Why The Press Loves The Birther Issue–UPDATED
July 27, 2009 / 3:30 pm • By Dr. Melissa ClouthierThe Birther issue serves one important purpose: if the whole of the Right can be painted as conspiratorial nutters, then the Left doesn’t have to defend or explain very unpopular policies like Cap-n-Trade, Card Check and Health Care.
It is, in short, a diversion. When you got no game, play dirty. That’s the Left’s mantra and so far, it’s worked because the press colludes with Democrats and their agents.
Mind you, unlike the seriously deranged nutjobs on the Left who felt like 9/11 was an inside job, aka Truthers, the “birthers” issue seems more easily resolved. Although, as my co-blogger here at Right Wing News noted on the podcast the other day, actual facts tend to not dissuade conspiracy theorists.
Anyway, I see this as one more trumped up way to divert attention from the true nonsense in Washington, D.C.–horribly unpopular policy. Since the criticism of the policies can’t be discredited, the only solution is to try to discredit the critics.
UPDATED:
Funny how many nuts, with many on the Left, went on about how Bush planned 9/11 and cooperated with either the Saudis or Israel depending on your source, was never big news.
8 Responses to “Why The Press Loves The Birther Issue–UPDATED”
July 27 2009 / 10:16 pm
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Wait a minute. There’s this group of nuts who believe that Obama is not the legitimate President because he was born in Kenya, and you say that is an example of DEMOCRATS playing dirty politics? I think you’ve got it backwards. The Birthers are a vicious example of dirty politics: extremists, racists, haters of the worst description. The Dems haven’t defended themselves hard enough against these psychopaths, in my opinion.
July 28 2009 / 1:37 pm
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I have followed this topic with some interest. The bottom line is that there was a Legitimate question about the President’s past. But it turns out the President does not want the public to know everything about his past. He seems to have spent hundreds of thousands of dollars (who’s money?) to cover up, to legally hide his past. Now, that does raise a legitimate question again. Why? By using ridicule to besmirch those questioners by calling them ‘Birthers’ is just another tactic to squelch those who just want to know the truth. Like, where are his school records? where are his passport and birth records, where are his records of published works (not counting the two books he claims to have written – but forensic writing investigators say 90% sure he did not himself write)? And more questions aplenty. No answers, only evasion.
July 29 2009 / 1:28 pm
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Just in from WSJ:
Beige Book Sees Recession Easing
Capital Spending Increases, as Durable-Goods Orders Fall
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124887015293690029.html
July 30 2009 / 5:48 pm
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I’m with Tony. Why has the President of the United States of America spent so much of whose money to hide his past? How did a young man who, by his own admission could not afford a taxicab, go to Pakistan when it was illegal for an American to go to Pakistan?
Most importantly, why did a media who found it vital to stare up into Governor Palin’s vagina ignore these and other questions?
July 31 2009 / 5:31 pm
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Aaaaaahhhhhh….someone with a brain finally gets it. It’s like having a longtime itch under a plaster cast finally scratched.
Check out what this nutty guy entered over at Cassy’s place on this issue (comment #4):
The real issue is a straw-man argument. I myself doubt the existence of even a single “birther,” as an incarnation of the caricature that’s been foisted upon us: Middle-aged white guy in a wife-beater shirt living in his momma’s basement, forming conspiracy theories, been shown a zillion times lots of hefty evidence of Obama’s Hawaii birth that he should find convincing, but he doesn’t, because his gears are stripped.
I don’t know anybody like this. Furthermore, I find it really suspicious that this “birther” stuff has a pulse to it, and the systolic pressure just so happens to be conveniently timed as Obama’s approval rating crosses the 50% mark and heads South just as He has a health care bill bottled up in Congress that nobody likes.
I think they’re talking about me.
But I don’t fit the classic definition any better than anyone else does. I’ve never once had a serious doubt that He was born in Honolulu…
Personally, I think we have a Hawaiian-born American citizen in the White House who’s shrewdly seized on a birther-boogeyman to be hauled out of the closet, with a willing press as an accomplice, any time He needs a distraction…Which is lately just about every two weeks. He won’t spend the $22 to produce the slip of paper you & I would’ve produced a long time ago, because He doesn’t *want* this issue to go away. But there isn’t anyone at any address outside of 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. keeping it around.
Classic straw man argument.
You know what this reminds me of? Man-hating feminists complaining about “the expectations of a patriarchal society” that womens’ breasts should be like basketballs, their waists should be thinner than the average coffee pot, their bellies should be non-existent, their butts should be so skinny you can cut a pane of glass with ‘em.
Meanwhile, the men are lusting after Marilyn Monroe’s figure just like they were fifty years ago. Who’s promoting this size-double-zero dress size? The women who run the fashion industry…and men who prefer other men. It takes less effort to blame the straight guys for it, though.
Except that misdirection of blame is accidental. This one is strategic. People think “birthers” and the first thing that enters their minds is that all Republicans are screwy…so a loyal democrat will choose to a) help promote this fairy tale, or b) not? Talk about a no-brainer.
August 2 2009 / 2:09 pm
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This is a ‘heads up’ alert on new ‘Birth Certificate’ info for those interested. Maybe the Uninterested Press might finally want to closely watch this one. Could be another Hoax, but claims seem to show all necessary info is there to prove one way or another. If this is finally a bonafied copy of original long form document – then the President and Hawaiian officials are going to have some tall explaining to do… I hope its OK to post links ………. tony
See http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=105764
(Is this really smoking gun of Obama’s Kenyan birth?
Attorney files motion for authentication of alleged 1960s certificate from Africa)