Barack Obama was born in Hawaii, and Lou Dobbs knows it. I don't believe I'd be bothering to comment on the idiotic claim of "controversy" about President Barack Obama's birth certificate, if not for James Carville's appearance with Liz Cheney on Larry King, which I just noticed by chance. What caught my attention was Carville's description of the staunch birthers as, if I recall correctly, "poor folks," meaning not their incomes but their victim status in a crass mixture of race politics and slumping ad revenues, and his description of the whole "controversy" as based on just a "simple thing" or actually its absence.
The "simple thing" I think he meant is the lacking integrity of a few trusted figures. The story continues to be earnestly trusted only because "authorities" or authoritative sources such as Liz Cheney -- and Lou Dobbs -- treat this ridiculous, totally debunked canard as a legitimate question. And I understand Lou Dobbs asks it quite frequently, and has more time to talk to a larger audience than Ms. Cheney has. That, for me, cleared up a lot. It's utter nonsense, but now I can understand how it's persisting.
(Edit 1: Jon Stewart's birther coverage, thanks to hopalong)
Liz Cheney obviously wants to make trouble for the President to keep the former Veep out of prison, but she couldn't have started or maintained such a hoax on her own, and I finally see who is perpetuating it, and how. Not everybody has a computer, and not everybody who does is proficient with search engines or rigorous about fact verification. Many people, especially consumers of corporate media, believe based on trust, not based on any methodical process of proof. I think I've gotten used to being able to quickly check as many conflicting sources as necessary in order to prove or falsify a statement of fact in a political debate, and somewhat forgotten what it's like to depend on newspapers and television for information about national politics. Even a few hundred cable channels don't compare to informed use of the Internet and convenient access to it. So these unfortunate people depend on Lou Dobbs for facts, and he knows it, and he's lying to them, and that is why I think he should be fired.
It's obviously racist as well, but then we all know the market will bear a certain amount of racism; some people want to hear some racist opinions -- thinly veiled or blatant, seasoned to taste -- on their televisions now and then. But what finally made the difference for me, to call publicly for Dobbs to be fired, was the assertion by his boss that Dobbs' take on the Birther Movement [BM] lie is somehow his "editorial" prerogative.
Asked if CNN is concerned that Dobbs' repeated granting of airtime to theories the network has conclusively debunked amounts to overkill and could harm CNN's credibility, Klein brushed off the possibility. "We respect our viewers enough to present them the facts and let them make up their own minds," he said, adding that what Dobbs does is "his editorial decision to make."
Well, that dog just don't hunt, boy. Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts.
Barack Obama's mother was a citizen of the United States, and his birth certificate has passed the scrutiny of factcheck.org and of John McCain's presidential campaign. Nobody has ever had more incentive to dispute President Obama's citizenship than Senator McCain had, but he found that there is no evidence that the Hawaiian birth certificate shown on factcheck.org is subject to any doubt.
Lou Dobbs is a race baiter and a shoddy "journalist." Even to his xenophobic audience, he owes better fact-checking. He encourages low-information viewers to make asses of themselves. He is not to be trusted and has no place in the profession of journalism.
Please help petition for the firing of Lou Dobbs.