Birtherism: Worst. Trap. Ever. By Adam Serwer

For the past couple of weeks, I've been writing about Republican politicians' birther problem.

Whether or not the issue is one of mere symbolic belief or genuine agreement among large segments of the Republican base, GOP leaders feel obligated to mollify those among their base who believe the outlandish conspiracy theory that president wasn't born in the United States or that he's secretly a Muslim.
But now former President George W. Bush adviser Karl Rove has come up with a new conspiracy theory that is less dumb than the original one, but not by much. According to Rove, the White House wants Republicans to continue raising doubts about Obama's citizenship in order to make the GOP look kooky:


"We need the leaders of our party to say, 'Look, stop falling into the trap of the White House and focus on the real issues,'" he said. Spending time and energy on -- and getting media attention for -- comments about where the president was born is a distraction that discredits the lawmakers and candidates making the remarks, he said.

Rove said he thinks that the Obama administration relishes the continued existence of the birther movement because it distracts from how the president is handling policy issues. "Look, these guys may be lousy at governing ... but they're damn good at politics," he said. "It fits into the White House theme line."


The problem, of course, is that at least one recent poll showed that a majority of Republicans have doubts about the president's citizenship, which explains the rise of "post-birtherism." Republican leaders don't want to anger a large section of their base by flatly calling this stuff what it is, which is nuts. So the new approach is to joke about it or to carefully avoid denouncing the idea completely.


The White House didn't force GOP Presidential hopeful Tim Pawlenty to make a birther joke at CPAC. It's also worth noting that three Republican congressional leaders recently gave the same exact answer to questions about the President's faith and citizenship:

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell on Meet The Press last August: "The president says he's a Christian. I take him at his word. I don't think that's in dispute."

House Speaker John Boehner on Meet the Press last Sunday: "[I]t's not my job to tell the American people what to think. Our job in Washington is to listen to the American people. Having said that, the state of Hawaii has said that he was born there. That's good enough for me. The president says he's a Christian. I accept him at his word."

Tea Party Caucus Chair Michele Bachmann told Good Morning America, "We should take the president at his word" that he was born in the U.S.

It's a very scripted answer, one obviously designed to dodge the question by leaving open the possibility that the president might simply be lying. It prevents the speaker from sounding paranoid about the president's background without suggesting that there's something weird about thinking otherwise.

The idea that the issue is a "trap" is belied by the ease with which Republican leaders could shut the entire matter down. All they have to do is say it's silly. Yesterday, Arizona Republican Congressman Jeff Flake showed how easy this is by simply telling CNN, "Barack Obama is a citizen of the country. We ought to get off this kick."

If birtherism is a "trap," it's the worst trap ever.