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I can understand why they would bother releasing the passport and not the long form birth certificate. Very few people have ever said that he wasn’t a US citizen, what they have said is that he wasn’t born in Hawaii or that he wasn’t a natural born citizen. Much of that could be cleared up by releasing the long form birth certificate but none of it can be cleared up are releasing a YouTube of the passport — this technique being very very similar to releasing a scan on one of his political supporter’s web site.

The passport looks real to me, not Photoshop or anything like that. But does everyone remember the whole ion birth certificate application that was filed by his grandmother and words that place of birth the box was filled in with “ Hawaii” (place of birth Kenya, filed in Honolulu)?

Does anyone have that image at hand?

Clearly, both the Senate bill and the Senate resolution were to support Obama and not John McCain. I just can’t feature the Democrats getting all worked up about protecting John McCain all by himself. It was a very strange episode but I well remember at the time that it was happening — it just seems so odd that the Senate Democrats would want to desperately protect John McCain so much that they would need to pass these laws and resolutions.

Here’s what I think: the Senate Democrats knew in 2007 that Obama was not born in Hawaii. So they passed a resolution to give themselves some cover, for when it was found out that Frank Marshall Davis was his real father, they could say see, here, he has two US citizens as parents, and therefore he is eligible to be president of the United States. So when his embarrassing longform birth certificate comes out and perhaps it says he was born in Kenya but the papers were filed in Honolulu, court says father unknown, or it says race would be Arab, all these things could be turned around so instead of getting kicked out of office it just looks like he is embarrassed, and that’s why he sent Lieut. Col. Lakin to jail but did not release his long form birth certificate.

Yes I saw the passport on YouTube — isn’t this bizarre to release a passport on YouTube and a short form birth certificate as an online scan only? why not just release the long form and be done with it? Why not just release the long form birth certificate if it says exactly what he has been saying to everyone all this time.? Really, the whole thing made no sense from beginning to end and releasing the passport or showing a passport makes no sense as to the matter of final resolution.

Who has the image of the whole line application filled out by the grandmother where it says Place of birth — Honolulu (born in Kenya, filed in Honolulu)? That always looked very very real to me...

Who has the image of the whole line application filled out by the grandmother where it says Place of birth — Honolulu (born in Kenya, filed in Honolulu)? That always looked very very real to me...

Really? It looked real? These warning signs didn't concern you:

- Its mysterious appearance online with no source.
- The anachronistic mention of a Hawaiian statute that didn't exist in 1961.
- The erased file number, serial number, and "State of Hawaii" line (not covered, but literally erased)
- The signature of an "attendant," even though it claims he was born in Kenya.
- The typewritten words that don't stay on straight lines across the page, like they would if actually typed on a typewriter.
- The fact that it misspells the street name of the mother, in a way that violates standard Hawaiian word structure and spelling.
- The fact that it erroneously says "U.S.A." under "Usual residence of mother: County and State."
- The curious similarity between two of the signatures.
- The inexplicable inconsistency for a document to simultaneously say "Place of Birth: Honolulu" AND "Birthplace: Kenya."

and my personal favorite:

- The fact when writing her signature, Madelyn Payne Dunham apparently forgot how to spell her own name.

I can understand why they would bother releasing the passport and not the long form birth certificate.

So can I. Some clever fellow in his political staff realized that this was a way to poke the Birthers into another round of frentic ranting while maintaining plausible deniability ("we're just putting a picture of an interesting Presidential tchotchke on the web"). The Birthers react in predictable stimulus-response manner, and a few more independents get the impression that Obama's opponents are a bunch of crackpots.

Whoever thought of this one ought to get a raise.