'Birthers' Mark President's Birthday by Claiming He Was Born in Kenya

Aug. 4, 2007— -- As President Obama prepares to celebrate his 48th birthday today with friends and family, another group of folks is saying the day should be yet another reminder that the man in the White House has no business being there.

For so-called "birthers", a loose-knit network of activists and lawyers intent on proving the president is not a natural born citizen of the United States and therefore ineligible for the post of president, his first birthday in office is being met with a simmering outrage.

"We should be reminded on his birthday, if it really is his birthday, that we still do not know the truth about when and where President Obama was born," said Dr. Orly Taitz, a dentist-cum-lawyer from Orange County, Calif., and the de facto head of the birther movement.

"People should go to the White House and protest," said Taitz, reached by phone in Europe at the start of a three-week vacation. "Then again, for me this birthday is insignificant. I have seen numerous birthdates in numerous places; some say Aug. 1, some Aug. 4. So this is just another day."

Despite ample evidence that Obama was born in the United States, the birthers insist on questioning the president's bona fides. The din has become so loud that the White House addressed the conspiracy theory as recently as last week, an attempt to throw water on the rumors but which likely served only to fuel the fire.

On Monday -- just in time for the president's birthday -- WorldNetDaily, a conservative Web site that has become the clearinghouse for birther conspiracies, published an unauthenticated document purporting to be a birth certificate for Obama issued in Kenya.