Yglesias Award Nominee

"The attention paid to President Obama’s place of birth is not unprecedented. In fact, it may be the only thing President Obama has in common with Pres. Chester Arthur, whose opponents whispered that he had been born in Canada. A number of unsuccessful presidential candidatesGeorge Romney, Barry Goldwater, and Lowell Weicker among themactually were born outside of the United States (in Mexico, the Arizona Territory, and Paris, respectively) to American parents and thereby into American citizenship. If the conspiracy theorists have evidence that President Obama went through the naturalization process, let them show it.

But there is no such evidence, because this theory is based on unreality, as two minutes’ examining the claims of its proponents reveals. The hallmark of a conspiracy theory is that a lack of evidence for the theory is taken as yet more evidence for the theory. Indeed, the maddening thing about dealing with conspiracy hobbyists of this or any sort is the ever-shifting nature of their argument and their alleged evidence: Never mind the birth certificate, his step-grandmother said he was born in Kenya! (No, she didn’t.)" - National Review.

2006-2011 archives for The Daily Dish, featuring Andrew Sullivan