Paul Flemming: Is the congressman a commando, too?

Friday, July 24, 2009

By Paul Flemming, Capital Ideas

There are different levels of “making it.” You can measure by wealth, influence, good deeds or personal satisfaction, among many examples.

Another is this: Making it into Weekly World News.

By that measure, U.S. Rep. Bill Posey, a Rockledge Republican, has now made it.

Posey’s in D.C., outside my usual bailiwick here in Florida’s capital. But Posey is 21 months removed from the Florida Senate where I knew him, and he’s a fine person. (My criteria for “fine personhood”? Return phone calls and don’t lie. It’s a surprisingly difficult hurdle to clear.)

Now he’s made it into the pages of the erstwhile supermarket tabloid (these days only inserted into another tabloid and alive on the Web) best known for the exploits of Bat Boy and columnist Ed Anger.

According to a story written by Reginald Cunningham III, Posey and another member of Congress “led an elite squad of commandoes in a daring heist at the Honolulu hospital where (President Obama’s birth certificate), real or forged, was kept.”

Posey — true fact — could not be reached to confirm or deny this published report. I’ll deny it for him.

Posey is sponsor — true fact — of a bill to require presidential candidates prove their eligibility for office, including presentation of an original birth certificate. Obama’s birth status and eligibility to hold office is the focus of a dedicated, intense, relentless group of individuals charitably described as the whacko fringe.

Further charitable views of Posey’s sponsorship would conclude he’s just trying to stop this nonsense from taking up precious energy in the future. Either that, or there really is no such thing as bad publicity. The Weekly World News did spell his name right.

Odds are, you already knew all of this. After all, the Weekly World News also reported this week that 53 percent of us are psychic.

This article is reprinted from http://www.tallahassee.com