of which were by Senator McCain. That was not so unusual except that Joe the Plumber from small-town Holland, Ohio was visited before the debate not by Senator McCain but by Senator Obama. Joe, a single father who works from sunup to sundown unplugging drains and installing toilets, asked Senator Obama what would happen if he bought a business and earned between $ 250,000 and $ 270,000. In fairness, Senator Obama told him his taxes on everything over $ 250,000 would increase by 3%. Let’s see, that would be an increase of $ 600 if he hit the $ 270,000 per year goal. Not exactly a royal flush but Senator McCain insisted the increase would further clog the drain and money would not flow. After hearing the potential earnings we have to believe that applications for plumbing jobs have increased substantially in Ohio.

No tulips or windmills in this Holland: Hans Brinker wore silver skates and was an amateur plumber as he put his finger in the dike to save Holland in a children’s story. Senator McCain did his best to put Senator Obama in Dutch by not holding back any water about Joe the Plumber in Holland, Ohio. In the children’s story Mr. Brinker is unable to work as the result of a fall from a dike. Mrs. Brinker, son Hans and daughter Gretel all worked various jobs to support the family, and were looked down upon in the community because of their low income and poor status. In real life in Greta grows up to get her own show on Fox News Hans becomes a fake weightlifter in a Saturday Night Live skit. Joe the Plumber, meanwhile, dreams of skating to annual riches of $ 270,000 silver dollars. We are not sure what happened to the Mrs. in real life. All we know from news reports is that Joe the Plumber is a single father. We hope Joe (Wurzelbacher) the Plumber’s family lives happily ever after just as the Brinkers did in the story.

Barack and John bob and weave: The debate between the two presidential candidates was the most spirited meeting the two have had. Even though, that giant sucking sound heard round the nation was most likely not hot air coming from the candidates. Although there was plenty of that. Rather, the noise was a collective sigh from the American public that the debates are finally over and the election cannot come soon enough. Presidential elections come every four years in America but the process of identifying a candidate and selecting a president seems to have lasted for at least a decade. We’re not sure if the weariness of the public over the long and arduous process will favor one candidate over the other but it is our hope that both parties will have learned a lesson and will not repeat the torture they’ve put the public through. No doubt CNN, Fox News, and CNBC will take an opposing view on that opinion.

Senator McCain assumed a pugilistic stance in the debate and took nearly every opportunity to jab at Senator Obama. Most polls, including the CNN and CBS flash polls taken after the debate, reported Obama won though certainly not by a knockout. Senator McCain danced around questions and sparred with the Illinois senator. He tried landing punches with the left hook (William Ayers), and with a right cross, as well as comments by Rep. John Lewis of Georgia. He relentlessly tried rabbit punches and hammerlocks by using Joe the plumber. But in the end it was a split decision by the judges with Fox News declaring McCain the winner and CNN and CBS declaring it an Obama victory.

Internet buzz suggests Joe the Plumber was a plant: Is there really a Joe the Plumber? Is he a member of the Plumbers and Pipefitters Union? Could he have been a plant? Let’s see, if we were conspiracy theorists we would consider that Senator McCain brought the topic up and used it more than 20 times during the debate. What is the official position of the Plumbers and Pipefitters Union? According to a letter on their website:
Dear Brothers and Sisters:

On January 9, 2008, the United Association became the first International Union to endorse Senator Barack Obama as its candidate for the Democratic nomination for President of the United States. This endorsement was discussed with the General Executive Board and they concurred.

Barack Obama is the choice of the UA because he has always fought for working people throughout his career and will do the best job of bringing badly-needed change to Washington. Obama will help us keep existing jobs and work to develop new, higher paying jobs here in America, reform our health care system, fix our ailing schools and make sure that the pensions of our retirees are safe.

So is Joe a disgruntled member, not a member (Heavens, a SCAB?????) or just a guy who wants to buy a plumbing company who thinks Senator McCain offers him more than the opponent? Or was John McCain simply well prepared for the debate. Of course, Senator Obama had his won cause célèbre in the name of Lily Ledbetter. Ledbetter, 70, a former supervisor for an Alabama Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. plant, lost her gender pay-discrimination suit more than a year ago in the U.S. Supreme Court. Regardless, let’s hope it is a slow toilet flow week so Joe doesn’t miss many calls.

The left wing buzz: Many left wing blogs have brought up questions about Joe “the Plumber” Wurzelbacher. The questions include: The Plumber was playing football outside with his son when he came upon the crowd gathered around Obama. What else would explain how conservative sites got stories posted about him in advance of the debate and how easily everyone else found him for interviews? Others rumors suggest The plumber is not a registered voter, is not a licensed plumber in the state of Ohio, already owns several companies, and that he might be related to Charles Keating’s son-in-law (Keating of the Keating 5 scandal that implicated McCain. The only thing that news media has confirmed is that he is not licensed. However, it seems the left has learned from Karl Rove how to trash a person.

A little blogging music Maestro… The old Country standard ”Flushed From the Bathroom of Your Heart.”

Dr. Forgot
http://drforgot.com

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