Outraged Responses to Obama Birth Certificate Reveal

The President and First Lady sat down with Oprah after yesterday morning's announcement. Photo: AP, Charles Dharapak

Following yesterday’s release of President Barack Obama’s long-form birth certificate, the Internet lit up with outraged media responses.

Most vocal were sites targeting black audiences. AOL Black Voices said plainly, “But let’s be real, just as with Trump’s foolish assertion that Obama didn’t deserve to attend Ivy League institutions Columbia and Harvard, the real issue is people’s inability to accept that a black man has the top job in this country. It’s always been about racists and their racism, point blank.”

The Root discusses the characterization of the President by “his fellow Americans as a dangerous outsider.”

“The idea that Obama ‘doesn’t belong’ in the White House is a threat to our sense — as people of color, as newcomers, as immigrants — of being legitimate participants in the gorgeous mosaic of America. But it is also dangerous for the president, already the recipient of an unprecedented number of threats against his life,” that article goes on to say.

And perhaps most passionate was a video response from comedian and author Baratunde Thurston, who added “rage” to the list of emotions he felt yesterday.

Mainstream outlets also had their say. Writers at The Atlantic, including James Fallows, commented on yesterday’s big reveal. “This is not a great day for the press. For anybody, really — but maybe a tie for worstness between Trump himself and those who have been barkers for his sideshow,” writes Fallows.

And David Remnick at The New Yorker tackled the issue with a powerful column titled “Trump, Birtherism, and Race-Baiting,” saying, “The one radical thing about Barack Obama is his race, his name. Of course, there is nothing innately radical about being black or having Hussein as middle name; what is radical is that he has those attributes and is sitting in the Oval Office.”