photo by Gage Skidmore
In two recent interviews with Parade and the New York Times, Texas Governor Rick Perry, currently biding for the presidential GOP nomination, insisted that he was not certain that President Obama was born in the United States.
In a form of conspiracy-stoking that’s as well-trodden as it is insidious, Perry openly links himself to the birther movement. Bent on cultivating racial paranoia, the birther-movement placed the burden on our first African American president to prove what passed without query for our forty-three white presidents.
Perhaps it’s too obvious to say that the birthers’ insistence on Obama’s illegitimacy is based on racism. After all, aren’t we living in a post-racial America? And isn’t the election of our first African American president moving us towards greater racial equality? So, obviously, the perpetuation of this conspiracy theory has nothing to do with a black man who has a foreign sounding name holding office, right?
Right?
Donald Trump, while pondering a run at the GOP nomination earlier this year, re-sparked a culture-war of sorts by making public his alignment with the birthers—he even centered the issue at the heart of his almost-“campaign.” After Obama released his long form birth certificate on April 27, 2011, Trump boasted, “I am really honored and I am really proud that I was able to do something that nobody else could do.”
You’re honored and proud that you’re a racist and a quasi-bully? Awesome, Mr. Trump. Well done, really. You’re truly an inspiration.
Perry on the other hand disguises his racist tendencies as playfulness, likening being questioned about his college grades to being repeatedly challenged because of the color of one’s skin: “It’s fun to poke at him [President Obama] a little bit and say, ‘Hey, how about let’s see your grades and your birth certificate’.”
Strangely at once dismissing the issue – “it’s also a great distraction. I’m not distracted by it.” – but yet also refusing to actually dismiss the issue – asserting “it’s a good issue to keep alive” – Perry went on to add that he doesn’t “have a clue about where the president [sic] and what this birth certificate says.”
Mr. Perry might only have one mouth, but he’s certainly talking out of as many sides of it as he can. Masking racism as a playful jab while also speaking in incoherent circles should at least prove to us that this is not a man who should have the opportunity to hold the GOP nomination, much less the presidency.