I think it's a case of Mutually Assured Destruction.
Interesting now to hear the radio talkers railing about the paltry level of factual documentation released about Obama back in 2008 compared to the full on adversarial discovery the Republican candidates this year are being subjected to. It was in their best interests to cover the eligibility issue even if it did bring mocking and ridicule from the power elites. Now they're part of the coverup whether they want to be or not.
I have been trying to analyze this phenomena for a long time. Back in the summer of 2008, I didn’t think the Democrats would be stupid enough to nominate Obama, but I underestimated their desperate need for “racial guilt healing.”
What surprised me is that the Republicans didn’t demand proof of eligibility from Obama in the General election, what with all the commentary for the preceding years about him being from “Kenya” and such. In retrospect, it makes sense.
At the time, none of us Primary Voters were aware that John McCain was NOT BORN IN the United States. I have personally met John McCain, and I have been aware of him as a Senator for over 20 years, and *I* did not know he was born in another Country. (Yes, on our military base, but not *IN* the United States.) Not being aware of this, the Primary voters (of which I was one, and Yes, I voted for John McCain, because everyone else sucked worse) Picked him as our nominee.
The problem was, the American people have a really weak understanding of the meaning of the term “natural born citizen” and the vast bulk of them suffer from the illusion that it only means being born *IN* our country. If John McCain had tried to raise the NBC eligibility issue it would have backfired on him. The Media would have successfully argued that John McCain was less of a “natural born citizen” than was Barack, because at least Barack was born here. (They would have finessed the proof same as they did before.)
The McCain campaign, (and therefore the Entire Republican Party Election Apparatus) made a conscious decision NOT to raise the issue because they KNEW it would backfire on them politically. Not only that, the word went out to ridicule any of the rest of us that dared raise it for the same reason. (It would hurt the party’s chances of winning the Presidency, as far as the Party Apparatchiks were concerned.)
Had McCain won, their strategy would have worked out fine, but since McCain lost, they could not use the eligibility weapon which they had thrown away, and they found themselves in the position of having to double down on ignoring and discrediting anyone who raised the eligibility issue. To do otherwise would be the same as admitting they knowingly condoned a strategy which undermined our constitutional rule of law.
The facts now stand thus: They were wrong to ignore the eligibility issue in the first place, Barack Obama has never demonstrated his eligibility to even the standard of a preponderance of the evidence, and if this court case is successful, it may blow this whole sorry mess wide open and demonstrate that the “anti-birthers” were wrong from the very beginning.
I for one believe it will be very much in the Nation’s interest to let in some sunshine and disinfectant.