WND's Farah should be destroying Corsi's Birther book in embarrassment - But they just changed the premise of the book instead!
The following should be a real news story, and not a satire:
In a stunning development one day after the release of Where's the Birth Certificate? The Case that Barack Obama is not Eligible to be President, by Dr. Jerome Corsi, World Net Daily Editor and Chief Executive Officer Joseph Farah has announced plans to recall and pulp the entire 200,000 first printing run of the book, as well as announcing an offer to refund the purchase price to anyone who has already bought either a hard copy or electronic download of the book.
In an exclusive interview, a reflective Farah, who wrote the book's foreword and also published Corsi's earlier best-selling work, Unfit for Command: Swift Boat Veterans Speak out Against John Kerry and Capricorn One: NASA, JFK, and the Great "Moon Landing" Cover-Up, said that after much serious reflection, he could not go forward with the project. "I believe with all my heart that Barack Obama is destroying this country, and I will continue to stand against his administration at every turn, but in light of recent events, this book has become problematic, and contains what I now believe to be factual inaccuracies," he said this morning. "I cannot in good conscience publish it and expect anyone to believe it."
When asked if he had any plans to publish a corrected version of the book, he said cryptically, "There is no book." Farah declined to comment on his discussions of the matter with Corsi.
A source at WND, who requested that his name be withheld, said that Farah was "rip-shit" when, on April 27, President Obama took the extraordinary step of personally releasing his "long-form" birth certificate, thus resolving the matter of Obama's legitimacy for "anybody with a brain."
"He called up Corsi and really tore him a new one," says the source. "I mean, we'll do anything to hurt Obama, and erase his memory, but we don't want to look like fucking idiots, you know? Look, at the end of the day, bullshit is bullshit."
But of course, it is a satire:
UPDATE, 12:25 p.m., for those who didn't figure it out yet, and the many on Twitter for whom it took a while: We committed satire this morning to point out the problems with selling and marketing a book that has had its core premise and reason to exist gutted by the news cycle, several weeks in advance of publication. Are its author and publisher chastened? Well, no. They double down, and accuse the President of the United States of perpetrating a fraud on the world by having released a forged birth certificate. Not because this claim is in any way based on reality, but to hold their terribly gullible audience captive to their lies, and to sell books. This is despicable, and deserves only ridicule. That's why we committed satire in the matter of the Corsi book. Hell, even the president has a sense of humor about it all. Some more serious reporting from us on this whole "birther" phenomenon here, here, and here.
Apparently, Farah is taking it about as well as you'd expect a paranoid right-wing crank to: He's threatening to sue:
Joseph Farah, editor and chief executive officer of World Net Daily Books, which published Corsi’s work, said he never spoke to the magazine and that the book is “selling briskly.”
“I have never spoken to anyone from Esquire. Never uttered these words or anything remotely resembling them to anyone. It is a complete fabrication,” Farah told The Daily Caller. “The book is selling briskly. I am 100 percent behind it.”
...Farah said he is considering “legal options” against the magazine for posting the story .
“Let me say this very clearly: There is not a single word of that report that is true. I assume it is a very poorly executed parody. In any case, I have begun exploring our legal options, since this report has all the earmarkings of a deliberate attempt at restraint of trade, not to mention libel.”
Of course he's sticking to his guns. Farah -- who advised Donald Trump to jump aboard the Birther bandwagon and who devoted his National Tea Party Convention speech to a defense of Birtherism, -- is deeply invested in the story. And it's in the nature of conspiracy theorists never to give up in the face of devastating evidence, but rather to transform that evidence into further proof of their conspiracy theory.
Gee, I wonder if Sean Hannity will ask Corsi about this the next time he has him on his Fox show.
White Nationalists
All this is coming on the heels of the news that Corsi's book was written with the help of far-right white nationalists. Just yesterday, as
Eric Hananoki at Media Matters reported, one of the nation's most prominent white nationalists popped up and claimed credit for having helped assemble portions of the book:James Edwards
As the SPLC's David Holthouse reported back in 2007:The host of a self-described "pro-white" radio program has claimed that he helped WorldNetDaily reporter Jerome Corsi with a story related to Corsi's new book, Where's the Birth Certificate?: The Case that Barack Obama is not Eligible to be President.
James Edwards writes today that Corsi "personally e-mailed me a few months ago for some assistance on a story closely related to the contents of this book. I was happy to oblige and work behind-the-scenes with both Dr. Corsi and World Net Daily on this matter."
Edwards is the host of the "pro-white" radio program The Political Cesspool. The show's website states: "We represent a philosophy that is pro-White ... We wish to revive the White birthrate above replacement level fertility and beyond to grow the percentage of Whites in the world relative to other races." The show regularly features a guest roster of "pro-white" figures like David Duke and "neo-Nazi activist April Gaede."
"The Political Cesspool" in the past two years has become the primary radio nexus of hate in America. Its sponsors include the CCC and the Institute for Historical Review, a leading Holocaust denial organization. Its guest roster for 2007 reads like a "Who's Who" of the radical racist right. CCC leader Gordon Lee Baum, Holocaust denier Mark Weber, Canadian white supremacist Paul Fromm, American Renaissance editor Jared Taylor, neo-Nazi activist April Gaede, anti-Semitic professor Kevin MacDonald, Stormfront webmaster Jamie Kelso and League of the South president Michael Hill have all been favorably interviewed on the "Political Cesspool" this year, along with former Klan leader and neo-Nazi David Duke, the show's most frequent celebrity racist guest, who has logged three appearances.
Edwards is one of those slick young racists who knows to stay away from over race-baiting language in public as a way to buttress his claim that all he wants to do is promote the white race. But inevitably, as it always does with such folks, the cover eventually slips:
The "Cesspool" host is a rising star of the white nationalist movement because he's articulate, charming and equally at ease in a television studio, behind a radio microphone and standing in front of a crowd. He was a specially invited guest speaker at the CCC conference. His topic: "Creating Your Own Media." CCC National Field Coordinator Bill Lord told a "Martin Luther Coon" joke in his introduction of Edwards. Lord and other longtime CCC members casually dropped racial epithets at the conference, but Edwards carefully avoided using such crudely derogatory language, as he always does when speaking in public, on the airwaves or to the media. Edwards allies himself with hate group leaders who call black people "niggers," but he doesn't drop the N-bomb himself. Instead he speaks in the more or less polished code of a suit-and-tie racist, calling blacks "heathen savages," "subhumans," and "black animals," exclusively in the context of discussing violent black-on-white crime.
His audience of about 150 at the CCC conference included Jared Taylor, whose magazine specializes in race "studies," and Don Black, the former Alabama grand dragon of the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan and founder of Stormfront, the largest racist forum on the Internet.
Guys like Farah would never try to run and hide now that their mendacious ruse has been exposed -- they always double down, proceeding as if their credibility was every bit as sound as ever. Which, really, it is. As I explained
long ago, Farah never pays for having his conspiracy theories fall apart -- he just picks up and keeps moving. When the big "Y2K Apocalypse" he and his magazine ranted about for much of 1999 (a sample is here), Farah simply cleared his throat and pretended that it had all been a valuable lesson -- and then never raised it again.That's because, underneath the conspiracy theory facade, these guys really are committed to a radical far-right agenda, and the theories they promote are really just a way of conditioning people to buy into that agenda. That's what they're about.
Most of all, it's an extremely clear example of what is called
the Transmission Belt -- the way ideas and agendas move seamlessly from the fringes of the far right directly into the mainstream, thanks to characters like Farah and Corsi, and by extension to guys like Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh.Jerome Corsi
Where's The Birth Certificate?
Contains excerpts from a post on mediamatters.org May 18, 2011 by Ben Dimiero & Simon Maloy
Then it all fell apart.
In the intervening weeks, the birther "issue" has very publicly - and quite embarrassingly for prominent birthers like Corsi and former pretend presidential candidate Donald Trump - collapsed. Obama released his long-form birth certificate on April 27, demolishing the supposed impetus for Corsi's book and rendering it an amusing cultural artifact. In its published form, the book provides a glimpse into the fevered imaginations of some of the most prominent conspiracy theorists of the Obama era.
So, first things first: Where's The Birth Certificate?, Corsi asks in his book title. In the Foreword, WND CEO Joseph Farah repeats the question, saying that it has "dogged Obama throughout his term of office" and "may well cost him any chance for re-election in 2012."
Well, here it is:
NEXT
"Obama Has Usurped The Office of the Presidency"
Throughout Where's The Birth Certificate?, Corsi promotes a variety of conspiracy theories about Obama's past and how Obama's "media collaborators" have "conducted one of the most audacious cover-ups ever perpetrated at the highest level of American politics." (Where's The Birth Certificate? Page V)
At the end of the preface, Corsi posits the essential thesis of the book:
I write in the conviction that Obama has usurped the office of the presidency by waging a skillful public relations campaign to suppress the facts about his actual birth circumstances.
If he is not eligible to be president, he is also ineligible to command the armed forces defending this nation - a challenge several brave members of the military have dared to make, putting themselves at risk, and in at least one case actually losing his own liberty - in court-martial proceedings brought against them for refusal to obey orders.
Those of us who believe the Constitution of the United States is worth preserving, protecting, and defending intend to continue pressing the Obama eligibility argument until Barack Obama is either removed from office or forced to reveal the truth. [Where's the Birth Certificate? Page IX]
Instead Corsi uses specious arguments and ludicrous speculation in a desperate attempt to cast doubt on Obama's birthplace. (Actual arguments from the book include suggesting that Obama's grandparents planted the birth announcements in the Hawaii papers; dismissing the government issued certificate of live birth as a "computer-generated document"; and parsing the wording of a statement from the director of Hawaii's Department of Health to suggest that when she said she had "personally seen and verified that the Hawaii State Department of Health has Sen. Obama's original birth certificate on record in accordance with state policies and procedures," she was deliberately trying to obfuscate whether she had personally seen Obama's long-form.)
For a characteristic example of how Corsi's mind works, here's his treatment of an interview Obama gave to NBC News' Brian Williams in 2010:
During a televised interview on August 29, 2010, NBC Nightly News anchor Brian Williams asked Obama why more than one-fifth of Americans responding to recent polls believe he is a Muslim.
Oddly, Obama answered the question about his faith with a reference to his birth certificate: "Well, look, Brian I--I would say that I can't spend all of my times with my birth certificate plastered on my forehead. (LAUGHS) It -it is what--the facts are the facts. And so, it's not something that I can, I think, spend all my time worrying about."
Since Obama was not even asked about his birth certificate, his answer, viewed psychologically, could suggest he is self-conscious about his truthfulness regarding facts surrounding his birth. [Where's The Birth Certificate, Page VII-VIII]
We suppose it could suggest that. On the other hand, a rational person might view the comments as Obama acknowledging that no matter what he does, people are going to believe misinformation about him (nicely illustrated by the very existence of this book).
In his foreword, WND CEO Joseph Farah asserts that Obama "probably doesn't meet the simple requirements" to be president, or else he would have no reason for all of the "secrecy," "mystery," and "intrigue."
The release of Obama's long-form certificate proved even further that there was no there there. The information contained on Obama's long-form certificate confirmed all of the previous details about Obama's birth that Corsi had declared dubious.
In response to the entire basis of his book - and his last three years of work - being publicly demolished, Corsi has not backed down. Instead, he and his publisher, WorldNetDaily, have committed themselves to declaring Obama's long-form a "forgery" based on inane observations about things like smudged stamp ink.
WND still has a whole section of their store devoted to hawking birther wares like t-shirts, yard signs, and, of course, this book. Apparently, as long as there's money to be made in pushing conspiracy theories about Obama's eligibility, Corsi and WorldNetDaily are going to stick to their guns, no matter how unhinged it makes them look.
Birthers, Truthers, and White Supremacists: Meet the Cast of Where's The Birth Certificate?
Throughout his book, Corsi scoffs at critics who dismiss those obsessed with Obama's birth certificate as fringe nuts. However, a closer look at some of the cast of characters that populates Corsi's birther saga reveals a mix of conspiracy theorists, racists, and other fringe figures.
More than once, Corsi references the allegation made by former Hawaii elections clerk Tim Adams that "there's no birth certificate" for Barack Obama on file in Hawaii. (There is.)
Adams told WND it was "common knowledge" among Hawaii government officials that Obama didn't have a long-form certificate:
In a telephone interview, Adams told WND it was common knowledge among election officials it was common knowledge among election officials where he worked that no original, long-form birth certificate could be found at the Hawaii Department of Health.
"My supervisor came and told me, 'Of course, there's no birth certificate. What? You stupid,'" Adams said. "She usually spoke well, but in saying this she reverted to a Hawaiian dialect. I really didn't know how to respond to that. She said it and just walked off. She was quite a powerful lady." [Where's The Birth Certificate? Page 26]
Here's how Corsi describes where Adams first made his allegations about the supposedly non-existent birth certificate:
Adams told WND he has been telling other people his information for a long time, and is free to talk about it publically since he no longer has any confidentiality restrictions from his former employer, the Honolulu government.
Adams first brought his testimony to public attention when he was interviewed by James Edwards, the host of a weekly radio show on WLRM Radio in Memphis, Tennessee. [Where's The Birth Certificate? Page 270]
Corsi is referencing a June 2010 interview on James Edwards' The Political Cesspool radio program, which was broadcast that day from the 2010 Council of Conservative Citizens National Conference. The Southern Poverty Law Center describes the CoCC as a "white supremacist" "hate group." The CoCC states on its website that they "oppose all efforts to mix the races of mankind."
Edwards' "weekly radio show" describes itself as "pro-White." Edwards claimed that Adams was "in attendance" at the conference. Other guests on Edwards' show that day included several leaders within the white supremacist movement.
Corsi previously appeared on Edwards' program in July 2008 and was scheduled to make another appearance in August 2008 to promote his anti-Obama book Obama Nation. Corsi canceled the appearance following criticism by Media Matters and the Southern Poverty Law Center.
At the time, Media Matters highlighted several outrageous remarks by Edwards, including his claim that "for blacks in the Americas, slavery is the greatest thing that ever happened to them. Unfortunately, it's the worst thing that ever happened to white Americans." Edwards has also urged his followers to attend a speech by David Irving, who the ADL calls "one of the best-known Holocaust deniers in the world." Edwards wrote that "If you're anywhere near Alabama, and you want the chance to meet a real hero, mark August 26th on your calendar. That's the day David Irving, a survivor of the Jewish Holocaust against free speech, will be speaking at the Prattville Holiday Inn."
After Corsi canceled his appearance, Edwards responded by suggesting Media Matters is funded by wealthy liberals with "funny last names" and announcing that he and his co-host were "not rooting for either [presidential] candidate. We're rooting for white people."
In a post on his blog this week, Edwards
touted the
release of Corsi's book, noted that Corsi
previously appeared on his program and wrote
that Corsi "personally e-mailed me a few
months ago for some assistance on a story
closely related to the contents of this
book." Edwards explained that he was "happy
to oblige and work behind-the-scenes with
both Dr. Corsi and World Net Daily on this
matter." [**Corsi disputes Edwards'
comments. See the update at the bottom of
the post.]
9-11 Truther Philip Berg
Philip J. Berg surfaces repeatedly throughout Corsi's book, often in the context of the lawsuits he has filed about Obama's birth certificate and eligibility. Corsi is careful to stress that Berg is a "Democrat" in his descriptions, but he glosses over the fact that Berg is a 9-11 truther.
Here's how Corsi handles Berg's trutherism:
One of the earliest litigants was attorney Philip J. Berg, former deputy attorney general of Pennsylvania and a Democratic supporter of Hillary Clinton. Obama supporters like to characterize Berg as an extremist, activist attorney who in 2004 filed a RICO (Racketeer Influences and Corrupt Organizations Act) case on behalf of a World Trade Center maintenance worker, charging the Bush administration was complicit in the 9/11 attacks. [Where's The Birth Certificate, Page 285]
Well, yes. Obama supporters do like to characterize Berg as an extremist over his apparent trutherism, but Corsi doesn't explain why that is unfair. That's a bit like writing "Obama supporters like to characterize David Icke as an extremist because he believes several prominent world leaders are lizard people."
The lawsuit (PDF) filed on behalf of the maintenance worker alleges, among other things, that the twin towers and WTC building 7 were "destroyed by controlled demolition, as clearly proven by the laws of physics" and that the "demolition could only have been an 'inside job.'"
In a January 28, 2004, appearance on the now-defunct MSNBC program Scarborough Country [accessed via Nexis], Berg said that there is "no question that President Bush knew about it, it was very complicit in the events of 9/11."
In 2008, Berg asserted on a conservative radio show that "evidence" indicates that "Barack Obama, even though he states he was born in Hawaii ... was born in Kenya."
"Chicago Activist" Andy Martin
Corsi compiles a "Birth Certificate Issue" timeline and references "Chicago activist" Andy Martin's attempts to get Hawaii to release Obama's birth certificate.
Martin was largely credited with starting the rumor that Barack Obama was a Muslim. However, after speaking with anonymous sources in Hawaii, Martin later revised his theory about Obama's upbringing, claiming that Obama's "father was Frank Marshall Davis." (Davis was a political activist and poet who lived in Hawaii and features prominently in conspiracies about the identity of Obama's real father.)
In 2007, Martin filed a lawsuit against Media Matters and in a document claimed that "African-American judges ... circle the wagons and try to protect Barry." He also said that the actions of an African-American judge who presided over the case "show that African-Americans are willing to corrupt and abuse their-public offices to defend their own sleazy candidate for office."
After Sean Hannity hosted Martin to smear Obama prior to the 2008 election, Howard Kurtz reported that Fox News senior vice president Bill Shine told him "having that guy on was a mistake."
Martin apparently occupies the sweet spot between "too crazy for Fox News, but not too crazy for WorldNetDaily."
"Dentist And Attorney" Orly Taitz
Orly Taitz, a "Russian-born, California-based dentist and attorney," features prominently in Corsi's birther timeline, as well as his section about the various lawsuits that have been filed about Obama's birth certificate. Corsi mentions that Taitz has "perhaps drawn the most media attention among the lawyers challenging Obama's eligibility." This is undeniably true, insofar as much ink has been spilled documenting her utter ridiculousness. A brief and incomplete list of Taitz's various adventures:
- In 2009, Taitz displayed her critical thinking skills by running with what she claimed was a copy of Obama's original Kenyan birth certificate (a story eagerly promoted at the time by WorldNetDaily).
- In a 2009 interview with Salon, Taitz seemingly implied that Obama was having his previous gay lovers killed, saying that numerous gay men who had attended Obama's church had supposedly ended up dead...mysteriously. She reportedly said, "Now, I don't want to say that Obama did it. I don't want to say that people close to Obama did it. But those are the facts."
- In a 2009 post on her blog, Taitz wrote that Obama's defenders, including "Clair McCuskill [sic]" should be "tried in Nurenberg [sic] style trials."
- Taitz once called David Shuster, who is Jewish, a "brownshirt."
Jesse Merrell "Colorfully" Uses Racial Slurs When Discussing Obama
In his birtherism timeline, Corsi lists an event where a "man critical of Obama case judge [is] visited by marshals":
A Washington, D.C., man who believes Obama probably isn't eligible to be president - and colorfully stated as much to a federal judge who dismissed a case challenging Obama's residency in the White House - says he got a visit from U.S. marshals for his exercise of free speech. [Where's the Birth Certificate? Page 339]
The language in Corsi's book is identical to that of a 2009 article at WorldNetDaily by "news editor" Bob Unruh about Jesse Merrell. However, Unruh specifically documents precisely how Merrell "colorfully stated" his concerns about the birth certificate to the judge.
Merrell also reportedly referred to Obama by using a racial slur, calling the president a "blue-gum baboon":
"How dare people use a flimsy thing like the Constitution to darken your sanctimonious door!" he wrote to the judge. "The insane idea that a blue-gum baboon slashing our Constitution has to prove U.S. citizenship - as our silly old Constitution demands - is too absurd to consider in the sacred chambers of the tiny tin gods of the Potomac, adorning the royal purple and sipping Jim Jones Kool-Aid."
How "colorful."
Jerome Corsi: Natural-Born Liar
Now that the release of Obama's long-form birth certificate has further debunked the already discredited premise of his book, Corsi has but one argument to which he can cling: the "natural-born citizen" clause. This argument has always served as a sort of Plan B for the birther faithful, who claimed pre-birth certificate that even if it could be demonstrated that Obama was in fact born to Ann Dunham and Barack Obama Sr. in Hawaii in 1961, he would still not meet the criteria for the presidency as laid out in the Article II of the Constitution, which stipulates that only a "natural-born citizen" of the United States may occupy the office.
What little confusion exists over the eligibility clause is attributable to the fact that the Founders never defined "natural-born citizen" and the Supreme Court has never directly ruled on its meaning. Corsi and the birthers have exploited this for all it's worth, which, as it turns out, isn't much.
Corsi argues that since the Founders did not define "natural-born citizen," we have to gauge their intent. And their intent, Corsi claims, can be found in... Switzerland. Specifically, in the writings of Swiss philosopher Emmerich de Vattel, a contemporary of the Founders who wrote extensively on the concept of citizenship. Corsi argues that Vattel was the first to use the term "natural-born citizen" in his 1758 treatise Law of Nations, which he defined as person born to two citizen parents. According to Corsi, this definition was clearly what the Founders referenced in drafting the Constitution:
The Founding Fathers wanted to exclude foreigners from the presidency because they were distrustful of elevating to chief executive of the nation or commander in chief anyone who by birth might bear allegiance to a foreign nation. That someone was born to a foreign parent reflects no fault of their own, of course, but the Founding Fathers were distrustful that a dual citizen at birth would owe his undivided loyalty to the United States of America. [Where's the Birth Certificate? Page 36]
Thankfully, the Founders put in place systems to help fill in such omissions: a process by which to amend the Constitution, and a judicial branch to interpret it. And both the courts and the amendment process have conspired against Corsi's restrictive (and legally suspect) definition of "natural-born citizen." The 14th Amendment states that "All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside." Its ratification effectively recognized two classes of citizens -- citizens by birth, and naturalized citizens. Since then, the courts have operated using this framework, and have lent support to the idea that birthright citizens and "natural-born" citizens are one and the same.
In 1898, the Supreme Court ruled in United States v. Wong Kim Ark that a man born to "subjects of the Emperor of China" who were residing in the U.S. was, by birth, a U.S. citizen. In the ruling, Justice Horace Gray noted the extent to which British common law informed the framers of the Constitution and observed:
The fundamental principle of the common law with regard to English nationality was birth within the allegiance, also called "ligealty," "obedience," "faith," or "power" of the King. The principle embraced all persons born within the King's allegiance and subject to his protection. Such allegiance and protection were mutual -- as expressed in the maxim protectio trahit subjectionem, et subjectio protectionem -- and were not restricted to natural-born subjects and naturalized subjects, or to those who had taken an oath of allegiance, but were predicable of aliens in amity so long as they were within the kingdom. Children, born in England, of such aliens were therefore natural-born subjects.
A 2009 Congressional Research Service report prepared specifically to address the question of Obama's eligibility concluded that the "weight of scholarly legal and historical opinion appears to support the notion that 'natural born Citizen' means one who is entitled under the Constitution or laws of the United States to U.S. citizenship 'at birth' or 'by birth,' including any child born 'in' the United States (other than to foreign diplomats serving their country)."
Corsi, however, insists that "natural-born citizen" is actually a class of citizenship distinct from citizenship by birth. He's capitalizing on the fact that the Founders never defined it by defining it in terms that suit his purposes -- namely, demonstrating Obama's ineligibility -- even though there is no evidence that the courts, following the passage of the 14th Amendment, have ever recognized such a distinction.
And while we're on the topic of the 14th Amendment, let's quickly examine Corsi's views on its citizenship clause:
The point is that being born in the United States was not alone considered sufficient to grant citizenship automatically. The persons born on U.S. soil must also be born under the jurisdiction of the United States, a determination that had to be made by considering the citizenship of the parents at the time the person was born. [Where's the Birth Certificate? Page 52]
As a moral issue, Corsi's view is nothing short of repugnant. The 14th Amendment was crafted specifically to cure the antebellum injustice of denying the rights of citizenship to those who, by virtue of their birth within the United States, deserved them -- namely, former slaves. Under Corsi's interpretation of the 14th Amendment, freed African Americans could have still been denied citizenship by virtue of the fact that their parents were not citizens, and children of immigrants can be denied their rights simply because of their parentage.
