Trouble in the Mideast? Call Joe

Picture this: It’s the day after a terrorist attack, you’ve lost everything in spectacular fashion and the media’s dying to talk to you. You’re expecting Anderson Cooper, but the guy who steps out of the van is Yoab the Drywall Man. You wonder: What the hell is CNN thinking?

And I wonder: What the hell will Israelis think of Joe the Plumber as war correspondent? Samuel Werzelbacher, the guy who skyrocketed to prominence by asking Barack Obama a single disingenuous question, has been hired as a reporter for the conservative Web site pjtv.com. He intends to let Israel’s “Average Joes tell their story.”

I don’t have much to say about Samuel Werzelbacher. I don’t know the man. But I will say that Average Joes, the ones proud of uninformed views and crappy grammar, are way overrated when it comes to writing books or running for political office or wandering around a war zone with a press pass and a microphone. Samuel Werzelbacher has now expressed interest in all of those things, without yet distinguishing himself in the profession for which he’s best known: Plumbing.

We can take comfort from the fact that pjtv.com is no CNN. But will the American celebrity mill ever tire of elevating dumbasses out of obscurity?