Editorial: Now birthers say it might be fake

As President Barack Obama continued hurting this country by compounding the progressive economic catastrophes of George W. Bush, serious advocates of smaller government became fed up with the birther movement of conspiracy nuts who believed Obama was a foreigner. These people are to the right what 9-11 conspiracy nuts are to the left.

Obama has enjoyed an ongoing distraction that's been more valuable than anything he or his advisers could have contrived. A chunk of his most-impassioned opponents have been busying themselves trying to find out where he was born. The birther conspiracy theorists have said Obama is a foreigner who could not reveal a valid American birth certificate.

But Obama has had what they want, and he revealed it only when it served his interests. Obama has made public the long-form birth certificate the birthers were sure didn't exist.

Obama would have been insane to diffuse the black helicopter crowd. It's been a perfect political chaff, drawing the enemy's rage to the wrong target while Obama has his way with policy. Talk show hosts and more than a few newspaper columnists, including some whose work has appeared in The Lima News, who could legitimately challenge Obama's policies, instead have wasted months expressing exasperation at Obama's refusal to further document his birth.

Obama released his long-form birth certificate with the explanation that it has kept the eyes of his opponents off the ball, providing “sideshows and carnival barkers” to distract from important fiscal policy matters. Have any of the birthers noticed, for example, a national debt of more than $14 trillion?

Apparently not. Just type “Obama birth certificate” in your Internet search engine to get a feel for what the flakes are saying about Obama's long-form birth certificate being a — big surprise — a fake. One of our favorites comes from a talk show host in Colorado by the name of Peter Boyles.

According to our sister paper in Colorado Springs, Boyles promised listeners: “This isn't over.” He desperately reminded his audience that John Mark Carr was presented to the public as the killer of JonBenet Ramsey, and wound up as merely a wannabe, pretend killer. The implication is that Obama's long-form certificate is not real. He questioned why Obama's race appears as “African,” explaining that “African” isn't a race. Let's see… Was that the work of a minimum wage clerk on the day of Obama's birth? Or is it a clumsy mistake by one of the growing army of high-level conspirators who invested in putting a foreigner in the White House? Conspiracy nuts will believe the latter, and you heard it here first.

Boyles, who typifies all of the birther conspiracy nuts, demanded to know why he hasn't seen Obama's marriage license, various school records and all sorts of other personal documentation that have nothing to do with the president's leadership of the country.

The birthers won't figure this out for themselves, so we're going to tell them something useful: Obama released the birth certificate now because Donald Trump joined the birther circus this month and expressed his interest in running for president. Trump sent investigators to Hawaii in an effort to find the truth about Obama's birth. Trump predictably took credit for the president's release of the certificate. It was apex of the circus. Obama probably wants Trump in the mix, as the ideal carnival barker to distract Republicans from finding a viable candidate. And who could blame him? Shrewd politicians should make the best of the birth certificates that life deals them.

The birther conspiracy will not end with the release of the long-form certificate. The conspiracy nuts will instantly expand the conspiracy to include bureaucracies and people at the highest levels of government. The sideshow may help keep Obama as ringmaster for another four years.

At least the kooks will have something to do.