[This column first appeared in FlyerGroup newspapers on June 10th, 2009]

Driving down the street the other day, I noticed something odd on the side of the road. I couldn’t put my finger on it at first, but I knew something was different about the intersection I was sitting at waiting for the red light to turn. I looked around for a new business, a new sign, an upgraded stoplight — anything.

Then, I spotted him. A man, dressed as Uncle Sam, complete with red and white striped pants, an American flag blazer, and a red, white and blue top hat, was dancing and waving his arms around at the passing traffic on the street.

Bear in mind that I used to live in San Francisco, and in that place, this man wouldn’t be worth a second glance, but what in the world was he doing here in quiet, suburban Avon, Ind.?

After taking a moment or two to process his flailing, I eventually realized that he was attempting to direct the attention of the passing traffic to a tax preparation business that had set up shop in an adjacent strip mall. Clearly, the man needed a sign or a banner of some kind to actually be an effective advertisement, but who am I to tell Uncle Sam how to do business?

Continued…

NewsCorpse, the most underrated media blog of our lifetime (note: “lifetime,” in web terminology, means approximately 2 to 3 years), has an amazing rundown of FoxNews stock market idolatry, and how they are claiming that the recent upticks in the market are thanks to the valiant teabaggers, just as they claimed that the 6-month slide that preceded it was thanks to that dastardly Obama.

A lesson in media history, courtesy of NewsCorpse:

For several weeks, Fox has used the phrase “Obama Bear” to describe the stock market when it heads down. At the same time they refer to it as a bear market rally when it goes up. So it should come as no surprise that on the April 18, broadcast of Fox’s “Bulls & Bears,” the host, Brenda Buckner, ups the ante by opening the show with this:

“Call it a tea party rally. Wall Street’s sure partying, up six weeks in a row. The bulls came out about the same time these guys started to shout, saying no to big government, big taxes, and big bailouts. Will that keep investors saying yes to stocks?”

In an absurd flight from logic, Buttner is asserting that the Fox-sponsored, Republican rallies last Wednesday played a role in the market’s performance for six weeks prior to their even being held.

Publicity stunt?  Shewd political move?  Honest personal choice?

Whatever the reason, Time has a nugget in its latest story on the downward spiral of the Republican party that “Joe the Plumber” has “quit” the Grand Old Party.

Many on the left are pointing and snickering, but I’m not sure this is news, particularly.  Ever since the pseudo-plumber positioned himself as the next great political commentator, he’s called himself non-partisan.  A conservative, sure.  A libertarian, perhaps.  But he’s always made a strangely serious point of not aligning himself with the Republican party.

But hey, even Senators are going out of their way to avoid the GOP in its current form, so I’m not sure Joe the Plumber’s distance is a bad idea, even if it isn’t a new one.