Fight vs. birthers worth waging

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Updated: August 4, 2011 4:20PM

We’re cheering on Hawaii Gov. Neil Abercrombie, a man we like to call the “anti-birther.”

The newly elected governor is taking on the birthers — those fringe gadflies who won’t rest until they prove that President Obama wasn’t born in the United States, rendering him ineligible for the presidency.

That will never happen, of course, because records clearly show Obama was born in Hawaii in 1961. But that hasn’t stopped the birthers from nattering on relentlessly since the 2008 campaign.

A friend of Obama’s parents since before the future president was born, Abercrombie is looking for ways to release more information about Obama’s birth in an attempt to quiet the birthers.

Hawaiian law prohibits the public release of a certified birth certificate. Obama has released what the law allows, a “certification of live birth.” The state’s health director has said she verified the original birth record, and the birth was announced in two newspapers in 1961.

In general, we prefer to ignore illogical conspiracy theorists for fear of giving credence to their claims. But because the birthers refuse to give up, Abercrombie is right to fight back. He says, by the way, that this is coming from him, not Obama.

“He can take sticks and stones,” Abercrombie told the New York Times. “But there’s no reason on Earth to have the memory of his parents insulted by people whose motivation is solely political.”

Without a sane voice speaking up, the nattering continues, casting doubt on Obama in a way that is both insidious and destructive.