A cranky post-blog-break Andrew Sullivan has added his voice to those calling for the release of Obama's "official original" birth certificate because, well, because Andrew has spent a lot of time calling for the release of Trig Palin's birth certificate so it's obviously easy for him to conflate the two issues:
So many readers are furious that I have dared to ask the president to show the original copy of his birth certificate. The reason for demanding it is the same reason for demanding basic medical records proving Sarah Palin is the biological mother of Trig.
Because it would make it go away and it's easily done. [Italics in original]
First off, the "birther" phenomenon of disgruntled conservatives and racists -- and sometimes both! -- searching for any possible way to discredit the election of Barack Obama as president of the United States is simply not the equivalent of the "anti-birther" phenomenon, namely, Andrew Sullivan and the handful of remaining people who still give a shit about the provenance of Trig Palin. The first speaks to the actual constitutional requirements for a person to serve as the nation's president; the second speaks to whether failed former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin is a pathological liar, which has been proven ad infinitum through other examples. Should Palin arise from the ashes of her political seppuku as a legitimate presidential candidate, then we can take another look at Trig; otherwise, let sleeping special needs infants lie.
Second, and more importantly, nothing that Barack Obama or his surrogates do will ever make this go away. Obama could ride his magic pony to the home of every birther in the nation carrying his original birth certiciate and they would not believe it. My guess is the excuse would be, "It can't be real because the government wouldn't let him carry the real certificate." But the specific excuse is irrelevant -- what matters is that there will be an excuse, because these people are simply not rational.
I happen to have a ragged, photocopied version of my birth certificate, along with a "certiciate of live birth" from Camp Pendleton Marine base. If I were a nationally elected politician and, oh, say, half black, there would be a certain section of the populace who would latch on to that -- "Photocopies must be fake!" and "A live birth certificate proves that they knew in advance that they needed a cover story for the fake birth certificate!" &c &c --and no matter how many ways I showed them or explained them it would never be enough.
Of course, I'm as white as a summer day is long, so that's not gonna happen.
Obama's birthright citizenship has been proven over and over again in a process with standards higher than any other politician would ever have been expected to meet (hey, no one ever showed me George W. Bush's birth certificate!). Indulging racist, xenophobic fantasists ike Lou Dobbs is not only a distraction from the issues at hand, it's an insult to what it means to be an American.
Update: Andrew walks it back, thankfully.
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