Justin Spees
Where will the birthers strike next?
President Obama released his long-form, but "birther bills" are still alive in state houses across the country
President Barack Obama gestures as he speaks at a Democratic party fundraiser, the third of three such events he attended in one night, in New York, Wednesday, April 27, 2011. (AP Photo/Kathy Willens)(Credit: AP) President Obama’s disclosure of his long-form birth certificate this week has yet to deter many birthers — including the ones elected to public office.
Less than 24 hours after the president’s press conference on Wednesday, for instance, Oklahoma’s House of Representatives passed a bill requiring presidential candidates to provide proof of identity and U.S. citizenship in order to appear on the state’s ballot. In all, about a dozen similar bills have been introduced in legislatures across the country. (In Arizona, a birther bill actually passed earlier this month, only to be vetoted by Gov. Jan Brewer.) Some of the proposed laws have some interesting twists — including one that would declare any voter who cast a ballot for an ineligible candidate guilty of a crime.
Here are a look at the five most notable birther bills that are still pending:
Oklahoma
SB 91 requires all candidates running for federal office to submit an “original birth certificate” to the Oklahoma Election Board. It passed the House in a landslide yesterday and will now be sent to the Oklahoma Senate for a procedural vote. The Oklahoma House and Senate both entertain a large Republican majority, and the bill is expected to pass. Oklahoma state legislators assume that Gov. Mary Fallin will sign the bill into law. We emailed Fallin’s office asking for a comment and received a reply stating that she has not made any public comment on the issue.
Louisiana
State Rep. Alan Seabaugh and state Sen. A.G. Crowe jointly proposed HB 561 several weeks ago, which also requires candidates to prove U.S. citizenship before appearing on a state ballot. Both lawmakers stated yesterday that they were pleased that Obama had released his long-form birth certificate, but that they would press forward with the bill in an effort to close loopholes in existing Louisiana law. The bill was publicly endorsed by Gov. Bobby Jindal last week. “It’s not part of our package,” his press secretary said in a statement, “but if the Legislature passes it, we’ll sign it.”
Missouri
At first glance, HB 121 appears to be a standard update of Missouri election procedure, but provision 8 of the bill would require presidential and vice-presidential nominees to submit proof of citizenship to Missouri’s secretary of state. State Rep. Lyle Rowland, who sponsored the bill, claims that the provision is intended to keep illegal immigrants from taking over the White House, just in case “something were to happen where one of them became popular with the people.” According to Rowland’s office, the bill has made it out of committee and is scheduled to be debated on the House floor. The specific date has yet to be determined.
Texas
Authored by Tea Party favorite Leo Berman last November, HB 295 would require presidential candidates to show their birth certificates to the Texas secretary of state. Unlike his many of his counterparts, Berman is an out and proud birther — in an interview yesterday, he claimed that he found Obama’s long-form birth certificate unconvincing and suspected it may be a hoax. The bill is currently stuck in committee. We contacted Gov. Rick Perry to see if he would support such a bill but did not hear back from his office.
Nebraska
Sponsored by State Rep. Mark Christiansen, LB 654 might be the most radical birther bill in the country. If enacted into law, the bill would not only require presidential and vice-presidential candidates to submit original copies of their long-form birth certificates to Nebraska’s secretary of state — but would also require candidates to prove that their parents obtained U.S. citizenship prior to his or her birth. Nominees would then have to sign a sworn affidavit to that effect and additionally swear that they were not born dual citizens. Nebraskans who vote for a candidate that has not met these criteria would be guilty of a class IV felony. According to Christiansen’s office, the bill is currently stuck in committee and will most likely stay there, at least through the end of the year.
Donald Trump: A history of hand-scrawled rage
The note he sent to Salon's Justin Elliott today is tame compared to some of his greatest hits
Donald Trump attends the South Florida Tea Party's third annual tax day rally Saturday, April 16, 2011 at Sanborn Square in Boca Raton, Fla. Sounding increasingly like a candidate, Donald Trump repeatedly told a raucous tea party crowd Saturday he has the qualities needed in the White House and the conservative ideals necessary to seal the Republican nomination should he decide to run. (AP Photo/Palm Beach Post, Gary Coronado) MAGS OUT; TV OUT; NO SALES(Credit: AP) Jerry Seinfeld this week pulled out of a scheduled appearance at a benefit event organized by Donald Trump’s son, Eric. The elder Trump responded by sending Seinfeld a letter that contained some …. choice words:
Continue Reading Close“I agreed to do, and did, your failed show, ‘The Marriage Ref,’ even though I thought it was absolutely terrible . . . Despite its poor ratings, I didn’t cancel on you like you canceled on my son and St. Jude. I only wish I did.”
The 10 most hilarious right-wing nicknames for Obama
The comments section of Sarah Palin's Facebook page is littered with angry -- and unintentionally funny -- puns
Skimming through the comments section of Sarah Palin’s most recent Facebook note earlier this week, we were struck not so much by the hostility toward President Obama, but by the strained attempts to twist his name into some kind of an insult: “Nobama,” “Obomba,” “La Bamba” and so on. Other commenters skipped the puns and crafted their own nicknames for their president. We then checked Mike Huckabee’s page and found the same phenomenon at work. So we decided to compile our favorites:
Continue Reading CloseThe 5 best and worst states to be unemployed in
Michigan just slashed aid to the jobless. How does it compare to the rest of the country?
People wait in line to attend a job fair for military veterans and other unemployed people in Los Angeles, California, October 7, 2010. REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson (UNITED STATES - Tags: EMPLOYMENT BUSINESS)(Credit: © Lucy Nicholson / Reuters) Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker’s state isn’t the only one with labor pains. Michigan, for example, faces the longest ongoing stretch of double-digit unemployment in America. And the state’s governor, Rick Snyde, has just signed a bill into law that slashes the total number of weeks the jobless can collect unemployment benefits from 26 to 20.
Since nearly every state has long offered 26 weeks of coverage, the move makes Michigan one of America’s stingiest states when it comes to helping the unemployed. But when you look at the whole picture — including the amount of money recipients are eligible for, which varies widely by state — it isn’t actually the stingiest. Several states offer far less to recipients than the $362 per week maximum that Michigan offers its laid-off workers. (Thus, an unemployed worker in Michigan receiving the top amount can collect a total of $7,240 over the 20 weeks of coverage that the state guarantees.)
Continue Reading CloseStephen Colbert on anti-Obama obituaries
A Salon report inspires the comedian: "This gives a whole new voice to America's extremely silent majority"
On his show Wednesday night, Stephen Colbert introduced viewers to a story originally reported by Salon’s Justin Elliott about a bizarre trend: Obituaries containing pleas to send — in lieu of flowers — money to efforts to unseat Barack Obama:
The real, fake @MayorEmanuel creator revealed
The author of one of the notorious and mysterious twitter feeds is a punk-turned-journalism-professor in Chicago
Former White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel leaves a news conference in Chicago, Monday, Jan. 24, 2011, where he responded to an Illinois appeals court ruling that threw him off the ballot for Chicago mayor because he didn't live in the city in the year before the election. The court voted 2-1 to overturn a lower-court ruling that would have kept Emanuel's name on the Feb. 22 ballot. (AP Photo/Charles Rex Arbogast)(Credit: AP) 5 months after it began, @MayorEmanuel had accrued 39,102 followers, notoriety among Washington insiders, and a $5,000 request from now-Mayor-elect Emanuel to reveal himself after the election. And for 5 months the anonymous Twitter feed kept up a kind of Greek chorus to the Chicago mayoral race by providing a take on real events with an increasingly absurd bent. By the end it had veered into an insane fantasy that both celebrated Emanuel’s inevitable victory and had him disappearing into a void in the sky.
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