Early this morning, the White House blog published President Obama's long-form birth certificate for the world to see.  Yes, he was born in the United States, and no, it doesn't say what religion he belongs to.  Has all of the speculation finally been put to bed?  With this conspiracy theory die out now so we can move on with our lives?  Only time will tell, I suppose.  But traditionally, giving wack-job conspiracy theorists the exact evidence they ask for only results in a change in the dynamics of their insanity, moreso than a ceasing of it.  You can show a JFK assassination theorist that Lee Harvey Oswald was more than capable of firing his rifle as quickly as he did.  You can show them the Presidential limousine's peculiar seating style, which rubs out the "magic bullet theory."  It won't stop them from publishing new books on the subject, or putting out new websites devoted to how the CIA, or the Mafia, or Communists, or aliens from Mars were the true culprits.

My early prediction is that these loons will just find something new to complain about, saying the long form birth certificate doesn't match their criteria or sport the features or qualities they were expecting.  I wouldn't be entirely surprised if some of these conspiracy theorists ended up criticizing President Obama for releasing it, citing the fact that the State of Hawaii doesn't release long form birth certificates for anyone, and President Obama never would have had this done for him if he weren't the President.  Some people simply can't be pleased.

What I'm not predicting, however, is that any of these birthers will apologize for their crudeness or their ignorance.  They won't apologize for their behavior, their outlandish speculations, or their baseless assumptions.  We won't hear Orly Taitz, or Donald Trump, or one of the other birther generals step up and thank the White House for releasing it, offering any degree of sincere gratitude or humbled gratefulness for the hoops the President had to jump through to satisfy their fatuous whims.

The birthers owe the President a thank you, and some of them owe him an apology for their fabrications.  Will that debt be paid?  By some, surely.  By most?  Not a chance.  And don't be too surprised if the birther phenomenon takes on new roots, either.  Call it pessimism, call it a natural knee-jerk reflect, or call it flat-out realism, but I'm willing to wager that six months from now, birthers are going to continue pushing their nonsensical, radical theories, and if in twenty-four hours a number of birthers haven't denied the legitimacy of this official document, I'll eat my own shoe.  You pick the condiments.  I'm not a particular fan of relish, if that helps.

The White House has had a pretty full plate.  President Obama entered the Oval Office with the nation tetering on the edge of ruin.  It's been a long, difficult road to navigate, and to be honest, I'm a bit upset that he spent this much time working on something so meaningless.  It's not like any of these birthers are going to wake up this morning, see the long-form birth certificate they've been ranting about, and then turn to their spouse saying "well honey, that's good enough for me, I'm supporting President Obama now!"  At best, some of these birthers will merely find some new conspiracy to latch onto.  But don't kid yourself folks, this had nothing to do with President Obama's place of birth.  It had everything to do with the losing side of an election bitterly searching for anything they could find that was worthy of criticism.  And if President Obama were a white man named John Smith, the conspiracy never would have existed in the first place.  I'm still waiting for someone to prove me wrong about that.

So there you have it, folks.  President Obama was born in Hawaii.  The long-form birth certificate offers nothing any more revealing than the previously-offered birth certificate showed.  His birth father wasn't Elvis, he wasn't born in Kenya and brought here in the pursuit of financial benefits, and Hawaii didn't recognize him as a Muslim when he was born.  I'd love to see your long-form apologies now.  But being that I'm not an Olympic swimmer, nor am I proficient in scuba diving, don't expect me to hold my breath.