President William Jefferson Clinton could be said to have come from humble beginnings, and being a son of Arkansas, one might even be tempted to doubt his intellectual capabilities if one is given to the sort of grotesque generalizations about the American South as is often done in some quarters of the US. This, however, has not, to my knowledge, ever occurred to the point where the media has continued carrying the story. Yet President Obama has been the brunt of continued questions about not the place of his birth, but also his intellectual capabilities. In light of presidents and politicians having humble beginnings and not being questioned so vigorously, it is hard to accept that the impetus behind these questions is in some sense racial. Now, that is not to say that the people asking the questions are racist, but rather to say that there is a component of race within their queries. What is relatively apparent is the sense of otherworldliness that these people view Obama with, and as such, leads one to believe that it is not so much an idea of superiority but a gross misunderstanding of what life for a person that is not Anglo is like in the United States. That there are intelligent individuals in the US that are not Anglo and capable of reaching such heights seems, as one can infer from the reactions to Obama, all together surreal.

While the proceeding article is not "conservative" in nature, it does present a relatively balanced view on the subject and shows how the claim of racism thrown upon birthers is more than likely incorrect, but also shows the lack of comfort with someone that seems, in many ways, otherworldly.

What is most unfortunate, as Mr. Sullivan points out, is how these actions continue to erode the view of the president. But it is not just about the actual president, in my view. What we have, and was even evident during Bush II's administration, is a lack of respect for the office of the president itself. This may have more to do with the lack of understanding of how the three branches of government work, showing, in some sense, a further erosion of knowledge regarding the same. It would then, as one could infer, undermine our ability to make informed statements about those in office. It is almost inconceivable that an individual could completely fool everyone involved in the vetting process to attain such a high position, but this is entirely lost on the birthers, and to some degree those that question not just Obama's policies, but Obama as a citizen and accomplished human being.

These cartoons show the absurdity and unwillingness to think through the claims that are made and to test them against sound reason and logic. Ohh, and they're kind of funny too.