I long ago debunked the claims that Obama is not a natural born US citizen. I’ve yet to see a single logical argument that he is not that even begins to approach the bounds of credibility. But this one is even more stupid than usual.

If President Obama were indeed born in Hawaii, was it while the islands were a territory of the United States?

A new wrinkle in the dispute over his birth – and whether he is eligible to be president under the U.S. Constitution’s requirement that the president be a “natural born” citizen – appeared today when Obama’s official MySpace page declared his age is 52, thus placing his birth year at 1957 instead of 1961 as has been claimed.

That would mean he would have been born during the archipelago’s time as a territory of the U.S., the islands’ status from about 1900 until statehood in 1959.

My guess – someone working on the thing on his behalf typed in the year of their birth rather than that of the president. But let’s assume for a moment that the claim is even vaguely true – that Barack Obama was born in Hawaii in 1957. It would still be irrelevant, because under American law Obama still would be a natural born citizen.

And for those who want to argue to the contrary, I offer you four words.

In other words, that argument was more-or-less dismissed 45 years ago when the GOP nominated the godfather of modern conservativism in 1964.

So while I’ll argue from my perspective as a historian that Barack Obama ought to supply the original document so that future generations can fully access the historical record, I’ll say again that supporters of the Birther conspiracy theories are simply making themselves look absurd.