INTERSTATE 4, Florida (CNN)– Joe the plumber goes on tour?
Well sort of.
Driving through Florida on the "Straight Talk Express," Sen. John McCain rallied voters and talked to small business owners during the "Joe the Plumber: Keep Your Wealth" tour.
“You know whether it is Joe the plumber in Ohio or whether it is Joe over here –thank you Joe. There's Joes all over here,” said McCain at his second stop, a rally in Ormond Beach, Florida. “Senator Obama wants to spread the wealth around. That means fewer jobs at their businesses and fewer jobs here in Florida.”
People cheered as they held signs that said, "McCain will help the working man" and "My husband is Tom the plumber". Two fork lifts held the "Country First" sign above the platform.
McCain kicked off the tour at the Starlite Diner in Daytona Beach with four small business owners, or in campaign speak, four Joe the plumbers.
Their actual names and professions are florist Richard Rivers, pub owner Tom Curtis, food store owner Patricia Surgine and Thomas Crowe, president of a lumber supply company and a former professional football player.
Diners at neighboring tables manned their cell phone cameras as the business owners told McCain their troubles, particularly with Barack Obama's tax plan.
At the morning rally, held at the lumber supply company owned by Crowe, the Arizona Senator got very fired up about two topics: the Bush presidency and his Democratic opponent.
“I call on the Administration to act now and buy up these home loan mortgages and keep people in their homes,” he said as he pounded on the podium. ”And why is the Secretary of the Treasury not ordering them to do that?”
McCain also emphasized concerns about Obama's ability to lead.
“You know it is amazing," he said "Are you ready to trust Americans’ national security to an untested leader in these times of war?”
He also mocked Obama’s explanation of why Democratic VP candidate Joe Biden said his running mate would be tested by an international crisis as president.
“Yesterday Senator Obama tried to explain away this by warning – by saying that his running mate sometimes engages in rhetorical flourishes. Really? Really? That’s another way of saying he accidentally delivered some straight talk to America.”
At his third and fourth stops, he also met with small business owners. The third stop was held at a dentist's office in Altamonte Springs, Florida. Hispanic business owners were targeted at the later stop, a Puerto Rican restaurant in Orlando.
After his meeting, he made a statement to the press corps where he talked about one of the women he spoke with inside the restaurant, noted the new jobless report, and said he was optimistic about his chances in Florida.
“We’re doing well in Florida, I’m happy with the polling numbers. It’s going to be a battleground state, we got a lot of work to do but with Charlie Crist, Mel Martinez and a lot of the great support we have across this state we will win and we will win this election.”
The six stop tour will take the McCain campaign through Florida along the I-4 corridor. This part of the state is home to nearly 20 percent of undecided voters which both campaigns consider the key to Florida’s 27 electoral votes.
From CNN Politics
© 2012 Cable News Network. Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
| Advertising practices | Advertise with us | About us | Work for us | Help
If I hear that Joe the plumber one more time from McPalin I will go nuts....for heavens sake is that the best they can do!!!!
This country is in a mess and all the McPalin ticket do is go on and on about this guy who is of no consequence anyway......it shows that they have nothing else to offer and it's getting boring!!!!
What a complete disaster the McPalin campaign has been....out of control crowds....desrespectful....lie after lie....enough is enough!!!
This country deserves so much better than McCain.....who's claim to fame as being honorable has long since diminished, alongside any dignity I should think.
No, it's time for a new chapter and new characters.....Sen Obama and Sen Biden will bring dignity and respect back to the White House and that has been lacking these past 8 years.
Vote wisely and vote now......we can't afford to have another 4 years of this useless Republican party.
Joe the Plumber tour? This is a campaign inept of strategy. Indeed a drowning man will clutch at a straw and CNN led by Wolf and Sanchez are cheering them on.
WARNING
DO NOT VOTE FOR OBAMA
He will raise everyones taxes. this guy is a fake do not be brainwashed. He is the next Jimmy Carter. There will be double digit unemployment, double digit interest rates, double digit inflation.
You have been warned
If you people think George Bush has been a horrible president, just
wait until Obama, if he is elected, jumps in the borrowed money pot
from China with Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid for all that unnecessary
spending they so want to do.
They should change the name of the tour to the John McCain Farewell Tour. However, unlike Streisand and Cher he won't come back for another Farewell tour.
McCain has hinged the last three weeks of his campaign on a man who is a FRAUD and tax evader. He must not want the white house that bad
Joe the plumber is s loosing team.Don you get it oldman McCain?
Observation: McLame a very creepy fake smile.
...crazy old man.
If I were Joe the plumber, I would sue McCain.
Why does he keep using this guy thats not a plumber and is against social security? Which along with Medicaid is SOCIALISM which makes McCain a card carrying member.
I like Palin, she's just like me. She's a working mom, who shops at Wallmart, just like me. So what, if she spent $ 150,000 on clothes, I want to be just like her. She makes believe that anyone can get lots of money for no reason.
Palin is the pride of "Rushpublicans" everywhere.
Now I'm off to put all my money on the lottery and pray that God will give me wealth, just like he gave to Sarah.
McCain will help the working man? How and since when? How will keeping the Bush tax cuts for the rich, help the working man? These people are crazy.
He's fake (Joethe plumer) McCain is losing a lot credibility and if we tge people wants 4 more year of this then we deserve more war and soon we will be all talking Chinese.
What kind of insanity. The man owes taxes. He is not licensed. He is not about to buy this business, not at least soon. He is not going to have his taxes raised. And yet here he is spouting the McCain the same slogans. Why can't people see how just insanely weird this is?
Dumb & Plumber
Is this tour in any way running in conjunction with the new ironically titled Guns & Roses 'Chinese democracy" tour ?
Axl & John shootin up & dancin' with Mr. Brownstone on the straigh lie to you express bus with Cindy and Sarah providing the "entertainment"
Should be a gas....
You can fool some of the people some of the time but you can't fool all of the people all of the time.
Does Obama's tax plan mean that he is in effect raising his own taxes, and does McCain's tax plan mean that he is giving himself
a tax break?
Why would you base a tour on a fake?
Joe the plumber doesn't realize that he would benefit more from Obama's plan than McCain's.
Just watch watach I tell you, after Obama wins this election, there will be a few dishonest stories about Joe the "so-called plumber" and John McCain.
There's something rotten in Denmark and it isn't Obama's tax plan.
The only thing I know for sure about plumbers, they put their face where I put my behind!
McCain needs to understand that the more he talks about Joe the plumber, the more credibility he loses. The guy is fake, gave a fake scenario and came to a fake conlusion.
There is also zero doubt in my mind that I don't know what I'm talking about.
$150,000 for Palins wardrobe and they cant spend $800 on whitening McCains crusty teeth?
Dirty Harry, that was the truth you owe an apology to people who are smart and do not work for campaigns as you do.
Bill you are absolutely correct!!! He is preaching to the choir because most people understand what a tax cut means for those under $250k.
Calling a tax-cut Socialist is the only way to tell dumb people that it is better to give tax cuts to the rich. Mind you, the same cuts that did not trickle down to the comon man and messed up the economy.
Mr. McCain you said on several occasions that you would run an honorable campaign. YOU LIED.........You used to be an honorable man but you became the pupet of the RNC and you LOST YOUR SOUL IN THE PROCESS.......