If the President were McCain, who was born in the Panama Canal Zone and whose status is therefore very slightly more ambiguous than Obama’s, this movement would not exist. The same people leading the charge today would probably be shouting down anyone who had the temerity to “raise questions” about McCain’s citizenship. I won’t rule out that race may have some role, but nationality and nationalism are far more important. Never underestimate how closely some of these partisans identify their own particular ideology and party with being truly American. The only way to make sense of the explosion of this lunacy is to see it as a continuation of the belief that Obama, by virtue of what he believes, cannot be a “real” American, so the obsession with his place of birth is really an extension of the presidential campaign in which he and his supporters were considered not to be from “real” America.I'd however have to disagree on that point I bolded above: I think the exact opposite is true. Nationality and nationalism are nothing more than a socially acceptable smokescreen for attacking Obama when the reality is there are people that primarily do not like Barack Obama because of his race. It's nothing more than applied Lee Atwater. Obama's birth certificate is simply an avenue that people can attack him on in order to delegitimize him. You see the GOP play this card all the time on immigration, for instance.
Also, I'd be much more willing to believe that Birtherism was less of a racial attack and more of a "real American" identity issue if it wasn't be accompanied by direct racial attacks on the President, and the woman leading the charge for the Birthers wasn't herself an immigrant from Moldavia via Israel, which nobody in the movement seems to have a problem with.
It's racism with a coat of goofy paint.
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It's a tempting conclusion, and I won't summarily reject it. But I don't think it's quite that "black and white".
Many of the same people who are anti-Obama were every bit as anti Hillary Clinton if not moreso (Bill too, for that matter). And John Kerry. And Ted Kennedy. And Al Gore, who after all was held in such disfavor that he started the club that Kerry joined later --- "Piled on by the Right and Lost to Bush".
At this point, when the aura is wearing off a bit, I think a lot of people are "suspicious" of President Obama because of his (a) Chicago political heritage (viewed as "corrupt" and super political), (b) Harvard Law credential (viewed as "elite", and (c) his oratorical bent (viewed as a "slick talker") and (d) his public sector, Washington-centric big-government solution tendencies. Race is incidental or irrelevant to all of these.
If race were the #1 factor, I doubt he'd have carried the vote in a state like mine --- midwestern and with its largest city highly segregated, or in a city like my winter getaway, where the GOP generally wins.
My theory is that the current resistance to Obama's emerging administration comes from those four things every bit as much as it comes from his racial heritage. Some of those things were effectively "managed around" in a brand identity sense during the campaign. But now that Obama is in place and people are more used to seeing and hearing him 24/7, and the right wing talkers are calling him a tax-and-spend (or borrow and spend) Socialist and highlighting his shortcomings in terms of experience, some of these other things are bound to bubble to the surface. We like to kick our politicians around, and their post-election approval ratings always fade, it seems.
As for McCain, in addition to his family being US Military for generations, I believe he produced all the "original" documentation available about his birth, and a court ruled about his eligibility, even though the lawsuit (as I recall it) was brought by someone the judge opined might not meet the criterion of having "standing", which is how Obama has gotten suits dismissed. Bartack has not been so "open" in terms of saying "everything is out in the open for all to see."
Returning to my main point, there are plenty of examples of White American political figures who have long been "targeted" by the extreme right and rejected by voters and/or skewered and called names after getting into office. It's the American way!
I like your blog by the way. Just now finding it
Good to hear Terry, and thanks. Always glad to see a solid, reasoned argument in the comments.
I will concede that if Hillary was President, the attacks would be ruthless as well, but the issue would be gender and not race, I totally agree with you on that. And yes, the original attacks on Obama were the standard Gore/Kerry elitism/out of touch crap. It started out being that.
But I have to say at least in parts of the South, the issue is still race. The GOP found an issue they could use to drive a wedge, and it was the bloodily obvious one.
There are enough people that reject it that it's largely failing outside that area. But I have no illusions that the birther crap is just applied code word racism, or will soon evolve into it. Racists don't like being called racists. But if you can get away with being a birther instead, well then that cosmic level of denial is the path they choose to take.
Yes, some of the birthers object to him being a Democrat. They'll never accept one in the White House, white, black, female, male, whatever.
But there's just too much inherent silliness in the birther "logic" to be anything other than a thin veneer over racism.
There are a lot more potential issues with BHO's birth certificate besides his alleged place of birth. See this
for instance.
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