Topic: WorldNetDaily
Jerome Corsi continues his series of vendetta-driven articles seeking to expose anti-birther critics on Internet forums in a July 19 article, in which he declares that Democratic Party operative James A. Johnson, the former chairman of Fannie Mae, "has been directing a team of up to 100 who are paid to publish disinformation on a wide variety of websites to discredit 'birthers'" and is "apparently operating with the full approval and cooperation of the president."
Corsi's main source for this claim is Ed Hale, whom Corsi identifies only as "the Texas-based creator of Plains Radio." Corsi made no apparent effort to confirm Hale's claim beyond leaving a message with Johnson that wasn't returned.
So, who is Ed Hale? To begin with, here's an introductory sample of Corsi hanging out with Hale -- who seems to have forgotten to put on pants -- earlier this month. Corsi, of course, didn't mention that appearance in his article.
Like a significant number of birthers, Hale is a PUMA, having shown up on CNN in 2008 to promote a website called Hillary Clinton Supporters for John McCain. He once claimed to have 21 million listeners to his Plains Radio webcast (actually, he misread his analytics data). Also, the domain for his Plains Radio website has expired; here's a capture from the Wayback Machine, which demonstrates the same 2001-era web design skills as his McCain website.
He has claimed to have Obama's Hawaii birth certificate, as well as the divorce decree of Barack Obama Sr. and Stanley Ann Dunham, neither of which he has apparently released publicly. Hale was also an eager promoter of the purported inflammatory Michelle Obama tape peddled by the dubious African Press International, which WND was also suckered into -- heck, Corsi was begging API for a copy -- until it was clear that API had no such thing.
Does this sound like someone who can be considered a reliable source for anything? It does to Jerome Corsi, and that's why he built an entire article about Hale's questionable claim.
Corsi also tries to fill in the many, many holes in Hale's story with screenshots from various Internet forums and plays connect-the-dots from there. But many of those posts clearly contain sarcasm that Corsi has chosen to take seriously.
On top of all this, Corsi concludes his article with a short bio of Johnson, making sure to note: "He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, the Trilateral Commission and the American Friends of Bilderberg."
So Corsi has penned an article based on a never-proven claim from a completely unreliable source filled with misinterpreted conjecture and overheated fearmongering -- all because he and his birther crusade has been mocked on obscure web forums.
Is it any wonder that Corsi simply cannot taken seriously?