Cartoon : Truther & Birther

Cartoon by Chip Bok of The Akron (Ohio) Beacon-Journal published 10 September 2009

Two new words have recently entered the American political vocabulary: a truther and a birther. Both words refer to conspiracy theorists.

- A truther is part of the 9/11 Truth Movement and is someone who believes that the attacks of September 11th were an inside job. In other words, he or she believes the US Government and President Bush were behind the terrorist attacks. Also called “9/11 deniers” and “9/11 skeptics,” the term “truther” has stuck. The movement was inspired by the documentary “Loose Change.” One of the reasons President Obama’s Green Jobs Czar, Anthony “Van'” Jones, had to resign was because he was accused of being part of this movement.

- A birther believes that Obama is ineligible to be President of the United States based on the claim that he wasn’t really born in the United States. The claim is based on the fact that Obama has never released his original birth certificate. According to the US Constitution, a president must be a natural-born citizen (born in the US) and not a naturalized citizen (obtained citizenship in country where he or she wasn’t born).

- A swap is when you exchange with someone one thing for something else. For example, imagine you are on the plane and you got a window seat and your neighbor has an aisle seat but you both don’t like your seats, so you both offer to swap seats. You take his aisle seat and he takes your window seat. In this case, the cartoonist shows the Democrat (represented by the donkey) proposing that the Republican (represented by the elephant) sacrifice one his birthers since the Democrats sacrificed a truther through the resignation of Mr. Van Jones.

Visit Chip Bok’s blog at : http://www.bokbluster.com/