Does Joe the Plumber hold the key to this election for John McCain? Maybe the seeds of it were there for McCain in the final debate against Barack Obama. Whether the GOP candidate can drive that point home by Election Day might be another question.
"Hey, Joe. You're rich. Congratulations!" McCain mockingly said as he blasted Sen. Obama's health care plans, and accused him of class warfare by saying he wanted to "spread the wealth around."
Joe is Joe Wurzelbacher, a Toledo, Ohio, plumber, who had a give-and-take with Obama that has caught the attention of many Republicans, who believe they can use it to drive home their argument that Obama is going to tax a lot of people who aren't exactly named Warren Buffett.
"I want to leave money in your pocket," McCain said of how his tax plans would affect Joe.
McCain returned to "Joe" over and over again during debate number three, as the Arizona Senator compared Obama's plans on the economy to Herbert Hoover.
"You want to take Joe's money and spread the wealth," McCain said to Obama, blasting Obama's response to Wurzelbacher.
"It's not that I want to punish your success," Obama said to Joe the Plumber, "I just want to make sure that everybody who is behind you that they've got a chance to success, too. I think when you spread the wealth around, it's good for everybody."
That "spread the wealth" line has stuck Republicans like a burr in your boots.
"My ole buddy, Joe the Plumber," said McCain during a discussion of health care, "doesn't want to pay a fine," that McCain claimed Joe would be hit with by Obama's plans, which Obama denied.
Back in Toledo, Joe was pretty surprised that he was getting so much attention.
"It's pretty surreal, man, my name being mentioned in a presidential campaign," Wurzelbacher told the Associated Press.
For whatever reason, Joe wouldn't tell the AP who he was voting for, but he said of McCain, "He's got it right as far as I go."
Maybe this is something McCain can hit on for the next 19 days, a living example of someone that he says would be negatively impacted by Obama's plans to tax those who make over $250,000 a year.
Republcans argue that might sound like a lot of money, but what it really does it hit small businessmen and women hard.
People like Joe the Plumber.
Somehow I think you are going to hear a lot about Joe in coming days. Whether McCain can transform Joe into a game-changing figure is another issue entirely.
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