Will WND Admit Its Birther Obsession Was A Lie?
The actual release of President Obama's long-form birth certificate -- which corroborates everything that appeared in the "certificate of live birth" released by the Obama campaign in 2008 -- demonstrates how much of a fraud WorldNetDaily's birther coverage has been.
WND, of course, has been peddling lies about birther issues for years, embracing some of the more fringe claims, such as the fake "Kenyan birth certificate" and the Ron Polarik conspiracy that the original birth certificate Obama released is "criminally fraudulent."
In the past couple of weeks alone, Farah stood behind unproven claims that Obama spent millions of dollars fighting birther lawsuits and thinks the utterly discredited claim that Obama's grandmother said he was born in Kenya is important. He even blatantly lied that "WND never reported that Obama had spent $2 million hiding his birth certificate" when Farah himself made that exact claim.
All of that has now definitively been proven to be a lie. Will WND editor Joseph Farah apologize for promoting every lunatic theory he could find? Hell, no -- he's too busy taking credit, as well as moving the goalposts:
Joseph Farah, editor and chief executive officer of WND, the only news agency that has waged a relentless investigative campaign on questions swirling around the Obama's eligibility for nearly three years, was elated at the turn of events.
"We're gratified that our work has begun to pay off," he said. "The certificate of live birth is an absolutely vital foundation for determining constitutional eligibility of any president. We look forward to reviewing it like so many other Americans do at this late date. But it is important to remember there are still dozens of other questions concerning this question of eligibility that need to be resolved to assure what has become a very skeptical public concerning Barack Obama's parentage, his adoption, his citizenship status throughout his life and why he continues to cultivate a culture of secrecy around his life."
We predicted that Farah would do exactly this, which is why he has been trying to move the argument from birth to "eligibility." And Farah is still insisting that Obama's "parentage" is in question, demonstrating that no amount of evidence will satisfy him.
For Farah, the birther stuff is nothing more than Vince Foster redux, and he's running the same attack plan against Obama as he did against President Clinton in the 1990s -- except this time he can make some serious coin by peddling birther trinkets, something he really couldn't do when he ran the Western Journalism Center (except, of course, for that Richard Mellon Scaife cash he got).
Farah and WND have demonstrated that their journalism is driven much more by irrational hatred of Obama than by actual facts. They simply can't be trusted to tell the truth, and they certainly aren't about to let the facts they in their way now.
UPDATE: Farah's not the only one doing some goalpost-moving:
Salon gets reaction from Jack Cashill, who insists that "The story of his first two years remains false."
TPM talks to Orly Taitz, who complains taht the certificate should read "Negro" and not "African" for the race of Obama's father.
Mother Jones gets a hold of Andy Martin, who says "The pressure for his college records is going to become relentless."
Newsmax (of course) touted Donald Trump's victory lap, adding that "Trump called on the president to release his college records and other documents he has so far declined to release."
UPDATE 2: Jerome Corsi has a WND-published book coming out next month called "Where's the Birth Certificate?" Are Corsi and WND scrambling to come up with a new title since the current one is no longer operative?
Posted by Terry K. at 10:11 AM EDT
Updated: Wednesday, April 27, 2011 12:56 PM EDT