It’s a sure sign the 2012 presidential race is heating up when email inboxes overflow with anti-Obama fantasies.

These things contend Obama is a Communist or perhaps a Socialist, definitely a Muslim (or an Arab?), possibly Indonesian or Kenyan, and that he could not have been born in Hawaii because his state-issued birth certificate is an obvious forgery.

Such bogus emails are usually created by agitated right-wing conspiracy theorists with swamp-fever imaginations and way too much time on their hands, folks who have a virulent hatred of President Obama for a variety of reasons.

He had a white mother and black father. He was raised in an unconventional way by his single mom and later by his Midwestern grandparents.

Obama is articulate, compassionate, glib and personable, everything his predecessor wasn’t and his likely GOP opponent will never be.

The president dared to tackle some of the most complex and challenging problems of our day, not the least of which was saving an economy on the brink of a second Great Depression.

Any rational, objective review of Obama’s record since January 2009 shows undeniable progress on most all fronts.

But the chain email authors fancy they have a higher patriotic purpose, breathlessly warning us of the coming apocalypse Obama is secretly plotting with (mix and match): Move On, Mau Maus, the Muslim Brotherhood, Iranian Mullahs, MSNBC, the Taliban, Putin, Planned Parenthood, al-Qaida, Al Gore, Al Franken, Bill Ayers, ACORN, the Antichrist and Wall Street Occupiers.

A graphic artist’s nightmare, these sophomoric screeds invariably feature mismatched upper and lower case fonts in various primary colors, lots of misspellings and grammatical errors, framed by exclamation points and underlined text in case you’re too dense to “get it.”

Most if not all of them are easily debunked with a little research, something their writers don’t want recipients to do and most readers wouldn’t bother with anyway.

Here’s a gem that came my way just this week:

Remember all the notices we kept getting to watch Fox News on Sunday at 9PM? What Happened?

This is the clip that got pulled due to pressure from the Administration.

Obama Puts Heat on Fox News to Prevent Sean Hannity airing this piece.

This is a video that Sean Hannity of FOX News has been trying to show that we are told has consistently been blocked by the Obama Administration for several weeks.

Watch it now before it gets pulled from the internet!

Except the video is still on the Internet if you can stand watching somebody’s amateurish mash-up of poorly edited Obama news clips we’ve seen on all the networks before.

Add this one to the scores of others just like it:

“Obama removed the American flag from Air Force One and replaced it with his logo” (no he didn’t). “Obama refuses to recite the Pledge of Allegiance” (false). “Obama canceled the National Day of Prayer” (lie). “You’ll pay a 3.8% sales tax on home sales after 2012” (nope). “Not one person from Obama’s past has ever come forward” (many have).

An unpleasant aspect of the Internet is that it shields writers from responsibility for their words. Electronic fallacies are like graffiti splattered on the walls of cyber space. They’re ugly and anonymous.

So why do people who otherwise consider themselves fair-minded and responsible citizens pass this trash along? I suspect it’s because, if it affirms the reader’s prejudices, it doesn’t matter whether it’s true or not.

Kevin Foley is a public relations executive, author and writer who lives in Kennesaw.