Posted on 07/29/2009 5:19:16 PM PDT by SirJohnBarleycorn
Republicans and conservatives opposed to a rapid increase in the size and scope of government should be heartened by the American publics gradual turn away from Obamaism.
But when we need Republican and conservative leadership the most, when we need our leaders and thinkers to clearly differentiate their vision for the country from Barack Obamas vision, many of our leaders have failed us. Instead of taking the opportunity presented to proclaim the conservative vision to the American people, some Republican leaders have opted to latch on to wild conspiracy theories promoted by the fringes of the Republican Party. Or, at the very least, some of our leaders have allowed such wild theories to fester by not proactively combating and denouncing them.
Just last month, for instance, Frank Gaffney, a former Reagan Administration Defense Department official and conservative intellectual, wrote in The Washington Times that Barack Obama might very well be a secret Muslim. [T]here is mounting evidence that the president not only identifies with Muslims, but actually may still be one himself, Gaffney wrote. Among Gaffneys mounting evidence was the fact that President Obama referred to the Koran as the holy Koran during his June speech in Cairo, Egypt.
But of course this was merely pandering on Obamas part. It no more helps prove that President Obama is a secret Muslim than President Bush speaking in Spanish to a Latino audience proves he is a secret Hispanic, or President Obama wearing a yarmulke at a gathering of American Jews (as he has) proves he is secretly Jewish.
How much resonance such conspiracy theories have within the Republican Party is unclear, but a YouTube video put up last week of a town hall meeting held by Republican Congressman Mike Castle is worrisome. A lady pressed the Delaware Republican about why Obama has not produced his birth certificate and then loudly declared that Obama was in fact a citizen of Kenya, not the United States. I want my country back, she shouted in her rant at the befuddled congressman, who could only respond, responsibly, that President Obama was in fact an American citizen. Its impossible to tell how many people in the audience agreed with the woman, but there were certainly enough of them to make some noise.
These birthers, as they have come to be known, allege that Obama is ineligible to be president because he was not born in the United States. Despite overwhelming proof that Obama is in fact native born including an official birth certificate from the state of Hawaii the birthers movement persists in claiming otherwise.
Why stop there? With equal plausibility, one might suggest that 48 years ago, a group of Islamists conspired to take over America by making Barack Obama president. Having the incredible foresight in the 1960s too see that a black man would be the obvious choice for president of the United States in 2008, their strategy would be to hide his foreign and Muslim identity by having his parents name him Barack Hussein Obama. Somehow, they knew this child would be smart and talented enough to get into elite colleges and become the first black editor of the Harvard Law Review. The men behind this clever movement to take over America wisely encouraged a young Barack to take drugs in his youth and then to later write about his drug-taking days in a memoir because, presciently, they understood that writing about ones drug-taking past is usually a successful presidential strategy.
Thats not all. Instead of having Obama be born in America, his mothers native country, as most people trying to conduct a successful take over plot of America would do, they had Obama be born in Kenya. But in order to deceive the American people that Obama was an actual American citizen 47 years later, the men behind this plot made sure local Hawaiian newspapers published notices of Obamas birth. The secret cabal behind Obama was also able to fool, evidently, the state of Hawaii.
One might go on and ask why someone who supposedly is a secret radical Islamist, determined to create a Sharia state in America, would add troops to Afghanistan to fight radical Islamists there; launch predator drone attacks against Islamist terrorists in Pakistan; and keep the Guantanamo Bay terrorist detention facilities open despite his campaign pledge to shut down the facility?
Yet another problem with the conspiracy theories is that they distract from more serious criticisms of the administration. I have written articles in opposition to Barack Obamas policies and I will continue to do so as long as he pushes policies that I think are harmful. However, we have to have responsible leadership in the Republican Party that opposes Obama on the basis of principle and uses reasoned discourse, not idiotic falsities, to make its case.
Conservative commentators, leaders and thinkers have a responsibility to denounce idiocy put forward under the conservative banner. Republicans and conservatives have a real opportunity to take back the country in 2010 and 2012. But they arent going to do it by promoting outlandish conspiracies.
BTW #29 seems to put you out of business. So take your hypothesis and play with Star Traveler for the rest of the night.
I think the WH screaming about it is just a way to use it as a distraction to change the subject away from mounting opposition to his policies.
Pennant, just remember Claire McCaskill started this, along with Obama and Leahy over McCain’s NBC status, then McCaskill tried to get NBC status changed for Obama.
Ignore the anklebiters. They hang around, worrying when something is going to break hard, after all, they saw what happened to Rather.
Thanks tx...I just cringe when people think we have to rely on the law to help us...the only true law came in the Constitution. That same document gave us the right to seek answers, yet many, including those who think conservatives are getting a bad name, want to lay back and let LAWYERS decide our countries fate. Gives me the chills...that is the action of a welfare seeking democrat..not a true American...IMHO anyway :)
The idiot author believes that it is the GOP's job to defend the secrecy of Obama.
Herr Weinstein, KISS MY @$$. I don't care if it bothers you - the GOP leadership has NO BUSINESS "debunking" something that Obama cannot himself debunk in the ONLY meaningful way.
Can do what ?
as for #29, no it doesn’t. It just says what must happen if a President is deemed ineligible. Take a step back though.
It does not say how, by whom, what proof is required, or even who has the burden of proof, among a host of other things.
These are all the blanks that have been filled in by centuries of legislation and court decisions for most of the rest of the Constitution. But not this bit.
...signatures of mother, physician and registrar.
Well, you see there, you've answered your own question.
Therefore, I as Director of Health for the State of Hawaii, along with the Registrar of Vital Statistics who has statutory authority to oversee and maintain these type of vital records, have personally seen and verified that the Hawaii State Department of Health has Sen. Obamas original birth certificate on record in accordance with state policies and procedures.
which only says he has a birth certificate on file and conspicuously avoids the issue of place of birth.
What are you hiding, Barry?
That he is Frank Davis’s son maybe!
The GOP leadership has an interest in making sure a bunch of their troops (or thats how they see them) don’t charge off a cliff to the amusement of their enemies.
And then there are the undecided voters who would take a poor view of the spectacle.
The only difference being that he Kennedy assassination could not be solved by simply producing a single document with a signature on it.
I, Dr. Chiyome Fukino, Director of the Hawaii State Department of Health, have seen the original vital records maintained on file by the Hawaii State Department of Health verifying Barack Hussein Obama was born in Hawaii and is a natural-born American citizen. I have nothing further to add to this statement or my original statement issued in October 2008 over eight months ago.
That pretty well cover’s it doesn’t it?
I was pointing out what was posted recently (re: the hospital), but I know that the hospital he was born in — isn’t going to bear on the Statement from the State of Hawaii — that Obama was born in Hawaii and that he is a natural-born American citizen.
Perhaps a lot of people might like to know the hospital, and I suppose that’s nice. You would know where to go to have your picture taken. But, for purposes of the three Constitutional requirement for office, I’m glad to know that he was born in Hawaii...
Perhaps they’ll have a plaque put on the hospital this year, since it’s the 50th anniversary year for Hawaii’s statehood.
Please don’t interupt I’m looking for that airplane thing in the constitution and federal law. Otherwise everyone will be swimming to Afghanistan.
I’m sorry you seem to take your self-definition from the eyes of others. You have handed the power to define who you are and what you believe to those who wish nothing more than your political humiliation.
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