When you live in an ivory tower you often hear what you want to hear by those you select to surround yourself with.

Reality doesn’t often enter the oval office of the President of the United States because of the layers of intermediaries that surround him, delivering a spin upward that may be as false as what is being portrayed downward on the Internet that President Obama calls a ‘powerful thing.’

Obama called the Internet a ‘powerful thing’ during an interview this past week with ABC’s Barbara Walters when she asked President Obama and the First Lady Michelle where the rumors the President is Muslim generate their strength.

Obama said the rumors are untrue and that both he and his family benefit from their lives as Christians.

The family does not belong to a Church.  Yet, Michelle says they pray as a family to, “Hope we live long and and strong.”

Rumors have surrounded Obama’s religion before he became president such as the Muslim and Jeremiah Wright attacks can somehow coexist – however, Obama blamed one particular subset of the media, the Internet. The Obama’s did belong to Jeremiah Wright’s church before the president denounced him for some of his comments about the United States.

“The Internet has a powerful effect these ways,” he told Walters, “so the way rumors can take up a life of their own ends up being very powerful.”

However, rumors can easily be dispelled by truth, whether it be through documents or behavior.

Much like the issue surrounding his citizenship, Obama doesn’t provide evidence of same nor has he declared his choice of a church for his family.

The official birth certificate is issued by the state and doesn’t declare religion, but does certify that the newly born is an American citizen. Another question posed by the Internet as well as the ‘people’ – is Obama a citizen of the United States?

Now it is not the Internet that is at fault, it is the president who is not as transparent as he promised, the transcripts from the colleges he attended are blocked by the president from disclosure.  Those that graduated the same year he did from Columbia, for example, do not know him, even those that were allegedly in his class and major.

The question of citizenship could easily be dispelled with a simple document – a birth certificate.  Why doesn’t the president provide the media with a copy.  Others are required to do so for a variety of reasons, instead he provides the media with a copy of his passport.  College documents could be disclosed with his permission. Reveal them, or is there something to hide?

This would dispel the ‘rumors’ of  the all ‘powerful’ Internet.

The truth always prevails over rumors – reveal the truth, whether it be by documents or actions.

(updated 11/28/10)