Birthers Return to Obama's Social Security Number

Busy, busy day in birther news: First came the Hawaii law making it legal for state employees to refuse repetitive quests for President Obama's birth certificate. (AP has more details.) Then Mediaite takes note of an old-but-new-again angle that soared up the Google trends list today—questioning the president's Social Security number. An Internet rumor (spread, coincidentally, by a site that sells birther stuff) maintains that the president's SSN was issued in Connecticut, in 1890. The Christian Science Monitor also has it.

The proof? Um, it's still coming. Warns Glynnis MacNicol of Mediaite: "Since it’s currently making its way up the Google trends hot list, it might be just the sort of thing to bubble up on cable news between segments as a 'you decide' filler once people get tired of the depressing BP oil video. Or, alternately, will cause Anderson Cooper's head to actually explode on live television."