Democracy Has Prevailed.

July 21, 2009

Teh Birther Crazie Continues

Mike Castle is a moderate Republican (I thought they'd all been purged from the GOP by now - you live and learn) from Delaware. Former Governor and current House Representative from Delaware.

He got booed in his own state for declaring that President Obama is a US Citizen. The Washington Independent has the story:

A little evidence that [the birther] conspiracy theory is showing up in uncomfortable situations for Republicans: Here’s Rep. Mike Castle (R-Del.), a moderate Republican who hasn’t announced whether he’s running for re-election or for the U.S. Senate next year, at a town hall meeting earlier this month.

A woman gets up, holding a baggie containing her birth certificate, and unleashes a rambling, minute-long tirade tirade about how the president is a “citizen of Kenya.” The crowd hoots and cheers when she’s done. Castle responds, diplomatically: “Well I don’t know what comment that invites. If you’re referring to the president, then he is a citizen of the United States.” That elicits roars and boos from the crowd, so Castle presses on. “You can boo, but he is a citizen of the United States.”

Take a look:


Even in little Delaware, teh crazie flourishes.

Then there's Pat Boone. In his Newsmax column he hits all (and I mean ALL) of the Anti-Obama wingnut points. First on the birth certificate:
I know; this suspicion, this question about whether Barack Hussein Barry Soetoro Obama was actually born in the United States — as the Constitution explicitly demands — has been circulating for months, since before he won the election last November. He, or somebody in his confidence, posted a supposed copy of a Hawaiian "Certification of Live Birth," or COLB, on his presidential campaign Web site — even though a COLB, under Hawaiian rules, does not necessarily prove in-state birth. Some found the document, which does not list the hospital of birth or attending physician, to be fake.
"Some" also believe the moon landings to be a hoax. That doesn't mean there's any evidence to support it. Same here. Pat goes further:
  • Corsi's trip to Kenya where he was denied entry (the cover-up's gone international!!)
  • The videotape (which, again, "some" have reported to have seen) showing Obama's paternal step grandmother saying she saw his birth -in Kenya
  • And then this convoluted conspiracy:
    Many, who know more than I do about what actually happened, notably the United States Justice Foundation, have surmised that baby Obama’s mother, about to have her child in Kenya, had booked a flight to Hawaii but was prohibited from flying because delivery was so imminent. But soon after baby Barack was born, USJF theorizes she flew with him to Oahu and obtained some kind of "record of birth" as if he'd been born there.
OR he was simply born in Hawaii.

Pat sums up the importance of this issue with:
Yes, it is important, crucially and everlastingly important. America’s very future depends on the defense of, and obedience to, our basic constitutional laws.
Good to know. But where was Pat and the other birthers when the previous President was lying the country into a war? Okaying illegal domestic surveillance? Ordering torture?

13 comments:

Unknown said...

Why do you continue to write about these crazies? They should be media footnotes at most. Birthers are trolls. If you don't feed the trolls, they usually go away. Perhaps such a strategy could be applied to a certain Heir. ;)

Social Justice NPC Anti-Paladin™ said...

"Some" also believe the moon landings to be a hoax. That doesn't mean there's any evidence to support it.
Some believe that
The Bush administration committed war crimes
Man is causing Global Warming/Climate change.
The Twin towers were destroyed by controlled demolition.
I am going to use the Jesse Ventura dodge and say
I'm just asking questions.

Ol' Froth said...

At least there is credible evidence for your first two Heir!

EdHeath said...

Look, the people who write this blog and the people who read it are fairly knowledgeable. But when you watch a video like that, then I guess you see the miracle of modern media. I mean, there have always been know nothing types in politics. But these days, they have cable “news” and national radio shows, and a lot of people hear their nonsense and believe it because it assuages their cognitive dissonance. It is a lot easier to believe a conspiracy theory that Obama was put in power by a communist plot than to believe that a black intellectual lawyer and professor who eats weird sounding food (arugula?) was more popular than a Vietnam war hero and a Christian.

Sarah Palin clearly has a chance (after all, Ronald Reagan won twice, even after saying that trees caused more pollution than automobiles do).

V Sobol said...

This is so frightening! Saw it on Morning Joe today--credit to them for showing it and spending many minutes criticizing.
http://morningjoecritic.blogspot.com/

Social Justice NPC Anti-Paladin™ said...

It is a lot easier to believe a conspiracy theory that Obama was put in power by a communist plot than to believe that a black intellectual lawyer and professor who eats weird sounding food (arugula?) was more popular than a Vietnam war hero and a Christian.
Mccain was also a kneejerk populist who required Palin to get the base to follow the "maverick".

Remember progressives were rational when believed the Bush AWOL story and the forged TANG documents with no proof?
It is just fun to annoy progressives with the fact that Obama is hiding his Birth Certificate. Because maybe it contains something embarrassing.
However Obama did win the election and the Birther's fight is pointless as this link explains even if proven true, Congress and Courts will do nothing.

What is amusing is Democratic flacks who continue to lie and say Obama released his Birth certificate and point to the Certification of Live Birth.

Anonymous said...

Heir,

The fact is that the State of Hawaii says that President Obama was born there. Legally, that's it. End of story. That's the best possible evidence. The form that their documentation takes, long, short, or whatever, is up to them. The fact is, they have officially documented his birth.

Unless, of course, you just can't get over the fact that, for the first time in its history, the President of the United States is not a white male.

EdHeath said...

So, HTTP, you are saying the Certification of Live Birth, which apparently shows Obama was born in Hawaii, is a fraudulent document? If Obama went to the trouble of creating a fraudulent Certification of Live Birth, why not create a fraudulent Birth Certificate? And why didn't the State of Hawaii recognize a fraudulent Certification of Live Birth, or acknowledge there is no Birth Certificate on file for Obama?

I laugh at the part of your link where it says that the matter is settled; Obama was born in Kenya. I think that if that could be proven there might be 67 Senators who would be so pissed off at Obama for lying that they might vote to convict in an impeachment. But it is true, then we would have President Biden.

Still, it is difficult not to wonder whether racism is not behind this "birther" movement. It is sad to think that some fraction of this country is that small minded, although I suppose I shouldn't be surprised.

Whatever the case with the Bush documents from that CBS news story (and that was badly handled by CBS, I'll agree), there seems no denying that Bush left Texas to go work in Alabama late in his Air National Guard career. His father was a political big wig even then and I think Bush junior played on that, betting he wouldn't be sent to Vietnam. Not that he was AWOL (although it is not clear whether or how much he showed up for duty in Alabama), just that he demanded the terms of his service be changed to fit his needs. You can say whatever you want about progressives, but that now meaningless truth seems pretty clear.

Anonymous said...

Is this racist? Of course it is. (All wrapped up in the finery of Constitutional law.)

Obama is not a real American.
(He's not white.)

Conservative Mountaineer said...

Oooohh... the "racist" angle.

BTW, he ain't all White and he ain't all Black.. he's 50/50.

Conservative Mountaineer said...

5,4,3,2,1... waiting for one of you liberals, oops, progressives to comment on the "ain't"... just tweaking you.

EdHeath said...

Surely, CM, you know that the greatest racial hatred from whites *and* blacks is reserved for mixed race couples.

Anonymous said...

For this conspiracy to be true it would also mean that the newspapers in Hawaii are in on it, since the state's two major newspapers both ran the birth announcement.

It would also mean that the NSA, FBI and CIA, under the supervision of the Bush administration, allowed an illegible person to become President. Somehow I think if he was actually not an American citizen, one of those agencies would have noticed, especially since, you know, Senators and Presidential candidates have to get security clearances from them. That they would ignore I guess means they were all in on it as well.

Yes, George W. Bush and Dick Cheney are in on the 40+ year plot to elect a Kenyan-born Muslim to the Presidency. I mean, Cheney is a distance cousin...