Joe The Plumber is the everyman who attacked presidential candidate Barack Obama over his tax policies. In the final U.S. Election debate before polling day, both candidates mentioned him many times, thus making him a celebrity over night. But it was a different Joe The Plumber that was the big winner on the night.

At a campaign stop last week, Joe The Plumber, whose real name is actually Sam Wurzelbacher, asked Obama a question about his tax policies. Overnight, he became a darling of the Republican party and is considered the everyman of this election. But that wasn’t the end of his five minutes of fame.

During the Presidential Election debate on October 15th, both candidates mentioned him on numerous occasions, and Joe The Plumber suddenly became a star. The media circus then went in to overdrive and it was soon discovered that Wurzelbacher was actually named Sam rather than Joe, and he’s not even a qualified plumber.

So Sam Wurzelbacher may now be a star, at least for a few days, but he has paid for that stardom by having his personal life dragged into the media. Meanwhile, a different Joe The Plumber is set to gain massively from the circus surrounding Wurzelbacher.

This Joe The Plumber, Joe Francis of Amarillo, Austin, is the owner of Joetheplumber.com, the website which has been the first port of call for reporters and campaigners looking for information and contact details for Wurzelbacher.

The website was inundated with traffic immediately after the debate, and Francis’ office was also bombarded with calls. Dallas News even claims a bidding war has begun over the domain name, with one offer rumored to be in the region of $800,000. There were also 300 people asking about t-shirts, 1,000 inquiring after Joe, and over 100,000 emails received in the space of just a few hours.

While Sam Wurzenbacher is likely to disappear as quick as he arrived on the scene, and have had to put up with media intrusion for his trouble, the real Joe The Plumber is set to cash in. And I don’t blame him.

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Entry was posted on Friday, October 17th, 2008 at 8:05 pm under Internet, Opinion.

Read more entries by Dave Parrack.
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