A conspiracy, a birth certificate and world peace

I once took a call from a man who told me he would be a great story. He was mentally ill, but taking medication and living on his own. He was an interesting fellow, he told me.

Then he announced he was responsible for world peace. He accomplished this by using a direct line to the Reagan White House so he could negotiate with Scotland. He spoke in an authoritative voice and was certain about the world peace.

I'm guessing he skipped a dose somewhere in there.

I thought of this guy lately when the furor over Lou Dobbs' reporting about "birthers" came up. Birthers are people who insist that President Obama was not born in Hawaii as his birth certificate says, but that it was faked and our president was actually born in Kenya, the African country from which his father hails. Obama has released a copy of his Hawaiian birth certificate -- he did this months before the election -- but there's a fringe who refuses to believe it's real despite the copy and that Hawaii's Department of Health director has repeatedly confirmed it's authenticity.

And on it goes. Now, due to what is an error on Obama's MySpace page (a MySpace page, for crippy sake) the debate reawakens yet again. The page says Obama is 52. Hawaii reached statehood in 1959. Obama was actually born, though, in 1961. It's another round of complete lies based on a mistake probably made, as the LA Times points out, by a low-level staffer.

The Dobbs issue was raised when the CNN host said on his radio show that Obama needed to release his birth certificate. He also mentioned that on at least one of his shows. Other CNN employees and contributors, however, have debunked the conspiracy, calling it ridiculous and referencing tin foil hats. (People who wear these hats like to call up papers, too.)

The question this raises is how much ink or air time do we give conspiracy theorists? It's been thoroughly proven by more than one news organization and factcheck.org, an independent outfit, that the birth certificate is real; Obama was honestly elected. So why is Dobbs still talking about it on CNN?

It's an easy answer: none. We have more pressing issues to discuss, such as health care. And, as far as conspiracy theories go, this one is pretty boring. A faked moon landing, Marilyn and Elvis living in Tahiti, aliens landing in Roswell -- all of these theories are a lot more interesting but I haven't seen them pop up on CNN. They're relegated to the occasional special on the History Channel or as the subject of a book.

I can't imagine reading a book or watching an hour about Obama's birthplace. I'm pretty hard to please, though. I once passed on writing a story about world peace.