Did Obama Just Fire Donald Trump's Presidential Candidacy?

After three years of listening to Republicans claim he was born in Kenya and therefore ineligible to serve as President, Barack Obama released his long-form birth certificate today. The certificate says Obama was born at 7:24 p.m. Aug. 4, 1961, in Honolulu, Hawaii. The White House sent an official to Hawaii to pick up the formal document, which proves that Obama was indeed born in Hawaii. The Obama team had previously released a computer version of the document during the 2008 campaign, which some partisans and conspiracy-minded Americans found unacceptable. Donald Trump, often mentioned as a potential 2012 Republican presidential candidate, has made Obama's birth certificate the centerpiece of this media tour. On Wednesday, Trump intimated that his attention to the issue of Obama's citizenship is what led the President to release the document. "I am really honored to play such a big role in hopefully, hopefully getting rid of this issue," Trump said. The question for Republican primary voters is whether or not Trump has a rationale for entering the race, as the birth certificate issue was his primary talking point. Early polling showed Trump at the top of the potential pack of GOP contenders. It remains to be seen how the settlement of the birth certificate issue will affect Trump's potential standing with primary voters. Some might argue that the timing of this release is suspicious, as it comes just as Trump was emerging as a formidable opponent for a hypothetical 2012 election. The White House downplayed that argument, saying that the issue had become a carnival sideshow and a distraction to the issues the Administration cares about. "I am speaking for the vast majority of the American people as well as for the press," Obama said. "We do not have time for this kind of silliness. We have better stuff to do. I have got better stuff to do. We have got big problems to solve."