Replies

I’ve emailed Ann Hollyfield the following.
Dear Ms. Hollyfield,
I realize you have posted the Final Chapter on this issue, but there’s some puzzles that don’t appear to have been addressed regarding Senator Obama’s birth certificate:

Why is the Obama Copy Dated June 7, 2007?
1. In mid-April, you stated “We tried to obtain a copy of Obama’s birth certificate, but his campaign would not release it and the state of Hawaii does not make such records public.”
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/464/
2. You stated “Okubo said a copy of the birth certificate was requested in June 2008, but she wouldn’t specify by whom.”
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2008/jun/13/obamas-birth-certificate/
3. Yet the date stamped on the back of the Certificate you posted is June 7, 2007.
4. If the campaign had this document in their possession for over a year, what would motivate them to delay releasing it for months, especially given that McCain had quickly addressed the issue of whether he was constitutionally qualified to seek the Presidency?

Why Does Father’s Race Say African?
1. The U.S. has a Standard Birth Certificate form that they encourage states to use.
2. FWIW, I think constitutionally Feds probably can’t MAKE states use this, but they preempt objections by:
• determining the data elements that should be collected “through consultation with State health officers and registrars; Federal agencies concerned with vital statistics; national, State, and county medical societies;” and
• letting states customize it to collect whatever additional information they want: “It has been modified in each state to the extent necessitated by the particular needs of the State or by special provisions of the State vital statistics law. However, the certificates of most States conform closely in content and arrangement to the standard certificate.”
Therefore, I cannot PROVE Hawaii used this form in 1961, but there is no indication in any of the numerous vital statistics tabulations regarding Color that Hawaii’s form did not collect this information.
3. You can see a copy of the standard form in use in 1961 here: http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/vsus/vsus_1961_1.pdf on pdf page 228.
• Item 8. requests “Color or Race” of Father.
• Item 10. requests Birthplace (State or foreign country) of Father
• Item 13 requests “Color or Race” of Mother
• Item 15 requests Birthplace (State or foreign country) of Mother
4. “Births in the United States in 1961 are classified for vital statistics into white, Negro, American Indian, Chinese,Japanese, Aleut, Eskimo, Hawaiian and Part-Hawaiian (combined), and “other nonwhite.” See pdf page 231 at same cdc.gov URL. Thus, whoever was coding Obama’s birth should have been following this classification scheme.
5. “African” is not a race. While there certainly are many Blacks in Africa, there also are Afrikaners who are white, not to mention Arabs, Indians and others who certainly would not designate themselves as Black. So putting “African” in the race field would not have made sense. Moreover, if someone accidently did this in field 8, they would likely quickly recognize their mistake when they got to field 10 and had to fill in the father’s birthplace.
6. While the original birth certificates are filled out by hand and signed by doctor, I assume these records long ago were computerized, in which case “funny stuff” such as an inadvertently miscoded Race field likely would have been flagged and corrected a long time ago.
7. I also assume that certified copies are generated automatically by a computer, on the Certification of Live Birth, it clearly states Father’s Race—not Birthplace—so if a computer was generating the copy, there’s no way it would have “mistakenly” grabbed the incorrect field (moreover, “African” wouldn’t be the correct way to fill in the Birthplace field in any case: it should either have been Kenya or the town where Obama’s father was born).
8. But even in the unlikely event these certified copies are generated by having a bureaucrat literally transcribe the relevant info from an original hand-written certificate that is on file, the fact that the mother is listed as Caucasian in the Mother’s Race field suggests that unless the person was very sloppy, they should have recognized that “African” was not an appropriate entry in the Father’s Race field etc.

Why Are There No Crease-Marks on the Obama Copy?
1. Notice the crease-marks and clear evidence of fading in the greenish background image used for the forms in the 2 presumably genuine copies of Hawaiian birth certificates that have been posted
here: http://tomo-dachi.net/pics/misc/BC.jpg and
here: http://www.valeehill.net/genealogy/documents/doc_decosta_pat_birth.jpg
2. Poster Naomiekeys claims that Hawaii”s State Department of Health has confirmed: “Certified copies of birth certificates are NEVER sent electronically. Copies can be requested by qualified individuals in person, by mail, or on line; and the Vital Records (VR) office will MAIL the Certification of Live Birth within 4 to 6 weeks.”
http://web.israelinsider.com/bin/en.jsp?enDispWho=TalkBack^l246689&enPage=EmptyPage&enDisplay=view&enDispWhat=object&enVersion=0&enZone=TalkBack&&Index=21&Article=Article^l12932&Max=29.
3. Similarly, Israel Insider claims that Janice Okubo, Director of Communications of the State of Hawaii Department of Health, told Israel Insider: “At this time there are no circumstances in which the State of Hawaii Department of Health would issue a birth certification or certification of live birth only electronically.” http://web.israelinsider.com/Articles/Politics/12939.htm
4. Claims #2 and #3 above are consistent with what I have seen regarding ordering:
• On-line (which apparently can only be done by a family member): https://www.ehawaii.gov/doh/vitrec/exe/vitrec.cgi
• Or in-person or by mail by a non-family member, but if so,
o “Certified copies are usually not issued on the day the application is made. Same-Day service may be provided upon presentation of written documentation establishing the need for urgency. Certified copies will normally be available for pick-up about 10 working days after the request is approved.”
o Moreover, “If you are applying for a certificate on behalf of someone else, you must provide an original letter signed by that person authorizing the release of their certificate to you.” http://hawaii.gov/health/vital-records/vital-records/vital_records.html
4. Thus, unless someone obtained a copy in person (which no one at Obama campaign has claimed, to my knowledge), this implies that the Obama certificate—like the 2 posted—would have been folded up and mailed, yet the posted copy is absolutely pristine: not even a smidgeon of creasing or fading is discernible.

Why Does Obama’s Certificate Say “Date Filed by Registrar” instead of “Date Accepted by Registrar”?
1. Note also that the 2 genuine copies both state “Date Accepted by State Registrar” even though the DeCosta document was to retroactively certify a birth that occurred before Hawaii was a state and the Tomoyasu document (like Obama’s) was to record a birth after Hawaii became a state.
2. Yet the Obama certificate states “Date Filed by Registrar” even though:
• It had the identical purpose as the Tomayasu certificate; and
• All three documents purport to be printed on the identical form OHSM 1.1 (Rev. 11/01) LASER, as indicated in the lower left-hand corner.

Why Is the Border on the Obama Copy So Different Than The Genuine Copies?
1. You can just visually inspect the 3 images yourself. Even though all are allegedly printed on the identical form, only the 2 genuine copies have nearly identical dark-hatched borders, whereas the Obama version is clearly much lighter and very different-looking.
2. Or, for a close-up view, see Polarik’s analysis here:
http://polarik.blogtownhall.com/2008/06/22/now_lets_compare_apples_to_apples.thtml
2. Moreover, I concur with Polarik’s analysis that the intersections of the vertical and horizontal border in the Obama copy are very sloppily done compared to the much crisper printed border on the DeCosta copy.

Why is the Certificate Number Blacked Out Using a Graphics Program?
1. The release of Obama’s certificate would have had to have been authorized by a family member. There is no particularly good reason to blank out the birth certificate number either on privacy grounds or other grounds, since that number could not have been used by anyone to obtain Obama’s records etc.
2. But even if there were grounds for suppressing that information, Polarik has shown it was done using a graphics program even though it would have been easier and just as effective to just cover that portion up with paper.
http://polarik.blogtownhall.com/2008/06/28/why_the_certificate_no_on_obamas_bogus_bc_is_blacked_out.thtml
3. Running the image through a graphics program to black out this information simply unnecessarily creates suspicion that other elements of the image also were faked. Why would a campaign intent on trying to dampen rumors do this? Polarik has offered some thoughtful speculation on some deceitful motivations for doing this: I can’t think of an innocent explanation, can you?

Why Are There Obvious Signs of Photoshopping?
1. Polarik has shown that the image properties for the Obama jpg show unequivocal markers that the “image was produced by Adobe Photoshop CS3, on a Mac running OS 2.0, and saved at 8:43am on June 12th — around the same date it was posted online.” http://polarik.blogtownhall.com/2008/06/29/proof_positive_that_photoshop_was_used_on_the_bc_image_posted_in_the_daily_kos.thtml
2. Likewise, his analysis of the sharp contrast in lettering between the DeCosta certificate and Obama certificate is pretty compelling:
http://polarik.blogtownhall.com/2008/06/22/now_lets_compare_apples_to_apples.thtml

None of these individually represents a “smoking gun.” But collectively, they surely pose a puzzle. Either Senator Obama or his campaign is:
1. deliberately hiding something for some motivation such as:
• concern about something potentially quite serious [e.g., he is ineligible to serve as president];
• possible embarrassment [e.g., his birth was listed as Not Legitimate in item 23 of his detailed birth certificate, and hence he was given his mother’s last name]; or
• fear that public concerns that might be raised about his trustworthiness [e.g., once the public observes that he has written or lied repeatedly about some aspect of his childhood], or

2. resorting to a deliberate campaign dirty trick aimed at diverting his opponents from focusing on more serious matters and/or deliberately creating smoke in hopes they’ll look foolish by shouting “Fire.”

I don’t pretend to know where the truth lies here. But either of the two possibilities suggested above arguably should be of great concern. If Senator Obama is dissembling on a matter this small (in the grand scheme of things), what should voters or world leaders conclude about their ability to trust his word? And if this is nothing more than a campaign trick, then what does that tell us about Obama’s claims to be a different kind of leader?

I don’t expect a reply, but I am hoping you might conclude there’s at least one more chapter to write in your assessment of this situation.