Just when it appeared that President Barack Obama’s origin of birth had been settled at last, Libyan President Muammar Gadhafi relit the fuse. In a rambling, disjointed and, at times, unintelligible address to the United Nations yesterday in which Gadhafi (whose UFC nickname is Strongman) attributed to the “mother of all jet lags,” the Libyan leader stated that Obama was “my son.” Phone calls and emails immediately flooded such cable news outlets as Fox News Channel, with callers and writers claiming they now had undeniable proof that Obama is not an American citizen.
“He said it, he said it!” blurted one caller into the Glenn Beck Show. “Gadhafi said it in front of the whole United Nations. That’s a respected leader of a country saying it before the most venerated international body on earth. That’s all the proof I need!” Fox News executives wrestled whether or not to broadcast some of the viewer comments, since they depended on accepting the respectability of both Gadhafi and the United Nations to make the birther’s claims. “Talk about the horns of a dilemma for us,” said one Fox executive, who confirmed that the station’s tag, “fair and balanced” is more “honored in its breach than adherence.”
In an impromptu editorial, Beck said that Gadhafi’s admission to being Obama’s biological father was reviewed by a university, “whose name I forget off the top of my head,” but indicates further corroboration to the Libyan president’s claim of paternity. “Now I’m sorry I so insultingly turned Gadhafi down to appear on my show. Man, I blew that one, didn’t I?”
Fox News downplayed the notion that Gadhafi might have been speaking “metaphorically” in referring to Obama as his son. “We don’t even know what that means,” said a Fox News director. “Meta-what? Sounds like one of those liberal global warming terms.”
Rumors that FNC was quietly seeking to book the Libyan president on as many of its political talk shows as possible could not be confirmed. Shephard Smith of FNC’s “Studio B” did say that he thought “Obama’s dad might have an interesting take on his son’s healthcare plan, while “On the Record’s” Greta Van Susteren speculated on “what Obama’s papa thinks of his offspring’s stimulus bill.” Sean Hannity and Bill O’Reilly merely repeated “my son,” “my son,” “my son” over and over again to a split screen image of Gadhafi holding a baby with Obama’s face on it.
To shore up the Libyan leader’s credibility for “as long as we can keep a straight face over it,” FNC also downplayed the comment Gadhafi made in referring to “Senator John Blutarski” as one of America’s greatest leaders, whose tragic death should be investigated, and that the Security Council could “learn a lot about international relations from Delta House.”
