Ed Brayton is a journalist, commentator and speaker. He is the co-founder and president of 
I've given Worldnutdaily founder Joseph Farah several Robert O'Brien trophies over the last few years, but now Keith Olbermann has named him his Worst Person in the World. Video below the fold. Here's a link to the Worldnutdaily article he cites and the relevant portion (and yes, I've got it saved in case it disappears down the memory hole):
A separate WND investigation into Obama's birth certificate utilizing forgery experts also found the document to be authentic. The investigation also revealed methods used by some of the bloggers to determine the document was fake involved forgeries, in that a few bloggers added text and images to the certificate scan that weren't originally there.
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I refuse to watch Olberman and just skimmed the article. So, maybe I'm missing something. I don't see the problem here.
The relevant portion of the article, written last August, states that they found the birth certificate to be authentic and some of the people claiming it to be fake, tampered with the scanned images.
So, he's being named worse person in the world because he authenticated Obama's birth certificate?
Posted by: JED | January 8, 2009 9:57 AM
I, too, have gotten fed up with Olbermann. These days, I find him little different than Rush Limbaugh. He's an entertainer, and he's discovered, as Rush did in the 1980s, that throwing red meat to his base sells.
Posted by: Orac | January 8, 2009 10:01 AM
Re JED
Obviously, Mr. JED is unfamiliar with the story. The issue is that WorldNutDaily is now publishing articles claiming that the birth certificate is a fake and is attempting to pretend that the article written in August never existed.
Posted by: SLC | January 8, 2009 10:03 AM
No, he's denying his site ever wrote that and claiming the certificate could still be fake. Which, as pointed out, is debunked by his own website.
Posted by: Brian | January 8, 2009 10:04 AM
I didn't watch the bit either but WND, for the last four months or so, been hitting the Obama birth certificate question pretty hard - this after they wrote an article stating that they believe the birth certificate has been authenticate. There hasn't been a week that has gone by without an new "supreme's going to review Obama's birth certificate!" article or one of the 'columnists' going off on how Obama hasn't been proven to be a natural born citizen. Farah has done it more than once.
Farah just see dollar signs in all this.
Posted by: yoshi | January 8, 2009 10:10 AM
If you and read a blog post that contains a video and a link to an article, and you don't understand it, maybe you should read the article and watch the video before jumping in with your comment.
Posted by: JC | January 8, 2009 10:26 AM
JED - While Ed doesn't reference it here and Olberman was very quick in referencing Farah's current position, Farah's website is now claiming that Obama's natural born is a legitimate issue, contrary to what his publication promoted last summer where they claimed there was no evidence validating any hanky-panky with Obama's birth certificate. Here is one link to Farah's flip to complement Ed's link on where the Nut stood last summer (I claim "one" as there may be others): http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=85595
Posted by: Michael Heath | January 8, 2009 10:31 AM
@JC
Other than saving the life of someone close to me, there's absolutely nothing that would get me to watch Olberman. And I really don't care to read WND.
Thanks to the others for explaining it to me.
Posted by: JED | January 8, 2009 10:36 AM
Speaking of Mr. Farah, tomorrow the action of Mr. Philip Berg is supposed to be heard before the Supreme Court. Of course, WorldNutDaily is right on top of the case.
Posted by: SLC | January 8, 2009 10:41 AM
I haven't been watching KO lately, but his rants against the Bush administration and various campaign tactics over the recent long election campaign were like oxygen to me, while most of the rest of the broadcast media, including the sainted Russert, tiptoed around such issues. Granted, he is an entertainer, but like Jon Stewart, George Carlin, and others, that doesn't mean his insights are wrong.
By all means don't watch him if he upsets your blood pressure; to each his own. Personally I find the world a better place with him in it.
Posted by: JimV | January 8, 2009 11:36 AM
Farah should probably be Worst Person in the World every single day from until WingNut Daily closes up it's servers. Their are the worst of the worst in Yellow Journalism. No integrity whatsoever. But at least they are good for a laugh now and then.
Posted by: Iason Ouabache | January 8, 2009 12:29 PM
I'm with you, JimV.
BTW He had a great snippet last night from Fox "noise" about the poor skiier caught with his pants down. On Fox and Friends, one of the guys started saying the guy needed to "dip two fingers in a Vaseline jar and rub it on himself." The other commentators caught the double-entedre and tried to save the guy. He then goes on to say, "I don't know what's going on here, so let's change the subject...why don't we talk about stimulus?"
It was a great moment....
Oh yeah, and I don't think that Olbermann would deny that his show does have some "entertainment" schtick to it.
Posted by: Rev. AJB | January 8, 2009 12:32 PM
JED - What TV news source did you watch that spent an adequate amount of time correcting the record on the lies told by either the Bush Administration or conservatives with political power or influence with voters?
While I find Olberman's approach where he rides the high horse and comes across very stridently annoying, I knew of no other media outlet that was actually providing an accurate rebuttal to conservatives on TV during the Bush reign. Rachel Maddow now makes it two, but her TV show is relatively new.
Posted by: Michael Heath | January 8, 2009 12:41 PM
What in this Olberman clip could be offensive to your sensibilities?
1) A formerly poor person uses his current position of influence to demonize poor people (and thus himself) saying that their intrinsic lack of character caused them to be poor.
2) Corroborated reports from Alaska that the drug arrest of someone close to the former VP-candidate was delayed through inappropriate political pressure.
3) A publisher's vitriolic departure from the mainstream understanding of where the truth lies was contradicted by his own publication's reports of an investigation paid for by said publisher.
4) Background music of Toccata and Fugue in D minor (J.S. Bach) -- Early eighteenth century pop hit.
5) Keith Olberman talks for a bit over 2 minutes related these stories with supporting details and clarifies his opinion that this is below-par behavior for human beings.
Posted by: rpenner | January 8, 2009 1:36 PM
On a related note, does anyone have any insight into why Scalia, Thomas and Roberts are referring the birth certificate cases to conference in the first place? There seems to be a pattern where the cases are rejected by the more "liberal" justices (Souter, Ginsburg) and then re-filed with one of the conservatives who refer it to conference. My admittedly limited understanding of how the court works is that it is very unusual for a case to be referred to conference when it has already been rejected before. And it seems to be happening repeatedly. Could it be that some of the justices actually think these cases have some merit?
Posted by: BobF | January 8, 2009 3:30 PM
Just for a moment, when I read the headline to this article, I thought Ms. Fawcett-Majors had won the woo equivalent of the golden globes. sorry, wrong Farah...
Posted by: Blaidd Drwg | January 8, 2009 5:06 PM
Comedy Central. From what I've seen, John Stewart is the only news caster that has not become a tool.
Posted by: JED | January 8, 2009 6:32 PM
BobF - My understanding of how the court works is probably more limited than yours, but I read something (on this blog, I think) about it. The poster stated that the same case can be submitted up to six times to different justices. So when it's apparent that a someone is going to keep resubmitting a bullshit case, they refer it conference, spend about a second deliberating it, then reject it. That way they're done with it.
Posted by: Taz | January 8, 2009 7:09 PM
Obama can't be POTUS.
Since no congressman and senator objected on 1/8/09 to Congress' count and certification of the electoral vote which would have turned resolution of Obama's eligibility issue over to Congress, rendering moot both the Berg and Lightfoot cases, Berg finally does achieve standing on the issue of actual harm, to be addressed at the 1/9/09 SCOTUS Conference on Writ of Certiorari. Obama's failure to submit evidence of his constitutional qualification for the 1/9/09 conference will mean he cannot thereafter challenge Berg's request to enjoin the 1/8/09 Congressional electoral count and certification, albeit retroactive, scheduled for SCOTUS conference 1/16/09. Moreover, Chief Justice Roberts has scheduled a full Court conference on the Lightfoot case 1/23/09 in the event there needs to be a Constitutionally mandated action, the Inauguration itself, to enjoin retroactively.
Checkmate! (WHERE IS THE NEWS MEDIA?)
Posted by: Ted | January 9, 2009 3:34 AM
Re Ted
What fucking assholes like Mr. Ted fail to tell us is that Mr. Berg has submitted no evidence that President Elect Obama was born in Kenya, or anywhere other then Hawaii. It's just like the ID fucktards never produce any evidence for ID; they just make negative claims about evolution. In order for Mr. Berg to have a case, he would have to produce evidence of a Kenyan birth for the president elect. Like, for instance, a Kenyan birth certificate. And before fucktard Ted makes a claim about one of the wives of the president elects' father being present at his birth, it is beyond question that the lady was referring to the senior Obama, whose name is Barack Obama. The junior Obamas' name is Barack Obama II.
Posted by: SLC | January 9, 2009 7:24 AM
Oops. The second to last sentence of my comment should read: "And before fucktard Ted makes a claim about one of the wives of the president elects' paternal grandfather being present at his birth ...
Posted by: SLC | January 9, 2009 8:04 AM
Very informative, Ted. Be sure to keep us updated through all eight years of the Obama presidency, ok?
Posted by: Taz | January 9, 2009 8:53 AM