If he were white, does anyone actually believe this would even be an issue?

It's funny how not so long ago, Republicans were talking about amending the Constitution to allow Arnold Schwarzenegger to run for President. You haven't heard that in a while, now, have you?

Just the other day, I responded to a blog comment by DCap by predicting that assuming Jon Corzine loses in New Jersey today, the media meme will be that this is a resounding rejection of Barack Obama himself, that his presidency is over, stick a fork in him, he's done. This will, of course, give the Republicans the cover they need to begin impeachment proceedings. They might take Michele Bachmann's bait and impeach him for creeping socialism with what they believe to be socialist health care reform. But I think it's more likely that they'll choose something more red-meat by finally embracing Orly Taitz and her birther lunatics and try to impeach him on the grounds of ineligibility. This way John Boehner can stand up and solemnly invoke the Constitution, and the media (yes, even Tweety) will lap it up. Then, after the next Republican president, presumably Sarah Palin or Liz Cheney, takes office, they will rend their garments and say that after much introspection, they were too tough on Obama and they'll slack off. Then there'll be another Democrat, and so it goes.

But the birther hysteria has taken hold in even a more local context than the Presidency: the New York City Marathon, where a naturalized American citizen who hails from Eritrea, and whose skin color is somewhat dark, is facing questions about whether he is a "real" American. I kid you not:

As soon as Mebrahtom Keflezighi, better known as Meb, won the New York City Marathon on Sunday, an uncommon sports dispute erupted online, fraught with racial and nationalistic components: Should Keflezighi’s triumph count as an American victory?

He was widely celebrated as the first American to win the New York race since 1982. Having immigrated to the United States at age 12, he is an American citizen and a product of American distance running programs at the youth, college and professional levels.

But, some said, because he was born in Eritrea, he is not really an American runner.

The debate reveals what some academics say are common assumptions and stereotypes about race and sports and athletic achievement in the United States. Its dimensions, they add, go beyond the particulars of Keflezighi and bear on undercurrents of nationalism and racism that are not often voiced.

“Race is still extremely important when you think about athletics,” said David Wiggins, a professor at George Mason University who studies African-Americans and sports. “There is this notion about innate physiological gifts that certain races presumably possess. Quite frankly, I think it feeds into deep-seated stereotypes. The more blatant forms of racial discrimination and illegal forms have been eliminated, but more subtle forms of discrimination still exist.”

There are few cases parallel to Keflezighi’s in American sports. Some are noteworthy because of how little discussion, by comparison, they generated over the athlete’s nationality. For example, the Hall of Fame basketball player Patrick Ewing (Jamaica) and the gold medal gymnast Nastia Liukin (Russia) were born abroad, but when they represented the United States in competition, they seemingly did not encounter the same skepticism that Keflezighi has.

That's because we didn't have a racist right wing that's been whipped into a racist frenzy by right-wing talk show hosts and Congressional Republicans, and a crazy woman in a bad fright wig screaming for attention by trying to declare the President to be illegitimate.