Thursday, April 1, 2010

Insubordination

Army Lt. Col. Terry Lakin, a physician, has joined the birther movement and has appeared in a video stating that he will disobey any order, including, it seems, an order to deploy to Afghanistan, from a superior officer until Obama produces a birth certificate showing that he is a US citizen.

Obviously, insubordination of this kind calls for a court martial and incarceration if he's convicted. But let's pause for just a second and remember that he, and the organization which produced the video, also know this. So why would he go public like this? Simple: to keep the story alive, to generate media buzz (Huffington Post has the story, but I haven't seen it anywhere else in the "liberal" media. Not even Faux News is covering it). Hasn't really worked yet, I think.

Like much of what the Right thinks is important in governing this country, it appears that this story, too, will fall flat. There are bigger issues now, and even while nearly 50% of Republicans believe Obama is not a citizen, it's time for advanced citizenship to kick in and deal with what's really important.

The biggest problem now facing the Republicans, as one of the panelists in last week's Real Time with Bill Maher said it, is that they are no longer a national party. They have become a leaderless, amorphous conglomeration of regional and local parties. The agendas are different, although they all share two things in common: they are all infused with some degree of crazy, and they all hate Obama so much they would rather pick up their marbles and go home than cooperate with him.

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