Party polarities

David Paul Kuhn:

Fully 35 percent of Democrats believe George W. Bush had advance knowledge of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Fully 28 percent of Republicans believe Barack Obama wasn't born in the United States.

Meet the fanatical third.

The tale of two conspiracy theories is the tale of the most polarized among us. The two statistics are based on a poll apiece. Neither is an exact measure. Yet, lots of liberals say take the "birther" poll on face value. Lots of conservatives say take the "truther" poll on face value. So let's listen to both sides.

The unsurprising conclusion: you can't reason with arch partisans.

On Friday, I published a post wondering why the mainstream media was paying exponentially more attention to the "birther" movement now. The 2008 campaign ended about eight months ago, after all.

The recent obsession over this fringe topic effectively blends conservatives with a fringe belief. The end result, the media has been making conservatives look like kooks.

That's because they are, according to many liberals who emailed me last Friday. The polar camp, the "birthers," sent me an even larger onslaught of emails; many were infuriated that I had inferred they were kooks.

...

Most conspiracy theorists' fidelity is to theory, not truth. They tend to uphold a belief despite the facts. The possible, however improbable, trumps the logical. And it's futile to attempt to disprove their belief....

...

A few years ago, an Emory psychologist scanned the brains of self-described partisans. Partisans were able to notice the hypocritical statements of the opposing candidate but not the inconsistencies of their preferred candidate. Ideology, it was determined, showed affects similar to drug addiction.

I find the birther position so improbable that it still surprises me that so many believe it so passionately. The idea that some 18 year old woman would want to go to some third world country to have her baby just strikes me as improbable in the extreme. As adventurous as Obama's mother was, this is a trip too far.

They need to let it go. There are much better ways to defeat Obama, and he is providing voters with more reasons to reject him and the Democrats everyday and none of them are related to the circumstances of his birth. Republicans need to focus on the issues that will persuade other voters to our side.

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