The Day America Lost Its Mind

The British newspaper the Independent for one is shocked, shocked that President Obama finally succumbed to birther mania and released his long-form birth certificate to shut up the fringe (a strategy already failing). "Has there ever been a more absurdly surreal moment, even in US politics, that theater of the absurd and the surreal?" wonders writer Robert Cornwell, who attributes the American humiliation to that "puffed up bullfrog" Donald Trump. "No sane person has ever doubted" that Obama was born in the US, he adds. But the birther debate has "moved to the lunatic center of American political debate," he notes.

But wait, things could get even crazier, warns Cornwall. Imagine Donald Trump in the White House. The man-threatening-to-be president boasted yesterday about his role in forcing Obama's hand in trying to disprove a zany theory, notes Cornwall. "I am really proud. I am really honored," beamed The Donald. "I feel I've accomplished something really really important that no one else was able to do." Whether this "triumph" will see Trump now addressing "momentous matters like the deficit remains to be seen," says Cornwall. (More birther stories.)