Blogger admits Hawaii birth certificate forgery, subverting Obama claims (Uh-oh)

Israel Insider ^ | 3 July 2008 | Reuven Koret

[SE Mom]

Jay McKinnon, a self-described Department of Homeland Security-trained document specialist, has implicated himself in the production of fraudulent Hawaii birth certificate images similar to the one endorsed as genuine by the Barack Obama campaign, and appearing on the same blog entry where the supposedly authentic document appears.

The evidence of forgery and manipulation of images of official documents, triggered by Israel Insider's revelation of the collection of Hawaii birth certificate images on the Photobucket site and the detective work of independent investigative journalists and imaging professionals in the three weeks since the publication of the images, implicate the Daily Kos, an extreme left blog site, and the Obama campaign, in misleading the public with official-looking but manipulated document images of doubtful provenance.

The perceived unreliability of the image has provoked petitions and widespread demands for Obama to submit for objective inspection the paper versions of the "birth certificate" he claimed in his book Dreams from My Father was in his possession, as well as the paper version of the Certificate of Live Birth for which the image on the Daily Kos and the Obama "Fight the Smears" website was supposedly generated.

Without a valid birth certificate, Obama cannot prove he fulfills the "natural born citizen" requirement of the Constitution, throwing into doubt his eligibility to run for President.

McKinnon, who says he is 25-30 years old, operates a website called OpenDNA.com and uses the OpenDNA screen name on various web sites and blogs, including his comments and diary on The Daily Kos. In recent years he has divided his time between Long Beach, California and Vancouver, British Columbia. He is a Democratic political activist, frequent contributor to the left wing Daily Kos blog, and a fervent Barack Obama supporter.

[David]

Hmmm. You are correct. I misread paragraph (g). I agree that regardless of the location of his birth, he is a US citizen by virtue of the 1952 law and being born to an American parent.

Don't say that. He has quoted you the new version of Sec. 1401(g). There isn't any argument about that, go back and look at the legal opinion post--the effective date of the 5 and 2 rule is persons born after November 1986; Obama was born in 1961. The amendment is not retroactive--the old rule was 10 years prior to birth, five which are after 14; Stanley Ann flunked by definition.

The statute about which there is uncertainty is Sec. 1409 which by its terms applies only to persons born out of wedlock. Obama misses because his parents were married--this is your case where even if their marriage was in the bush in a Grove of trees, they are still in wedlock for persons affected until a court says they are not.

[Freedom of Speech Wins]

Good points.

[browardchad]

David, I was replying to your post #23238 as quoted here:

According to the Chicago Tribune, divorce of Obama Sr. and Stanley Ann occurred in 1964. Where and when—presumably Honolulu but I have not yet found that in the record; nor I have seen the actual date in 1964.

We need to identify the court where the divorce occurred; and get a copy of the complaint. In the normal divorce proceeding, counsel pleads the location of the marriage—likely if he did so here, that sheds some light on the facts; maybe if he does not plead where they were married, that suggests a purpose in not doing so.

Time gives you the "where and when" of the divorce, and the "actual date," and the "location" of the marriage (per the divorce records).

Your response is bizarre: "I wonder where newspaper Vital Statistics for Maui can be found," and then "If you found it in a Vital Statistics column, you would be tempted to believe it even if you didn't find the certificate." Time is not quoting from "newspaper Vital Statistics," but from the divorce record, which they have obviously seen (and yes, I tend to believe even the biased MSM when they give actual, specific dates.) Time makes no claim to finding the "certificate" of marriage -- they are neutral on the matter of a marriage certificate.

You state that you are "locked in your view that they got married in Kenya," and admit that "it's a mistake to approach the facts that way." I agree.

Then you backtrack to "counsel in the divorce proceeding pleaded Maui which is probably what his client told him; failure to find the filing is probably pretty good evidence that it didn't happen there unless you find Vital Statistics showing that it did."

Who is arguing with that? Why does that somehow lend weight to BO being born in Kenya?

"We are still looking in Kenya." Well, good luck with that.  And yes, I've seen the video of Stanley Anne's friend in Seattle; yes, I've seen the airline schedules to Seattle and Kenya. What exactly do they prove? I subscribe to the K.I.S.S. theory -- if you believe something is being hidden/obfuscated/forged, then look first at the simplest explanation, not the most spectacularly remote.

[bvw]

Yes, ... even with that lead-in my writer’s instinct’s tell me that sentence should have been simpler and informative as to the date of the wedding and not as weirdly remarkable as it is.

[WOSG]

“Thus he has to get back to Sec. 1401(g) to find citizenship through his mother-”

If you assume a marriage between his parents (which is valid) and a birth overseas (which is not), we are on the same page her. I quoted from the law itself. You can read the code here:

http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/8/1401.html

Let me repeat the law itself:
“a person born outside the geographical limits of the United States and its outlying possessions of parents one of whom is an alien, and the other a citizen of the United States who, prior to the birth of such person, was physically present in the United States or its outlying possessions for a period or periods totaling not less than five years, at least two of which were after attaining the age of fourteen years”

So she met the residency test and Barack Obama meets the natural born citizenship test.

Now, I was wondering about why you have a different residency requirement - I found it here: “1986—Subsec. (g). Pub. L. 99–653 substituted “five years, at least two” for “ten years, at least five”. “ So an amendment in 1986 changed the situation to the 5 + 2, which Stanley Ann Dunham met. Further, the claim that someone can fail a residency test despite living their whole life in the US is beyond dubious.

“As I said earlier, it is 100% certain that both Barack Obama and John McCain meet the eligibility requirements to be President.”

“You can keep reciting that at the bottom of every post but it is also not correct.”

“McCain has an obvious problem as indicated by the numerous law review and other legal periodical articles, meeting the natural born test. There is no conclusive authority directly in point on the issue.”

False. McCain is manifestly and obviously a natural born US Citizen, 100% certainty of this.

http://volokh.com/archives/archive_2008_02_24-2008_03_01.shtml#1204265246

http://volokh.com/archives/archive_2008_02_24-2008_03_01.shtml#1204246912

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9B0DE4DF103EF933A1575AC0A961948260

http://althouse.blogspot.com/2008/02/crafty-obama-finds-way-to-look.html#comments

PS. Making snopes and other debunking sites:

http://www.snopes.com/politics/obama/citizen.asp

http://peacefulvet.info/blog/2008/06/19/barack-obama-is-a-us-citizen/

[null and void]

The key issue to understanding what Stanley Ann did is what Stanley Ann thought.

We need something akin to a psychological autopsy. What did she think the law said?

My money is on she thought that a polygamous marriage + an overseas birth = citizenship troubles for her baby.

If, as her relatives assert, she delivered in Kenya she's be apt to panic and try anything she could to make the problem go away.

Simplest solution? Show up in Hawai'i with a newborn, and claim you delivered him at home.

[WOSG]

Further explanation as to why McCain and Obama are both natural born US Citizens.

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9B0DE4DF103EF933A1575AC0A961948260

No Simple Matter to Be a Natural Born Citizen

Published: September 20, 1987

LEAD: To the Editor:

To the Editor:

William Safire’s column on Presidential ineligibility due to birth abroad (’’The Constitution’s Flaw,’’ Sept. 6) was entertaining, but it was not accurate. Lest someone who aspires to the Presidency be dissuaded when he or she need not be, let me clarify this thorny area of law.

First, Mr. Safire commits a common error when discussing the Constitution’s requirement that the President be ‘’a natural born citizen.’’ Mr. Safire believes this to mean native born, that is, born within the United States. A far more logical and reasonable meaning, however, is one who became a citizen naturally, through the circumstances of birth, and not through being naturalized, the lengthy and onerous process by which aliens become United States citizens.

One most definitely may have citizenship transmitted automatically even though born abroad. When is someone born abroad a birthright citizen? Under our immigration law we must start with the date of birth.

If you were born after Dec. 2, 1952, citizenship devolves if either parent was a United States citizen. If both were, either must have had, before your birth, a principal abode in this country for any length of time. You thus may be a citizen automatically although you may never in your lifetime set foot in the United States. And since only one parent need have lived here, one of your citizen parents could never have set foot in this country either.

If one of your parents was a United States citizen and the other was not, but was born in American Samoa or on Swains Island, and you were born abroad, you are a United States citizen if your citizen parent, before your birth, resided in the United States for one year.

If one of your parents was a United States citizen and the other an alien, if you were born abroad, you would automatically be a United States citizen if your citizen parent had been, before your birth, in the United States for five years, two before the age of 14.

Of course, as with most law, things are more complicated than they seem. Three other sets of rules apply for those born in the following three periods: before May 24, 1934; between May 24, 1934, and Jan. 12, 1941, and between Jan. 13, 1941, and Nov. 23, 1952. Since I earn my living as an immigration lawyer by helping clients to traverse this thicket, I do not wish to examine why Congress saw fit to change the law from time to time.

A more interesting constitutional question, one that keeps me awake at night and to which Mr. Safire may wish to devote a future column, is whether or not one who was born in the United States and therefore was a birthright citizen, but who lost citizenship and then regained it, can be President.

If one becomes a citizen of a foreign country, takes an oath of allegience to a foreign state or serves in foreign armed forces, one may lose United States citizenship. Later, he may repatriate and become a citizen again. Does the Constitution’s language, ‘’natural born citizen,’’ mean continuous citizenship since birth? Nobody knows. And as the issue doesn’t affect any of this year’s crop of Presidential hopefuls, we are not soon going to get an answer. DONALD M. KRESGE New York, Sept. 8, 1987

[bvw]

Your linked Eugene Volokh's comment is

I'm not an expert on this, but I'm pretty sure that Sen. McCain is a "natural-born citizen" and thus eligible to be President: He was a citizen from birth, having been born to citizen parents (his father was stationed in the Canal Zone). My sense is that "natural-born citizen" is most plausibly interpreted as being a citizen from birth.

Your "100% certain" is Mr. Volokh's "pretty certain" and "most plausibly interpreted".

[WOSG]

Read the other article cited, there are several. It nails definitively and conclusively both the common-law and statutory understanding of natural born citizen. McCain is in.

[WOSG]

“”We are still looking in Kenya.” Well, good luck with that. And yes, I’ve seen the video of Stanley Anne’s friend in Seattle; yes, I’ve seen the airline schedules to Seattle and Kenya. What exactly do they prove? I subscribe to the K.I.S.S. theory — if you believe something is being hidden/obfuscated/forged, then look first at the simplest explanation, not the most spectacularly remote. “

.... I’ve been trying to tell them ... will they listen?? ...

[bvw]

So what was the Supreme Court vote on it? I’m 100% certain you must know.

[Spunky]

"The key issue to understanding what Stanley Ann did is what Stanley Ann thought. We need something akin to a psychological autopsy. What did she think the law said?

"My money is on she thought that a polygamous marriage + an overseas birth = citizenship troubles for her baby."

As an 18 year old myself during that period of time I rather doubt her thoughts were of citizenship problems for her baby.

[WOSG]

“Your #2422: I beg your pardon but I have never accused you of libel—I don’t say stuff like that. “

I never said you did. You called my reply to a post that did reply to that accusation ‘excessive in tone’, hence I copied you on the reply explaining why it was NOT a fair characterization.

This whole born-in-Africa farce is a rabbit trail anyway ...

[WOSG]

The case challenging McCain on it was so weak it went .... nowhere. Check the cites I linked and do some digging.

[David]

Here is another source to the same case...it sure looks like a SC case opinion to me

Yes sir. That is a copy of the Supreme Court opinion in the case--I read it on a law search engine Case Law. What you were citing was a an article published by a Cornell Law School student which quoted the dissent in that case (the justices who didn't agree with the result).

Reason that case is not authority here is because the facts are wrong and it deals with a different statute. In Miller, the case is about a father attempting to qualify his kid under the father-citizen born out of wedlock statute by admitting paternity. Argument was that having different rules for father and mother violated fifth amendment equal protection right. Our case doesn't have anything to do with any of that.

The stuff in the dissent is what lawyers call "dictum"--it doesn't have anything to do with the result and thus it isn't authority for anything. It is interesting history but doesn't get you specific rules about how you get a result on your facts.

I have a bunch of similar stuff that says the out of wedlock provision of Sec. 1409 is subject to an overlay of Sec. 1401(g) to the end that the mother of the out of country out of wedlock still has to prove compliance with the 10 years prior to of which 5 years are after 14 or 16, whichever applies. But, I can't find that in the statute either so I am not going to post it as the basis for an opinion. I would like to find the statutory basis for an opinion but the law search engine I have here won't let me get behind the statute.

I tend to think your view is probably going to prove out correct but I can't get there on the material I have available.

And the more I read about the marriage and divorce the more comfortable I am with the conclusion that Obama never gets to the "born out of wedlock" condition anyway. Common law marriages work for wedlock for this purpose--never married at all; just told people they were.

Here, you got them all pleading in a legal divorce case they paid significant money for that they were married.

I still think it's important to find out what the answer is but I haven't got the resources to do that right now and won't for a week or so.

But I will also concede that your hammering me on the issue has forced me to rethink Sec. 1409 which is good because my actual legal opinion on the main issues is in fact in the hands of someone who has the swat to do something about it--since I got to your original Sec. 1409 question after I wrote the main opinion, it wasn't in the opinion--I just sent him an email with my original response to you which now looks a little suspect. So after jousting with you the last day or so, I had the opportunity to write him another email and tell him Sec. 1409 might be a little different.

But you don't need to insult me to get me to pay attention. I have figured out that you are doing real work; and I too am an accountant by primary training and have had my most important business relationships with the accounting community so I am paying attention even though I may not look like it.

[null and void]

Elvis?

[Cyropaedia]

Dude, you are asking some very good questions.

Was the bukenasli expulsion program still in effect after the regime change in 1966...?

There are so many discrepancies with Obama's past.

[Freedom of Speech Wins]

His mother did follow Muslim traditions apparently in giving birth to Maya in Jakarta, Indonesia. So if she followed the traditions for one child she could have also followed them for the other.

[Cyropaedia]

Multiculturalism is what it is, it leads you in such directions.

You're obviously eviscerating your own argument.

So why wouldn't a leftist so infatuated with the multicultural ideal want to to take a trip to Kenya...?? She's already proven her "commitment" to the multicultural ideal by becoming pregnant with a Kenyan Muslim's child at the age of 17.

Furthermore, this same individual would marry another Muslim foreigner, and actually move with him to the world's Islamic country where her son would be raised.

But a visit to Kenya is out of the question....?? That logic doesn't make sense.

[Cyropaedia]

His mother did follow Muslim traditions apparently in giving birth to Maya in Jakarta, Indonesia. So if she followed the traditions for one child she could have also followed them for the other.

Bingo!