For all the dollars amassed by Donald Trump over the years, he’s managed to

The Donald

retain little if any sense. All dollars, no sense. Trump is the latest in a long line of would-be politicians who have confused personal financial literacy with public legislative competency. Ross Perot, Meg Whitman et al…feel free to shout amen anytime now.

There are two components to any presidential campaign and with them, two distinctly different strategies. The first is designed to curry favor amongst party loyalists for the primaries and the other is to relax stances and hopefully galvanize the middle masses during the general election.

“The Donald” is in full-swing primary mode, catering to each of the lowest common denominators of the GOP. Tea Party, Birthers, yes Mo’Kelly is talking about you. Anyone who supports the likes and rhetoric of Sarah Palin, Michele Bachmann and now Donald Trump rightfully deserves to be ridiculed.

Trump has has been consistent in his harangue for President Obama to “verify” his citizenship…to Trump’s satisfaction. Yes, the government has threatened to shut down, but Donald Trump is still stuck somewhere in between searching for the Loch Ness Monster and the Boogeyman with his oratory on the legitimacy of the Obama presidency.

The strategy is simple. Create doubt as to the legitimacy of the presidency in the minds of Americans and thus legitimize all opposition to and disrespect of the administration. The beautiful thing about doubt is it can survive despite facts, common sense or sunlight. It does not need reason, rational thought or real purpose to thrive. It only requires unbridled ignorance, which unfortunately runs rampant in our country; one which not-so-coincidentally has fallen further behind the rest of the world in education of its citizens.

Birthers (and Donald Trump) will argue that the president should just “show his birth certificate”…the presumption being he either hasn’t yet or is required to bow again to such insanity.

Birthers (and Donald Trump) will have you believe that although you can’t open a bank account or board a plane without adequate verification of citizenship in this Patriot Act/post 9/11 America; Barack Obama managed to somehow trick the world and become senator and President without an adequate background check.

Yes, evidently they do background checks for all government jobs except for Leader of the Free World. That is, if you believe Donald Trump. Although President Obama’s birth has been verified by the state of Hawaii, the ignorance promulgated by Trump is that Obama himself has been loathe to “verify” his citizenship.

President Obama won’t “just show his birth certificate?”

"Damn...this Mo'Kelly guy is good!"

Really?

Let’s approach this from another angle. Not that Mo’Kelly is a geography maven, but 2008 presidential candidate Senator John McCain, wasn’t even born in the United States.

Really.

He was born in the Panama Canal. Note the word “Panama” in the name. Because that’s where the canal is…it’s in Panama. It’s a 10- mile wide zone that the U.S. bought…but IN Panama. Panama has not moved and is still most surely located in Central America. John McCain’s status as an American citizen is at best a technicality, little different than if he were born on Space Shuttle Discovery in low Earth orbit. Meaning, if you’re born on U.S. property, you’re a citizen.

Donald Trump would have you believe there’s more doubt about the man born in Hawaii than the man born in a 10-mile stretch in the middle of Panama, bookended by Nicaragua and Colombia. McCain was born even before WWII and 23 years prior to the invention of the copy machine in 1959. The same 1959 in which Hawaii would become our 50^th state. But Donald Trump and the rest of the Birthers would rather you believe that the document created on Great Grand Mommy’s typewriter down in Central America is more trustworthy and less questionable than the one created here in the actual United States of America.

Got it…Donald Trump wants to pick and choose which “U.S.” agency is more believable.

But out of fairness to Senator McCain, his actual birth location is moot…here’s why.

As of 1934 citizenship law was changed to reflect a child born outside the limits and jurisdiction of the United States, whose father or mother (or both) was a citizen of the United States at the time of the child’s birth, would be considered a United States citizen provided that the U.S. citizen parent had resided in the United States prior to the birth of the child.

Meaning, McCain could have been born ANYWHERE in Central America and would still have been a U.S. citizen.

Now out of fairness to President Obama, his actual birth location is also moot…here’s why.

The 1940 Statute also provided for more stringent requirements for prior residence where, at the time of the child’s birth, one of the parents was a U.S. citizen and the other was an alien. On or after January 13, 1941, in the case of a child born to a U.S. citizen parent and an alien parent, the U.S. citizen parent had to have resided in the United States or its outlying possessions for 10 years, at least 5 of which were after attaining the age of 16 years in order to transmit U.S. citizenship to the child.

SOURCE 1

SOURCE 2

No matter how you slice it, President Obama is an American citizen. This misdirection from Trump and other Birthers is about race and racism.

Have a seat Donald.

But let’s look at this from another angle…

The chants and calls for President Obama to “show his birth certificate” ring familiar to African-Americans knowledgeable of 19^th century history, where freed slaves were required to show “freed papers” on command to permit travel around the country.

The mentality is not much different from Arizona in 2011.

There is something historically distasteful to African-Americans having to “prove” one’s authenticity or nationality and it is inextricably linked to racism. If Donald Trump wishes to question the legitimacy of the birth records in the state of Hawaii, then his complaint is with the state of Hawaii, not the President of the United States. This is an issue of principle.

When the Torrance, CA police stop Mo’Kelly (as they’ve done countless times over the decades) here is the common dialogue with few variations.

Officer: Do you know why we stopped you?

Mo’Kelly: No, I do not.

Officer: May we search your car, do you have any guns or other dangerous weapons in your possession?

Mo’Kelly: No I do not, and no you may not.

Officer: Why, do you have something to hide?

Mo’Kelly: No, it’s the principle of the matter.

Just because Mo’Kelly as an African-American man is driving through Torrance after dark, that alone is not reason enough to search my car. I don’t have any guns, drugs or dangerous weapons at my house. I don’t have any stashed away in a body orifice; and I sure don’t grant random, whimsical house or cavity searches either.

It’s the principle of the matter.

So as a matter of course, when police “ask” to search my car, I politely answer “no” accordingly. They are welcome to further waste my time and contrive “reasonable suspicion” to move forward with the search, but it’s the principle. It is not my job to prove I deserve to drive home without an unreasonable search. The California DMV with each traffic stop has verified that my license, registration and liability insurance are in order. My responsibility as a driver has been fulfilled.

Have a good night officer.

Comparatively, it is not President Obama’s job to further prove the authenticity of his birth certificate, certificate of live birth or any twisted combination of the two. The state of Hawaii has verified the authenticity of President Obama’s citizenship. His responsibility has also been fulfilled.  And if that’s not enough, Mo’Kelly just proved it for you.  Reading is fundamental.

Have a seat Donald.

President Obama should never lift a finger or offer a single word of clarity beyond what the state of Hawaii has already provided. He is neither required nor expected to satisfy the racially-tinged musings of an ignorant segment of the population or an oligarch with a reality TV show. The same oligarch who won’t even authenticate what is or is not crawling around the top of his head.

The Mo’Kelly Report is an entertainment journal with a political slant; published at The Huffington Post and EURWEB.com. For more Mo’Kelly, https://mrmokelly.com. Mr. Mo’Kelly can be reached at [email protected].

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