Note to the plumbing obsessed – do not confuse politics with reality

It’s (very) mildly entertaining to read about the “Joe the Plumber” reality vs. fantasy story …

Egregious Moderation: Ed Kilgore: John McCain: Dishonest, Dishonorable, and Incompetent

…A day after making Joseph Wurzelbacher famous, referencing him in the debate almost two dozen times as someone who would pay higher taxes under Barack Obama, McCain learned the fine print Thursday on the plumber’s not-so-tidy personal story: He owes back taxes. He is not a licensed plumber. And it turns out that Wurzelbacher makes less than $250,000 a year, which means he would receive a tax cut if Obama were elected president…

Problem is, this completely misses the point.

It wouldn’t matter if Joe the Plumber were a mass murderer or a visiting alien. This has nothing to do with reality, this is talking-to-the-undecided-voter end-of-the-game politics.

It’s a good thing Obama understands this. His response will be to the Joe-meme, not the Joe human. He won’t bother pointing out reality, because that’s not relevant.

The right response might be to say nice things about middle-class white men, and point out that they’ll do much better with Obama/Biden than they’d do with Bush III (McCain) or President Palin.

I say “might” because I know I don’t understand the “undecided” voter that all these discussions are aimed at.

I think Obama’s team does understand them … fortunately.