Birther Reporter Makes Arse of Himself Again at Press Briefing

Just last week, the birther reporter from World Net Daily, which is like that alien gossip paper, Weekly World News, told Robert Gibbs he wasn't sure Obama was born in the U.S. The fact that Les Kinsolving is in the White House briefing room at all is a wonder to me.

For reasons clear only to himself, conservative radio correspondent Lester Kinsolving -- who has questioned President Obama’s birth certificate -- applauded heartily when Vice President Joe Biden arrived and departed the briefing room.

Clapping is a major no-no for reporters -- although Kinsolving plays by his own rules. read the rest at Politico.

Birther Reporter Challenges Gibbs on Obama's Social Security Number

World Net Daily is like the Weekly World News, the one with Bat Boy on the cover. It's a piece of crap fringe publication. Their latest story says a clerk from Kentucky says Obama doesn't have a birth certificate. WWD is fringey-er than Human Events. I don't know how one of its reporters gets in the White House press room. But he's usually entertaining when he gets to ask a question. I can't wait to see the video (just posted here).

In the last question of the day, Kinsolving asked Gibbs "why the president is using a Social Security Number reserved for Connecticut applicants" – alluding to a popular conspiracy theory among some who question the president's citizenship.

Gibbs began to reply, saying he was "amazed" by the question, before interrupting himself to ask directly: "Do you think the president was born here, Lester? Do you think the president was born in the United States?"

"I don't know," the conservative correspondent answered, adding he wants to see Obama's birth certificate.

More at Politico

In other birther news, a few soldier birthers are refusing to serve saying Obama isn't the president. Birther Terrence Lakin is set for court martial.

Wingnuts Gone Wild Say Hasan Advised Obama

WorldNetDaily is the equivalent of Weekly World News, the paper that writes about aliens in your backyard, yet what Rachel Maddow talks about is all over twitter. People are even saying that Obama is linked to this shooting, because, of course, they believe he's a Muslim (all Muslims are terrorists in the view of wingnuts).

I can't believe that so many people actually voice their stupidity, without shame or caution. It's stunning. Ignorance threatens our freedom--not the deficit, not "big government." We could have reasonable conversations and debates if there wasn't so much willful stupidity out there.

It's not just Muslims who pay the price of stupidity, though they suffer more directly. We all pay for the ignorance of our fellow Americans. In addition to lifting people out of poverty, we've got to find a way to lift people out of ignorance.

Ralph Peters, a guest on O'Reilly's show, calls Hasan a terrorist:

The Obama Haters Get a Name: The Birthers

This is good. I'm glad Politico is writing about the most annoying fringe out there, but the story misses the point. Why do they have an irrational hatred of Obama? But I guess that's the point-- it's irrational and therefore, irrelevant, until one of them goes rogue.

Every once in a while I check in with them at their favorite lair.

I'm not sure if they're dangerous (but I'm sure the Secret Service watches them), or just ignorant, but at times, they're very racist. Read their comments on this story here.

I think racism is at the heart of their hatred. These people were literally insulted when Obama became president. In their world, a black man simply cannot be president. So they latched on to the eligibility issue so that they could try to legitimize themselves.

I realize one of the ringleaders, Alan Keyes, is black. But he's got another axe to grind with Obama. For him, it's the sin of jealousy. Keyes ran against Obama for the Senate (read an interesting exchange here).

There is also an element of fighting the "liberal media" and fighting the government (they really hate government) that they view to be all that's wrong with the world. Scapegoating. It's kind of how some republicans have made Hispanic immigrants the root of all evil.

It's mass denial and it's interesting to observe, especially if you have any interest in psychology. This post commenting on Politico's story by one of the members of freerepublic says it all:

Discredit, ridicule the boy who shouted that the King has no clothes, that is the proven Communist method, bought hook, line and sinker by the incurious!

Little do they realize that it is they who drank the Kool-Aid.

Politico's got all the kooks covered, except for pastor Wiley Drake.
Some notables are Orly Taitz, Alan Keyes, Gary Kreep. WorldNetDaily, mentioned in the story, is sort of like that tabloid that always has aliens on the cover.

Politico: Bill Clinton had the Vince Foster "murder." George W. Bush had 9/11 Truth. And the new administration has brought with it a new culture of conspiracy: The Birthers.

Out of the gaze of the mainstream and even the conservative media is a flourishing culture of advocates, theorists and lawyers, all devoted to proving that Barack Obama isn't eligible to be president of the United States. Viewed as irrelevant by the White House, and as embarrassing by much of the Republican Party, the subculture still thrives from the conservative website WorldNetDaily, which claims that some 300,000 people have signed a petition demanding more information on Obama's birth, to Cullman, Alabama, where Sen. Richard Shelby took a question on the subject at a town hall meeting last week.

The story doesn't mention it, but Shelby didn't exactly dismiss the question.

Because they're cowardly, they look to this argument--that he's not legally eligible to be president--as a means of opposing Obama:

"Some individuals and groups who are opposed to Obama's presidency want an 'acceptable' reason to cite to convince other individuals and groups who might be on the fence to join in their way of thinking," said Patricia Turner, who studies rumors at the University of California, Davis. "The notion that his presidency is actually in violation of the Constitution has a fundamentally patriotic appeal."

I'd love to see them at a roundtable. I think if the light was shone on them and they could get some air, some of them might come to their senses.

"At some level, they're not that bad to have around because it reminds people that under the mainstream conservative press there's this bubbling up of really irrational hatred for the guy," said former Clinton White House press secretary Jake Siewert.