Independent Omnipotence: April 2011

News Coverage

According to recent polls the GOP (Republican Party) is now a majority Birther Party. Polls are showing that 51% of people voting in the Republican Primary now believe that President Obama was not born in the United States. The polls also show that 28% firmly believe that the President was born in the America and 21% are unsure and 23% of Republican voters will only support a birther candidate. The fact that the Presidents birth certificate has been produced both by the President and Independent sources have in many cases only depended the conspiracy theory behind the birther movement. Birthers believe overwhelmingly that the birth certificate produces where faked, sighting what they believed to be a fake stamp and non-raised seal. Recently FactCheck.org has disproved those claims by taking high resolution photographs of the original certificate showing the raised seal and proper stamp.

"Photos of President Obamas birth certificate are also at the end of this article."

There have been many champions of the birther nation however the most recent is possible GOP front runner for President, Donald Trump. “The Donald” according to recent polls is now the leading candidate for Republican voters with 26 percent of the primary vote while Mike Huckabee gets 17 percent, Mitt Romney takes 15 percent, and Newt Gingrich receives 11 percent.

While many conservatives play to the birther nation Mitt Romney has firmly came out against birther beliefs. Romney told CNBC’s Larry Kudlow “I think the citizenship test has been passed. I believe the president was born in the United States. There are real reasons to get this guy out of office.” Too many in the Democratic Party, Romney’s statement were a breath of fresh air in an ever expanding sea of birthermania. Although this statement has been received well by most all Democrats and many Independents, Romney has paid for his beliefs in the republican primary polls. However there is some good news for Mitt coming in the form of a recent poll showing that the majority of Republican voters believe he is the most qualified to be the President.
Birthers have raised much ire over their beliefs. Racial prejudice has been the main talking point for most birther detractors sighting that no other President has ever been asked to produce his birth certificate. In fact, Arthur Hinman in the 1880 presidential election was paid by Democrats to dig up dirt on the Republican nominee Chester A. Arthur. Not being able to find anything damning, Hinman created a story showing that Arthur was born in Ireland and only came to live in the United States when he was 14 yrs. old. The claim that Arthur was born in Ireland was easily disproven and little was done afterwards. However the overwhelmingly older Caucasian demographic of the birther party have made the claims of prejudice against the nation’s first African American President ever more prominent.

Opinion

I truly believe that President Obama was born in the United States. All the credible evidence supports he was born in Hawaii. In the darkest economic times since the 1930’s how do we as Americans let this become a serious public issue? Millions of people are still out of work, home foreclosures are still a serious problem, our math and science education is ranked one of the lowest in the industrialized world, our soldiers are in Iraq and Afghanistan fighting for people that don’t want us there, our national debt keeps going higher and higher and the three things that should be looked at to cut (Defense, Social Security and Medicare) are not even on the table because both Democrats and Republicans do not want to take on the hard issues because they think they will be run out of office if they do.

Let’s face the facts Republicans and admit at least 40 to 50% if not more are Birthers primarily because the President is African American. The other 50 to 60% are just Republican voters that want to see the Democrats out of power. However Democrats aren’t totally blameless in this birther nation. Judah Benjamin, a Hilary Clinton supporter that first brought forth the claim that President Obama was not eligible to be President because his father has from Kenya therefor it didn’t matter where he was born because that make Obama a subject of Queen Elizabeth and a duel citizen at best. Of course to believe the way he does means you cannot believe in the 14 Amendment of the Constitution but apparently that didn’t stop him.

The Dems are also to blame for having such a passive weak voice. This is the age of the internet and unlimited 24hr news coverage. This is the era of Fox News opinion reporters (and I use the term reporters loosely) such as Sean Hannity, Bill Oreilly and formally Glen Beck claiming they are actual news people. In this age people on TV can claim Obama is a Muslim even though he is a lifelong Christian and goes to church. One can equate the President of the United States to Adolf Hitler because of a healthcare policy because if Hitler was known for anything it was his healthcare policies. The Dems just sit back and take it and take it and take it because the believe such non-sense is below them and shouldn’t even be addressed in public discourse…which is probably correct. What Dems don’t realize is that the world doesn’t work that way anymore if it ever did. So I will end this with a quote that sums up the birther movement:

1. "Any theory is valid if it sells books, soaks up ratings or otherwise moves units."

2. "Anything can be true if someone says it loudly enough."

3. "Fact is that which enough people believe. Truth is determined by how fervently they believe it."

—Idiot America: How Stupidity Became a Virtue in the Land of the Free, Charles Pierce

President Obama's birth certificate