{"id":1262,"date":"2009-05-07T01:50:18","date_gmt":"2009-05-07T08:50:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=1262"},"modified":"2009-05-07T13:03:48","modified_gmt":"2009-05-07T20:03:48","slug":"joe-the-plumber-joins-arlen-specter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=1262","title":{"rendered":"Joe The Plumber Joins Arlen Specter"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Republicans favorite symbol for what they imagine ordinary Americans to be, Joe the Plumber, has turned his back on the GOP<\/a>. And while he has not taken the additional step of registering as a Democrat, the blow will surely come as a shock to Sarah Palin and the rest of the right’s lunatic fringe. From Time:<\/p>\n

Big Government is never popular in theory, but the disaster aid, school lunches and prescription drugs that make up Big Government have become wildly popular in practice, especially now that so many people are hurting. Samuel Wurzelbacher, better known as Joe the Plumber, tells TIME he’s so outraged by GOP overspending, he’s quitting the party<\/strong> – and he’s the bull’s-eye of its target audience. But he also said he wouldn’t support any cuts in defense, Social Security, Medicare or Medicaid – which, along with debt payments, would put more than two-thirds of the budget off limits.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

As the defections accelerate, the GOP will soon be left with only Carrie Prejean, Ted Nugent, and an ocean of dittoheads, to lead their trek back to relevancy. Of course, this could all be unfolding exactly as planned<\/a> by Republican National Committee chairman, Michael Steele.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Republicans favorite symbol for what they imagine ordinary Americans to be, Joe the Plumber, has turned his back on the GOP. And while he has not taken the additional step of registering as a Democrat, the blow will surely come as a shock to Sarah Palin and the rest of the right’s lunatic fringe. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1,16],"tags":[494,433,514,71],"class_list":["post-1262","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general","category-wankery","tag-arlen-specter","tag-joe-the-plumber","tag-michael-steele","tag-rush-limbaugh"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4Ijg-km","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1169,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=1169","url_meta":{"origin":1262,"position":0},"title":"Joe The Plumber – Now A Crack Reporter","author":"Mark NC","date":"1\/7\/2009","format":false,"excerpt":"America's own Renaissance Man, Samuel \"Joe the Plumber\" Wurzelbacher, has tackled many tasks. He has been an author, a country singer, a digital TV promoter, a tax advisor, a pundit, and a campaign mascot. One of the few things he has not been is a plumber. Now Joe has found\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "General"","block_context":{"text":"General","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=1"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1119,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=1119","url_meta":{"origin":1262,"position":1},"title":"Neil Cavuto Cavorts With Cliff Claven And Plumber Joe","author":"Mark NC","date":"11\/2\/2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Today on Fox News Neil Cavuto, the managing editor of the Fox Business Network, brought in a couple of first string financial pros to discuss America's economy and politics. The renown expert John Ratzenberger (formerly Cliff from TV's Cheers) was there to provide his unique insight on world affairs. And\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Election"","block_context":{"text":"Election","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=152"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1269,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=1269","url_meta":{"origin":1262,"position":2},"title":"Are Conservatives Getting Stupider?","author":"Mark NC","date":"5\/14\/2009","format":false,"excerpt":"\"I sense intellectual deterioration of the once-vital conservative movement in the United States.\" Those are the words of Judge Richard Posner, a Reagan appointee to the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit. Posner is also one of the founders of the Chicago school of law and economics,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Art\/Culture"","block_context":{"text":"Art\/Culture","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=9"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1149,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=1149","url_meta":{"origin":1262,"position":3},"title":"Glenn Beck Is Even Stupider Than Joe The Plumber","author":"Mark NC","date":"12\/11\/2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Glenn Beck was indisputably the stupidest man on CNN's Headline News. He certainly holds a similarly high ranking in talk radio's carnival of conservative clods. Next month Beck will debut his spanking new soap box on the Fox News Channel. Fox, of course is the home of Bill O'Reilly, Sean\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "General"","block_context":{"text":"General","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=1"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1783,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=1783","url_meta":{"origin":1262,"position":4},"title":"Joe The Plumber: Living In The Past","author":"Mark NC","date":"6\/17\/2010","format":false,"excerpt":"It would take something uncommonly funny to resurrect any interest in the sublimely irrelevant Joe \"The Plumber\" Wurzelbacher. And wouldn't you know it, Joe obliges: \"I don\u2019t listen to Rush Limbaugh or Glenn Beck or Sean Hannity because I never want to be accused to stealing their material.\" What does\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "General"","block_context":{"text":"General","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=1"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1172,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=1172","url_meta":{"origin":1262,"position":5},"title":"This Is Joe The Plumber Reporting From Israel","author":"Mark NC","date":"1\/11\/2009","format":false,"excerpt":"The highly anticipated debut installment of war correspondent Joe the Plumber has been filed and is ripping apart the fabric of the journalistic community. For someone who was ridiculed for not having the experience or skills to perform as a reporter, Joe showed his critics that he should not be\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "General"","block_context":{"text":"General","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=1"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1262","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1262"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1262\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1262"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1262"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1262"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}