If I were Joe Six-pack, I’d be getting really, really sick of having my name thrown around like some mangy flannel shirt that’s one missing button away from becoming a dust cloth.

Joe is everywhere right now, invited into the best places, put in prime time, extolled as the keeper of the right stuff.

But is Joe really supposed to think these people care? Come Nov. 6, he’ll be lucky to be Joe Dollar Draft.

Common, that’s what they’re looking for. Joe Six-pack is common. His name is common. He’s supposed to get vertigo two feet inside a Starbucks.

That’s the pitch. Joe is once again being brought back as an everyman hauling his tattered values to the campaign tent.

And he is called on as if he sits in his duct-taped recliner waiting to answer for all those who just want a warm place to drink cold beer, knit American flag tea cozies and oil gun parts on the kitchen table.…

The name was invoked again Thursday night in the vice presidential debate. Sarah Palin brought Joe into the debate as that same old Joe who always wants the same old things, sticks to the same old beliefs and waits for someone else to make up his mind for him.

Some people — mostly evil, wise guy pundits — have taken to calling Palin Sarah Six-pack because she seems to stick so very close to the very common ground Joe Six-pack tends to travel.

Palin even said in an interview that it’s time that “normal Joe Six-pack American” be represented in the vice presidency. She said she and John McCain would put government back on the side of Joe Six-pack.

The accent is on “normal” here. Joe is embraced as much for what he isn’t as what he is. And he isn’t that New Yorker reading, Woody Allen movie watching, NPR listening kind of guy.

It was inevitable that Joe would show up. Candidates open their arms to Joe. They seem to love the way they can just squeeze him and squeeze him until he fits right into the place they’ve set for him.

Joe gets more political hugs than Abe Lincoln some nights. Palin, who did her best to bring the atmosphere of Thursday’s debate as close as possible to that of a game dinner, made sure Joe Six-pack was there to not be Chips Chardonnay.

But aren’t you just a little tired of this, Joe? I mean, we’ve downed a few brews over the years, you and I. We’ve talked and laughed at some really bad jokes and endured some afternoon reruns of Law & Order while cleaning out a couple bowls of stale bar mix.

You’ve told me how screwed up I am, Joe. I’ve replied. And you’ve never threatened to knock me into next Tuesday.

So I can’t believe you’d put up with this. I can’t believe you’d sit still for all this patronizing, condescending campaign swill.

I have to believe you watched that debate Thursday night and at some point felt the need to look back at the Republican nominee and ask “Are you talkin’ to me?”

Sure, we hear about you all the time, Joe. But we don’t hear from you. Here you are, made into the standard bearer for some plodding, one-dimensional band of blue collar drones, and you know there’s more. You know it’s not as simple as that simple name implies.

It’s insulting, Joe, and it’s time to respond. Don’t be used this way. Don’t let them decide who you are and what you want. You’re a good guy, and you deserve better.

Drive a Volvo.

Order a scotch.

Buy a case of Heineken.

You’re no ordinary Joe. Just remember that.

bkerr@projo.com