A group of researchers from the University of Maryland's "Program on International Policy Attitudes" [1] (link) have released a study attempting to show that the most misinformed voters are those who are viewers of Fox News. One problem: those researchers can't even get their facts straight on one of the issues they used to determine whether voters knew the truth. Those researchers set themselves up as the arbiters of truth, and then invented their own facts.

Now, since the issue they got wrong is the Obama citizenship issue, don't expect anyone who promotes their study to point out that it's flawed. The establishment works night and day to silence debate on that issue and to try to present as fact that Obama was born in the U.S., when it's not a fact but just a belief. It's very highly likely that Obama was indeed born in the U.S., but there's no definitive proof. All of the supposed proof so far offered does not stand up to scrutiny. That doesn't mean he wasn't born in the U.S., simply that he has not provided definitive proof.

In their study, the researchers can't tell the difference between belief and fact. They refer to "the misinformation that Barack Obama was not born in the United States" and say that "[f]ifty-six percent knew it is clear that Obama was born in the United States" [2] [3]. Once again, it's not "clear": all the forms of proof that have been offered are flawed; there's good evidence that Obama was born in the U.S. but it hasn't been definitively proven.

And, they provide this information box to go with [2]:

Obama's Birth
The claim that Obama was not born within the United States was proven to be false in 2008. Researchers for the site Factcheck.org examined the physical birth certificate authenticated by the state of Hawaii and provided an exhaustive account of it, together with five photographs from various angles. Factcheck’s article also reproduces the birth announcement that Barack Obama’s parents posted in the Sunday edition of the Honolulu Advertiser on August 13, 1961.

1. That links to Fact Check's "Born in the U.S.A." article in which FactCheck lied about what the state of Hawaii said in their 10/31/08 statement. In that statement, the state of Hawaii only said that they had Obama's "original birth certificate on record in accordance with state policies and procedures". Fact Check falsely stated that they'd said he was born there when that's not what Hawaii said. Compare the 10/31/08 statement to what Fact Check said about that statement and it's clear that Fact Check lied. For further proof that Fact Check lied, note that Hawaii released a second statement on July 27, 2009 in which they explicitly stated that Obama was born there. If Fact Check were telling the truth about the first statement, why did Hawaii have to release a second statement?

2. The only people who claim that the "physical birth certificate" was "authenticated by the state of Hawaii" are Fact Check themselves. The two FactCheck researchers who claim to have seen the document are not document experts, and no one else has authenticated either the physical document those researchers claim to have seen nor has any official authenticated the pictures that FactCheck posted nor has any official authenticated the picture that Obama posted to his website. Specifically, the state of Hawaii admits that it has never authenticated the photo on Obama's site.

3. FactCheck later recompressed and removed EXIF (camera) data from the photos that they posted, and they did so silently: they edited the photos they uploaded without noting what they'd done. That EXIF data showed that the photos had been taken months before FactCheck claimed they were taken, although that might be due just to an incorrect camera setting. Nevertheless, it's not a good sign that they'd remove that information. The one photo that I'd saved looks identical to the recompressed version, but I'm not a digital photography expert. Overall, it's not a good sign that the supposed source for the truth about this issue modified evidence and did so without noting what they did.

4. There is absolutely no proof that "Barack Obama’s parents posted" those newspaper announcements. The University of Maryland researchers state that as a fact, so where's the evidence? There's no proof at all of where those announcements came from; see that link for the details. If Obama was indeed born in Hawaii then those announcements would most likely have come from the birth hospital, not his parents as the University of Maryland researchers state. But, there's no definitive proof of any source for those announcements. The only extremely weak evidence that those announcements could only come from a birth hospital and would definitively indicate a Hawaiian birth was the vague recollection of someone who wasn't even employed by one of the papers when the announcements appeared. One other possible explanation is that the grandparents placed the announcements in order to strengthen a possible divorce case. But, that's just speculation because once again there's no proof where the announcements came from. The University of Maryland researchers are stating their speculation as a fact; they're confused between belief and fact.

Unfortunately, because many people of low integrity are wont to mislead about this issue I have to point out again: I'm not claiming that Obama wasn't born in Hawaii. I'm simply pointing out the truth: there's no definitive proof of where he was born. All the evidence points to a Hawaiian birth, but that evidence is not solid, it doesn't provide definitive proof even if University of Maryland researchers want to invent their own version of the truth.

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[1] The researchers are Clay Ramsay, Steven Kull, and Evan Lewis from the Program on International Policy Attitudes's WorldPublicOpinion.org

[2] Aside from the information box, this is the section on that question:

From approximately spring 2008 onward, the misinformation that Barack Obama was not born in the United States has circulated widely. Respondents were asked the following:

As you may know, some people have suggested that President Obama was not born in the United States. Do you think that Obama was not born in the US, Obama was born in the US, or it is not clear whether Obama was born in the US or not?”

Forty-two percent of voters believed either that Obama was not born in the US (15%) or that it is unclear whether he was or not (27%). Fifty-six percent knew it is clear that Obama was born in the United States.

[3] 31% of Fox viewers said it wasn't clear whether Obama was born in the U.S., as did 24% of public broadcasting (NPR or PBS) consumers. Don't worry: they have an explanation for that and other things public broadcasting consumers got "wrong":

This suggests that misinformation cannot simply be attributed to news sources, but are part of the larger information environment that includes statements by candidates, political ads and so on.