Joe da Plumber
Here is a blog link which I am including because it links to a video of the phenom "Joe the Plumber", trotted out by McCain in debate three to score points against Obama. Joe became an instant celebrity then sort of crashed and burned:
http://www.thewashingtonnote.com/archives/2008/10/mccain_didnt_ve/index.php
Underlying a lot of Joe's predigested rant was substantial racism and xenophobia, and you didn't have to listen too hard to hear it.
Kris Kristofferson's line some 30+ years back says it well: "Everybody's got to have somebody to look down on".
This is greedy/deluded America's nasty underbelly when, in social development terms, the "revolution of rising expectations"/relative deprivation proves a chimera.
And, no, its not "a lot of good" people, who a blog commenter opined that Joe represents, who fall into this trap, unless by “good” you credit Americans as being terminally gullible. It requires an abrogation of the idea of social responsibility in favor of unfettered personal gain.
It's displaced anger projected both up and down the food chain. Only, you know, it wouldn’t be projected upward if the credit bubble kept on expanding. But it will always be projected downward because this is the way the greed code works; crawling over the backs of those you assume must be competing for your piece of the riches.
http://www.thewashingtonnote.com/archives/2008/10/mccain_didnt_ve/index.php
Underlying a lot of Joe's predigested rant was substantial racism and xenophobia, and you didn't have to listen too hard to hear it.
Kris Kristofferson's line some 30+ years back says it well: "Everybody's got to have somebody to look down on".
This is greedy/deluded America's nasty underbelly when, in social development terms, the "revolution of rising expectations"/relative deprivation proves a chimera.
And, no, its not "a lot of good" people, who a blog commenter opined that Joe represents, who fall into this trap, unless by “good” you credit Americans as being terminally gullible. It requires an abrogation of the idea of social responsibility in favor of unfettered personal gain.
It's displaced anger projected both up and down the food chain. Only, you know, it wouldn’t be projected upward if the credit bubble kept on expanding. But it will always be projected downward because this is the way the greed code works; crawling over the backs of those you assume must be competing for your piece of the riches.
