OK, so let’s say that is a person’s #1 problem with Obama. How does demanding a long form birth certificate address that again?

@ Ken: Really?! “Nothing else?”! You obviously haven’t been paying attention to all the people–including those on these boards–whose primary problem with Obama, as it was with Bush, is the irresponsible and destructive spending. You must have not watched any news right after the Congressional elections, when even “liberal’ networks were calling the results a referendum against ridiculous Congressional spending.

What was the Taxed Enough Already party’s formation all about, anyway?

“Nothing else” indeed.

What baffles me is how people can seemingly completely ignore what the other side is saying, and then act offended when that side is frustrated.

Bush, Obama, and their Congressional company have perpetrated one of the biggest financial frauds of all time, and may yet succeed in economically crippling us for the foreseeable future, and we don’t have reason to vehemently oppose them?!

It’s blindness like this that makes me think America’s time as #1 has come and gone…

And school time essays and letters and such were also brought out about Clinton and used to criticize him. I don’t have a problem with a school time essay that Obama wrote ‘coming out’ should someone find one gathering dust in a box somewhere….but I don’t think Obama has any obligation to release his grades or release special copies of his birth certificate that other’s aren’t required to release and those that call for him to do so often do not practice what they preach. Sarah Palin, for one, has never released Trig’s birth certificate or her detailed medical records! I make an exception to my objection if the speaker is someone like Andrew Sullivan who has gone on record asserting that we should have super-detailed backgrounds on all who aspire to Presidential office including detailed medical records and such. That’s fine in my book if you want it applied to everyone.

Truth
Libbers are the ones who originated the “Birther” issue!!

True but irrelevant, Republicans made it their own. To her credit, Hillary never lowered herself to the least common denominator. Many Republicans, though, have raced to it.

Heather
Many people say that all this could have been avoided had Obama released his certificate sooner..

Just to be clear Obama did release his birth certificate two years ago during the election. He released the birth certificate that you would ‘release’ if you went to DMV to get a license or applied for a passport. For you to release for yourself what Obama just did, you’d have to get a lawyer and file a Freedom of Information Request.

All this could have been avoided if dishonest peole had choosen to be honest. Aside from a small core of deluded people who honestly believed this nonsense, most who exploited the birther issue are dishonest people.

Pentamom
Yes, and have discounted it. It’s hard not to consider racism in a world where people are quick to run to it as an answer for all manner of things.

Actually “I don’t want to be PC” has become a type of PC all in itself. While ‘civilians’ may be honest birthers who really think something is afoot, I think it’s pretty hard to deny that the movement itself and the pandering too it smacks clearly of a motive to exploit racism against Obama but keeping ‘plausible deniability’. Consider Huckabee’s ‘mau-mau’ comment, for example. By ‘civilians’, though, I mean there are people who are not well educated (or even if they are they can be delusional about some subjects) who watched one or two videos or read an article or two and are super sincere believers. I’ve spoke with people who swear the moon landings were faked or that big companies ‘certainly’ have the cure for cancer but are hiding it to make profits…these people embrace a wacky belief or two but in other areas of their lives they are perfectly rational and functional. Maybe some peolple just need to have a few off the wall beliefs.

America’s best interests at heart if his heart seems to be elsewhere, or to be concerned that someone you believe may have Muslim connections might *potentially* have a conflict when it comes to dealing with Muslim enemies.

Here’s my rule with this, if something is really important to you then you’ll take the time to learn the details. If, for example, you’re really concerned about conflicts with Muslim enemies, then you’ll learn a lot about Islam, a lot about different Islamic enemies, and a lot about the person you are concerned with. If this is the case, then I’d say the person is honest, if possibly mistaken. If, however, they say this is a very important issue for them but their words reveal themselves to be horribly ignorant of even the most basic facts…well if they don’t respect their brains enough to not use them why should I?

This response is why conservatives think libbers are so stupid.

Occam’s Razor hardly even applies here. The reason liberals think that a lot of opposition to Obama stems in part – in part – from the fact that he’s black is that nothing else explains the vehemence, stupidity and irrationality of so much of conservative response to him.

And being suspicious of someone because he doesn’t seem sufficiently American in spirit to you to be a good American president is decidedly distinct from racism, as is a concern over a Muslim identity. Neither of those things are big issues to me, but they’re really not about racism, they’re about other, genuine issues.