The Problem with the Announcement Stories

Two items have been offered as evidence of Barack Obama being born in Hawaii: an online COLB image which the HDOH has indirectly confirmed in 2 different ways as a forgery, and online images of birth announcements in the Hawaii papers shortly after Obama’s birth. This post will explain why I believe we’ve been fed – and swallowed – a lie about where those images came from. Later posts will give a glimpse of just how far it seems somebody was willing to go in order to have something – anything – that would suggest Obama was born in Hawaii, a critical need since Hawaii Governor Neil Abercrombie told Mike Evans (transcript and audio link) he had gone into both hospitals (Kapiolani and Queens) with a search warrant but found no birth certificate for Obama.

Shortly after Barack Obama’s campaign website posted what they said was Obama’s Certification of Live Birth (COLB) and questions arose regarding its authenticity, Lori Starfelt decided to see if there was a newspaper birth announcement for Obama in Hawaii. She contacted the HDOH and was told that on Fridays they printed out a list of the week’s births; “The Honolulu Advertiser” used that list to print birth announcements in their Sunday paper. So Starfelt calculated that if Obama was born on Friday, Aug 4, 1961, his birth would have been on the list the following Friday, Aug 11th, and should appear in that Sunday’s paper – Aug 13th. She contacted the Hawaii State Library (hereafter HSL), asking for a copy from the microfilm of the Advertiser’s birth announcements on Aug 13, 1961, and was sent an e-mail with an image that had Obama’s announcement on it. She posted that image, along with her story, at Texas Darlin’ Blog around July 21, 2008. (See Post 7679 )

Several days later “Infidel Granny”, posting at Atlas Shrugs Blog, said she had asked a woman at the Advertiser office about birth announcements and was told to check the HSL. She asked the HSL for a copy of the Aug 13, 1961 “Advertiser” birth announcements and the librarian sent an e-mail with the image, saying she had it handy since somebody had just asked for it a week earlier.

On Aug 13th “Koa” at Texas Darlin’ Blog posted an image for the Aug 14th Star-Bulletin announcements, which he/she had copied directly from the HSL archives.

Around Oct 21 a poster at Prius Chat also posted an image of the SB announcement, saying, “Here's a copy I made today of the August 14th (could have been the 15th or 16th), 1961 Star Bulletin newspaper showing Obama's birth announcement stored on microfilm at the Hawaii State Library in Honolulu. I had to enlarge it to the point of losing the top of the page with the date and day in order to make it readable. The microfilm is stored in the basement of the library and was in the box marked Star Bulletin Aug 1, 1961-Aug 16, 1961. ..."

On Oct 29th Whatreallyhappened.com posted images of both the Advertiser and Star-Bulletin images, which were said to be directly from the Star-Bulletin and Advertiser – which both had their microfilms stored at the Advertiser building. Note that he was not told to contact the HSL, as “Infidel Granny” says she was told.

Texas Darlin’ Blog archives, Atlas Shrugs Blog archives, the original article on Whatreallyhappened, and the Wikileaks page which also posted a copy which was a text-searchable file, have all been removed from the web, and the page at Prius Chat requires registration first; neither I nor several others who tried to register were allowed to do so. So the whole story of these claims and the images themselves have been scrubbed, except for fragments (such as the ones I link to) where others discussed and/or copied material, some of which have now been scrubbed from the web also.

I got Starfelt’s Advertiser image from a link referenced elsewhere as being Starfelt’s image, when the image was still available (“Infidel Granny” was given the same image). Whatreallyhappened still has their images posted. The Prius Chat Forum still has the link to their Star-Bulletin image. I copied Koa’s image from Photobucket when it was still available as linked to from the original post atTD Blog. (In my analysis links below I cite where each image came from.) So the images I have used come directly from the original sources.

To verify that I have not altered the images, here are some other places that still have images (as of today), although not necessarily saying the source: Both, Advertiser, Advertiser, Star-Bulletin .

When a person looks at the documents and claims about the documents, and compares them to what is actually in the Hawaii State Library microfilms, it is obvious why somebody would want these claims buried – although I am not making any specific allegations about who has done what. That should be investigated by someone with subpoena power. Here is a concise summary of what we have:

The Advertiser image that Starfelt and “Infidel Granny” supposedly got from the HSL is pristine. But in reality the HSL microfilms are so scratched up they are nearly unreadable. When a colleague asked the HSL librarian in late April, 2010, for a copy of the Aug 13, 1961 Advertiser birth announcements – the exact image that Starfelt and “Infidel Granny” supposedly got from there - this is what she was told about the condition of the microfilm (emphasis mine):

"As for your request for the Aug. 13, 1961 Honolulu Advertiser birth announcement page, I looked it up, but unfortunately, the microfilm is so worn down on top of being poorly microfilmed, that it is hardly legible. You might be better off asking another library that has a better, less used copy than ours. Or does it have to be the Advertiser? I checked the Star-Bulletin and that date and that film is fine. Let me know."

The Starfelt and “Infidel Granny” images are pristine, with no sign of being “poorly microfilmed”, which would be a constant state for the microfilms, not affected by usage. Those images are clearly not from the HSL microfilms as claimed. However, they match perfectly the images WRH got from somebody at the Advertiser office (with the exception of one C&P line in the left margin below the Asing announcement, which disappeared by the time WRH got a copy). A comparison of the images is here.

Conversely, the Star-Bulletin image – which is the exact same image for WRH, Koa, and the Prius Chat poster (right down to the same piece of hair caught in the viewer when the copy was made and the same waviness in the page being scanned), even though they each claim to have acquired their copy independently, and WRH even claims a different source - has a large scratch down the column of text. But the HSL’s Star-Bulletin microfilms are pristine, including the copy from Aug 14th, where there are no extra marks or scratches anywhere. A comparison of the images is here. To believe the stories of Koa and the Prius Chat poster, you’d have to believe that scratches disappear over time.

It is clear that what we were told about where these images came from is not true.

It appears that somebody at the Advertiser office gave out images to select people with the instruction that they were to peddle them off as genuine – the Advertiser image to the librarian at the Hawaii State Library, the Star-Bulletin image to “Koa” and the Prius Chat poster (who may have been the same person), and both images to Whatreallyhappened.com.

This is according to the statements already made and images already made public, which show glaring discrepancies in the stories. There are other discrepancies in the claims which stand out to those who have researched the microfilms as well, and those will be addressed later.

But for now the question is this: Why would somebody at the Advertiser office deceive the public into thinking their birth announcement images were actually copies made directly from the Hawaii State Library microfilms by individuals acting on their own? Why intervene at all, rather than letting these individuals get what really IS in the HSL microfilms? And who was in on this deception?

Those are questions that deserve an answer. Those like Bill O’Reilly and certain “news sources” who cite these images as their reason to ridicule “birthers” would do well to find out exactly why somebody worked so hard to deceive them on where those images actually came from.

The Hawaii State Archives don’t have the paper copies. All the libraries we were able to check have evidence of microfilm tampering. Couldn’t get a straight answer on whether the NY Public Library even has the dates in question. Microfilms in some places (such as CA State Library and the Hilo library) are being removed from public access.

What is in this article right now is the very tip of the iceberg of the research that exists and the problems with these alleged announcements.

I don’t get mad very easily but I need to say that I am angry that you are calling this “wild speculation”, as if I haven’t spent the last year of my life doing the very things you say I should do before publishing something like this. I’m pinging your comment to another lady who has invested more than you will ever know, and I suggest you plug your ears when she responds. But I do want you to know that you will deserve everything she gives you because you act as if you know what we have and haven’t done when you don’t know jack about what we’ve done.

I have documented in this first part that the stories we were told are bullshit. How do you refute what I have documented?

...If the Fockers weren’t so damned far away, this is definitely an important motive. OTOH, IIRC Sr’s dad was particularly upset about this marriage/birth, whereas Dunhams appeared more accepting of the situation. But I don’t know when in time it was established that Sr’s dad was upset: in theory it could have been aired face-to-face with Ann. But if I were Sr. planning to fly my wife to meet the parents, I would surely check ahead about whether that was OK with them (especially if I’d left a wife behind whom they knew). It’s hard to believe that Sr’s father wouldn’t have figured out he was angry about the situation before Ann arrived. So if Sr. checked and Dad vented, I’m hard put to see why Sr. would want to follow through on what could turn out to be a highly contentious visit....

It might have been his last chance with his dad hoping that SAD and maybe having the baby there to see and hold would soften his dad’s heart.that’s why God made all babies so cute....that thought could have come from Sr., SAD,or the Dunhams That actually is a good motive for Kenyan birth in my book.

On a side note I was friends with a black Ethiopan who married a white girl. His Parents were mad as heck. They did calm down and accept her in time, they had no other choice...Coming to America

,,,before wasting everyone’s time on wild speculation?,,,

ooops,,you just stepped in it big time....say where are the passport records for Stanley Ann Dunham? How did some of them disappear? People tried to get them, over two years and lawsuit to find out some were destroyed. Could the destruction be a coincidence, wild speculation of govt conspiracy, or the truth?

Why don’t you get your library to buy a copy from Bell and Howell Information Services now known as Pro Quest? Waste some of your time.

http://www.proquest.com/en-US/products/brands/pl_umi.shtml

Might get to the bottom of the announcements, unless of course John Brennan has gotten there first...

I am very interested in politics and always vote. I try to read about all the candidates. I had never heard of Barack Obama before 2008.

Very early in 2008, I saw a video of a news reporter interviewing Susan Blake, a friend of Obama’s mother in Washington state. She was saying that Ann visited her with newborn Barry in the latter part of August, 1961. She joked how she changed his diaper because Ann didn’t know how to do this yet.
This threw up a flag to me. I suspected this child was born very near to Seattle, Washington. Maybe in Canada. My reasoning was based on my own personal experience. I had my first child when I was 18 yrs. old just like Ann. In the first 4 weeks after giving birth, I was not physically able to take my child and fly thousands of miles away alone. I recall that I was so exhausted (from loss of blood) after the first week, that I had to spend a week with my aunt, who took care of the baby while I rested. I also needed help to learn how to care for a newborn. I could not even imagine Ann traveling to Seattle from Hawaii.
When a volunteer called me to ask me to vote for Obama in the primary, I told her I could not because I thought he was lying about his past. I told her of the video I had seen and what I thought about it. She seemed shocked and said she would look into it.
I have been curious and have followed this birth issue ever since.

“Not Questioning Authority on government form=one point toward Lemming Degree”

On the on-line version, I now see that the required fields are clearly marked and that countries to be visited is not one of these. It’s certainly not “intuitively obvious” why the government has the authority to require my occupation but not my itinerary. I can’t think of a single legitimate reason it would need to know my occupation, but several good reasons it might be useful for it to know what countries its citizens were visiting.

Likewise, it’s literally a violation of federal law to be using SSNs for identity purposes, yet lo, and behold, the passport application makes this a required bit of information. I’m sure one could shriek and scream about this, but my bet is that anyone trying to get a passport without this information would find their application denied.

The point being, when a form does not specify what information is required and what is discretionary, the average citizen can be forgiven for supposing that each piece of information requested is required etc. Since the government is the monopoly provider of passports, it has the luxury of being as hard-nosed as it wishes WRT what hoops have to be jumped to get one. In that context, most citizens aren’t going to pointlessly waste time trying to submit an application with a number of fields left blank because that citizen doesn’t think it’s the government’s business to know X, Y or Z.

Life’s too short to waste it arguing with bureaucrats, especially about a piece of information as innocuous as what countries I hope to visit. The reality is that anyone wishing to keep this information hidden could simply insert bogus information into those fields (how is the government going to fact check this? If challenged upon departing or returning to the country, you can just say your plans changed after you made your application).

Please send my PhD in Lemmingology to the address listed on my passport application...

The documents the DOS claims were destroyed are the applications.

Never mind that they have applications they’ve disclosed that should have been destroyed according to the criteria they said were followed.

And never mind that the required paper trail for the change in the retention periods and the actual destruction apparently don’t exist.

They’ve supposedly gotten rid of any records that would tell the intended destinations. What they supposedly have left is the record of what passports were issued - but they won’t disclose that either.

I wonder if there’s a transaction log for that supposed DOS “cable” that was submitted for Strunk’s case - something that would indicate when it was created, when it has been accessed, and any changes made to it.

Do you think that would be subject to a FOIA request, rolling stone? I suppose it would require a subpoena.

Ah so your the type who would try cutting to the front of the shower line at Auschwitz to please your “leaders”. and not ask questions. The questions may not be so revealing, but ass-u-me-ing you must answer is incorrect. As far as someone being able to lie about where and when they are going, yes they can, see SAD;s 1986 passport application and request for WILL CALL.

Sorry no Phd will be issued at this time but a temporary Lemming Student ID Card will be sent to you, that's
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW Washington, DC 20500, right?

You can always drop out of Lemming school and join conservatives and libertarians at the this is my government, they work for me, so I'll ask the questions and demand answers- AMERICAN UNIVERSITY of FREEDOM.

Wow, great find. I bet Stanley Ann did go over the border to a unwed mamas house for her pregnancy months, and had Barack there in Vancouver.

She was not old enough to confer even NORMAL AMERICAN CITIZENSHIP on him, so he must have been an illegal alien.

This has become now the most LIKELY story, now that there is zero evidence of him being born in Hawaii, so it MUST be investigated because if Obama is a citizen at all, he is a NATURALIZED one only. No wonder people died trying to fix his passport records.

.....They’ve supposedly gotten rid of any records that would tell the intended destinations. What they supposedly have left is the record of what passports were issued - but they won’t disclose that either.....

YES they won’t why not? When is a judge going to force them to?

.....I wonder if there’s a transaction log for that supposed DOS “cable” that was submitted for Strunk’s case - something that would indicate when it was created, when it has been accessed, and any changes made to it.....

Teletypes depending on the machine that made them and when have a “punch paper or magnetic tape of the cable” what happens is someone types out the message first them uses the tape to send it. It uses less time and cost to not have to wait for someone to type and pause when composing the cable and the cable can be checked for correctness prior to sending. If by punch tape the tape was folded then stapeled to the original cable. Many teleletype locations store the tape with the original message. Where is the original?

http://www.baudot.net/teletype/M43.htm
http://www.baudot.net/teletype/M40.htm

Transaction log beyond that is not within my knowledge. Regular filing procedures should call for records to be able to be located, stored, and destroyed in accordance with regulations.

Do you think that would be subject to a FOIA request, rolling stone? I suppose it would require a subpoena.

I think it would be subject to a request, the problem is our government is stalling and avoiding FOIA requests that have to do with Obama. FOIA is being circumvented by the administration, and icluded checking on the requestor prior to filling requests. Cleary a violation of FOIA and our civil rights/ Why aren’t they in jail? Lawless Administration.

Pamela Barnett noted the odd locations that cable was sent to. Why just Beirut and what was the other one? Kabul? I wonder what criteria they use to know which teletype messages to keep and for how long.

Lawless government is exactly right. I wonder if and how Issa is going to FORCE the Obama regime to cough up the records he’s demanded?

I’ve known mules that are more cooperative, but then mules have nothing to hide.

If Issa plays this right, the FOIA investigation could subpoena some records the Obama folks thought they deleted from computers, etc, which will reveal this whole stinkin’ mess. I’d really love it if Issa was being sneaky and effective, but at this point my expectations aren’t ankle high to a centipede.

I'd have saved some trouble if I bothered to read the whole article closely before commenting, but still, it is pretty wild.

If someone could produce a fake page resembling those of the two Honolulu papers and go through all the microwave copies of the papers from that day in various libraries and archives and change or hide the relevant pages, would it be much harder for them to produce a fake long-form birth certificate and put an end to the whole controversy?

It would be all the easier if the government agencies were going to back them up or if the original long form document wasn't in the government files anymore. Why would the forgers content themselves with a fake birth announcement when they could fake a birth certificate without much more effort?

"Pristine" and "unreadable" are relative terms. What looks "pristine" to one reader doesn't to another and what's "unreadable" to one person may be perfectly legible to another. The degree of magnification and type of reproduction also make a difference. It might help if you showed an example of a microfilm copy you found "pristine" or "unreadable."

I suspect that’s exactly what Obama and Abercrombie planned to do after Abercrombie shook his fist angrily at the “birthers”.

Unfortunately, after he had already tried to set the stage for the triumphant unveiling of the forgery..... a thread right here at Free Republic recommended that everybody ask their state legislators to pass a bill requiring not only the vital records but the TRANSACTION HISTORY for those vital records to be made public.

That made a dilemma. The forged long-form was supposed to convince states that they didn’t need to pass an eligibility bill. But if they presented a forgery and the transaction logs showed it as being created in 2010 there could be jail time.

Abercrombie tucked tail and ran - but not before he had mumbled something to a reporter about a recording of Obama’s birth actually being written down in the archives, and had told his friend Mike Evans that there is no Barack Obama birth certificate.

So anyway, what do you have to refute the documentation I provided that the stories we were told about who “found” those birth announcements and how is a bunch of BS?

And it’s microFILM copies, not microwave.

I posted a copy which I called “pristine” and I posted the copy from the HSL which is very clearly not pristine.

Butter:

I think you need a new computer. I have an iMac and I don’t worry about viruses, etc. and it plays all the videos you have been missing.

New they are just over $1100, but you can pick up used ones for half that.

I’ll bet if you set up a page asking freepers to paypal you a dollar you’d have it in no time. The name sounds gross but it’s called cyber begging.

Set it up and I’ll paypal you ten bucks. It’s worth it just to read your posts, and who knows where it can lead. Frog marched in an orange jump suit would be nice. :)

New digital microfilm scanners already in use in libraries can digitally remove dust and scratches from microfilm prints.

You will get a different quality print depending on whether you use an old-style microfilm reader or a new digital scanner.

But no! That's just too easy! There must be a massive conspiracy afoot! Alert the media!

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