Obama: As American as apple pie

Karl Rove is right. The fanaticism of the birther faction of
the Republican Party is a curse that could sink the GOP. When polls show that barely
30 percent of all Republicans are convinced that President Obama is a natural born
American, this is a level of sickness and weirdness in a major political party that
could bring them electoral disaster.

I have not been shy about occasionally criticizing President
Obama when I believe it is called for, but:

President Obama is as American as apple pie. He is as American
as the nearest red, white and blue flag. He is as Christian as the nearest Protestant
church.

Obama succeeded the American way. He studied hard and excelled
at school. He rose by winning the respect of his peers. He succeeded the way Americans
are supposed to succeed and achieved what he has through intelligence, diligence,
ambition and hard work, which is the American way. He is devoted to a loving wife
with whom he is raising a loving family.

There is something very wrong and in my view very sick when a
large element of a major political party cannot accept the obvious Americanism of
an American president, and when certain partisans in that party view nuts like the
birthers as a constituency worth courting.

Criticize his policies for sure. But Barack Obama is as American
as apple pie, and those who do not accept this are far outside the mainstream of
our nation and our tradition as Americans. It is the birthers who need to learn
the lesson about what it means to be an Ameican.