To quash the conspiracy theory that he was not born in this country, Barack Obama released his long-form birth certificate today that shows he was born in Hawaii. In 2008, Obama released his “certification of live birth,” which is for legal purposes as good as his long-form birth certificate. But after Obama released that document in 2008, conspiracy theorists demanded to see the original long-form certificate that includes more information, such as the name of the attending physician at the hospital where he was born.
Why did Obama wait until April 27, 2011 to release this document? A White House official emails Ben Smith: “I am not going to argue the politics of doing this are good — they probably aren’t. Allowing the GOP primary to devolve into birther mania probably would be better, but the president felt strongly that this was bad for the country.”
