If the internet PDF was altered from the original in any way, a lot of people, especially the Hawaiian officials, would have been in a position to say so.
Indeed, but the argument lately expressed here is that all those people have been "brainwashed." And yes, there are accusations that the Hawaii officials have been pressured to certify the existing paper and digital documents. Yeah, the whole thing reads like a bad political thriller novel.
Or does someone think that the original document in the bound volume is the forgery?
Indeed that has been proposed as well.
If that was so, then a photocopy wouldn't show any evidence of it.
But that's the point. Birther logic goes kind of like this:
The Federal Election Commission's certification is fake. We need a birth certificate.
The digest certificate is fake. We need a copy of the long-form certificate.
The copy of the long-form certificate is fake. We need a certified copy of it.
The certified copy is fake. We need the original.
The original is fake. We need...
In other words, the arguments fit a pattern:
___ is fake. We need ___.
But mathematically speaking, there is an ordering implied here. So if we quantify the argument:
X is fake. We need
X+1.
The problem is that
X derives from an open-ended set, hence the cartoon posted a few days ago where the Birthers are in a time machine witnessing Obama's birth live, and still saying they need more.
Despite the relative and iterative nature of the argument, there is a certain absolute value of
X at which absurdity is achieved. We were there a long time ago, but the Birthers can still add 1, and do so
ad infinitum nausaeam.
What would it take to for the birthers to say "Whoops, I guess that sucker is real"?
The election of a different candidate as President, and maybe not even then. Political conspiracy theorists seem to hold grudges forever.
