She didn’t say the issue was legitimate. She said that conspiray theorists, even if they are stupid conspiracies (the title she gave to her facebook entry), have a RIGHT to ask questions of politicians, no matter how outrageous the questions might be (such as the outrageous questions about her son).
The only bone she threw to the “birthers” as you call them is that she mentions that she did provide the birth certificate (although that hasn’t stopped her attackers from still raising the issue).
DO you think she would ignore a legitimate question? She specifically says she never asked Obama the question, and if she thought the question was a good one, she certainly would have asked it. She has no problem telling Obama what else he should do, when she thinks it’s legitimate.
My proximate point is that when a politicians says “I would never ask Obama about the birth certificate”, you do a disservice by posting a photoshop of her ASKING OBAMA FOR HIS BIRTH CERTIFICATE. She said she’d never ask the question, so why do you post a picture showing her ASKING the question she never asked, unless you think she SHOULD be the one asking the question?
I think Sarah Palin was quite gracious in defending the birth certificate folk’s right to ask their questions, rather than coming right out and saying the question was stupid. But maybe she needs to be more direct than she already was, if the birth certificate folks actually think her response supported their position.
I am going by her radio interview: http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/1209/Palin_Obama_birth_certificate_a_fair_question.html
Speaking to the conservative talker Rusty Humphries today, Sarah Palin left the door open to speculation about President Obama's birth certificate.
"Would you make the birth certificate an issue if you ran?" she was asked (around 9 minutes into the video above).
"I think the public rightfully is still making it an issue. I don't have a problem with that. I don't know if I would have to bother to make it an issue, because I think that members of the electorate still want answers," she replied.
"Do you think it's a fair question to be looking at?" Humphries persisted.
"I think it's a fair question, just like I think past association and past voting records -- all of that is fair game," Palin said. "The McCain-Palin campaign didn't do a good enough job in that area."
I really think you ought to take her at her word. The Photoshop work only portrays what she said in her interview. I did not separate Sarah Palin from the "electorate" because she IS a part of the electorate now and as long as she is a US citizen!!