Hawaii vs. 'birthers'

(Image credit: Wikicommons)

last updated 8 January 2015

Hawaiian lawmakers are considering making it illegal to request President Obama's birth certificate. Officials complain that they waste time and money responding to as many as 20 such requests a week from so-called "Birthers" — who doubt whether Obama was born in the U.S. — even though state law forbids the release of birth certificates to people without a "tangible interest." Under a proposed bill, repeat offenders would be declared "vexatious requesters" and put under special restrictions for obtaining government records. Is this a sensible measure, or will it just fuel the conspiracists' fire? (Watch Robert Gibbs address the Birthers' requests)

This will just fan the flames of the movement: You can't blame Hawaii for wanting to put an end to this "ridiculous phenomenon," says Akela Talamasca at Manolith. But threatening to ban conspiracists from all government records "would only serve to heighten the level of suspicion birthers already have for the whole process." There's really "no way to win."