Of course, another tack this group has taken is to continue to insist that President Obama is a Muslim. A church acquaintance sent me the e-mail described in this Snopes article. The photograph shows Obama carrying a book titled The Post American World, by Fareed Zakaria, an Indian-born political journalist who has written regularly for Newsweek. The caption caption on the photograph:

What does Obama read?
Hussein Obama with a book in his hands.
He's reading "The Post-American World" — it's a Muslim's view of a defeated America!

The e-mail emphasizes that Zakaria is foreign-born (and says nothing of his American citizenship and his extensive and distinguished U.S. employment history), and refers to Zakaria and "Hussein Obama" as "fellow Muslims." By using the name "Hussein" and indirectly calling Obama a Muslim, the e-mail insidiously serves to support the hatred people have for the President.
As I usually do when people send me deceptive e-mail forwards, I replied to all recipients, providing a link to the Snopes explanation. I told my acquaintance there was plenty of valid information on both sides of most arguments, so there was no need to send such trash.
I got an indignant response from the sender and some recipients, saying that Snopes had a liberal bias, and that the sender was a man of good character, and how dare I send my rebuttal to all recipients.

I'm really tired of the lies and the hatred. The opposition has valid points; but they prefer to oppose Obama with lies and innuendo and thinly-veiled bigotry instead of rational discussion.

The "birther" thing it the most outrageous example of the thinly-veiled bigotry that has become a trademark of conservatives in the U.S.

-Joe-

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I think I'll take the 'crazy" out of the thread title. I moved one or two of IchMael's birther threads to here since there already was an ongoing discussion of the subject. But in fairness to IchMael, maybe it would be better to have the thread title not quite so opinionated.
-Joe-