Stephanopoulos gets Bachmann to admit the validity of Obama's birth certificate

Watch Stephanopoulos show Michele Bachmann a copy of Obama's birth certificate, saying "so this story's over?" and her resignedly admit: "Yes, it's over." You can tell she saw this coming and was hedging on the birth certificate issue from the start of the interview (clearly George warned her before the interview that he would do this), but she'd been beating this drum earlier this week, so I don't think she is making a conscious attempt to make herself look more mainstream. To me, her body language is showing defeat.

So now the obvious question: Conservatives have been questioning Obama's birth certificate and drawing all manner of dark conclusions for four years. A significant percentage of the country has bought into this rubbish, and the number of dupes is rising.

Why did it take four years for someone in the press to confront Bachmann with a birth certificate that was made freely available by then-Senator Barack Obama early in the '08 campaign and expressly backed by the relevant officials in the state of Hawaii?