Well, it was bound to happen sooner or later. Detroit News editorial page whatever-his-title-is Nolan Finley has gone down the birther wormhole in order to defend Mitt Romney from Democrats cribbing Newt Gingrich's Bain Capital attack strategy.
Nolan Finley: Every company Romney invested in is being fine-tooth-combed. But Obama's association with Wright, domestic terrorist William Ayers and anarchist Saul Alinsky are pooh-poohed. Ask a question about the president's college records, his law school writings or new reports that he claimed to be born in Kenya to sell books and you're dismissed as a crazy birther.
Yeah, no one has ever talked about any of those things before. Except for the million times people talked about them during the 2008 campaign.
Obama was associated with Jeremiah Wright until he stopped being associated with him after revelations of Wright saying some nutty things. There's really not much more too it then that. We may as well also ask why Nolan Finley won't do anything about his employee Henry Payne's association with crazy racist John Derbyshire before Derbyshire was revealed to be a white supremacist. Maybe Payne knew Derbyshire was a fumigated David Duke all along and, as with Obama and Wright, he secretly shares Derbyshire's radical worldview. That theory seems completely implausible with both Payne/Derbyshire and Obama/Wright but, you know, can we take that chance?
William Ayers had been a domestic terrorist in the 1960s, but apparently redeemed himself enough to sit on an Annenberg Foundation board with Barack Obama. The Annenberg Foundation was, at the time, run by Ronald Reagan's good friend Walter Annenberg. Why was Ronald Reagan palling around with guys who pal around with terrorists?
Anarchist Saul Alinsky died when Obama was ten years old, so it's hard to know what to make of their "association." Mainly because they never associated with each other. Also, I'm not so sure it's accurate to call Alinsky an anarchist. He was an anti-communist left-winger, but there is very little evidence to suggest Alinsky believed (as anarchist's do) "all forms of governmental authority to be unnecessary and undesirable." Hey, look, Nolan Finley is your new Roy Cohn!
But, really, as petty and specious as the Wright-Ayers-Alinksy canard is, it's par for the course in politics. You should have heard what Adams and Jefferson said about each other back in 1800. What's truly remarkable is Finley's birtherism. He's a hair's breadth away from accusing Eisenhower of spying for the Russians.
There are no "new reports" that Obama claimed he was born in Kenya. Just new reports that publishing industry PR people are morons. And, yes, if you believe that Obama claimed to have been born in Kenya to sell books then you are a crazy birther because there is no evidence to suggest that. The end.
Even if there were actual "new reports" that Obama claimed to have been born in Kenya, it doesn't matter. It is a demonstrable fact that he was born in Hawaii to an American mother, which makes him a natural-born American citizen and instantly eligible to be president after the age of 35.
There could be new reports that Texas Senate candidate Craig James killed 5 hookers while a student at Southern Methodist University and, hopefully, no one would take them seriously because the Craig James killing hookers story is demonstrably false.
But, really, you can understand why Nolan Finley went birther. I mean, if you had the choice between siding with logic and reason or Orly Taitz, you'd probably choose the unhinged dental lawyer too. -- JTW
