White House releases photo of birth certificate

This is interesting.

Apparently Obama is holding a PC later this morning to address the “issue.” My off the cuff reaction is that this is a mistake. From a political standpoint I think it’s great that Donald Trump is out there saying crazy stuff on Anderson Cooper about how the real birth certificate is missing. What’s the percentage in even giving a hint of legitimacy to the combination of pure paranoia and even purer cynicism that fuels the birther nonsense? I suppose the angle the Obama people have decided to play is to present their man straightforwardly as a victim of slanderous accusations from Trump types, and/or coy non-denial denials from prominent Republicans who purport to remain birther curious. Going even more meta, the idea may be to whip up even more “controversy” over this, since it goes without saying that this “birth certificate” is typed in a font that didn’t exist in 1961 on paper synthesized from chemicals that were never combined before 1977 etc etc.

Update: White House statement

The President believed the distraction over his birth certificate wasn’t good for the country. It may have been good politics and good TV, but it was bad for the American people and distracting from the many challenges we face as a country. Therefore, the President directed his counsel to review the legal authority for seeking access to the long form certificate and to request on that basis that the Hawaii State Department of Health make an exception to release a copy of his long form birth certificate. They granted that exception in part because of the tremendous volume of requests they had been getting. President Barack Obama’s long form birth certificate can be seen here (PDF). Correspondence with the Hawaii State Department of Health can be seen here (PDF).

Trump is holding a press conference. Quotes:

“Today I’m very proud of myself, because I’ve accomplished something that nobody else has been able to accomplish.” ..

“Our president has finally released a certificate. I want to look at it, but I hope it’s true.”

“I am really honored, frankly, to have played such a big role…”

“I’m taking great credit.”

Somehow I doubt all this is what James Madison had in mind.