Birther Control or Ol' Clementine Got Some Questions About The President's Birth Certificate

Eds. note: At 236-years-old, Ol’ Clementine is the oldest man in the world. He worked as a slave in most of the Confederate states and has continued the profession long after Emancipation. Occasionally, he shares his unique perspective on the pressing issues of the day and we present it for you, dear reader.

Back when that Kenyan boy was running for president I was living in New York and working for Mister Trump, for no pay of course. Ain’t have no time to be thinking ‘bout no politics.

I was a judge on his show The Apprentice, ‘cept he ain’t want me on camera. So I stay behind the scenes advising Boss Trump each week on which contestant to sell down South.

People keep telling me this man Brock O’Bama is running for president and talking all this Yes We Can stuff. And white folks is smiling up in my face saying I should be proud and look how far my people have come. Proud? I’m furrowing my brow and looking at them funny. I ain’t no Irishman. What I gotta be proud of this O’Bama boy for? Then I figure we ain’t have an Irishman in the White House in a long time. Should be nice. I never seen the boy; how was I supposed to know he was a negro?

One thing about me is I don’t vote. Uh uh. Never have. Won’t do it. It’s just not right.

I’m what they call a strict constructionist. That’s when you follow the Constitution and don’t worry about no ‘mendments. Some of them ‘mendments are good. Like the 2^nd ‘mendment. Shot me a grizzly the other day and got them bear arms over my fireplace.

But it say there in the Constitution that I’m 3/5^th of a man. So I don’t see where I gets off casting a ballot. I don’t care if some activist judge say I got the right. I ain’t ‘bout to disrespect the founding fathers’ vision. And part of they vision is you got to be born here to be president. Once I figure things out, I gets powerful angry. It’s obvious he ain’t from either the Union or the Confederate States. After all, his name Barack Hussein Obama (not Brock O’Bama like I thought). If that don’t sound like the name of some negro Kenyan Asalamalakum negro then I don’t know what do.

I’m looking at the TV and there he is just a-making laws and talking to white folks anyway he want. I’m so shocked watching this boy’s antics that I slap myself in the mouth so hard I tip over in my chair. Back hit the floor and legs just shooting up in the air.

I’m the first one that begin all that question-asking and ‘vestigating. Then people start getting ‘spicious about that boy. On Nov. 5, 2008 you should have seen all the white people who voted for him like, “What have I done?” Guess they like me and misheard the man’s name.

I tell Mister Trump he need to do something, but he don’t want to listen. That short birth certificate look fake, I say. Why he don’t release the long one? It’s not even from no real place. Ain’t nobody ever heard of no Hawaii. Honolulu? That just sound fake.

We go back and forth about it for a few months. Mr. Trump try and say Obama had one of them birth notices in the Hawaii newspaper. I look at this fool like he done slam lost his mind. I say, “Don’t you know them Kenyan negroes got them magical bush doctor powers? Make it appear like there were a birth notice in the paper back then on that day they say he was born on when, in truth, there wasn’t no such birth notice anywhere near that damn newspaper.”

After the president get to giving health care to little black negro children, Mr. Trump start getting concerned. He say, “Clementine, you may have a point.  This could be big, tremendous, the most amazing thing that ever happened in the history of the world. Bigger even than this season of my hit, number 1 NBC reality show, The Apprentice. Sunday at 10/ 9 central. This is going to be uuuuge!”

Mister Trump don’t say ‘huge’ like normal people. He say it like rich folks. Rich folks leave out the ‘h.’ And he was right, this thing was uuuuge, because the next day he say he gon’ send me to Hawaii to ‘vestigate.

When he tell me that, I’m all excited ’cause I never left the United States before. Ain’t want to get all ‘mancipated by accident. Man next to me say when the plane touch down you get laid by some Hawaiian woman so I get even more excited. That didn’t happen. Some woman put flowers round my neck and then I look at her all amorous-like and I’m thinking, this is where I get laid, but she move on and I ain’t press the issue none.

Then I thought about it; maybe he ain’t mean as soon as you touch down you get laid. Maybe it happens after you get out onto the town. So I went to the beach. Went out to the club and started dancing with fine Hawaiian women. Got slam dunk off mai tais at the bar. Figure I keep partying and eventually I’ll get laid.

To tell you the truth, I forgot about ‘vestigating this birth certificate thing.

About a week after I got to Hawaii, Boss Trump call me. He ask: “Have you seen the birth certificate?”

“No, suh,” I say.

“Incredible. Outrageous. Out of this world. More out of this world than one of my buildings or my television show, which by the way, is the biggest, most exciting show on NBC and all of television,” he reply. “What about people who knew him growing up?”

“No, suh,” I says. “I ain’t met a one.”

“Unbelievable. No one knows this guy until later in life. Keep digging, Clementine, this is good stuff. This is uuuuuge!”

So Mister Trump hangs up and I don’t feel bad about leading him astray. After all, I ain’t lie. Plus I figure I bought myself some time. So I go back to the club, back to the beach, back on the hunt ‘cause I ain’t get laid yet.

But then about two weeks later, I’m watching TV and that Kenyan negro is on the screen looking serious and he say, “Asalamalakum my fellow Kenyans, er, I mean, Hello, my fellow Americans. Here go my birth certificate. I ain’t got time for this shit no more. Later for you suckers. PEACE.”

Immediately my phone gets to ringing and I know its Mister Trump. When I answer, he’s yelling and screaming.  Say I have him out there looking like an “absolute fool.” I’m thinking, that rat fur you got on top of your head got you looking like a fool, but I don’t say that. What I do say is, “You should be prouda yaself, boss. You helped put an end to this issue.”

“Clementine, you’re absolutely right,” he say. Then he gets quiet like he thinking. “Well, he’s an American alright,” Mister Trump say, “but he’s still black.”

“Yes, suh,” I say. “Besides, we got much more to ‘vestigate.”

“We do?”

“Yes, suh. He claim he a Christian, right? Anyone seen his baptismal records?”

Rion Amilcar Scott writes fiction all over the damn place, tweets @reeamilcarscott and blogs at datsun flambe.