Greg Sargent has an excellent piece up tracking the reactions of the GOP and notes how many of them are not walking back the birfer nonsense:
Meanwhile, a number of leading Republican figures who have either endorsed birtherism or flirted with it are either refusing to say anything about today’s developments or are still insisting that Obama took too long to come clean.
John Boehner, by contrast, did suggest that it’s time to move on. His spokesman said today that this has “long been a settled issue.”
Until these good people step up and call out birtherism for what it is, we can only conclude that they are either too cowardly to challenge or alienate voters who remain wedded to their birther fantasies, or are hoping to continue capitalizing politically from the out-of-control hatred and paranoia that will continue to be directed at America’s first black president.
Will the media hold them accountable? Don’t hold your breath- they have more pressing issues:
GOTCHA! ZING! BOOM!
Sometimes I wonder what it would be like if all the news sources like the NY Times went broke and we only had Fox News, the Daily Caller, and Pajamas Media to provide information. Now I wonder how it could possibly be any worse.
Nick
TOLD YA SO
slag
I actually think the “newshole” point is a fair one. Now, if they’d actually put a little more effort into those so-called stories on the economy.
Just Some Fuckhead
Whoda ever thunk a nutjob drunk like Boner would look like the reasonable Republican?
Just Some Fuckhead
I like how it’s a “settled issue” when it’s actually never been an “issue” to sane people.
Allan
Obama hurt Chuck Todd’s fee-fees, and Dana Milbank has a big sad about it. They’re both lucky that none of their viewers or readers can get past the moat into their castles today.
Some Guy
Even Orange Boner’s attempt to take the high rode conceals birther-sympathy: long been a “settled” issue implies it ever was an issue which is wasn’t.
This has long been (as in always been) a made up issue.
A birther or birther-sympathizer is anyone who not only actively says “its and open question” of Obama’s place of birth, but anyone who shades their language to suggest there was ever any question about his place of birth.
The allowance of “once upon a time” doubt is a birther dog whistle.
fourlegsgood
WHat would it be like? why a lot like it is now, of course.
We really ARE doomed. I’m certain the president was talking about network and cable coverage, and he’s right. Every time I turn on the freaking TV, there’s Trump, spewing bullshit.
Elia Isquire
I’d say devoting 4% of news time to Birtherism counts as overwhelming.
I think I prefer Tea Party Patriots to Elite and Wannabe Elite Journalists, honestly.
fourlegsgood
@slag: I don’t. Most people don’t seek out a variety of print, email AND cable coverage of political stories the way we do.
They turn on network news or CNN or FAUX – and what do they see? Donald fucking Trump. Ad nauseum. Obama is right.
slag
@Just Some Fuckhead: That’s interesting. I wonder if Obama did this as a favor to Boehner. And I’m not kidding about that. You know…trying to make it easier for the more adult of the party to start acting more adult.
Corner Stone
@Nick: Whuh?? I’m…I’m…YOU’RE ALIVE!!
We all thought you were dead! And here you are again! Proving to all of us how right you were from your mom’s basement this whole time!
Villago Delenda Est
Last week I think it was, Mittens said that he “believed” that Obama was born in Hawaii.
“Believed.”
A weasel word, to give him an out with the cretinous racist vermin who are the birfers.
The correct phrasing is this: “Barack Obama was born in a hospital in Honolulu in 1961. He is a natural born citizen of the United States. Any position other than this one is in conflict with established, verifiable, indisputable fact, and should be dealt with appropriately. By dismissal out of hand.”
That is the definitive way to deal with this idiocy.
LittlePig
“IS NOT!”
“IS TOO!”
“IS NOT!”
“IS TOO!”
Yeah boyhowdy, that’s some rigorous intellectual discussion right there.
I have to believe Obama knew this was a hole with no bottom, and did this just to screw with their heads.
slag
@fourlegsgood: That is a very good point:
Especially since there’s no real excuse for that nonsense.
Some Guy
Also too: the shrewd rightwingers probably see this as their best bet to make Obama lose his cool and become the angry black man they wish he was so they could say, “See, see!!”
So expect to see, as John says, a tepid tsk tsking from the right, while they hope the lunatics push Obama to real anger.
Taunting. That is what our politics amount to without a tincture of hyperbole.
Obama handled it incredibly well. Never has anyone faced this kind of idiocy and obviously no president has ever stared down racism so flatulently dispersed. I would have been looking for Trump with a taser if I were Obama.
Just Some Fuckhead
@Nick:
Which one of you told us?
LittlePig
@Some Guy: “You are like the buzzing of flies to Barack ‘The Islamic Shock’ Hussein Superallah Obama”.
AkaDad
Obama’s birth certificate is legit, as far as I know.
Martin
Of course they’re not walking it back. Half of all registered Republicans are birthers. Based on the polls, nobody is getting through the 2012 GOP primaries without them.
satby
The WATB Tapper crowd think they’re sooo smart “fact-checking” the President. But it really seemed like the birther BS was crowding out way more important stories and by trying to make Obama wrong about that, they prove his larger point. Again. To the people who barely pay attention Obama looks like the only adult in the room.
Well played, Mr. President.
WaterGirl
@AkaDad: Not funny.
Villago Delenda Est
Jake Tapper needs to hang around more screaming three year olds, to pick up pointers on how to look more adult.
Badtux
WND.com headline: “Even Hawaii birth won’t make Obama eligible.” Uhm, yeah. The reality of course is that no document will ever satisfy the birthers, because no document will ever turn Obama white.
– Badtux the Snarky Penguin
Andre
What percentage of the “newshole” is made up by “missing white girl” stories?
cathyx
This won’t be over until the media stops giving the birthers airtime or newsprint. As long as they keep doing that, the story won’t go away.
Citizen_X
If the newsholes* devoted 4% of their coverage to moon-landing deniers, that would also be a problem.
And it would be just about as justified as the birther horseshit, too.
*When did this become a word, anyway? I think I like my usage better.
Phil Perspective
@fourlegsgood: You’re damn right!! If I had Trump money, I would have already put my foot through the TV about 4 times this week. Not because I actually watch the nonsense, but because I find out about it here and on the Twitter machine.
General Stuck
You see, there you have it. A lady born in Russia in 1960, and immigrated to the US in 1987, becoming a citizen in 1992, is an expert on 60’s race relations and lingo at the time in this country. Nevermind, that Hawaii wasn’t exactly Alabama in 1961.
It is not the stupid questions we have to worry about, it is the stupid questions that end up on the teevee. The real birther movement is the birth of all the crazy shit born on the internet and somehow weaseling it’s way into the national bloodstream.
Joel
“Newshole”.
Never has there been a more appropriate description of today’s mass media.
ABL
Fuck Milbank. Right in the eye.
He “lowered” himself? Fuck these people Fuck these people Fuck these people.
BGinCHI
9, count them, 9 soldiers killed in Afgh today by a single gunman.
I’m not trying to concern troll here, but Jesus Christ, what is the difference between the MSM and Parade Magazine?
This whole thing would even make Baudrillard throw up.
Superluminar
@Corner Stone
Which one of him said that?
ABL
It’s far easier to “fact check” the Black Guy in the white house and call him a liar than it is for these white assholes to examine what makes this story so fascinating to them and why it has dominated the news. I don’t care how much coverage it was given. It is the dominating issue right now.
And for them to ignore that palpable fact means they should fuck each other in their respective eye sockets.
I know this may, in the end, inure to Obama’s benefit, but as a black person, I’m offended and pissed the fuck off.
Someone will have to tell me what happens on the rest of Parks & Recs because I’m not watching NBC anymore. It may not make a difference, but fuck these people.
WaterGirl
I’m hoping that the President’s message actually got through to some of these blowhards in the media. That’s who his real audience was; he was calling them on their bullshit. I am hoping this initial reaction is just bluster while they save face after being called out by the President, and maybe they will pivot away from the birther crap in a couple of days when they think no one is looking.
p.s. I make that assumption as someone who actually has a soul and a conscience, so their mileage may vary.
slag
@General Stuck:
Ha! From Russia with Rove?
AkaDad
@WaterGirl:
That’s cause Liebrals have no sense of humor. :D
WaterGirl
@AkaDad: Today, I just don’t find anything funny about this at all. It’s just pathetic and discouraging. Even the helicopters aren’t laughing.
JPL
NBC News covered the story in a fair and balanced way. They pointed out that the President had released his birth certificate over two years ago and today released the long form. Hawaii does not normally release that form and the President had to request an exception to the law.
It could be someone at NBC feels complicit.
Midnight Marauder
@slag:
It’s actually just a really clever sleight of hand by The Village to once again deflect any blame they have in enabling a freak show of racism:
We are talking about Birtherism representing maybe 90% of the coverage when it comes to that oh-so-suddenly popular 4% number.
That is insane by any standard.
JPL
@ABL: If you have a chance listen to Brian Williams coverage of the brouhaha over the birth certificate. He didn’t eat crow but he did a decent job. BTW..I’m not a fan of his but I don’t have cable and my choice was Katie or Brian for news tonight.
Comrade Mary
Some faces are made for punching: Tweety deals with two smug teabaggers.
Corner Stone
@Superluminar: 4 out of 5 Nicks agree that he told us so.
jeffreyw
We are not doomed. Here is evidence of a Just and Loving God.
AkaDad
@WaterGirl:
Now that made me laugh.
sukabi
@Joel: “Newshole”.
Never has there been a more appropriate description of today’s
mass media.fixed it for you…
Warren Terra
Now that the Birther controversy is settled – and surely, it must be settled now, mustn’t it – we need some now “controversies”. Some suggestions from British musical comedian Mitch Benn:
And from him, to NPR’s Peter Sagal:
… actually, his twitter feed has a million of them. Mostly not very good, but loads of them.
lamh34
@ABL:
here, here, ABL, I don’t watch much on NBC, but I will damn sure be apart of any boycott of NBC.
I’m angry too abl!
me
Didn’t see this linked yet.
Trump Unable To Produce Certificate Proving He’s Not A Festering Pile Of Shit
BGinCHI
@me: And this right under it:
http://www.theonion.com/articles/walmart-greeter-knows-exactly-how-many-blacks-in-s,20085/
Superluminar
@Corner Stone
you may be right there…
/forgiving you for blowing my trollish cover on EDK’s thread
Citizen_X
@Comrade Mary: Oh Christ, that was awesome.
Usually don’t love Tweety, but when he gets ahold of a bone he can be pretty good.
slag
@Midnight Marauder: Yeah. I think you’re right. I just got done reading your comment on this in the previous thread and thought it was compelling enough to reference here. Having killed my teevee long ago for the very reasons you state, I find it hard to see much bright side here.
Now, I’m going to say something that people are going to dislike. I do think it’s important to cover this shit, to some degree. Because it shows the level of crazy we’re dealing with as a nation. And I think that’s useful knowledge. But, as always, the amount of coverage it receives and the way in which it’s covered really matter. And those two points are hard to address with “newshole” statistics.
I don’t think crazy, when it’s so obviously politically influential, should be allowed to lurk in the shadows. What they say about news being history’s first draft is relevant here. I just which we didn’t have such crappy first drafts to go by.
russell
“newshole”?
asiangrrlMN
I am so pissed off about this, I can’t even go there right now (plus, I’m blogging about it and don’t want to lose my ire before I finish the post). This media bullshit is just the fucking maraschino cherry on the shitcake of birferism.
I am furious at the fuckers. My song of the day seems very appropriate here. Millie Jackson: Fuck you.
@slag: Covering it is one thing. However, featuring these batshitcrazies and not saying, “This is racist bullshit and patently untrue*” is another. There is a truth out there. They need to state it. They don’t because they want to goose their ratings. Assholes.
*Without the swears.
In addition, they never covered the truthers with this much zeal. Without context, their coverage is meaningless at best and harmful at worst.
Lolis
HuffPo currently has a front page article all about how this birther fabrication is Obama’s fault and not the GOP’s. HuffPo gives me the skivvies. This meme is truly vile. Republicans sure are assholes and entirely without shame.
JPL
Tapper used the word lie on ABC News in describing the birthers comments.. He then talked about Trump..
WaterGirl
@me: My first laugh of the day. Thanks for that.
Edit: @AkaDad: Good!
EconWatcher
@slag:
Boehner a nutjob? I don’t think so. He’s an old-school country club Republican trying to get bidness done in an environment where a large portion of his caucus is nuts.
I catch myself sometimes kinda feeling sorry for the guy.
Midnight Marauder
@slag:
I absolutely agree with you and that is why I find it appalling that anyone could offer praise to Tapper for writing an article that is flagrantly disingenuous in how it approaches President Obama’s remarks today. If the Traditional Media covered birthers with a consistent framing of “Look at what these crazy motherfuckers are up to now,” then a think a lot of the criticism they received on this front would go away.
But when you get put on blast by the President of The United States for enabling a racist propaganda movement, your initial response should not be to write about the great “untruth” he uttered in calling you out.
It’s a rather telling moment in terms of just how much someone “gets” what’s really going on this day and age.
FlipYrWhig
At this rate, one day soon our media stars will disappear up their own newsholes.
slag
@asiangrrlMN:
I couldn’t agree with this more. That’s a big friggin deal. And there are depressingly few among the Serious People with the leadership capacity to really bring it. It’s a travesty of our so-called meritocracy.
slag
@EconWatcher: Right. I think it’s vaguely possible that Obama’s trying to make it a little easier for Boehner to marginalize the nutjobs.
Midnight Marauder
@EconWatcher:
Does it often look like this?
WaterGirl
@slag: Hmm. I don’t see this as trying to make it easier for the orange guy.
I think this was Obama sending a message to the republicans and the media:: Pick a side. Do you politicians and media idiots really want to be on the side of the idiots and racists? Pick a side, because so far you’ve been complicit with this racist nonsense, and i’m gonna make sure all the reasonable people see that. This is your last chance to get it right.
That’s how I took it, anyway.
Chuck Butcher
@slag:
Cripes on a jumping crutch – country club in this nut case milleau maybe, but not on a fucking bet historically or by his own damn rhetoric over the years. What kind of fucking Republicans are you two? Attention span consisting of moments?
slag
@Midnight Marauder:
In general, I think pretty much everyone’s first response tends to be self-defense. And that’s obviously what this was. But I agree, that doesn’t make it right. Especially, when it becomes a question of semantics, which it appears this was. Tapper’s argument was tangential at best, intellectually dishonest at worst. I am no longer remotely sympathetic to it. Which, quite frankly, I’m relieved by :).
gex
@Badtux: There are a fair number of 27%ers who went to school when segregation was the law of the land and Hawaii *wasn’t* a state. That combo is a petri dish for birtherism.
Chuck Butcher
@slag:
Damn, as was pointed out in the comments on Poynter’s “newshole” is a bullshit methodology minimizing the actuallity.
JCT
@FlipYrWhig:
Never to be heard from again? Nirvana!
hilts
Pollster, Democratic political strategist, and Fox News whore Doug Schoen loves Trump’s strategy
h/t http://washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/op-eds/2011/04/first-lesson-trump-candidacy
TaMara (BHF)
@Villago Delenda Est: This is way too reasonable and intelligent. You would not survive in the current media.
But other than that, I agree completely with you.
gex
@Corner Stone: Can we just take it as read that Nick has told us so about every topic posted?
El Cid
@General Stuck:
Funny times then.
From 1961, in a battle to lead the National Students Association (Time):
EconWatcher
@Chuck Butcher:
I doubt that Boehner has any real ideology at all. His focus is appeasing K Street lobbyists, corraling his caucus, and getting to the links by mid-afternoon, so that he won’t be late for cocktail hour.
Not a nutjob. This is a business for him. But he has to deal with the crew he’s been assigned, and throw a few bones to the base every now and then. That’s my read, anyway.
lamh34
Can someone explain to me why it seems that international media covers US stories with more integrity than our own “esteemed press corps”????
Republicans will rue their birther backing
slag
@WaterGirl: Haha! It could be that. But as Chuck Butcher implies, we measure racist, idiot nutjobs on a sliding scale. So, “pick a side” is probably more like “Come a little closer to this side of the wingularity; I won’t hurt you, I swear.”
Splitting Image
@slag:
Heh. Beautiful.
gex
@asiangrrlMN: Ah, so glad to see the swears are back. I’m firmly convinced I’d end up on heroin if I couldn’t swear. And then I’d probably swear when I was out of the stuff.
@slag: Frankly, their bosses won’t allow it. Whether it be the “journalists” and their corporate bosses or Republicans who need to win at all costs for the money men.
Chuck Butcher
@slag:
If that was an implication, I’m sorry I was so subtle. Boehner has a record and it isn’t country club and that’s all there is to it. What he looks like in comparison is ridiculous as a measure and politically ignorant regarding its implications. This is like calling Attila the Hun a reasonable Nazi-ist.
Elizabelle
@WaterGirl:
Well said with comments 34 and 64. Agree with you.
Chuck Butcher
Golly, let’s try this – The Ryan Plan made it to a winning vote in the House and the Majority Leader isn’t Ryan or anyone other than Boehner. Ummm? Which Country Club was that again?
lamh34
Damn!
Lawrence O’Donnell just went ALL IN ON TRUMP!!!! Ya’ll gotta get the video when available
slag
@Chuck Butcher: Maybe. But he’s in a position of power now. And people in positions of power generally like to get shit done. It tends to make them feel more powerful. And in order to get shit done, he’s going to have to work with a Dem Senate and Exec. For whatever that’s worth.
Just Some Fuckhead
Boner is a nutjob. Look where he came from, what he represented when he came in. Just because the rest of the party went further right doesn’t make him sort sorta honest broker.
Chuck Butcher
@slag:
That’s a nice thought, hold onto it. The GOP proved that “Say No” was a winning strategy from 2008 on and being the “dishonorable” opposition may play large in their thinking. Crash the car again and blame the passengers – again.
Chuck Butcher
@Just Some Fuckhead:
Hmmm, you must be over 30 years old…
Midnight Marauder
@EconWatcher:
John Boehner’s ideology consists of the following:
That is all.
Just Some Fuckhead
@Chuck Butcher: A bit.
Chuck Butcher
@Just Some Fuckhead:
Uh, yeah – me too, just a biiiiiiitttt.
dogwood
@ABL:
Well, ABL, as a white person, I want you to know I’m also offended and pissed the fuck off. I turned off NBC as soon a Trump started doing the rounds. His interview on the Today Show where Meredith V just sat there and let him spew his racist crap was it for me. It was a pure conflict of interest. One of the reasons that this talk radio, internet, Fox News crap bubbles it’s way up to the MSM is that Democrats and liberals don’t put pressure on the way wingnuts do. I hope someone gets a hold of the advertisers on the Apprentice and a good old fashioned letter writing campaign begins. I don’t understand why groups like The Color of Change who did a good job turning advertisers away from Beck aren’t all over this.
geg6
@dogwood:
THIS!
Beautifully said.
Brian R.
As others have said, even if the media did only devote 4% of it’s time to this stupid bullshit, that’s still too much.
We had Birchers spewing crazy shit back in the early ’60s too. The difference was that back then the media didn’t feel the need to treat insane people as credible sources.
Nick
If the news is covering literally 100 stories, 4% is ALOT
Chuck Butcher
The Newhole bullshit is about headlines not content inside those headlines.
bemused
@me:
Great Onion.
I try not to look at Trump very closely but I couldn’t help but notice in the huge Onion photo that he has very small, girly lips for a manly man.
Chad N Freude
I am SO going to steal this.
Chuck Butcher
@Chad N Freude:
no (C) on that, feel free
Another Bob
It’s the ultimate tyranny: saying that something is true when it’s false. Birthers are not merely stubborn or unreasonable, they’re bullies. This “debate” is not about convincing birthers one way or the other, because of course they’ll never allow themselves to be convinced. For them, their insistence is more like forcing someone to eat dirt. That’s why I hate these fuckers so much — not because they’re misguided or foolish, but because they’re such assholes.
bcinaz
hmmm…just 4%? If that’s just 4% on FOX, that translates to about 1000 hours in the past couple of years, and probably none of them from midnight to dawn.
Midnight Marauder
@Chuck Butcher:
Right. And both the headlines, and the content inside those headlines, featured birther nonsense.
That is a distinction without a difference.
Corner Stone
@gex: Usually Nick only “tells us so” on threads involving the media, media narrative, etc.
Nick seems to think his job as editor-in-chief of Mom’s Basement Times allows him to derive the actual narrative of the MSM, et al.
Corner Stone
@Superluminar: I wasn’t blowing your cover, that was ultra obvious to everyone but EDK.
Svensker
@Brian R.:
My husband and I were saying this same thing tonite at dinner. Could you imagine Walter Cronkite giving those bozos a minute of respectful time?
pattonbt
4%. Said like it’s an insignificant amount. That basically equates to an hour of every days news broadcast. One hour a day devoted to a several years ago debunked conspiracy theory. An hour a day, and they have the balls to act like it’s nothing.
Put me in the mad, sad, hope may be lost category on todays events. We just had the president of the US come out on national TV, forced to do a “breaking” press conference to display his birth certificate. This is what the US has come to. A damned disgrace.
dww44
Bad weather in these parts caused me to stay up for the 11 p.m. weather on the local CBS affilliate, the dominant TV station in the area. After a 2 1/2 minute coverage on the birther issue, in which they give the “issue” credence by calling it an “issue that may not be resolved” they announced the results of the web poll conducted since the 6 p.m. news in which 66% of those voting opined that they still weren’t convinced that Obama was a natural born citizen of the states. I am white and Southern and totally disgusted. How the young black female anchor sits there and doesn’t get totally pissed, I simply do not know.
4jkb4ia
Think about Peter King and his ridiculous Muslim hearings. If Fox News and company was the only source of news, that sort of bigotry would be what everyone heard every day.
/obviously not finished off by tornado. Mother-in-law lost power for a whole day and all the Passover food in the refrigerator died. I prepared food for her. Husband took me to see the damage on St. Charles Rock Road. Several buildings were smashed to be unfit for human habitation. Sulzberger Jr. story about airport amusing.