A recent New York Times poll found 45% of Republicans believe Barack Obama was born outside the country. The mainstream media are taking this up as a challenge, to try to inform their readers and combat the increasing lunacy of the birthers. The New York Times, deserving of the name “newspaper of record,” has published a major article on The Psychology of the ‘Birther” myth.
I’m putting this article up as fast as I can, before I have even had time to read the Times piece. I’m sure, however, that we’ll have a lot to talk about.
One of the seven authors of the Times segment, David P. Redlawsk professor of political science at Rutgers University, said:
The reality is that “facts” are unlikely to mean much to those who believe in their gut that Obama is not American. Political psychologists call this “motivated reasoning.” It goes something like this: I dislike someone; I learn something positive that should make me feel better about him; instead, I dislike him as much or even more. This is clearly irrational, but our feelings about people are complicated, and we tend to hold on to them even in the face of contradictory information. This is not unique to those who dislike Obama.
At the risk of becoming tiresome, I feel I must again point out that asking if people believe the President was born in this country is a poor indicator of birtherism. I would much rather see a poll ask if the President is Constitutionally ineligible for his position, and should be removed.
That was an excellent set of articles, covering various aspects of the psychological issues behind what is going on. Defintely my highest recommendation to everyone to take the time to read through them all.
Thank you, Dr. C for posting the link to them here!
Thanks to expelliarmus for the tip.
I would like to see a poll ask if President Reagan was born in Ireland or was President Bush born in Mexico? I would image the number would in the 10 to 15 percent saying yes they were. A combination of ignorance and fear of putting down the wrong answer.
I would remind readers of my article: George Bush’s secret birthplace. A random sampling of humans revealed that most mistakenly thought he was born in Texas.
I wasn’t born in Texas, but I got here as fast as I could! Bush’s family moved to Texas when he was under three and he was as much of a Texan as many. I have deep family roots in Texas unlike GW, but I have no problem with him calling himself a Texan, I just wish he hadn’t ever been more than a failed oilman.
45% of Republicans are racist; they can’t stand Mexicans, Middle-Eastern people, Asians, etc.
But did he kill himself a bhar when he got there?
Davy Crockett killed himself a bhar when he was only three!
The news media has had their minds so twisted around they can’t see the obvious. It’s not their job to be the President’s protector. What is this the state run media of the old Soviet Union or of middle eastern states run by dictators?
It’s their job to inquire skeptically of *political* leaders. Emphasis on the political. These are politicians remember? What they should be doing as asking the President why won’t he release the original long form birth certificate to make the issue go away.
Bob
Everyone is focusing on the high number of republicans who say no, but what should really be concerning to the Presidents camp is the high number of independents who either say no or don’t know:
‘Birther’ claims force GOP leaders to take a stand.
Democrats hope the debate will fire up their liberal base in 2012.
By CHARLES BABINGTON
updated 4/22/2011 4:38:53 PM ET
“In the latest poll, about half of all independents said Obama was born in the United States. The other independents were about evenly split between those saying he is foreign-born, and those saying they don’t know.”
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/42723024/ns/politics-decision_2012/
About 50% of independents say Obama was not born in this country or don’t know if he was. Carrying the independents was how Obama was able to win the White House. This many independents who now either believe outright he wasn’t born here or don’t know one way or the other means it would be very hard to win this segment of the voters.
Bob
“What they should be doing as asking the President why won’t he release the original long form birth certificate to make the issue go away.”
Wow.
And another brilliant example of spectacular irony and a clueless, anger addled birther fool brilliantly illustrating the point. It should be funny but it’s really not.
A false sense of entitlement is a common birther trait. And birthers wonder, as they continue to spin debunked lies, refuse to acknowledge the truth even when it’s presented by their own sources or like minded allies, continually move goalposts as they dance like idiots in fear and hatred and mock the laws they pretend to respect, why rational people mock them with scorn and derision.
As if any more proof of the truth would “make the issue go away”?
That is an incredibly asinine, irrational assertion and not at all surprising.
One of the seven authors of the Times segment, David P. Redlawsk professor of political science at Rutgers University, said:
“The reality is that ‘facts’ are unlikely to mean much to those who believe in their gut that Obama is not American.
Political psychologists call this ‘motivated reasoning.’ It goes something like this: I dislike someone; I learn something positive that should make me feel better about him; instead, I dislike him as much or even more. This is clearly irrational, but our feelings about people are complicated, and we tend to hold on to them even in the face of contradictory information. This is not unique to those who dislike Obama.”
Paranoid, malicious, irrational, self absorbed, small minded, bigoted and politically motivated birther dimwits have their minds so twisted around they can’t see the obvious.
Your disingenuous concern trolling is fatuous and obnoxious.
> This is clearly irrational, but our feelings about people are complicated, and we tend to hold on to them even in the face of contradictory information. This is not unique to those who dislike Obama.
Actually, it is a very commonplace psychological phenomenon.
You can see the reverse in every mother who won’t believe her son is a murderer (“he was always such a good child who couldn’t harm a fly”).
> This many independents who now either believe outright he wasn’t born here or don’t know one way or the other means it would be very hard to win this segment of the voters.
As I’ve told you time and again, until these people actually attribute any importance to Obama’s place of birth, their belief will have no impact on how hard or easy it is to “win this segment of the voters”.
For example, you would have to subtract those who believe that he is a natural born citizen even if born abroad (because of his citizen mother). Here again, it doesn’t matter if that is a correct defition of NBC, it only matters what people believe.
Or do you think the 20+% of Americans who believe the Sun revolves around the Earth will not vote for a heliocentric candidate? Do you think the 25+% of Americans who believe Europe is a country will not vote for a candidate who proposes a treaty with Spain because they think “he’s too stupid to know that’s not even a country”? Do you think the 25+% of Americans who believe the moon landing was a hoax will not vote for a candidate who does not promise to close down NASA?
Speaking of irony. These supporters give excuses for why Obama is behaving in an irrational manner and in fact should behave in this irrational manner when in other circumstances the obvious rational thing to do would be to just release the original long form birth certificate.
About 40% of the country either believe outright that Obama was not born in this country or don’t know one way or the other. That’s not just republicans but independents and democrats too. When that large number of people don’t know if their President is even legally allowed to hold the office, you do what you can to remove that “misperception”, you release the original long form birth certificate.
Bob
There was a recent poll that said in the range of 40% of independents said they definitely will not vote for Obama, regardless of who he runs against. That is a large number for a President running for re-election to overcome.
I suspect a lot of those have skepticism about whether he is actually holding the office legally. It would be interesting to ask in other polls of how these people who have doubts will vote.
Bob
Which means?
Bob
No it isn’t! I hate to stun you but he won a, quote, ‘landslide victory’ with just 53% of ballots cast going for him.
40% of independents means that 40% of newly minted ex-Republicans who have been driven out of the part by the fact that its un-American and Guano crazy won’t vote for him. Woo, there’s a shock. People that have never voted democrat in their lives wont vote for a Democrat. You have the making of a masters in Political theory with that one.
Which means that 60% of people are certain he was born in Hawaii. Which is up from the 46% that Chris Mattews raged about a few months back. Which means that the Whitehouse strategy is working, and you are losing the information war.
Bull. I’m calling you a liar considering that the latest fox poll showed that just 40% of republicans thought that. Show us the link or shut up.
No, You do what the white house has been doing; laugh at them and debunk the myths. Make the info available to the press. You will notice that after a slow start the press has become massivly better at debunking the birther standard talking points in the past week. It does help that all birthers like you do is constantly recycle the same lines over and over and over AND OVER.
And since that has raised the number if believers by 14% in the past couple of months, I think there’s no long form needed. Not that President Obama could get one anyway.
“What they should be doing as asking the President why won’t he release the original long form birth certificate to make the issue go away.”
1. Bob, please post a copy of YOUR “Long Form BC”.
2. Also tell us specifically what piece of information are you looking for that is not on the Hawaii COLB that pertains to POTUS eligibility and the legal reason for that?
3. tell us what state or federal court does not accept Hawaii’s COLB? Be specific and provide the cases and courts.
Actually the press should also repor:t:
– on the NINETY birther cases filed and lost since 2008.
– the FACT that the thirty appeals of the decision have all been upheld.
– the FACT that the SCOTUS has had at least EIGHT opportunities to grant cert on these cases, and, that eachtime the cases have been denied without comment.
So tell us wht did the SCOTUS completely IGNORE you? Why does Justice Roberts hate you? LOL
The President was elected, the Electoral College voted and the Congress approved the results without objection. He holds the office legally. If you had film and 300 witnesses that absolutely proved he was born in Kenya he would still hold the office legally. If the House filed a bill of Impeachment, he would still hold the office legally. While a trial was going on in the Senate, he would hold the office legally. Only if a vote to convict were recorder would he stop holding the office legally.
I posted something along the same lines at my blog before I saw the NYT article. http://rcradioshow.blogspot.com/2011/04/everyone-is-missing-point-on-trump-and.html
I think the Birther beliefs among conservatives are a symptom of a larger problem that for whatever reason a large fraction of conservatives hold beliefs that have no basis in fact and they are either incapable or unwilling to engage in critical thinking.
I agree. Except upon a vote to convict, he would no longer hold the office, legally or illegally.
This is one of the “finer points” that is apparently too complex for the media to grasp.
However, polls from 2006 found over half of Democrats thought 9/11 was an inside job. Of course I never thought that or knew anybody that did — the story is too incredible to take seriously without some serious evidence. (I did see the Michael Moore film Fahrenheit 911.)
It’s always a fallacy to lump the “don’t know” response with one side or the other.
If you remove the “don’t” know from the poll, you get 67% believe Obama was born in the US among independents who have an opinion.
I commented over at the Times that I think this is more than just a movement that condensed from a fog of anti-Obama feeling. The born in Kenya story in all its essential points, just appeared on the Internet one day. it was not a rumor that grew in the telling, accreting details as it went along. Somebody created that story, and even today there are people who make up new stories intentionally and there are people who intentionally create smear material that know exactly what they are doing. This is an engineered crisis that is successful because of the reasons the Times commentators gave.
The question is who would those “don’t know”s vote for? That they don’t know suggests they have doubt. My *guess* is that a majority of them would not vote for Obama. I would like to see voting preference asked in reference to this question next time.
Bob
Point taken Doc but you have to be careful quoting 911 polls. I don’t think there is a strong correlation as to political leaning and those polls. If you look at the Zogby 2007 poll on 911 the MIHOP (made it happen on purpose) polling is around 5% each for progressive/liberal vs. conservative/very conservative. If you conclude that the libertarian category should be added to conservative the MIHOP number goes to 15% for that group. The LIHOP numbers are higher on the progressive side but I think a lot of the LIHOP group would included those like me that felt that Bush’s ineptitude and refocus of the federal law enforcement resources to issues like prostitution in New Orleans may have contributed to the poor performance of the FBI and other agencies leading up to 911.
I still stand by my assertion that more of those who believe in outright fantasy like Creationism, and manufactured lies like Death Panels and Birtherism fall on the right side of the political spectrum.
Having a mind like a hammer and seeing a nail I will (re)state the obvious: why do a % of people believe Obama is not a real American? Because he’s black. It’s that simple. Real Americans are white christian, preferably anglos. But you’ll never get anyone to fess up to it (except the KKK).
I don’t remember the numbers for the Fox poll, but in this recent poll the 45% is for republicans who believe outright that he was born in another country, and 22% is the number of republicans who don’t know. So this is 67% of republicans who either believe he was not born here or don’t know.
For the general population, 25% believe he was born in another country and 18% don’t know for a total of 43% of the people in the country who believe either Obama was not born here or don’t know. See the second poll provided on this link on page 8:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/04/21/politics/main20056282.shtml
Bob
When I run for President I will. I will also post publicly my tax returns another requirement for running for President.
Bob
Concidering Chris Mathews (You love quoting him dont you?) raged a couple of months back that ony 46% pf people in a CNN poll were certain that Obama was born in America (he added the answers for “probably was” and probably wasn’t” to the doubters) that means that the number of people certain that Obama has been born in the country has risen since Trump started mouthing off about it.
11% rise in a few months despite the media frenzy over Trump bringing your arguments to the masses. Somehow I don’t think Obama is losing any sleep here.
So wheres the birth certificate, Bob?
I totally reject that argument. I do believe that his father being Kenyan though has something to do with it, and that he lived sometime overseas in his youth.
If for example another black extreme leftist such as Jesse Jackson were President I don’t think you would see these large numbers of republicans believing he was from another country. Republicans would dislike him just as much but they wouldn’t believe he was from another country.
Bob
Jackson is from Greenville, South Carolina. If he were from Hawaii, a distant and exotic place, I could see the same stories believed.
Remember, the stories that Obama was born overseas sprang up one day fully formed — long before there was any grandmother tape, or any Kenyan politician using metaphoric language. People were birthers before there was any reason to be. It is a movement that started with no justification. Someone described it as “a movement in search of facts,” a phrase I think quite apt.
And, as the President has always said, since he was running for the Senate in Illinois, there’s that strange “un-American” sounding name: “Barack Hussein (for goodness sake) Obama.”
There are still a lot of birthers who don’t believe that the President is half-black, they are certain that “Hussein” makes him an Arab, like that other Hussein.
Anyone that still thinks Obama is a socialist after his record so far needs their head examined. Hes more conservative than Reagan was.
“Some Obama Birth Records Made Public for Years”
http://www.timesunion.com/default/article/Some-Obama-birth-records-made-public-for-years-1349562.php
I must have missed that requirement in the Constitution. Could you point me to that requirement? As it is, the President has posted his tax returns, again (http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2011/04/19/us/politics/19obama-doc.html?ref=politics).
If you anyone here to take you seriously, you have to stop making up requirements.
Don’t you understand?? He’s hiding it by releasing it1 HE’S HIDING EVERYTHING IN PLAIN SIGHT! It makes me really suspicious.
Thanks for that. Atty. Gen. spokesman Joshua Wisch repeats the false information here:
Bob
> I do believe that his father being Kenyan though has something to do with it, and that he lived sometime overseas in his youth.
I think the degree of “foreignness” is simply enough for the right-wing extremists. Kenya as his father’s country, Hawaii as his place of birth, Indonesia as the place where he spent part of his childhood – that adds up to being “un-American enough” for a certain part of the population.
However I am still not convinced the same movement would not have existed if the first black president had been Jesse Jackson or Alan Keyes. It may have differed in the details, but the general direction would have been there. At least the attempts to paint him as a “radical” of some sort (or someone who “hates whitey”), or the reverse-racism notion of “he can do whatever he wants because if he were impeached, the blacks would start a civil war”. The people who are “birthers” now would simply have found something else to build there “everyone is protecting the criminal president” conspiracy theory on. The one thing I will never underestimate about the wingnuts is the ability to create a conspiracy theory out of whole cloth.
> repeats the false information here
> “but original records of live birth are never released, he said”
What false information? Are you saying Hawaii would (have to) release the original (!) birth certificate to Obama? Like hell they would. States never give out the originals to anyone. Only certified copies.
It seems that 45% of Republicans these days are really amazing.
They believed that Iraq had nuclear weapons.
They believed that Iraq had biological weapons.
The believed that Iraq had chemical weapons.
They believed in mobile trailers with weapons of mass destruction.
They believed that Niger sought to sell yellowcake.
They believed in source “Curveball,” who recently confessed that he had been lying all along.
They believed in the natural born citizenship of John McCain, even though he was not born in the United States, and never showed them his birth certificate.
They believed all of that, on the basis of minimal evidence.
But when it comes to Obama, the 45% have doubts.
Even though Obama HAS shown his birth certificate.
They have doubts in the face of overwhelming evidence, including the official certification, the repeated statements of Republican state officials, contemporary newspaper announcements, and the proven forgeries offered to support birth elsewhere.
Amazing. They must really hate Obama.
Oops, that’s right.
They do hate Obama.
That’s the reason.
> Also tell us specifically what piece of information are you looking for that is not on the Hawaii COLB that pertains to POTUS eligibility and the legal reason for that?
The key point to understanding the birfers’ mindset is this:
They don’t *want* to see the BC. They simply want to harp on about the alleged *absence* of the BC to build their smear campaign on.
That’s also why they keep moving goalposts. As long as they can point to some records that are not released, they can keep their meme of “those records must contain something worth hiding” meme. And that’s why no release of anything will make the issue “go away”. They are not interested in things proving them right (or wrong). They are only interested in the absence of things proving them wrong.
If Obama released any “long form BC” plus kindergarten records plus baptism records, they would insist his college records or his client list contains something “worth hiding”.
If he released everything the birfers demand right now, they’d come up with more things they’d like released so they can keep the “he’s hiding *something*” meme alive.
And that’s why no amount of proof ever is enough. Because it was never about proving anything to anyone. It was always about building a smear campaign out of the alleged absence of allegedly required “proof”.
It’s the same as “prove you are not beating your wife” or “prove you do not like to drown little kittens in your spare time”.
Yes, I agree certified copies. The statement of Joshua Wisch makes it sound like Obama couldn’t even get those.
Bob
Another black extreme leftist? Again you just make things up. Thus far Obama has shown himself to be nothing more than another centrist democrat who gives in too much to the right instead of doing stuff for the left. All I’ve seen out of Obama is capitulation to the republicans instead of real compromise and bargaining. If he was interested in being a “leftist” he would have pitched single payer and run with that from the getgo and compromised from there. He would have called for much stronger financial regulations, he would have stopped the home foreclosures, done everything he could to stop the CEO bonuses on top of the bailout they received. The fact is he’s a centrist.
Yes, I was making the point that running for President requires you to publicly release information you wouldn’t normally release. For most people publicly releasing your tax returns would be worse than releasing your original birth certificate. Obama has no problem with the first, but won’t do the second.
Bob
Doc do you have links to any of those polls. I’ve never seen one with that question specifically asked. I’ve seen the poll where they believe Bush knew about 9/11 which is a totally different question from if he was in on it
Presidents since Nixon have released their tax returns. Obama is the only one to release his birth certificate.
I have to say phony, phony, phony
Bob,
You are so desperate in your hatred of Obama to look for any kernal of info that you can cherry pick and hold up, it is pathetic.
Notice that the only reference to those self-described “independents” in that 50% combines the “I don’t know” category with those with doubts and doesn’t break them out?
That makes for a pretty useless statistic. “I don’t know” answers are extremely meaningless minefields that any side has a danger into reading too much into. The article could have done a better job of splitting those two out and linking to the poll itself. Any online article that refers to a poll should link to its underlying numbers (I fault the article not you on this) so we can see how the poll was actually conducted, how questions were asked and what the actual full breakdown of responses were.
Considering that a lot of Tea Party folks (who seemingly also always vote GOP) have been calling themselves “independent” over the past few years…it is really hard to tell what that self-description means either.
But hey, you want to play the quote mining and cherry-picking game on this article to make a point here, I can do that too.
So, from your same article, back at you:
Now let’s also look at the articles concluding paragraph too, shall we? After all, a concluding paragraph is where the main point is resummarized:
So Bob, using this particular article as your argument that the crazy birther issue is somehow a “winning” issue against Obama. Chalk that up as another FAIL that blew up in your face…
That describes Robert Clark in a nutshell.
Agreed.
I think most of us are fairly certain that there is a great deal of overlap between the membership of those who hold each of these crazy and utterly faith-based beliefs.
There is a lot of good scholarship that can be done for Statistical Analysis to closely examine what ideas certain people hold and do all the Venn Diagrams of the different ways they self-identify (politics, religion, race, culture, geography, education, income, occupation, etc.)
I’ve seen enough to feel comfortable drawing some overall generalizations on the overlaps and modeling some basic predictions, but I’d love to see hard core data to really see just how extensive and persuasive this is amongst certain core crazy beliefs…
I challenge that meme as a perception fallacy that has been out there for too long. Mostly as a result of a few poorly worded poll questions that did not distinguish between those that ARE NOT AT ALL TRUTHERS (those thatmerely indicated they viewed GWB’s administration as INCOMPETENT for not doing anything about the NIE / DPS reports in Aug 2001 that indicated an attack from Al-Queda was immenent) and those that are ACTUAL 9/11 TRUTHERS – who hold some sort of view that the US was actually INVOLVED in the attack to some extent.
There is a big difference there. The actual 9/11 Truther nuts seem to be few and far between and always were. Hey, we all lived through those years and I’m a fairly social indivudual and I used to have a lot more free time to get around and have such discussions back in those days. I’ve had a lot of trouble ever finding that many actual 9/11 Truthers … and MOST of the ones I did find seemed to really be part of the typical anti-government / conspiracy crowd that we seem to see over and over and over again on just about ALL of these different crazy conspiracies.
Details of the poll here:
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-goldberg15may15,0,3962183.column?coll=la-opinion-center
You are now making weak speculations of voting behavior based on trying to merely “guess” at what an “I don’t know answer” means, without anything to support that conclusion.
Unless a poll carefully dives into such things and asks a proper follow-up voting clarification or for further details of what “I don’t know” means…you can’t draw ANY reasoanble conclusions or patterns from this group.
All you are doing is desperately pulling conclusions out of thin air because your ODS has so obsessed you, that you have to desperately make up your own pretend reality.
Seek help, Bob. Stop grasping at meaningless straws and focus on what you can do to improve your own daily life. When 2012 rolls around, you are free to cast your vote for whomever you wish at that moment (or to not vote at all if you chose). You have no control over what the rest of the voting population will chose to do or not do and you need to just accept that. Election results at all levels are often going to be different than what you desired… that is just simple reality. When that happens, all you can do is console yourself knowing that in a few more years, another election is around the corner.
There is a big problem with what LIHOP actually refers to and how some people misuse the term.
Let’s look at these actual definitions. Wikipedia is actually fairly good on this account:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LIHOP
Merely being aware of the NIE / PDB info from August 2008 and feeling that the government didn’t do enough to take this threat seriously in advance is NOT a conspiracy theory at all. It is merely a judgement of looking back at actual FACTS and concluding some form of INCOMPETENCE.
That is a far cry from what LIHOP is – which is an actual accusation of DELIBERATE INTENT to not act on the data.
There is a big difference between the two. One is mere disappointment, the other is an accusatory conspiracy theory. Only the 2nd category could be called part of “9/11 Trutherism”
Those two are improperly lumped together all the time and should not be.
LOL! Yeah, right. Let us know when that actually happens. You are all talk and no action.
Let’s look at the actual reference you are giving, shall we?
Let’s also consider the title of this poll (2012 Republican Presidential Race) and the focus of the rest of the questions on it and how most of the questions are directed and what they distinguish as GOP constiuencies and Tea Party constituencies separately.
Given the nature of the poll and primary focus on those that would vote in the GOP Primary, it is hard to make too much out of who those 25% really are of the “overall” total that spent this much time answering a poll primarily focused on GOP 2012 candidates before ever getting to this question.
I notice how you conveniently focus on the 25% of “ALL” that say NO instead of the 57% of “ALL” that say YES, he was born here.
Again, it just goes to show your desperation to cherry-pick poll results and grasp at conclusions that cannot be made.
Wake me up when they start with a poll that first properly filters and identifes a sufficient sample of people that DID vote for Obama in 2008 and THEN asks them questions about their views on where Obama was born.
Until then, you are likely dealing with results that are nothing but an echo-chamber of people that never voted for Obama in the first place… in other words, nothing that meaningfully changes the 2012 voting dynamics…
Indeed. The post 9/11 Muslim paranoia that still afflicts America has led a number of otherwise reasonable people to just have a gut-reaction of fear/hate of anything sounding in the least bit “Muslim”.
I think this “Muslim” fear is an even bigger part of the bigotry bias going on here than even issues of his race. Look at how many people are completely adamant in denying him his Christianity and insist on viewing him as a Muslim, despite all evidence to the contrary.
Information isn’t false just because you don’t like the truth. Something doesn’t all of a sudden become “false” just because you repeat the word false over and over again.
The AG repeats the info because it is TRUE.
The only one here who is wrong, lying and in constant denial is YOU.
AGREED.
Well said!
AGREED! Well put.
This is ALL Birtherism tactics amountsto in a nutsell.
This is exactly the type of TROLLing that Robert Clark is engaging in on here and why – he doesn’t want the truth – he only wants to sow smears and doubts. He is an intentional deceiver with petty motivations and absolutely no personal integrity.
NO. Only because you continue to misinterpret.
Wisch is very CLEAR what the CERTIFIED COPY IS that you get: THE COLB. That *IS* explictly the ONLY *certified copy* of your birth records that they provide.
AGREED. Although I’d say he’s definitely center-left.
Further, I’d point out that many of his views and policies that he campaigned on were always center-left. On those areas where his campaigning and administrative decisions differ, he has consistently moved to the right of his previous positions.
That doesn’t mean those decisions are on the solid “right” of the spectrum, but just that they are “right” of where his prior pre-governing positions were. Some of those could still be considered slightly “left of center” or “center” or even “center right”…depending on where the actual reasonable center of the spectrum exists anymore in the US…
LIAR. He released both – in the only realistic and applicable terms that have meaning.
He HAS released his official HI BC – that is what the 2007 COLB was and is.
You have repeatedly been shown that you can’t release a HI “original birth certificate”, so that is a misleading and disingenuous term to use any more.
He’s released a certified state-issued copy of his BC. ALL of that document’s info comes from the original state records. That is ALL that can be done. End of story.
And that very example shows the very problem both I and Reality Check have been pointing out.
First of all, you cite a column from a well-known Conservative OPINION columnist. So his interpretation of poll results (a poll conducted by Rassumsen BTW – also known to have a strong conservative bias) contains his usual biased slant.
Let’s get to some of the things he reports in that article:
Doc I’m sorry but do you have the original poll? I don’t trust doughy pantload Jonah Goldberg. Remember this is the nutjob who tried to claim the Nazis were leftists.
See this is the problem I’m talking about Goldberg starts out with the poll question and results: “Democrats in America are evenly divided on the question of whether George W. Bush knew about the 9/11 terrorist attacks in advance. Thirty-five percent of Democrats believe he did know, 39% say he did not know and 26% are not sure.”
Okay the question simply asks if Bush knew about the 9/11 attacks in advance. That’s a far cry from saying democrats claimed it was an inside job. The fact is he did know. He was warned repeatedly about the possibility of the attacks including in the august pdb. Also Condi told her friend willy brown not to fly and many administration officials started taking private planes instead of public airlines.
I chalk it up to gross incompetence but you see this line Goldberg uses: “So, 1 in 3 Democrats believe that Bush was in on it somehow, and a majority of Democrats either believe that Bush knew about the attacks in advance or can’t quite make up their minds.”
1 in 3 democrats believe that Bush was in on it somehow? That’s not what the poll says.
Yeah, he’s so hung up against releasing his birth certificate that he did it 3 years ago, before he was even President!
You keep bringing up the independents who are unsure of Obama’s birthplace. Did you ever stop to consider they’re unsure because they don’t give it much though, and that because the birther noise is out there, it’s tainting their views? Did you stop to consider that their doubts are based on honest ignorance, rather than willful stupidity like the Birthers? And did you consider that in light of this, all they need is a little clarification, and the Certificate of Live Birth will do?
Quit it with this “he should show his birth certificate” bullshit. He did that 3 years ago, and if a state certified official birth certificate which has more corroborating evidence behind its authenticity than anything Donald Trump released, and is more than any other president has provided, if that is not enough for you, then nothing will be.
Funny, as it was the Democrat party that has a history of racism. Fought the civil war over it. Fought the voting rights act. Jim Crow laws etc…all attributed to the Democrat Party. LBJ, however, found that he could use government money to buy blacks into the Democrat machine. By the way, MLK was, at one time, a registered republican as many backs in the early and mid-1900’s were. My personal observations are the most Vietnamess Americans are Republican, because they remember what the Democrats did in Vietnam. They started the war, and when it was actullay won, they abandoned South Vietnam.
Funny how Obama hated waterboarding, but has no problem executing suspected terrorirst with drones form 10,000 feet….LOL
As I said before the Atty. Gen. himself told the governor the original long form could be released with the persons consent. I think the Atty. Gen. himself knows more about the law than spokesman.
Bob
Wow…talk about someone who has to be stuck in the distant past in order to try to make a point…and failing because of it.
Wake up there you simple-minded person – the national parties and their composition change drastically over time.
Today’s GOP has very little in common with the party of Lincoln…nor even the party of Ike. Heck, it barely even resembles the party during Reagan’s time for crying out loud!
Post 1960’s Civil Rights actions, most Dixiecrats eventually migrated to the GOP.
If you are wasting time talking about hippies and Viet Nam…those issues are many decades in the past too.
Wake up and deal with the environment of 2011. That is all that matters.
??? Just where did he say that?
Show a link of an actual interview & statement that says what you are claiming. And not some weird nonsense from some birther site. Give me an AP report or some local or otherwise potentially credible source.
As described you don’t believe that President Bush ‘Let It Happen On PURPOSE‘ – you think that he let it happen because of incompetence (as do I). MIHOP and LIHOP are very specific and well-defined terms (partially in order to prevent the kind of lie you just tried to tell). We can argue as to how well the poll captured the size of those groups, but the pollsters intent is clear (if they used those terms).
Reality Check – I apologize. I thought your comment was from Robert Clark (inattention on my part) and attributed his prior bad history to your comment and interpreted it as another of his propaganda efforts (which, upon re-reading it clearly isn’t). I do think that if pollsters are using the terms ‘MIHOP’ and ‘LIHOP’ (assuming that they are constructing unbiased polls) then they are not confusing people who ‘LIHDTI’ (Let It Happen Due To Incompetence). Sorry for the misunderstanding.
It will be very telling if we see a significant movement in these numbers that correlates with Trump’s embrace of the birthers – I expect that the increased media attention will result in more people believing that he is eligible.
Neil Abercrombie, Hawaii governor drops mission to dispel birthers, prove Obama was born in state.
BY ALIYAH SHAHID
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER
Saturday, January 22, 2011
“State Attorney General David Louie told the governor that it’s against state law to release private documents, including an individual’s birth documentation without the person’s consent.”
http://articles.nydailynews.com/2011-01-22/news/27096375_1_gynecological-hospital-hawaii-governor-president-obama
This was said in the context of the governor wanting to release Obama’s original long form birth certificate. In this context, he is saying it could be released if Obama gave consent.
Bob
You FAIL again Bob! You are utterly making up the “original long form birth certificate” portion out of whole cloth. Abercrombie NEVER mentions such here in the article you provived, NOR did he ever mention that in ANY other interview. You are 100% WRONG as usual.
Was Dr. Martin Luther King a registered Republican?
False.
http://www.politifact.com/texas/statements/2011/jan/17/raging-elephants/houston-group-says-martin-luther-king-jr-was-repub/
And not according to [Martin Luther King III], who’s liberal partisan politics are reflected in his statement released through the King Center published in an AP article in July 2008 at http://www.ajc.com/metro/content/printedition/2008/07/05/kingrepublicans.html, Martin Luther King III said, “It is disingenuous to imply that my father was a Republican. He never endorsed any presidential candidate, and there is certainly no evidence that he ever even voted for a Republican. It is even more outrageous to suggest that he would support the Republican Party of today, which has spent so much time and effort trying to suppress African-American votes in Florida and many other states.”
And this Washington Post article in 2006 says King voted for Lyndon Johnson in 1964. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/10/18/AR2006101801754.html
In “The Autobiography of Martin Luther King, Jr.,” which was published after King’s death from his written material and records, King called the 1964 Republican national convention that nominated Goldwater a “frenzied wedding … of the KKK and the radical right.”
His niece once stated he was with no evidence to back up her opinion.
“Funny how Obama hated waterboarding, but has no problem executing suspected terrorirst with drones form 10,000 feet….LOL”
That’s funny? Here’s a person that should be monitored by local law enforcement.
Check to see how many of this troll’s neighbor’s pets have been mutilated and tortured.
It is also funny how President Bush had no problem with waterboarding but didn’t care much for taking out terroists with predator drones.
No, that would be jumping to a conclusion (or engaging in wishful thinking). It’s like the poll where 3% of respondents said they didn’t know whether Hawaii was a state. It’s not that they have doubts that Hawaii is a state–they just don’t know because they are uninformed. If they cared, they could find out — the same with where Barack Obama was born — just open the Encyclopedia, for example the Britannica that says “Barack Obama, in full Barack Hussein Obama II (born Aug. 4, 1961, Honolulu, Hawaii, U.S.).”
http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/973560/Barack-Obama
That’s true. In Lincoln’s day Republicans were liberals, representing the northern urban voters; some were called the “Radical Republicans” for their unyielding opposition to Slavery. The Democrats, largely Southern, took the part of the slaveholders and emphasized states rights.
Today, of course, the labels are reversed. It is the Democrats who are liberal and represent northern urban voters and most of the racial minority voters. Republicans are conservatives, oppose a strong federal government, are disproportionately southern and appeal to anti-immigrant feelings and promote racial stereotypes.
And if you go back far enough, you find that the Republicans (aka Democrat Republicans) were conservatives again, opposing the federalists like Washington. It keeps switching back and forth.
The change came in the 60’s when Lyndon Johnson pushed through the civil rights act. When I was a young kid (born in the 50’s), southern states were solid Democrat. The term “yellow dog” Democrat was used to refer to Southerners who always voted straight party line– as it was said that “they would vote for a yellow dog before they would vote for any Republican”.
In 1948 the southern democrats formed their own party – the “States Rights” party, called the Dixiecrats — in protest of Truman’s ending racial segregation in the military, and as a response to the Democratic party adopting a civil rights platform at their convention. Their candidate, Strom Thurman, carried 4 southern states in the general election, but the party was later disbanded.
In 1964, when LBJ succeeded in breaking a Senate filibuster and forcing the passage of the Civil Rights act, he is reported to have said, ” “We have lost the South for a generation”.”
The GOP recognized the opportunity before them and adopted the “Southern Strategy” by exploiting the disenchantment with the Democratic party, and emphasizing a “states rights” platform from Nixon’s candidacy onward.
So you can see that the birther / tea party movement is essentially this same faction trying to exert political influence — and of course the GOP is at a crossroads. The problem for them is that with changing US demographics, the GOP will lose more vote than it will gain if they pander to the racist elements of their party.
@ G — I’ve been meaning to congratulate you on all your thoughtful, succinct & well organized posts.
It’s true that Obama is the piñata of racists/bigots/xenophobes: black, african and muslim-sounding names, foreign father, race-traitor/hippie mother, lefty campaign rhetoric (sadly unfulfilled for the most part but that’s another discussion), connections with 1960s radical left intellectual and kill-whitey pastor, loves Yurpeans, alleged frequentation of gay bath houses (totally unfounded but who cares), general uppity behavior… My oh my!
Yes it is no surprise that the already weakened sanity fuse in the bithers’ tiny reptilian brains goes ka-booiee and melts away when they see Obama.
Let me clarify my stance on Bush and 911. I am not a LIHOP. I was just saying that depending on the wording of a specific poll question I might be placed in that category because I believe his incompetence was a factor. Bush may have been misguided and not up to the job but I never questioned his patriotism nor love for his country.
If I wrote that sentence, I’d change it to say that “It is the Democratic supporters who are liberal” and “Republican supporters are conservatives.” If Democratic politicians were truly liberal and Republican politicians truly conservative, there wouldn’t be so much dissatisfaction among each party’s base. Bush wouldn’t have been as profligate with the budget. Obama would be beloved by liberals, and there’d be no Obama Republicans. Liberals aren’t happy with Obama.
A lot of radical Republicans were very unhappy with Lincoln too.
Actually, I think there are some parallels between Lincoln and Obama, but that’s a whole other topic. Back then the conservative Democrats had Lincoln Derangement Syndrome. You can have fun with some old newspaper passages when you exchange the words “southerner” with “birther” and “abolitionist” with “socialist.”
All I said was he was registeded republican. Since the ballot is secret, at least as long as card check has not been past, we have no idea who he voted for. And since MLK is dead we have no idea how he would view the current political parites. Those that demonise wage earners to support the enslaved? I think not.
Wasn’t Sen Byrd (D) in the KKK, Al Gore Senior was of the old south, right? How about George Wallace? Even Obama has showed his racist and sexist tendancies.
Oh, that’s right if you oppose Obama then you must be racist….LOL
I know what you said, and I know what you haven’t given any evidence for.
Before you dig yourself too deeply into a hole claiming Martin Luther King, Jr. was a registered Republican, let me remind you that Georgia doesn’t register voters by political party.
You’re welcome, Lupin. Much appreciated! I very much always look forward to your posts and insights as well!
Happy Easter
Yes. Those questions have already been answered though, as to how and why the parties have changed over time. Once again, your examples are all dredged up from the distant past and completely disconnected from the world today.
Dr GoreBullWarming: Even Obama has showed his racist and sexist tendancies.
Not that I’m aware of. Sounds like you are just making up slanderous smears or deliberately twisting statements and contexts to make things out to be other than they are.
Another false straw-man argument.
Not all who oppose Obama are racists. Many people have lots of legitimate reasons for opposing him.
However, there are sadly too many examples that there is definitely an element of racism at play amongst various momements opposed to Obama. To deny that these racist elements exist is ridiculous.
Such things do tend to taint entire movements by association, but it would definitely be wrong to say all within certain movements are movtiated by racism – just as it would be equally wrong to pretend that there isn’t a significant amount of racism mixed in there.
Reminds me of the old saw – not all Republicans are racists, but all racists are Republicans…
This is not literally true, of course, but it does express a certain amount of truth, like any aphorism.
There are definitely some racists who consider themselves to be Democrats, Libertarians, Constitutionalists, independents, etc.
I suspect those factors are definitely a component of those smaller percentages showing “birther” beliefs among those consituencies. Most PUMAs “claim” that they were Democrats…at least at the time. Quite a few of them definitely had racist motives. That was quite evident in quite a few of the comments that would be made on various PUMA blogs back in the day.
However, I would have to sadly agree that it seems clear that many racists have migrated to the GOP over the past several decades and there is a much higher acceptance for a whole host of xenophobic and bigoted beliefs in the GOP today. Outside of actual white supremecist minority parties, the modern GOP clearly has the highest visible proportion of such attitudes.
The perfect example of the PUMA and their inherent disgusting biase is Squeeky Fromm aka Jennifer4Hillary.
To be fair, Squeeky seemed to primarily have issues, to say the least, with men.
Absolutely, but I think we agree that if there’s a mainstream party which has become a haven for racism (or at least turns a blind eye to it), it’s the GOP.
It was Martin Luther King SENIOR who was a Republican. As with lots of middle class blacks in the South in the 1940s, the Republican Party offered more hope in fighting racism than the southern Dixiecrats of the Democratic Party. Martin Luther King JUNIOR was not a Republican and tried to remain non-partisan.
In the 112th Congress, there are 40 African-American Democrats plus 2 non-voting black delegates from the District of Columbia and the Virgin Islands and there is 2 African-American Republicans.
Correction, there are 2 African-American Republicans in the 112th Congress, I forgot Representative Scott from South Carolina.
If 45% of Democrats were 9/11 Truthers back when Bush was up for reelection in 2004, I would have been ashamed to be a Democrat.
I guess Republicans have no shame and don’t care what kinds of outright lies Republicans and conservatives tell about the opposition. Sad, pathetic, and unAmerican
On conservative sites like FreeRepublic, racism is common and barely restrained.
Zing!
Alas no, Jennifer4Hillary is now posting at both the Pest and Fail and Dr K(H)ates, sad to see but plainly finding her level.
She’s probably just doing that to try to steer people to her crappy website.
She tends to pop up from time to time on all sorts of different sites – usually in the comment thread on some news story that references the Birther nonsense or presents some other anti-Obama diatribe.
She must spend a really good portion of her time just trolling for articles to comment on. And yes, it seems she often throws in statements trying to steer the reader to her site.
That saddest (and totally not surprising) aspect of all this is that like all disingenuous Trolls, she goes to these new sites and basically makes the same statements and Concern Troll arguments she tried here early on and was soundly debunked or thrashed on. She’s even still putting forth her same lame “KISS” theory analogy that gets ripped apart nearly every time she’s tried to use it.
In other words, the typical behavior of hard-core Birther propagandist con artists….
Why focus on Republicans and their beliefs?
For Obama, more important segments of voters are Independants and Democrats.
” In the latest poll, about half of all independents said Obama was born in the United States. The other independents were about evenly split between those saying he is foreign-born and those saying they don’t know.
Ten percent of Democrats said Obama was born overseas, and 9 percent were unsure.”
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_obama_birthplace
10% of Democrats think Obama was born abroad.
25% of Independents think Obama was born abroad.
Now you know why Abercrombie wanted to end the birther issue once and for all – it is a political liability for Obama’s re-election campaign.
There was similar number in the general election in 2008. Obama won by a landslide.
Recent polls show the numbers who believe in your stupid theory going down.
Obama not worried at all.
Are you one of those lunatic bigots who constantly giggles uncontrollably? Do you see pretty colors too?
BTW, your knowledge and comprehension of U.S. history is laughable and pathetic.
How many of the respondents to these surveys think Hawaii is a foreign country? Or for that matter, think “abroad” means “outside the continental US”?
This issue is a liability for the GOP. Trump has wrecked Romney, the only one who could beat Obama. All the others are unelectable.
Romney should find a soap opera cast. He is not going to be president.
SEF said “think “abroad” means “outside the continental US”?”
strange, I thought it meant a nice looking girl!
OK, questions for you (or anyone else).
1. If Obama were to release a long form birth certificate today and that certificate had no surprises on it, how do you think those numbers would change a month from now?
2. If Obama were to release a long form birth certificate today and that certificate had no surprises on it, do you think that would insure Obama’s re-election?
3. Do you think an unremarkable long form birth certificate released in October of 2012 (an “October surprise”) would be more or less effective in persuading folks to vote for Obama in November than a certificate released today?
Dr GoreBullWarming, a little history lesson for you. First, it is the Democratic party, not the Democrat party; always has been. The inability to acknowledge someone’s or some entity’s true name says something about you.
Second, you employed a little innuendo regarding the senior Gore. You betrayed your lack of real knowledge about him when you called him Al. Back in the day Gore Sr. was involved in politics NO ONE EVER called him Al. He was always Albert. And you said he was of the Old South. There’s nothing wrong per se with being of the Old South. But since you used the term in a paragraph slamming Democrats, one might rightfully assume you meant something negative, and obviously that would have been about his civil rights record.
Fact: Gore Sr. had the second-best civil rights voting record of any U.S. senator representing a former Confederate state during the zenith of the civil rights movement of the late ’50s and the ’60s. Texan Ralph Yarborough had the best, voting for all five landmark civil rights bills that became law between 1957 and 1968. Gore voted for all but one — true, this was the big kahuna, the Civil Rights Act of 1964. I’m sure he voted no on that one out of political expediency, having calculated (correctly, I believe) that he could not face the heat for backing that momentous law. He won by a 53-47 percent margin, so it’s not hard to imagine more than 3 of those 53 percentage points deserting him. You can criticize all you want his decision not to fall on his sword.
Now as to Martin Luther King Jr.: Taylor Branch in his monumental trilogy on the King years wrote that King voted for Eisenhower in 1956. No surprise there; MLK Sr. was a lifelong Republican and children usually — but by no means always — adopt their parents’ political leanings. Branch doesn’t say, and I haven’t seen or heard elsewhere how MLK Jr. voted in 1952, if he voted at all. I believe he was a Ph.D student in Boston at the time.
In 1960, MLK could not vote, as that was the year he moved from Alabama to Georgia, and in those days the waiting period to establish voting residency was relatively long, six months and sometimes a year in some instances. Don’t know about Georgia.
BUT MLK played an indispensable role in JFK’s election all the same. Check with a university political science or history prof if you don’t know that story.
In 1964, MLK, for all his protestations of nonpartisanship, made no secret of his support for LBJ.
In 1968, MLK was assassinated a half year before the general election.
You’re welcome
Numbers drop to 8% Democratic
15% Independent
No it wouldn’t insure it, but it would improve his chances of re-election because the Republicans who pushed the birther issue will look like idiots or smear merchants.
More effective. People don’t make up their minds about who to vote for until just before the election. I voted for Obama, and I don’t know if I’m going to vote for him in 2012. Too many unknown variables at this point. I will say, though, this birther issue pushes me toward voting for Obama. It makes the Republican party look like they’re filled with character assassins and paranoid people who’ve never been out in the real world.
Birthers should keep this in mind. Lincoln was called a “usurper” and a “dictator” in his lifetime. He was hated by people in both the north and the south for suspending the writ of habeas corpus and declaring a war without Congress. Today, he’s one of our most beloved presidents. When Booth killed him, he thought he’d be a hero for destroying the tyrant. Instead, the entire country (well most of it anyway) mourned for Lincoln because he was assassinated. Birthers are assassinating Obama’s character and that of his deceased mother, and that will create sympathy, rather than antipathy, towards Obama.
I am going to vote for Obama. I disagree with him about Afghanistan. It’s simply Karzai instead of Diem. Both had brothers up to their ears in corruption. I believe Karzai will be assassinated, and it’s going to end the same way. That’s another blog.
I vote Democratic, because a GOP vote is a vote to theocratize the country. Voting GOP is a vote to weaken the 1st Amendment.
Huck: “I believe it’s a lot easier to change the Constitution than it would be to change the word of the living God. And that’s what we need to do is amend the Constitution so it’s in God’s standards”
http://newyorkleftist.blogspot.com/2010/11/few-words-from-mike-huckabee.html
We are still early in 2011. Most of the 2012 campaign action is still over a year away. The “Birther” issue for the mere sake of being out there and infecting so much of the GOP is likely to continue to draw coverage – but I would argue that as things get closer or the issue becomes more focused, you will merely see more of what has already happened with Trump making it an active issue – as a direct result of Trump bringing it up, we’ve had more serious coverage of the facts and debunking of the Birther nonsense than ever before.
I think this trend would just continue. Any who pay attention will be continuously exposed to enough of the fact checking debunking this nonsense. It will become clearer and clearer to any who are rational but curious that only the COLB matters. Those that refuse to be satisfied by the body of evidence already out there are so predisposed against him that this isn’t a pool of people that would be voting for him anyways.
There are real serious and big issues out there for people to base their votes on. Anyone who is still claiming they are worried about the “long form” still by fall of 2012 is not going to suddenly be open to voting for Obama if he showed it.
The GOP already looks like idiots and smear merchants on this and a whole host of other issues. I really don’t buy the argument that Obama doing anything else on the “birther issue” will “improve” his changes of re-election. If anything, for him to waste time on this issue would be viewed more as a sign of unnecessary pandering and weakness.
It either is an issue for someone or it isn’t. If it is…that is likely because that person is latching onto it as emotional justification for other areas of anger/disappointment in him. There may be some small pool of sincerely “confused” voters at this point…but let’s see what remains by fall of 2012.
If it could have any serious affect to benefit him, as you’ve even agreed, it would make better sense to address such in fall of 2012, when that effect could be used to his advantage.
It is a very reasonable and fair position for you and others to not know for sure who you are going to vote for until an actual election is at hand. As you aptly put it, there are always too many unknown variables that come into play, especially the further out people are.
As with all elections, it will come down in the end more to what is going on in the world (economy, wars, other “big issues”), the perception of how they are being handled and the perception of whether or not any of the competition could seriously and convincingly handle things better than the person currently doing the job.
At this stage of the game, the entire potential GOP field is embarassingly weak with no credible serious competitor amongst them. We’ll just have to see what the picture looks like 17 months from now… but for now, such dynamics definitely favor Obama.
That is why from a polticial perspective, it makes much more sense for Obama to stay away from the issue as much as possible and let the GOP expose themselves and tarnish themselves on the matter. If there is any legitimate concern that remains that he needs to address on this, he can deal with that much closer to the actual election time.
His BC was available at his Chicago HQ. Only Factcheck went.
Here’s my prediction: if Trump makes enough noise, I think the DOH will hold a presser, and have documents for reporters to inspect. I further predict, WND will not send Kinsolving, nor anyone.
I agree with your line of thought on this. I still hold the position that no matter how much Trump is squawking on this in April of 2011 that it makes no good political sense for Obama to pay attention to it at this stage of things and there are lots of advantages to holding back and letting his opponents self-destruct and hoist themselves on their own petard in the meantime. Especially when there are positive signs that the media is finally doing some of its job in covering and explaining the facts of the issue as a response to louder squawking. No, there is no good sense for Obama to get into the middle of this at this point, other than to continue to handle it as he has by cracking jokes from time to time.
If there are still serious squawkings by mid-summer/fall of 2012, then his campaign can reassess if there is any real value to addressing these issues more directly and then look at what they might still need to do to dispell such nonsense.
Actually, I believe now that other major news organizations also viewed the certificate, but just didn’t put out articles or photos. I believe that based on statements that have appeared in articles they have written stating as much — that the birth certificate was viewed by their reps — and I think that definitely includes CNN and Fox. I just think that it was a non-story at the time, so not reported. (That something is what it purports to be is not “news”)
It’s the same 45% that believes that earth is flat.
Wait, it’s not?! Uh, oh.