Today is President Barack Obama's 49th birthday, but Rush Limbaugh is not buying it.

Rehashing the nonsense spewing from the Birther movement, Limbaugh said he doesn't believe today is the president's birthday.

"They tell us August 4th is the birthday; we haven't seen any proof," Limbaugh said in his latest idiotic rant.

Wow. I thought we had moved passed this already. The sight of an African American in charge is such a shock to some people that they had to make up myths to prove that his election is not legitimate.

And the number of people who question when and where Obama was born is frightening. A Washington Post/ABC News poll shows that one in five people believe Obama was not born in the United States. For people who self-identified as Republicans, that number jumped to one in three.

These are the stats despite the fact that it has been proven beyond a doubt that Obama was born in Hawaii.



Even Hawaii's Republican Governor Linda Lingle is tired of the Birther movement. She sent her health director to examine Obama's birth records to put the false controversy to rest:

"I think it's one of those issues that is simply a distraction from the more critical issues that are facing the country. And so I had my health director, who is a physician by background, go personally view the birth certificate in the birth records of the Department of Health, and we issued a news release at that time saying that the president was, in fact, born at Kapi'olani hospital in Honolulu, Hawaii. And that's just a fact. And yet people continue to call up and e-mail and want to make it an issue. And I think it's, again, a horrible distraction for the country by those people who continue this. ... It's been established. He was born here."

Limbaugh's charges just reek of desperation, but they still flow from voices in the Republican Party, including J.D. Hayworth, who is challenging Sen. John McCain in Arizona, Lou Dobbs and others.

I wish I could just dismiss this rhetoric, but it is dangerous: All it takes is some mentally unstable ultraconservative to try something lethal to remedy his so-called illegitimate situation. Look at what happened with Glenn Beck and his targeting of the previously relatively unknown Tides Foundation.

Luckily, mainstream Republicans know how nutty the Birther rhetoric makes them look. This country needs to move beyond this nonsense and have a real, honest discussion about race and why some people feel so uncomfortable with a black man as president that they're willing to make up fairy tales.

Since it won't be coming from Limbaugh anytime soon, and Sasha, Michelle and Malia are out of town, happy birthday, Mr. President.