Tipsheet

A Plumber and a Fisherman Walk Into a National Debate...

Thanks to his courageous confrontation of Barack Obama, Joe Wurzelbacher, aka "Joe the Plumber", has become America's newest folk hero.

Obama's minions, being typical leftists, decided against responding intelligently to the phenomenon -- and threw a tantrum instead. In a fit of irrational passion, they immediately began digging up dirt on the newly-famous "everyman".

The resulting attacks were immediate and personal:  "He has tax liens ... he's not named Joe (it's his middle name) ... he's not even a plumber!"

The allegation that Joe is not really a plumber is the one I found most interesting, as it reminds me of another incident from a few years back. 

As you might recall, the fisherman who plucked Elian Gonzales from the sea was later criticized for not being a "real" fisherman.  Not only was Elian's rescuer criticized for this -- but the liberals attempted to impugn his character by implying he was a phony who was posing as a fisherman (which, I suppose, is less humorous than when George Castanza poses as an architect...)

This, of course, begs the question, "What is a fisherman?" In this instance, Donato Dalrymple was not a licensed commercial fisherman, but rather a man who happened to be fishing when he rescued Elian. In a lot of people's minds, this made him a "fisherman". However, the slime-mongers decided that this was not a correct definition and made an issue of it. Ultimately, the debate was utterly irrelevant to the larger political discourse surround young Elian, but relevance does not seem to way all that heavily on the minds of certain leftist.

So, putting aside the question of whether or not Joe needs a plumbing license (his company holds one), the notion that he isn't really a plumber is nothing more than a red herring. The only purpose of such pointless debates is to distract from the real issue:  Obama's intention to "spread the wealth". 

Townhall's Adam Brickley contributed to this post.