Peter Boyles' birther billboards coming to a highway near you

Last month, we told you about KHOW talk-show host Peter Boyles' plan to put up a billboard questioning the native-born status of President Barack Obama. This notion had a major roadblock to overcome: In June, the outdoor advertising wing of Clear Channel, the Texas mega-corp that owns KHOW and seven other Denver-area stations, announced that it wouldn't put up so-called birther boards. But Boyles found a way around this obstacle, and he's hopeful that not one but two billboards wondering, "Where's the Birth Certificate?" will be on view along I-70 near Kipling within the next few weeks.

As Boyles points out, "we'd done a couple of boards in the past," including one reading "Welcome to Sanctuary City" that criticized what he saw as Denver's lax enforcement of laws targeting illegal immigrants. On those occasions, Boyles had to raise funds to erect the billboards. Not this time around, though.

"This guy called me off-air," he explains. "We know each other through a mutual friend, and he said, 'I have these billboards on I-70, and you can have them,'" at least for the time being. As a result, Boyles says, "I don't think it's going to cost us anything at all to put them up."

Upon receiving this offer, Boyles talked with Clear Channel-Denver management, and it was agreed that the billboards wouldn't include either KHOW's call letters or Boyles' name. That's okay by him. After all, the "Sanctuary City" billboard left out those elements, too -- and besides, if his moniker was front and center, "I would be accused of trying to profit or gain publicity, and I think the story's what's most important. I don't need to get the credit. Dean Singleton doesn't put his name on the headlines of the Denver Post...." Besides, the simplicity of the billboard design seen above, which duplicates ones already on view in Las Vegas and a number of other locations, appeals to him. "I like the psychology of it, the mystery," he says.

In Boyles' view, the timing couldn't be better. Yesterday afternoon, World Net Daily, the website leading the birther parade, published a story by frequent Boyles guest Jerome Corsi about a hearing scheduled for October in San Diego that could lead to an actual trial about the birth-certificate issue. "This story's got a lot of Watergate in it," Boyles asserts. "They dismissed that as a third-rate burglary, and look how it ended up."

According to Boyles, the art for the billboards is ready to go, and he sees no reason why the placards shouldn't be on display by month's end. "The sooner the better," he says. "Because things are really starting to develop."