Replies

"And since what Obama released was purported to be an official Hawaiian certificate of live birth, shouldn't Hawaii be able to now discuss the issues around that certificate, like the blacked out certificate number?"

I might be wrong, but I believe that to be an incorrect statement. The page on Obama's fight the smears website doesn't claim that at all. The Obama staff claims this: Senator Obama was born in Hawaii in 1961, after it became a state on August 21st, 1959. Obama became a citizen at birth under the first section of the 14th Amendment. They do not claim the image to be a copy.

In my humble opinion the image is posted as a reference to what the kerfuffle is all about. Neither he nor his staff is claiming the image to be a copy of his birth certificate.

"do I have a right from all the states that I wasn't born in"

That's a good point and as I have pointed out in the past, if he wasn't born at Kapiolani Med, someone on staff would have leaked that information to the press. It's not against the law to talk about information that does not exist, heck, it's not even against policy, whereas, if his records do exist, then it is illegal to give out that information.

By the same logic, I'm sure there's a conservative in Hawai'i that has access to birth information. And there is nothing illegal about telling the world that there is no record of Obama being born in Hawai'i, but it is illegal or at least a firing offense to give out information if it does exists. For that reason alone, I believe the record exists.

We have all been witnesses to leaks in this country from George W Bush's DUI to classified Pentagon, NSC, CIA and Whitehouse documents. Does anyone seriously believe that several people working for the county governments in Hawai'i haven't looked this up out of curiosity? How on Earth could a person be prosecuted for telling the world that Obama was born in Kenya in 1957, while on a BOAC flight to Mecca and that his real name is Barack Sadaam Hussein Obama? Whistle Blower laws would keep a person safe from prosecution.

Thanks for your reply. I do think that if a Conservative looked in Hawaii's records and announced that nothing was there, somebody in Hawaii would concoct an issue of unauthorized usage of the system in the first place, unless that person had a legitimate business reason to search the records (data privacy laws). Unfortunately, having access and curiosity is not enough, a person must have a legitimate business reason to do the query, too. Unless they are in a fraud division, and it's their job to follow up on suggestions of fraudulent use of Hawaii's documents, then it would probably still be used against somebody.

I do recall reading somewhere that Kos claims to have gotten the information from Obama, or with Obama's permission? If the Smears site only claims that the image is an example of right-wing smears and makes no claim about the authenticity of the document, what about Kos claiming that they got it legitimately from Obama or on his behalf, or did I get that wrong?

-PJ