Here’s an exchange that Donald Trump had with Anderson Cooper:

TRUMP: Well I’ve been told very recently Anderson that the birth certificate is missing. I’ve been told that it’s not there and it doesn’t exist. And if that’s the case, that’s a big problem.

COOPER: Who told you that?

TRUMP: I just heard that two days ago from somebody.

COOPER: From your investigators?

TRUMP: I don’t want to say who. But I’ve been told that the birth certificate is not there, it’s missing.[…]

COOPER: Can you name even one person who your investigators have talked to?

TRUMP: I don’t want to do that right now. It’s not appropriate right now.

You got to love how this facade gets lamer and lamer. For all the talk about “Where’s the Birth Certificate?”, it turns out no one was looking too hard for it. Anyone can actually find proof at the Hawaii Vital Records Office, which lists all the children born in the state, including Obama, yet only the Associated Press and one other person have bothered to look at the binder according to the sign-in sheet.

But don’t think that means Republicans are racist. Why, more than half of Republicans in Mississippi think interracial marriage should be legal, and that’s got to count for something. I mean, it’s only been 43 years since the Supreme Court decided ant-cegenation laws are unconstitutional. Give them a little time.

Ann Coulter came on Hannity’s show not too long ago and claimed that “every responsible conservative organization to look at [the Birther issue] has shot it down, which is why you normally hear it being talked about exclusively on the liberal cable stations.” Obviously, an intellectually honest Birther would have told her, “Actually, I myself have doubts about Obama’s birth certificate.” Instead, Hannity responded with, “Well, it’s an interesting point,” since it’s more important to put up the facade of unity than to actually distinguish his political philosophy from other Conservatives. If a liberal show host had tried that, they would be instantly discredited, but in the Conservative world of Doublethink, you can be a Birther and still blame Birtherism on the Liberal media. (Of course, Ann Coulter was full of shit: WorldNetDaily, which runs her column, promotes Bither conspiracies, and Greta Van Sustren had Trump on the very next hour to trumpet his birther credentials.)

Ezra Klein recently wrote an interesting article about how if you look at Obama’s policies, he’s really a moderate Republican from the 90’s:

America is mired in three wars. The past decade was the hottest on record. Unemployment remains stuck near 9 percent, and there’s a small, albeit real, possibility that the U.S. government will default on its debt. So what’s dominating the news? A reality-television star who can’t persuade anyone that his hair is real is alleging that the president of the United States was born in Kenya.

Perhaps this is just the logical endpoint of two years spent arguing over what Barack Obama is — or isn’t. Muslim. Socialist. Marxist. Anti-colonialist. Racial healer. We’ve obsessed over every answer except the right one: President Obama, if you look closely at his positions, is a moderate Republican of the early 1990s. And the Republican Party he’s facing has abandoned many of its best ideas in its effort to oppose him.

He goes on to point out that Obama’s individual mandate plan and Cap and Trade first came to life as Republican ideas meant to counter the single-payer and direct taxes Democrats had planned, and that Obama’s budget has far fewer tax increases than George H. W. Bush’s budget.

Ramesh Ponnuru responded by joking that you can make the argument that George W. Bush was a moderate Democrat since he sponsored No Child Left Behind, “he favored the war Iraq–like John Kerry,” and he cut taxes with Max Baucus’ support.

Obviously, the last two of those hardly prove anything “favoring” the Iraq War merely meant voting to give Bush the power to go to war, which the Administration claimed was only going to be used as a threat, and one Democrat supporting his tax cuts does not mean most of the Democrats in office supported it. But Klein responded that he was right that No Child Left Behind, as well as Medicare Part D, were originally Democratic ideas.

Another point Klein failed to mention is Obama’s Republican acceptance of basically every Bush-era attack on civil rights, from Obama dropping his plan to close Guantamino on the very first day of his re-election campaign, to his War on Whistleblowers, to the unconstitutional imprisonment of Bradley Manning without a trial.

The Daily Show played a clip of liberal “protesters” singing a terrible, off-key song to Obama about Manning’s imprisonment, but even before the song was over, they promised to vote for him again and even called out their love for him after the song. Oh yeah, and they paid $76,000 to Obama to sing it to him. And really, this more than anything shows what absolute pussies Democrats are.

Liberals like Klein aren’t the only ones comparing Obama to Republicans, but on the right, any comparison made is a negative one to Bush. While this is true when it comes to foreign policy, some of the attempts to show similarities are ridiculous. For example, one person who calls Obama “Bush Black” sent me a list of suppossed traits of which Bush and Obama are identical, such as “Czar Appointees” and “Federally Funded Faith Based Groups.” Here was my response:

BAILOUTS & STIMULUS PACKAGES: Yeah, another similarity is Bush and Obama both have two eyes. And they both have a nose. And they both wear clothes. Everyone in congress voted on the bailouts and stimulus packages. But who are the people that are mad at Wall Street and who are the people making excuses for them and complaining about Obama being antagonistic to them after he just let them all off the hook like that?

CZAR APPOINTEES: I have to give the guy who wrote this credit for acknowledging that Bush created czars too when that was clearly left out of the Republican Talking Points, but he’s still an idiot. EVERY PRESIDENT SINCE ROOSEVELT HAS CREATED CZARS AND NO ONE CARED!! The “czar controversy” was just like every other Republican controversy: it was ginned up as a cynical attack on Obama for no reason but to make people think he’s doing something radically different. Find me the guy who was actually complaining about czars BEFORE OBAMA: He doesn’t exist!!!

CITIZEN SURVEILLANCE: Yeah, liberals used to complain about this one until Obama was elected. Now both sides have accepted this. Only liberal blogger Glenn Greenwald criticizes Obama for this.

FEDERALLY FUNDED FAITH BASED GROUPS: Again, liberals are the only ones who ever complained about this.

A CALLING FROM GOD : The website says: “Once again, Bush was often criticized by various groups for claiming to ‘do God’s will’ in his politics…. Obama: ‘This is the source of our confidence. The knowledge that God calls on us to shape an uncertain destiny.'” Uh, yeah. BIG DIFFERENCE. Bush was talking about WAR WITH IRAQ being “God’s will.” He told this to a Palestinian official and to the President of France. Obama was talking about “honesty and hard work, courage and fair play, tolerance and curiosity, loyalty and patriotism.”

MEETINGS WITH RELIGIOUS LEADERS: Just like every other president….. Also, most religious leaders are right-wingers…..

MIDDLE EAST ISSUES: The website says: “This segment may be an eye opener for some. The general stereotype is that Bush was a loyal Zionist supporter and blindly supported Israel in every endeavor while Obama will take America away from Israeli support into either a moderate position or even a pro-Palestine position.” Yes, that is the Republican talking point that you embraced. […]

LOBBYIST APPOINTEES: Again, nothing new. Again, liberals are the ones protesting Washington lobbyists.

THE TREATMENT OF DISSENTERS UNDER EACH ADMINISTRATION: The comparisons made are not equa[l] at all. The first source says the Bush protestors were on a public street, while the second source says, “According to Minerd, the police told them the stadium had been rented by the Obama campaign.” The third source says a guy [was] ARRESTED and FINGERPRINTED for wearing an anti-Bush T-shirt on the Capitol steps during a presidential appearance. The fourth example is a pathetic attempt to find equivalence by picking some random car that got pulled over in Louisiana which had NOTHING TO DO with the president.

Marginalizing Citizen Protest Efforts by the Media: “Under Bush: Example: Cindy Sheehan, Antiwar Protester”, “Under Obama:
Example: Tea Party Protesters” Say what?? The media gave both Cindy Sheehan and the Tea Party free advertisement!

NATIONALIZATION OF AMERICAN INDUSTRY: There’s a difference between a “bailout” and “nationalization.” Bailout means the taxpayer assumes all the risk while Wall Street keeps all the profit. “Nationalization” means the taxpayer gets to keep a rightful amount of profit. The only people who wanted nationalization are left-leaning writers like Paul Krugman and Matt Taibbi.

AGREEMENT ON VARIOUS SOCIAL ISSUES: I don’t what this guy was on when he wrote this. Obama eliminated abstinenace-only sex education. Bush wasn’t for same sex marriage. We just had a huge fight over health care and we’re still fighting over economics.

CONCLUSION: The guy goes on to say Obama is the 5th term of the ClintonBush White House. Do you really believe that too? I guess he’s trying to say Bush was always a liberal, but if you look at the actual ISSUES, it’s obvious it’s Obama who has accepted all the Bush Fallacies (War on Terror, PATRIOT Act, Survellance State, unconditional support of Israel, Tax Cuts for the Rich, Lobbyists, etc. etc. etc.).