Joe the Plumber: Champion of the Free Press and an Informed Public

Those wise and intrepid bloggers over at the conservative Pajamas Media site had the brilliant idea to send Joe the Plumber to Israel to cover the war with Hamas.

Not that Joe knew anything about journalism or war or the Middle East or much of anything else. Which accounts for this bit of nonsense from Journalist (to use the title loosely) Joe:

I'll be honest with you. I don't think journalists should be anywhere allowed war. I mean, you guys report where our troops are at. You report what's happening day to day. You make a big deal out of it. I-I think it's asinine. You know, I liked back in World War I and World War II when you'd go to the theater and you'd see your troops on, you know, the screen and everyone would be real excited and happy for 'em. Now everyone's got an opinion and wants to downer--and down soldiers. You know, American soldiers or Israeli soldiers. I think media should be abolished from, uh, you know, reporting. You know, war is hell. And if you're gonna sit there and say, 'Well look at this atrocity,' well you don't know the whole story behind it half the time, so I think the media should have no business in it.

According to our correspondent, the public is better off not knowing about war and conflict. And that business of reporting troop locations? Joe cites no evidence, because (except for Geraldo in Iraq) this hasn't happened.

War is hell, Joe says, repeating the cliche, but it's not the media's job to tell anyone about it. "I think media should be abolished from, uh, you know, reporting," Joe says.

Note to Joe: Your press prescription sounds a lot like authoritarianism and not at all like, well, democracy.