Birther, Swiftboater

Well, isn’t that interesting.

The Romney campaign is letting a notorious “reporter,” Jerome Corsi, fly on their plane who’s a birther – his anti-Obama books include “Where’s the Birth Certificate?” He also recently alleged that President Obama is secretly gay. But Corsi is perhaps best known for co-authoring the book, “Swift Boat Veterans Speak Out Against John Kerry” – yes, he’s one of the Swiftboaters.

Oh, and Politico reports that he’s also been accused of being anti-Islamic, homophobic, anti-Semitic and anti-Catholic.

Issue with Jews

Hang on there, Batman! Anti-Semitic? The day after Mitt Romney professed to the world his love of all things Israel (and we’ll just forget that time that Romney accused Israel of being a socialist hell-hole), Romney is palling around with accused anti-Semites?

It seems that, among other inflammatory comments, Media Matters reports that Corsi mocked John Kerry once for supposedly being Jewish:

“After he married TerRAHsa, didn’t John Kerry begin practicing Judiasm? He also has paternal grandparents that were Jewish. What religion is John Kerry?”

What’s interesting is that Corsi’s comments (blog posts, apparently) about Kerry center around accusing Kerry of being a communist and an America-hater. So it’s interesting that the third “smear” is that Kerry is Jewish too. It clearly doesn’t sound like he meant it to be a good thing. Here’s Corsi’s other comments on Kerry:

CORSI: Kerry has a long history of Communist supporters. (03/12/2004) CORSI: Kerry offers a clear choice. Anti-American hatred. (02/08/2004) CORSI: John F*ing Commie Kerry and Commie Ted [Kennedy] discuss their plan to hand America over to our nation’s enemies. (02/04/2004)

Corsi says that he has since apologized for the inflammatory comments.

Anti-Catholic

What he had to say about Catholocism and the Pope is sure to raise eyebrows as well, again via Media Matters:

So this is what the last days of the Catholic Church are going to look like. Buggering boys undermines the moral base and the laywers rip the gold off the Vatican altars. We may get one more Pope, when this senile one dies, but that’s probably about it.

Appearing with Racists

Just as troubling is Media Matters’ report that in 2008, Corsi was scheduled to appear on a “pro-White” radio show that also has issues with Jews. Again, Media Matters look at anti-Semitism from the host of the radio show that Corsi was schedule to appear on:

In an August 6 post headlined “Jewish media reaches new heights,” discussing a Slate.com article by “Jew Timothy Noah,” Edwards [the radio show host] wrote that the piece would “make sense once you understand that Jews are the ones who are always speaking in code; when they use words like ‘racists’, ‘bigots’, ‘anti-semites’, they simply mean white people.” Similarly, in a July 9 post headlined “Great moments in Jewish journalism,” Edwards referred to a column by The Washington Post‘s David S. Broder about former Sen. Jesse Helms as “another hatefilled Jewish attack piece.”

I’m not feeling the love for Israel here.

More on Corsi’s past comments about Islam and Catholicism:

Corsi on Islam: “a worthless, dangerous Satanic religion”

Corsi on Catholicism: “Boy buggering in both Islam and Catholicism is okay with the Pope as long as it isn’t reported by the liberal press”

Corsi on Muslims: “RAGHEADS are Boy-Bumpers as clearly as they are Women-Haters — it all goes together”

Regardless of Corsi’s apology, that’s a lot of venom for one guy.

Secret Muslim Decoder Ring

Though I’m personally rather fond of the “Obama is gay!” exposé, my favorite is Corsi’s recent article claiming that President Obama wears a secret Muslim decoder ring (that he dug out of the bottom of his favorite box of Muslim cereal?)

As a student at Harvard Law School, then-bachelor Barack Obama’s practice of wearing a gold band on his wedding-ring finger puzzled his colleagues. Now, newly published photographs of Obama from the 1980s show that the ring Obama wore on his wedding-ring finger as an unmarried student is the same ring Michelle Robinson put on his finger at the couple’s wedding ceremony in 1992. Moreover, according to Arabic-language and Islamic experts, the ring Obama has been wearing for more than 30 years is adorned with the first part of the Islamic declaration of faith, the Shahada: “There is no god except Allah.”

So, basically, Corsi is peddling the “Obama is a Muslim” lie.

Let’s recap: Allegedly anti-Catholic, anti-Muslim, homophobic, issues with Jews, birther, Swift-boater, and one of the “Obama is a secret Muslim” conspiracy theorists.

What exactly is this guy doing on Mitt Romney’s plane?