Hillary Clinton is responsible for the 'Obama is a Muslim' smear.

[steronz]

@Wesley_Clark

had it not been him, someone else would have started the rumor. Obama is a black democrat with an ethnic name and much of his opposition is angry, xenophobic white christians. It was only a matter of time until someone started this rumor.

I’m going to +1 for the notion that this rumor didn’t require starting. Muslim name, father with connections to Islam, spent time as a child in a majority Muslim country… given the rampant Islamophobia in this country, the rumor basically starts itself. Why bother looking for the source?

[GIGObuster]

@TriPolar

Your cite does nothing but provide evidence that Clinton was behind it and then comes to the erroneous conclusion that she wasn’t. It may as well have come out of Fox News. All of the evidence points to the Clinton campaign, no evidence counters that.

As other evidence pointed, Clinton was not behind it.

Though it’s true that the specific allegation that Obama wasn’t born in the U.S. first reared its head during the 2008 presidential race, rumblings about Obama’s “otherness” had been percolating since long before that. In 2004, a political gadfly named Andy Martin issued a press release calling Barack Obama a “complete fraud” who had “misrepresented his heritage” in his memoir, Dreams From My Father, and “is a Muslim who has concealed his religion.” The theme was pushed further in December 2006 by conservative columnist Debbie Schlussel, who published an article entitled “Barack Hussein Obama: Once a Muslim, Always a Muslim,” which stated that “Obama has a ‘born-again’ affinity for the nation of his Muslim father, Kenya.” In March 2007, Clinton campaign strategist Mark Penn proposed attacking Obama on the basis of his “lack of American roots.” And, in December 2007, a Clinton volunteer county coordinator in Iowa was fired for forwarding an e-mail making the by-then familiar claim that Obama is a Muslim.

The idea that Obama was born elsewhere, specifically Kenya, was first floated in April 2008, according to a 22 April 2011 Politico article by Ben Smith and Byron Tau on the origins of birtherism:

That theory first emerged in the spring of 2008, as Clinton supporters circulated an anonymous e-mail questioning Obama’s citizenship.

“Barack Obama’s mother was living in Kenya with his Arab-African father late in her pregnancy. She was not allowed to travel by plane then, so Barack Obama was born there and his mother then took him to Hawaii to register his birth,” asserted one chain email that surfaced on the urban legend site Snopes.com in April 2008.

That Hillary Clinton supporters circulated such an e-mail isn’t in question, but the claim that that’s the moment the birther theory “first emerged” simply isn’t true. The likeliest point of origin we’ve been able to find was a post on conservative message board FreeRepublic.com dated 1 March 2008 (which, according to a report in The Telegraph, was at least a month before Clinton supporters got on the e-mail bandwagon):

I was told today that Obama swore in on a Koran for his Senate seat. I do not believe he did. Can someone clarify this for me? I am under the impression only a Congressman has so far sworn in on a Koran.

Also that Obama’s mother gave birth to him overseas and then immediately flew into Hawaii and registered his birth as having taken place in Hawaii.

Again, any clarifications on this? Defintely disqualifies him for Prez. There must be some trace of an airticket. While small babies are not charged air fare they do have a ticket issued for them.

Long time ago but there may be some residual information somewhere. Good ammo (if available and true) BEST USED AFTER he becomes PREZ (if that occurs) and it’s too late for Dems – except accept the VP.

The same rumor was repeated, with elaborations, four days later on the conservative blog Ruthless Roundup:

Add to the family history shown in this article that Obama’s mother was allegedly visiting Kenya with Obama’s father in the final months of her pregnancy and was not allowed to board a flight in her late term to return home.

She allegedly had Obama in Kenya and quickly boarded a flight to Hawaii. Airlines do not accept late term pregancies but do not refuse passage to a newborn, usually issuing a 10% or free fare ticket for the trip.

Once in Hawaii, his mother registered him as being born in Hawaii.

**The conspiracy theory was already fully formed at this point. Clearly, the Clinton supporters accused of spreading it via forwarded e-mails knew “good ammo” when they saw it, but, as the above posts show, they deserve neither credit nor blame for the invention of birtherism. **

(Bold and Underline added)

Nor, as I did notice you attempted to refute it with little success, the invention of the “Obama is a Muslim” smear.

[Telemark]

@TriPolar

At least I have some evidence.

Judge: Mr. Hutz w’ve been in here for four hours. Do you have any evidence at all?
Hutz: Well, Your Honor. We’ve plenty of hearsay and conjecture. Those are kinds of evidence.

[GIGObuster]

I forgot the link to the Snopes article:

Did Clinton Supporters Start the 'Birther' Movement?

[ElvisL1ves]

@TriPolar

Oh, you must be right. I forgot that Hillary was backing Obama as the candidate during the primaries.

You’re sticking with the claim “She might have benefited from it, therefore she must have done it, no matter the lack of any other evidence”, then?

You and **John **can go comfort each other.

[steronz]

Surely the existence of an article from 2006 debunks the claim that the rumor was started in 2007.

[Lightnin]

And, of course- even *if *Clinton’s camp was behind the “OMG Barack HUSSEIN Obama is a secret Muslim” (and there’s no real evidence they were), it was the Republicans who really weaponized it. The fact that it’s the Republican apologists who are now pushing the theory that Clinton started it should really tell you all you need to know about its veracity and their intentions.

[GIGObuster]

The PBS News Hour did also take a look.

Again, no support for Clinton pushing for the ‘being a secret Muslim’ accusation or the birther lie.

AP fact check: Trump's bogus birtherism claim about Clinton

Here’s a closer look at evidence that is dubious at best, fails to tie the falsehood conclusively to Clinton herself and cannot compete with Trump’s yearslong effort to undermine the legitimacy of the nation’s first African-American president.

THE EMAIL

In an interview Sunday with CBS’ “Face The Nation,” Conway offered as a first piece of evidence an email that surfaced about a month before the January 2008 Iowa caucuses. Obama and Clinton, then U.S. senators, were at that time locked in a fierce campaign as stars atop the Democratic presidential field.

Judy Rose, Clinton’s top volunteer in a rural eastern Iowa county, had forwarded the chain email to eight fellow Democrats. It mentioned Obama’s father’s Kenyan ancestry and the father’s Muslim faith. But that email, which became public the following month, stated that “Obama was born in Honolulu, Hawaii.” There is no evidence that Clinton herself has ever said Obama wasn’t born in America. The email falsely claimed Obama is a Muslim and equated Islam with support for overthrowing the U.S. government. “The Muslims have said they plan on destroying the U.S. from the inside out, what better way to start than at the highest level,” the email from an anonymous author stated.

Rose quit her unpaid volunteer post and Clinton’s national campaign manager Patti Solis Doyle contacted her counterpart in Obama’s campaign, David Plouffe, to apologize. It was clear, Obama’s team says, that Clinton was not behind the attempted smear.

“Having worked on that campaign, there was no point where we felt that Hillary Clinton was pushing these rumors,” said Tommy Vietor, Obama’s 2008 Iowa campaign spokesman and later a White House communications aide.

Questions about Obama’s place of birth did surface in an anonymous email in April 2008 that was circulated among some die-hard Clinton supporters, as Obama appeared headed toward the presidential nomination.

That email alleged that Obama’s U.S.-born mother was living in Kenya late in her pregnancy, was unable to travel and registered his birth in Hawaii after he was born. There is no evidence Clinton or her campaign team spread it around.

THE MEMO

Conway also cited a memo by Mark Penn, Clinton’s chief pollster and media strategist in the 2008 campaign. It cites Obama’s “Lack of American Roots” as a liability.

“His roots to basic American values and culture are at best limited,” Penn wrote, further suggesting Obama was “not at his center fundamentally American in his thinking and his values.” Penn went on to suggest Clinton draw attention to the idea “without going negative.”

In a race that had become personal and caustic, Clinton rejected out of hand the ideas that Penn did present, Solis Doyle said.

[GIGObuster]

One more thing:

@TriPolar

In another thread I was presented with utter nonsense posing as counter-evidence, yet it was nothing but a debunking of statements made by Trump many years after the fact that had nothing to do with the ‘Obama is a Muslim’ concept, but instead the claim that Clinton started Birtherism, something patently untrue, and that I did not say.

As I pointed in the other thread: “that last bit about “Her campaign started the ‘Obama is a Muslim’ bullshit, and she went along with it” is wrong, please read the cites again.” The context shows that even your point here misses that we already acknowledged that Birtherism was not the reason for that counter evidence, it just so happens that Birtherism was **also **mentioned by the cites when that ‘Obama is a Muslim’ item was mentioned by bad conservatives and misguided Clinton supporters. And you are using that as an excuse to ignore that indeed the cites ***also ***mentioned that the ‘Obama is a Muslim’ concept was not started by Clinton or used by her.

[E-DUB]

I view it as similar to the 1988 “Willie Horton” issue. You hear a lot of righties say that Al Gore raised it first. Well, Gore did mention the existence of the prison furlough program and did point out that some of the furloughed prisoners did re-offend. What he did not do is plaster pictures of Willie Horton’s scary, and not so incidentally black, face all over the place. Rather than excuse Mr. Bush’s later use of the issue, Gore’s use put Bush’s in its proper context by showing that it was possible to raise the issue without demagoguing it.

[ElvisL1ves]

Bush (okay Atwater) also failed to mention that the furlough program (implemented by Republican Governor Frank Sargent) had been highly successful in reducing recidivism.

[Paranoid_Randroid]

Can we be totally clear, all cards on the table about this? The evidence presented that Clinton is responsible for this rumor seems to be:

1. she benefited from it
2. some of her supporters spread it at various points
3. her renunciation was insufficiently vociferous

Is that it? Because unless this argument has some other legs, I can’t imagine how it stands. I benefit from tax cuts, I have friends and family who support tax cuts, and I haven’t made an effort to denounce arguments in favor of tax cuts. Does that mean I’m responsible for supply side economics?

Specifically what other legs does this argument stand on?

[ElvisL1ves]

And,

4. We just hates her we does … we know she did it because she’s just evil …

[Kent_Clark]

@steronz

Surely the existence of an article from 2006 debunks the claim that the rumor was started in 2007.

I love the down-the rabbit-hole logic in that article.

His full name–as by now you have probably heard–is Barack Hussein Obama, Jr. Hussein is a Muslim name, which comes from the name of Ali’s son–Hussein Ibn Ali. And Obama is named after his late Kenyan father, the late Barack Hussein Obama, Sr., apparently a Muslim.

And while Obama may not identify as a Muslim, that’s not how the Arab and Muslim Streets see it. In Arab culture and under Islamic law, if your father is a Muslim, so are you. And once a Muslim, always a Muslim. You cannot go back. In Islamic eyes, Obama is certainly a Muslim. He may think he’s a Christian, but they do not.

So someone named after his father, who had a Muslim middle name, is automatically a Muslim and is a Muslim forever, even if he thinks he’s a Christian - the poor, deluded guy!

Using that same logic I can definitively prove that I’m a member of a Great Lakes native tribe, despite the fact that both sides of my family were (documented) immigrants.

[tim314]

@TriPolar

Your cite does nothing but provide evidence that Clinton was behind it and then comes to the erroneous conclusion that she wasn’t. It may as well have come out of Fox News. All of the evidence points to the Clinton campaign, no evidence counters that.

The way I see it, you offered speculation with no real evidence, and BobLibDem’s cite offered pretty convincing evidence to the contrary.

It’s kind of perplexing that you think “she must have done it because she benefitted” is more persuasive than “paid member of her staff denounces it and local campaign volunteers who forwarded the already long-running email chain lose their volunteer jobs.”

[BobLibDem]

@tim314

The way I see it, you offered speculation with no real evidence, and BobLibDem’s cite offered pretty convincing evidence to the contrary.

It’s kind of perplexing that you think “she must have done it because she benefitted” is more persuasive than “paid member of her staff denounces it and local campaign volunteers who forwarded the already long-running email chain lose their volunteer jobs.”

I suppose the “she must have done it because she benefitted” also means that LBJ had JFK killed.

[Ravenman]

Let’s follow this logic:

1. TriPolar works for ABC Company.
2. TriPolar asserts that star bellied sneetches are secret Muslims.
3. ABC Company dispenses with TriPolar because of such statements.
4. ABC Company would stand to benefit with increased sales and PR from the odious anti-sneetch segment of society.

Ergo, ABC Company is the one that came up with the idea that star bellied sneetches are secret Muslims. Fits in right with the OP’s argument.

[Little_Nemo]

@Lightnin

And, of course- even *if *Clinton’s camp was behind the “OMG Barack HUSSEIN Obama is a secret Muslim” (and there’s no real evidence they were), it was the Republicans who really weaponized it. The fact that it’s the Republican apologists who are now pushing the theory that Clinton started it should really tell you all you need to know about its veracity and their intentions.

It’s a win-win for Republicans. Get a rumor going against one Democrat. And then get a second rumor going that it was another Democrat who started the first rumor.

[ElvisL1ves]

“Let’s you and him fight!”

If either one responds to the rumor in *any *way, just say that means it’s true. We have evidence right here that it works.

[The_Other_Waldo_Pepper]

@BobLibDem

I suppose the “she must have done it because she benefitted” also means that LBJ had JFK killed.

LBJ was a woman?