For those unfamiliar with the debate, “birthers”, for example Republican Presidential Candidate hopefuls Donald Trump, Michelle Bachmann and Mitt Romney amongst many others believe, or claim to believe, that the President was born outside of the country. United States law decrees that only U.S citizens can run for and subsequently be elected President, thus making his office, in “birthers” opinions, illegal.  Mr. Obama has faced other vexing criticisms during his Presidency such as whether he is secretly Muslim, socialist, fascist, communist, or some alien hybrid with draconian visions of world domination.  These criticisms could be viewed as comical if there weren’t so many Americans who believe them. 

A recent New York Times/CBS News Poll found that 45 percent of Republicans think that Mr. Obama was born in another country.  A new national survey by the Pew Research Center finds that nearly one-in-five Americans (18%) now say Obama is a Muslim (up from 11% in March 2009) and an astounding 55% believe that the President is either a socialist or has socialist leanings. 

While every President faces their fair share of conspiracy theories, the ones facing President Obama are particularly concerning because the media has forced such huge attention to them leaving in its wake a deficiency of honest, practical and necessary discourse.  Consider the fact that the US is facing record debt, large scale unemployment, three unofficial wars and a looming budget debate that has major implications for the American public- and that’s just domestically speaking!  Throw global issues such as climate change, nuclear proliferation and Middle East instability in the mix and it doesn’t take a political scientist to realize that the priorities of some are seriously misguided.

"We've got some enormous challenges out there," the president told reporters from a press conference Wednesday morning. "I am confident that the American people and America's political leaders can come together in a bipartisan way and solve these problems. … (But) we aren't going to be able to solve these problems if we get distracted by sideshows and carnival barkers."

Although I’m generally a big fan of sideshows and carnival barkers, (I took a class on carnival barking in college and found it quite invigorating) I hardly find now to be the time or place for such trivialities.  Many would argue that we are at a pivotal moment in modern history and governments around the world need to stop fucking around (yeah I’m talk to you too Berlusconi!) and start tackling issues.