Why does the media care more about Joe Wurzelbacher's record than Barack Obama's record?

Joe the plumber was on the Mike Huckabee show last night. I was unable to watch it but the Toledo Blade has some coverage. I have been amazed at how the mainstream media can apply journalism to Joe’s past but for some reason we hear very little about Obama’s past. Understandably, the scrutiny is intimidating to Joe W.

Mr. Huckabee said that Mr. Wurzelbacher only asked a question when Mr. Obama happened to stop by his current neighborhood a week ago. Mr. Huckabee asked how Mr. Wurzelbacher felt about the scrutiny he’d received.
“It actually upsets me,” Mr. Wurzelbacher said. “I am a plumber, and just a plumber, and here Barack Obama or John McCain, I mean these guys are going to deal with some serious issues coming up shortly. The media’s worried about whether I paid my taxes, they’re worried about any number of silly things that have nothing to do with America. They really don’t. I asked a question. When you can’t ask a question to your leaders anymore, that gets scary. That bothers me.”

The moral is, if Barack Obama comes to your door, don’t answer.
Most of what I can find about Obama’s record on housing is on blogs or primary sources. Other than the Boston Globe article, where is the investigative reporting of Obama’s record in Chicago?

Obama's housing policies, part one – Is past prologue?

During the Vice-presidential debate, Joe Biden attempted to pin President Bush to McCain-Palin by saying “the past is prologue.” If there is any truth to that saying, then it is fair to examine the past record of Barack Obama. Specifically, over the next several days I will examine the record of Obama on housing. A signature issue for Obama, he has 8 years of work on housing as an Illinois senator which is open to review.
I must admit that I was not aware of much of what I plan to cover until mid-last week. I had read about Tony Rezko and knew there was a relationship between Obama and the convicted slumlord but I had not considered the context of that relationship until recently. A June, 2008 Boston Globe article by Binyamin Appelbaum triggered my interest in this matter. Honestly, I was shaken to read about the conditions of housing in the South Side of Chicago during the two terms Barack Obama spent in the IL Senate. He served for 8 years in this district and said he did not know conditions were as bad as they were. I find that to be an incredible admission.
This post begins with an embedded video released with the Boston Glose article. Coming articles will explore in more detail the programs and people which contributed to the sorry state of housing in the South side of Chicago.

I urge you to read this article. It is over 3 months old but I doubt many people are aware of these facts.
Stay tuned…
Other posts in this series:
Part One: Obama’s housing policies: Is past prologue?
Part Two: Obama’s housing policies: Cold constituents
Part Three: Obama’s housing policies: A story about what did not happen
Part Four: Obama’s housing policies: Obama’s housing advisors

Colin Powell may endorse Obama

My suspicion is that the McCain knows what is going to happen and they are trying to prevent the news from being a complete surprise.
However, if Powell endorses Obama, the news will push Joe the Plumber out of the news cycle and become the lead for a couple of days.
Bill Kristol predicted this would occur in August but it did not happen.
UPDATE: He did it (sigh)

Wurzelbacher a plant? Not possible, says reporter on the scene

On October 12, Barack Obama held a campaign appearance in Toledo, Ohio. On his way to a planned speech, Obama stopped to do a little door-to-door politicking in the suburban Toledo neighborhood where Joe Wurzelbacher lives. Investigating the suspicion by some that Joe Wurzelbacher was a McCain campaign plant, I called reporter Tom Troy of the Toledo Blade. Tom was covering Obama’s visit to Toledo and was on the scene for the meeting between Obama and Wurzelbacher.
According to Troy, the stop location was known only to the Obama campaign and the Secret Service. Troy said, “Nobody in that neighborhood knew Barack Obama was going to be there.” The press was aware that some kind of unscheduled stop was possible but they did not know where or when it would happen. Said Troy, “It’s not possible for him to be a plant. It was totally unplanned.”
Mr. Troy told me that the motorcade stopped so that Obama could talk to voters in an informal manner. According to Troy, the conversation between Obama and Joe occured “right in front of his [Wurzelbacher’s] house.” Troy said that Joe gave credit to Obama for being willing to stop and talk to people.
I hope that clears things up.
Read Tom Troy’s October 12th article.

Breaking: Joe Wurzelbacher is really Joe Wurzelbacher

Now the U.S. News and World Report has become unhinged.
Bonnie Erbe gives credence to the conspiracy theories about Joe Wurzelbacher – aka, Joe the Plumber. The media is tearing into this guy with a vengence, even questioning his name, because he uses his middle name, something by the way that I do.

Joe the Plumber so loves media attention, he’s drawing pro-Obama bloggers to question his authenticity as an undecided voter:
Joe has been on so many right wing talk shows it appears pretty obvious that this is a coordinated attempt to pull a last second ‘tax and spend’ haymaker. Family Security Matters, a wingnut security policy thinktank, has the first interview with Joe after this Obama encounter. Hmmm. What’s the chance that a group like this gets the first interview with this alleged ‘undecided voter’?
Other blogs say Wurzelbacher may be related to Charles Keating of the Keating Five and that his father is a major Republican donor:
Joe the Plumber, the star of tonight’s debate, may have a very interesting connection to John McCain. In fact, Joe the Plumber (Joe Wurzelbacher) of Cincinnati, Ohio may be related to one Robert Wurzelbacher of Cincinnati, Ohio, who happens to be Charles Keating’s son-in-law. Robert Wurzelbacher was implicated in the Keating 5 scandal, and sentenced to 40 months in prison in 1993. Wurzelbacher is also a huge Republican donor.
Keep watching this story because if it proves true that “Joe the Plumber” is the wealthy, Republican regular the liberal blogs are claiming he is, the McCain campaign could go down as the most corrupt and inept in history.

Read this story from the Toledo Blade which is from the day of when Obama and Joe met. There are many people around and Obama is on the street meeting people. How the McCain forces could set this up is beyond me.

Mr. Obama’s longest conversation was with a man who said afterward that he likes Sarah Palin, the Republican nominee for vice president.
Joe Wurzelbacher, 34, a plumber, debated with Senator Obama about his tax plan.
‘I’m being taxed more and more for fulfilling the American dream,’ Mr. Wurzelbacher said.
Mr. Obama tried to convince him that his plans to give a tax cut to 95 percent of Americans and to raise taxes on those earning more than $250,000 would be good for the plumbing business by helping get the economy righted.
‘Pretty good practice’
As Mr. Obama left, he said, ‘I’ve got to go prepare for this debate, but that was pretty good practice.’

This apparently amended article sets the context for Obama’s visit to Springfield Township. He dropped in the neighborhood.

Mr. Obama arrived in Toledo yesterday for the start of three days of intensive preparation for Wednesday’s final presidential debate, but he first made an unscheduled stop in a Springfield Township neighborhood to canvass for votes.
The candidate surprised residents of the working-class Lincoln Green neighborhood off McCord Road when his motorcade made the unannounced stop on the way in from Toledo Express Airport.
Wearing a white shirt, suit trousers, and no tie, Mr. Obama chatted, joked, hugged, posed, and debated for 45 minutes with the folks of Shrewsbury Street who came out of their homes to meet him.
Rachel Jesko, 28, a teacher, was dropping off her friend when she saw the motorcade in the neighborhood.