So, the latest person that some are pushing to become the Democratic version of “Joe the Plumber” is…Sean Powless who I am happy to report IS a registered voter.
How does he compare to the other standards that some felt was necessary to point out about “Joe the Plumber’s past? The Blade does not provide those details, but public records are our friends…Mr. Powless has had some problems in the past, though he does have less of a record than a good majority of those currently attached to the Lucas County Republican Party and there are no tax liens.
I’m not writing what his exact past is, beyond saying he has one because I don’t want this to turn into an “attack Sean the Ironworker” saga as happened before. What I would like to focus on is the selectivity factor of the media and why this is even happening. In this scenario is again the Blade, who did not look at a person they were promoting because it fit their editorial stance of supporting Obama with the same scrutiny they did with “Joe the Plumber” and a long list of others, it’s also disappointing that the Governor’s staff and the Democratic party would not vet a person before promoting them.
The time frame argument will be moot, because the Blade has previously established that a 20 year window to look at a person’s past has been done by them. This again goes to the selectivity standard.
Had the whole door to door event in Holland been managed properly, the whole “Joe the Plumber” incident would have never happened. No one’s talked about that. You don’t take your candidate into a situation where he could face something that could impact negatively on him. This was supposed to be a photo op of Obama going door to door, not a mini-town hall forum. Campaigns are lost and won on silly reasons at times, where one gaff (unless you are Joe Biden) can cost you.
The Obama campaign handed the McCain campaign the Joe the Plumber story, and all the backtracking in the world, all the coming up with cute nicknames for other people that they want to try to put out there to counter it? Is not going to do much of anything, except bring a spotlight on a few people who if they actually had to face what happened to Joe the Plumber? Might want to think twice about it…
If we are going to hold people to the “Joe the Plumber” standard of looking into their pasts? Then both parties should do a better job in vetting these people before they attempt to use them for their campaign purposes.
