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[RedKing]

Lies, Damned Lies, and Statistics.



That is all I've got to say about that.

Having taken courses in both statistics and polling, I would disagree. Poll data is typically pretty good, although it can be skewed by exactly *how* a question is phrased or how the results are interpreted.

[Aqizzar]

I hate to say it, but you'll have to take it up with the pollsters.  Having been trained as one myself, they catch a lot of crap they don't deserve.  Harris and McClatchy are big names precisely because they don't mince words; although it is fair to say that the only people who can really judge pollsters are other pollsters, being such a competitive lot, they're actually pretty good at that.  It is worth saying though, that political polls tend to over-represent much older people, despite the best efforts of demographic reweighting.  And I can say from very definitive experience that you can go to any group of 55-and-older people in America, and you can't shake a stick without finding a few who fervently believe Barack Obama literally lied his way into American citizenship and the Presidency based on a multi-decade plot funded by George Soros and the ACLU, and will get fighting mad over any attempt to prove otherwise.  And a pretty good number of people below that age for that matter.

Producing a birth certificate and proxy-capping bin Laden in one week did turn a lot of ordinary folk around, but it's an undeniable fact that a solid portion of the American populace curse the ground he walks on, for reasons having absolutely nothing to do with rational reality, and will never be convinced otherwise.  How large is unknowable, but when multiple accredited professional opinion research institutions produce numbers hovering around 50% within self-described members of one party prior to that critical week, it really can't be talked down very far.

[Strife26]

Very well, I'll let it drop.



_{Are people really that crazy . . .}

[Il Palazzo]

I wouldn't want to hijack this thread with some random dwelling on conspiracy theories, but could somebody briefly explain the whole birth certificate issue? I've been seeing this popping up every now and then, and treated it as one of the "wacky Americuns" anecdotes, but never thought it was so widespread a belief.
So, what was the problem? Why did he take so long to produce this certificate if it's such a big issue?

[knaveofstaves]

In the spirit of lies, damned lies, &c., here's some numbers from Pew, taken between March 30th and April 3rd 2011, on just exactly what President Obama might be risking.

The important bit: a slight majority of Republicans (51%) think it's a very important goal for the United States to protect Israel, but only 36% of independents and 34% of Democrats feel the same. In cases where independents and Democrats feel approximately the same way, Obama wins elections by doing what his base wants him to do. Of the five options tested, protecting Israel came last, among Democrats and independents alike.

[nenjin]

So, what was the problem? Why did he take so long to produce this certificate if it's such a big issue?

From Obama's camp, it was an issue of not dignifying such an attack with a response. It was on electronic file, was verified by the media early on, and most rational people considered it a closed issue. And that's where the conspiracy started. He didn't produce the actual, physical document, nor did anyone, so everyone who didn't want to let it drop clung to that. Nevermind it's a paper document outside the proper US from 40 some odd years ago.

Put it another way, if someone calls you a liar on public knowledge (public knowledge being freely available public documents), how far do you go to disagree with them before you're wasting energy and media attention on a non-issue? In truth, it's just payback for what Democrats and Liberals did to George W. Bush: they demanded his service records and claimed there were cover ups and doctoring, yadda yadda. But Republicans and Conservatives dialed that tactic up a notch by questioning Obama's citizenship. And to be fair to conservatives' world view, a black man one generation removed from foreign citizenship, with two parts of his name like our worst enemies....to them it's the kind of thing that demand scrutiny.

Eventually, the Obama administration decided to give an official response to the whole issue and made it a point of making birthers look like idiots because they still wouldn't accept the fact, after so long. Trump's timing of picking up the birther issue couldn't have been poorer. It was a sinking ship and he captained the helm, and then got served at the White House Correspondent's dinner. It's now a dead issue.

[knaveofstaves]

I wouldn't want to hijack this thread with some random dwelling on conspiracy theories, but could somebody briefly explain the whole birth certificate issue? I've been seeing this popping up every now and then, and treated it as one of the "wacky Americuns" anecdotes, but never thought it was so widespread a belief.
So, what was the problem? Why did he take so long to produce this certificate if it's such a big issue?

Oh. Oh, Jesus. Oh, you did ask, didn't you. Here's a Google search if you don't value your sanity.

The state of Hawaii, where every rational person knows Barack Obama was born, only provides a "certificate of live birth" or "short-form" birth certificate, which anybody could see. Hawaii had to pass a bill allowing their department of health to deny multiple requests from the same source, though, the workload was becoming too much. Two successive governors of Hawaii, one from each party, said that Barack Obama was a natural-born citizen of the United States. Two Hawaiian newspapers carried birth announcements for Barack Obama, available in their records for anyone who cared to look.

I don't know why he eventually released the long-form, nor why eventually was now. According to the timeline as I understand it he released his long-form birth certificate on April 27th, before he was certain he would be giving the order for the OBL raid, so if there was an attempt to drop the birth certificate down the memory hole it couldn't have been a sure thing. Nor, if it were an attempt to memory-hole, would that be a problem for me -- if it were to help put the issue to bed sooner, all the better.

There might be a fundraising angle, Obama's reelection campaign is hawking merch with the certificate on it.

I don't know why so many were irrational for so long -- I tend to put it down to tribalism, saying "Barack Obama wasn't born here" was just part of the package of a raft of beliefs, not actually held as an opinion, more said as a shibboleth. About half of birthers gave it up in the four days following the long-form certificate's release, or approximately thirty million people abandoning a preposterous idea at once. That's impressive, I guess, if only one doesn't consider how many believed it to start, or how they came to believe it.

[nenjin]

About half of birthers gave it up in the four days following the long-form certificate's release, or approximately thirty million people abandoning a preposterous idea at once. That's impressive, I guess, if only one doesn't consider how many believed it to start, or how they came to believe it.

Kind of mind blowing watching masses of humanity change their minds based purely on information. Anyways, it's just been a trend of Obama's presidency that those who truly dislike him will agree to the plausibility of just about any negative statement until it's been utterly debunked. Again I'd compare it to how GWB was viewed by demos and liberals, except their anger was more directed at the executive orders, wiring tapping, torture and military action.

[knaveofstaves]

Kind of mind blowing watching masses of humanity change their minds based purely on information.

And even more mindblowing to see how many people set their minds based purely on misinformation, but, sure, what you said is true too.

Anyways, it's just been a trend of Obama's presidency that those who truly dislike him will agree to the plausibility of just about any negative statement until it's been utterly debunked. Again I'd compare it to how GWB was viewed by demos and liberals, except their anger was more directed at the executive orders, wiring tapping, torture and military action.

Your comparison is poor, because the right-wing's claims of Obama's Kenyan birth and Muslim faith are lies, while George W. Bush really did expand the use of executive orders and wiretaps, really did torture (according to the Republicans' 2008 nominee for the presidency), and really did start two Middle Eastern wars.

OTOH, every time a bell rings an angel gets his wings you bring up Dubya an undecided voter becomes a Democrat, so, God love you and your false equivalencies.

[RedKing]

About half of birthers gave it up in the four days following the long-form certificate's release, or approximately thirty million people abandoning a preposterous idea at once. That's impressive, I guess, if only one doesn't consider how many believed it to start, or how they came to believe it.

Kind of mind blowing watching masses of humanity change their minds based purely on information. Anyways, it's just been a trend of Obama's presidency that those who truly dislike him will agree to the plausibility of just about any negative statement until it's been utterly debunked. Again I'd compare it to how GWB was viewed by demos and liberals, except their anger was more directed at the executive orders, wiring tapping, torture and military action.

It's been a trend before Obama and Dubya. I'd say the really kooky levels of disbelief in reality started with Clinton. By the mid-nineties, you had a fair 12-20% of the populace that honestly believed that he had a fleet of black helicopters and was going to use those, FEMA and the BATF to seize all guns in the United States, declare martial law, and then...well, that's where it frayed apart. Some said rule as a dictator. Some said hand over control of the US to the United Nations. Some said exterminate Christianity. It would have been laughable, had it not influenced certain people to...y'know, blow up a Federal building and kill hundreds of people. 

I don't remember the batshit crazy being there with Bush I or Reagan (ok, there was always a segment that hated Reagan but they didn't honestly believe he was involved in bizarre conspiracy plots. Which is ironic, considering that Iran-Contra happened and he actually was getting advice from an astrologer.)

[nenjin]

That's plausible to me. Clinton was the first real Democrat that threatened conservatives since JFK and RFK. Conservatives had enjoyed their heyday in the 80s with Reagan and seemingly continuing with Bush. Clinton was the first real halting of Republican and Conservative power by a popular democrat in a decades. So I'm not surprised the really entrenched elements started losing touch around then, and have just gotten worse. Plus there was Waco and other things making them even more paranoid.

When you get down to it, people on both sides of the spectrum are terrified of their governments doing the exact same things to them for the exact same reasons....it's just like, the lighting and the angle at which they sneer that differs.

[DJ]

I think the real issue for 90% of the birthers is the fact that Obama is black.

[Il Palazzo]

Thanks guys, together with the stuff (so easily)available online, I feel much more educated on the subject.
As a kind of a rethorical question, I wonder if had it been McCain to win the presidential elections, would've he become attacked by a similar birther movement? Him being born in Panama and so on.

[RedKing]

I think the real issue for 90% of the birthers is the fact that Obama is black.

Racist! 

I've never quite understood the logic behind the counter-accusation that if you point out that a number of Obama's most vocal opponents are...shall we say, dog whistling about race...that it makes you a racist for noticing. It makes me think of Colbert's vaunted "color-blindness" where he pretends to be so self-righteously unracist that he doesn't even perceive color.

[nenjin]

Your comparison is poor, because the right-wing's claims of Obama's Kenyan birth and Muslim faith are lies, while George W. Bush really did expand the use of executive orders and wiretaps, really did torture (according to the Republicans' 2008 nominee for the presidency), and really did start two Middle Eastern wars.

I was being generous to Republicans. And we all seem to forget Loose Change, don't we?

OTOH, every time a bell rings an angel gets his wings you bring up Dubya an undecided voter becomes a Democrat, so, God love you and your false equivalencies.

You know, I'm a liberal and a registered democrat and I still find that attitude annoying. Just like I did back then, when I still was a liberal and a registered democrat. But thanks for reminding anyone why it was hard to get any conservatives to even listen back then, on issues that really mattered.

Him being born in Panama and so on.

Depends on whether he would have (rightfully) told the Tea Party to put a sock in it or not. I would have loved to see pictures of McCain with a little sombrero on though.