I relegated Donald Trump to the “no longer interesting or relevant” pile a year ago, but in fact he keeps on birthin’, telling The Daily Beast recently concerning the publisher’s brochure that said Obama was born in Kenya:
Now they’re saying it was a mistake. Just like his Kenyan grandmother said he was born in Kenya, and she pointed down the road to the hospital, and after people started screaming at her she said, “Oh, I mean Hawaii.” Give me a break.
I bet the folks in Kogelo village will be surprised to learn that they have a hospital!
Even as Donald Trump fans the flames of birtherism, he’s hosting a big fundraiser for Mitt in Las Vegas and saying that he would accept the Vice President position.
Read more:
- Why is Mitt Romney Embracing Birther Donald Trump? U.S. News & World Report
- Romney camp mum on Trump’s latest birther comments. CBS News.
- Trump doubles down on birther comments despite Romney fundraising role. The Hill
- Donald Trump is Still a Birther. Daily Beast
- Birther Donald Trump to host Las Vegas fundraiser for Mitt Romney. Washington Times
- Romney campaign sticks with Trump, Despite birther comments. CNN
If it’s true that Romney can’t get elected without the birthers, then the Obama campaign’s strategy should be to ask Romney about it at each turn. He either renounces the insanity or panders to the birthers.
I have to believe that Romney will use this opportunity to denounce Birtherism in order to show that he can lead and not just be led around by the Fringe. At most, his denunciation of Birtherism will be joke-y weasel words. But who would want to be a part of a political organization that can’t even acknowledge the eligibility of the opposing candidate?
Then again, I see little evidence of sane rank-and-file Republicans who might applaud harsh criticism of the Birthers.
From one sane (or so I think Republican), I have consistently supported criticism of Birthers at every turn.
There are some other Republicans who post to this blog who can speak up as well. I wish more Republicans would reject all forms of conspiracy theories and similar nutty theories. I would have nothing to do with Donald Trump.
It’s delicious. The birthers have Mitt and the Republicans in a real bind. Karl Rove is pulling his remaining hair out. Try to placate the birthers and lose the innependents. But, if the birthers stay home that’s trouble too. I am convinced that Bennet was beiing told what to do every step of the way by Rove or his peeps.
But where the rubber will really hit the road is with the VP choice. Rove knows that for the Republicans to stand a chance they need to keep the Hispanic vote somehwat close-near the 40% that W got. Romney is running below 30% which makes him toast. They also know Florida is a must win. So, far and away the best choice for them is Rubio. He’s young, good looking and smart enough to avoid any Palin moments. But do they dare pick him when the great Apuzzo says he isn’t an NBC?
Mario, the Obama campaign thanks you every single day…
You are being way too soft on Romney here.
Romney’s campaign was explicitly asked by the press to denounce Bennett’s actions (Bennett heads the Romney campaign in AZ). The campaign refused to do so.
And it’s not as though Trump is holding a fundraiser on his own. Come on! Romney is completely, totally involved with the Trump fundraiser–it’s not a PAC event.
No, Romney didn’t simply awaken one morning to discover that Birthers were fighting on his behalf. HE ASKED THEM TO FIGHT FOR HIM AND REFUSES TO DENOUNCE THEM.
That makes Romney a Birther at best and the lowest form of spineless panderer at worst.
You are letting him off far too easily.
so who are the birthers? a u of delaware study concluded that the negative evaluations of Obama by White participants may be racially motivated.
http://content.usatoday.com/communities/sciencefair/post/2011/04/social-scientists-look-at-racisms-role-in-birther-viewpoint/1#.T8ETHb9947A
these are the same white tea party members
the same 20% who are small government, christian conservatives, who want to limit women’s rights, peek in doctors’ offices and bedrooms and support vaginal probes (state sponsored rape)
the same people who probably still think interracial marriage should banned
the same people, like pat buchanan, who oppose multiculturalism
the same people who fear headlines like this: Whites Account for Under Half of Births in U.S.” (banning/restricting birth control and abortion would increase the number of white)
ETC
i don’t get how supporting/not disavowing birthers expands romney’s (SMALL) tent
according to recent polls, he already has their votes while he doesn’t have women and minorities who are NECESSARY to win
since romney is offering that (birther, etc) group NOTHING by way of his policies, WHY ELSE are they flocking to him?
or is it that, without that group, he only has the rich and CAN’T POSSIBLE win with just them?
Bennett is also a Mormon. This is the US future if Romney gets in.
An open comment to John Reilly: I know you will vote for Romney, and that’s fine. I believe in the ballot box, not legislating away your opponents. Romney would be better for Israel than Obama.
However, I’m not a one issue voter as most Jewish Republicans are.
I vote on social issues. I am not going to trade reproductive freedom, the 1st Amendment, science and healthcare, for Israel.
That doesn’t make me any less of a Zionist. I also believe that after what has been dished out to us, we should not be dependent on handouts from gentiles. What the Settlers and their politicians are doing is basically running a protection racket, targeting evangelicals.
Now Israel has put up a wall. How long did the Berlin wall last? We should be using Nelson Mandela and Desmond Tutu as our model, not the old Germany.
I am now going to get off my Union Square soapbox.
Any unwanted penetration is legally rape.
“Twenty states already have laws dictating rules for ultrasounds, according to the Guttmacher Institute. Here are seven other states that have advanced similar measures in the last year:”
Read on:
http://www.motherjones.com/mojo/2012/03/transvaginal-ultrasounds-coming-soon-state-near-you
I’m a bit surprised by your comment. I am not aware of any specific policies that Romney has proposed that would be better for Israel than the current policies. In fact, I would say that US policy towards Israel has been remarkably consistent over many decades regardless of who is in the White House.
guarantee you that he won’t with them. Why Romney cannot see that standing on the same stage as The Donald who is an outsized fool does NOT make him look presidential.
Besides all that, just this week we had the state of HI once again give an OFFICIAL declaration of the details of his birth. What is Romney saying here?? The state of HI is not to be trusted??
Really this is a no win setup for Romney. Birthers are fools and not a single person who has sense or intelligence gives them the slightest credence.
“Mr. Romney has suggested that he would not make any significant policy decisions about Israel without consulting Mr. Netanyahu…”
Entire article:
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/08/us/politics/mitt-romney-and-benjamin-netanyahu-are-old-friends.html
Netanyahu and Israel are 2 different entities. What’s good for one may not necessarily be good for the other.
misha: these MORONS don’t KNOW ANY women – the reason they switched to vaginal probes is because a sonogram is not performed early in a pregnancy (when most abortions are performed) since they can’t even detect a pregnancy – to get the WING NUTZZZ desired effect (for the women to see a “baby”), they needed the PROBE – AND since more than one of these tests are not doctor recommended, republicans are LIMITING more testing when WARRANTED
REMEMBER, saint-orum wanted to BAN fetal testing since the majority of women (over 80%) choose termination rather than having a child with down syndrome, etc
regarding mitt – he’s appearing with 2 THRICE MARRIED, SERIAL ADULTERERS in a CASINO – what is WRONG with that picture considering the mormon faith?
This is it. It’s all about “The other,” which to these people Obama represents. It’s a deeply rooted fear that their tribe is losing an innately privileged position, even as they refuse to admit that such privilege ever existed.
That’s actually a quite natural reaction in human history, and I can certainly sympathize with it to a point. We are, after all, tribal creatures by our very nature. But one of our supposed aspirations is to rise above our mere nature.
That’s what makes the hard core birthers so sad and pitiful. Emotionally, they’ve invested themselves in a core cause that’s a guaranteed loser; it’s not ever going to be the 1950s again. Intellectually, they’ve invested themselves in a cause that’s a guaranteed loser; the sheer complexity and stupidity of their arguments is obvious to everyone but them. It would be obvious to even them except for this reptile brain block that simply cannot accept a reality where someone named Barack Obama, with his taunting excess of melanin, can be President.
I took a casual glance at Free Republic. My only reaction is “Jesus wept.” Every single time, it’s exactly the same.
Within a day of any court decision, it’s been picked apart for the most meaningless stringing together of partial phrases out of context, all to insist it hasn’t really judged their arguments on the merits.(Not to forget that every judge is also corrupt when he rules against them).
Within a day of any new verification from the state of Hawaii, it’s been picked apart for the most meaningless stringing together of partial phrases out of context, all to insist it doesn’t mean what the plain English language meaning of the words is.
Within seconds of someone aping their cause (Trump, Arpaio, some nothing burger state representative), this is the new hero, the new light in God’s eye who will smite their enemies.
Every single time. Without fail.
It is the money.
Trump, for his part, says he won’t turn down the Vice President slot:
http://wtvr.com/2012/05/26/trump-says-he-wouldnt-turn-down-vp-job/
I think it would be a most excellent birfoon, er, “Constitutionalist” campaign if all birfoons, er, “Patriots” pledged to vote for Romney only if he picks The Combover Con Man as veep.
I want Mitt to wear Trump around his neck like an albatross.
Your wish will be granted. Donald thrives on being the center of attention, and loves TV cameras. After Vegas, do you think he’ll stay in the background?
It is an ancient Mariner
And he stoppeth one of three…
Donald stops everyone, and has an opinion on everything. Popcorn.
“It is the money.”
They claim they will make as much as Clooney
.
How surprized they will be!
Romney/Trump 2012: “I like being able to fire people” / “You’re fired!”
Baron von Butcher (shaking his fist): I’ll get you Lancelot Link!!
As reported at Talking Points Memo:
Conservative columnist George Will criticized Donald Trump with colorful language on Sunday when asked on ABC’s “This Week” whether it helps Mitt Romney to ally with the billionaire real estate mogul.
“I do not understand the cost-benefit here,” Will said. “The costs are clear. The benefits – what voter is going to vote for him because he’s seen with Donald Trump? The cost of appearing with this bloviating ignoramus is obvious, it seems to me. Donald Trump is redundant evidence that if your net worth is high enough, your IQ can be very low, and you can still intrude into American politics.”
Birther Donald Trump to host Las Vegas fundraiser for Mitt Romney
(excerpt) But the big question has now become: Where does Mitt Romney stand on the Birther silliness? As he told Larry Kudlow on CNBC a year ago: “I believe the president was born in the United States. The man needs to be taken out of office, but his citizenship isn’t the reason why.”
Yet Romney now has nothing to say about using Donald Trump as his surrogate out on the stump for him, spouting more venom. In fact, the campaign has not responded to repeated requests whether to have such a man representing Mitt Romney is appropriate, much less to have asked him to host a massive fundraiser.
What does this tell us about Romney? Plenty. Plainly in Romney World, only money talks. Nothing else. Certainly not integrity as a candidate. And, Mr. Romney, character does count.
If we elect Mitt Romney, remember this day when we knew for sure he would sell his soul to the highest bidder, no matter what that person stood for. Now imagine a Romney White House.
(http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/ad-lib/2012/may/25/birther-donald-trump-host-las-vegas-fundraiser-mit/)
I would love to see Obama ask Romney about it at the debates.
I would like Obama to ask Romney, as a fellow HLS alum, to summarize birthright citizenship for the folks, since Romney’s dad was born in Mexico and ran for president.
And, frankly, I don’t think that the US President allowing US foreign policy to be dictated by Israel is particularly good for either country.
As I noted above,
No he didn’t. He ran for the Republican Nomination for President but he dropped out before the convention, even before the New Hampshire primary in fact. He never got near running for President.
Some say because it was because he claimed to have been “brainwashed” in Viet Nam, but WE know it was really because he knew he would never have passed the NBC test.
…and did not set foot in the US until age 6.
As I have written many times, George Romney was born at home. He claimed birthright citizenship. It would have been simple to say George’s mother was Martha, a US citizen, rather than Mercedes, a Mexican national.
“Questions were occasionally asked about Romney’s eligibility to run for President due to his birth in Mexico, given the ambiguity in the United States Constitution over the phrase “natural-born citizen”.
His Mormon paternal grandfather and his three wives had fled to Mexico in 1886, but none of them ever relinquished U.S. citizenship. While the Constitution requires that a president must be a natural-born citizen, the first Congress of the United States in 1790 passed legislation stating: “The children of citizens of the United States that may be born beyond the sea, or outside the limits of the United States, shall be considered as natural-born citizens of the United States.” Romney and his family fled Mexico in 1912 during the Mexican Revolution.
During the campaign, Romney was generally considered a viable and legal candidate for United States president. He departed the race before the matter could be more definitively resolved, although the preponderance of opinion since then has been that he was eligible.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Romney_presidential_campaign,_1968
Yes, I read the wikipedia article too, but decided not to quote that passage because of its use of the 1790 naturalization law that had several “mistakes”. It was one of the first substantial laws produced under the new Constitution, and not all consequences had been worked out. The 1795 law was substantially better, and there have been many changes since then, including the 14th Amendment, that would be more important to George’s situation than the 1790 law.
Wiki is seriously flawed in that discussion, but I am not energized enough to try to fix it. Without looking, I suspect there is an editor’s war about it.
In fact, in my opinion, George would be eligible for exactly the same reason that McCain was eligible: born abroad to two citizen parents, but I would like to see the birth certificate. Which of the wives was really the mother, what is the proof, and was she really a U.S. citizen?
I understand the distinction and I am not trying to imply that GRomney was ever close to his party’s nomination, but candidates and the media use the terms interchangeably. Even the FEC states on its website “The table below lists all individuals who have filed a Statement of Candidacy (FEC Form 2) with the FEC to register as a 2012 presidential candidate.” A list of 384 “candidates” follows.
http://www.fec.gov/press/press2011/presidential_form2nm.shtml
“Today I am announcing my candidacy for president of the United States. You can watch my announcement here. http://bit.ly/kEbh7d,” he wrote to his 1.3 million followers on Twitter.
http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/newt-gingrich-biography-republican-2012-presidential-candidates/story?id=14563602#.T8K-vZ9YulA
Yes, I know that too. I refuse to give in to such laziness myself.
Since Trump apparently can’t afford any, it must be true … shame is priceless!
I agree completely, and have done the same. I have criticized the birthers and those who defend them at every turn.
One difference, though: I’m no longer a Republican. I removed myself from the party rolls because of these very issues. I’m still the same conservative person I always have been, but the GOP left me and decided to pander to narrow-minded bigots and racists. I will not put myself in their company willingly. I just could not and can not support those who seek to profit on what they know to be a lie.
That doesn’t make me a Democrat. I’m not liberal. My views haven’t changed. It simply makes me “not a Republican”. The Republican Party left me first.
It bothers me greatly that the GOP caters to these nuts, criminals and liars. It bothers me because many of the young adults I know (college age) are not Republicans because of this and similar issues. It bothers me to know that GOP party heads know this is a lie and prefer to run on lies to running on a platform of small government and limited government intervention. GOP leaders prefer this easy lie to defending the complicated truth.
They are cowards and liars. I will not support them, and will not vote for any candidate who seeks to profit from these lies.
If Romney stays with Trump I will not support him and I doubt he will be elected.
I recognized long ago that most people are not as partisan as I am, and tend to vote for the guy they think will “do the best job” and who seems honest. The voters who elected Bush are the same voters who elected Obama. They swing back and forth, and their criteria is not strictly partisan or ideological. It is based on who they feel will do a good job, on who seems honest and trustworthy.
If the biggest difference between Romney and Obama is that Romney caters to publicity-seeking morons like Trump, who do you think they’ll vote for? If the biggest difference between the sitting President and his opponent is that the opponent associates with bloviating liars, who will they vote for?
Here’s to the GOP returning to sanity. I don’t see it happening any time soon, but hope springs eternal.
When I was in graduate school, some forty-odd years ago, one of my professors taught me a very important lesson: the difference between “explaining the data” and “explaining them away”. Our obligation as scholars, he said, is to do the former and avoid the latter, since the explanation will probably be wrong.
What the birthers are doing is increasingly “explaining away” the data, which — as we have seen — merely leads to an growing spiral of insanity. My professor was right.
How hilariously ironic that this article about Romney needing the Birther vote, comes right after another article where Rush says Obama is the one prompting the Birthers. Did any of us ever really think that Birthers would stay home instead of cast a vote against Obama? Trump knows his fans well & most of them live by what the Globe headline says as they check out at the grocery store. If Mitt keeps this up (& I almost hope he does, actually!), independents will find him so pathetic & embarassing that they’ll doubt Romney’s ability to deal with the nation’s real problems.
Some birthers will stay home, because they think that Romney isn’t a NBC. I agree with your main premise, though – Romney risks turning off a huge segment of the population who might vote for him by messing around with Donald Trump.
That is pretty much how I vote. If partisan Democrats and Republicans saw my voting record they would puke.
My Voting Record, so far.
================
1988 – Bush Sr. My first vote, just one year out of High School
1992 – Clinton, Voted overseas while in the U.S. Army
1996 – Clinton, I do not remember why I did not vote for Dole.
2000 – Bush Jr. seemed like a good choice (at the time), Gore seemed too hippie for me.
2004 – Kerry was a “Hold your nose” vote, no winners here, lost faith in Bush Jr.
2008 – Obama, I just did not see the benefit to America of McCain/Palin.
2012 – This may be a “Hold your nose” vote for Obama, Romney is not convincing me he can do better.
I don’t fit in with partisans either but my life experiences have made me lean toward the Democratic party over the years. My record:
’72 Nixon
’76 Carter
’80 Reagan
’84 Reagan
’88 Bush St
’92 Clinton
’96 Clinton
’00 Gore
’04 Kerry
’08 Obama
I was “wrong” only 20% of the time. The first time that happened was when Dubya lost the popular vote but got “appointed” by the shenanigans in Florida. It is now interesting to read how that state is working hard to throw folks off the voter lists, including WWII vets who’ve been voting all their adult lives but now need to “prove” themselves.
As I wrote before – Liberals believe in the ballot box. Conservatives believe in legislating away your opponents.