Here, My Friends, Is How You Write a Truly Nuclear False Equivalence

If I were to ask you: “Who are ‘the new birthers?’” What might you say? I bet you cannot guess what the actual, published answer to this question is!!!!

“The New Birthers”—according to an op-ed published in the very prestigious Wall Street Journal—are………………………………………………………………………..
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PEOPLE WHO SAY DONALD TRUMP IS RACIST.

Yes—the argument that is being made, right before your very eyes, is that we can equate birtherism, a false and made up and imaginary theory with absolutely no basis in fact, with….. let me just double check here to make sure this is right…. yes…. with the assertion that Donald Trump is racist.

That is the argument being made in real life!

Here we are again, only it’s much worse this time. You want to fulminate against Donald Trump for his cruel tweets and childish behavior or his madcap non-policies on trade and North Korea. But then the president’s meanest adversaries on the left will level a charge so dishonorable, so wantonly unfair, that you feel almost bound to defend him.

The most common of these charges is that Mr. Trump is a racist.

Why would anyone think Donald Trump is racist?

If you’ve ever had a conversation with a conspiracy theorist, you know this is what it’s like. Evidence that the theorist’s claim is unproven or false becomes evidence that it’s true. Countervailing logic only reinforces his certainty.

How strange, then, that many of Mr. Trump’s angriest detractors have begun to sound like adherents of the conspiracy theory he helped to propagate: birtherism.

This piece was written by a white guy, surprisingly.

Credit birthers with this much: Article II, section 1 of the U.S. Constitution does require that the president be a natural born citizen. There is no provision in the Constitution barring “racists,” real or alleged, from serving in any office. One of these theories is adopted mainly by Joe Blows who’ve spent too much time online, the other by educated metropolitans and media elites. I’m not sure which is crazier.

There is simply no way to litigate the veracity of these two separate claims. They must be the same.