Posted on 07/28/2009 5:29:21 AM PDT by reaganaut1
Pres. Barack Obama has a birthday coming up, a week from Tuesday. We hope he takes the day off—or even the whole week, the briefest of respites from his busy schedule of truncating our liberties while exhausting both the public coffers and our patience. The president’s birthday comes to mind because we recently spent some time looking at a photograph of his birth certificate, being held by Joe Miller of Factcheck.org, who took the time to examine it. President Obama was born on August 4, 1961, at 7:24 p.m, in Honolulu County, Hawaii, on the island of Oahu. The serial number on his birth certificate is 010641. Baby Barack’s birth was not heralded, as some of his partisans have suggested, by a star in the east, but it was heralded by the Honolulu Star, as well as the Honolulu Advertiser, each of which published birth announcements for young Mr. Obama.
Much foolishness has become attached to the question of President Obama’s place of birth, and a few misguided souls among the Right have indulged it. The myth that Barack Obama is ineligible to be president represents the hunt for a magic bullet that will make all the unpleasant complications of his election and presidency disappear. We are used to seeing conspiracy theories from the Left, for instance among the one in three Democrats who believe that 9/11 was an inside job conducted with the foreknowledge of the Bush administration. We’ve seen everything under the sun blamed on Dick Cheney and Halliburton, and Rosie O’Donnell has given us much mirth with her metallurgical expertise, while Andrew Sullivan has beclowned himself and tarnished the good name of The Atlantic with his investigation into the “real” parentage of Trig Palin. Most notable, the Iraq War summoned the craziness in a big way, and there are those who still shudder over their espressos at the mention of the Carlyle Group. And there is a fair amount of crossover between those fixated on Obama’s birth certificate and the 9/11 “truthers” — lawyer Phil Berg, for instance, is a player in both worlds. There is nothing that President Obama’s coterie would enjoy more than to see the responsible Right become a mirror image of the loopy Left circa 2003.
The birth-certificate business is not a uniquely conservative phenomenon; the allegation that Obama was born in Kenya seems to have originated with a Hillary Clinton supporter at a blog called The Blue State. Either way, this fantasy is not particularly widespread within the conservative movement, but it has attracted enough interest that it needs to be addressed.
The fundamental fiction is that Obama has refused to release his “real” birth certificate. This is untrue. The document that Obama has made available is the document that Hawaiian authorities issue when they are asked for a birth certificate. There is no secondary document cloaked in darkness, only the state records that are used to generate birth certificates when they are requested.
If one applies for a United States passport, the passport office will demand a birth certificate. It defines this as an official document bearing “your full name, the full name of your parent(s), date and place of birth, sex, date the birth record was filed, and the seal or other certification of the official custodian of such records.” The Hawaiian birth certificate President Obama has produced—the document is formally known as a “certificate of live birth”—bears that information. It has been inspected by reporters, and several state officials have confirmed that the information in permanent state records is identical to that on the president’s birth certificate—which is precisely what one expects, of course, since the state records are used to generate those documents when they are requested. In other words, what President Obama has produced is the “real” birth certificate of myth and lore. The director of Hawaii’s health department and the registrar of records each has personally verified that the information on Obama’s birth certificate is identical to that in the state’s records, the so-called vault copy. Given that fact, we are loath even to engage the fanciful notion that President Obama was born elsewhere, contrary to the information on his birth certificate, but we note for the record that his mother was a native of Kansas, whose residents have been citizens of the United States for a very long time, and whose children are citizens of the United States as well.
The attention paid to President Obama’s place of birth is not unprecedented. In fact, it may be the only thing President Obama has in common with Pres. Chester Arthur, whose opponents whispered that he had been born in Canada. A number of unsuccessful presidential candidates—George Romney, Barry Goldwater, and Lowell Weicker among them—actually were born outside of the United States (in Mexico, the Arizona Territory, and Paris, respectively) to American parents and thereby into American citizenship. If the conspiracy theorists have evidence that President Obama went through the naturalization process, let them show it. But there is no such evidence, because this theory is based on unreality, as two minutes’ examining the claims of its proponents reveals. The hallmark of a conspiracy theory is that a lack of evidence for the theory is taken as yet more evidence for the theory. Indeed, the maddening thing about dealing with conspiracy hobbyists of this or any sort is the ever-shifting nature of their argument and their alleged evidence: Never mind the birth certificate, his step-grandmother said he was born in Kenya! (No, she didn’t.)
One of the unfortunate consequences of this red-herring discussion is that there are plenty of questions about Obama’s background and history that we would like to have answered. In spite of two books of memoirs, there remain murky areas in his biography. And when it comes to those college transcripts, count us among those who’d love to know whether Dr. Bailout ever took an advanced economics class and how he performed in it.
Barack Obama may prefer European-style socialized health care. He may consider himself a citizen of the Earth and sometimes address his audiences as “people of the world,” as though he were born not in another country but on another planet. Like Bruce Springsteen, he has a lot of bad political ideas; but he was born in the U.S.A.
For goodness sakes, Obama won't let us see his birth certificate why would he let anyone see this? After he did say something to the effect he wanted to keep his administration open with full disclosure...That's worked out GREAT for him so far!
agreed
I would have thought at least one journo would go and visit his family in Kenya, ask them why they say he was born there and why the place is being touted as the birth place of bozo.
Instead out media are pathetic, they just sit there , doing no work whatsoever.
This would be really easy for a media group to find out and do a documentary.
When HI went digital, Barack was in his thirties. Pre 'digital' Barack must have had and used a copy of a 'long form' birth certificate. Where is it and the original from which it was copied.
Like it or not, Barrack Obama is our President now & even if it were proven tomorrow that he was born on Mars, he couldn't be removed from office now - it'd take YEARS of court procedure just to get him to answer a subpoena! Meanwhile he gets to wreak irrevocable harm on future generations while everybody's examining arcane minutiae of longform Hawaii birth certificates!
Ya gotta hand it to them: BHO & his crooked Chicago posse have found a nifty little Alinskyesque loophole here, no doubt about it, and no doubt also they're cynically stoking their opposition's nagging suspicion he's somehow 'unamerican' for all it's worth & to great effect in order to get their anti-american agenda rammed through right now.
“So I guess, now, that every conservative who does not believe the birthers as well as Ann Coulter and National Review are liberal hacks who have been taken over by the Obama cult.
“The birthers believe that the world has been taken over by pod-people. Everyone else has been hypnotized by the Obama cult and only they see the truth.”
They are the ‘Old Guard’. Conservatives are entering a new generation mostly due to the demise the RINOs brought during the Bush Era.
National Review and Ann Coulter are all for Romney, BTW. A guy like Romney represents the old Republican party. But someone like Palin would represent the new.
The National Review article is badly written not because people disagree with it, but because it doesn’t even list the facts.
I know the Viral Messengers that have infested Free Republic in the last few days have to be going nuts that nothing is stopping this. The reason why is because this is a Constitutional Issue.
Anyone who thinks Obama wants “Birthers” to continue doesn’t understand what is going on. Demanding the Birth Certificate about Obama is calling into question who Obama is and what is his history. The more we know about Obama, the more his polls drop (most recently, see his ‘stupidly’ comment about the cops. This comment tells us what he really believes).
Obama doesn’t want people asking questions about his past. Demanding a Birth Certificate either has two outcomes:
1) Obama coughs it up and everyone is happy. People will wonder why Obama spend so much money and time delaying to do the obvious.
2) Obama keeps hiding it. This leads to people asking ‘why’.
Those who fear ‘birthers’ will be called ‘kooks’ need to realize that ‘conservatives’, in general, are already called ‘kooks’ by these people.
If you aren’t being criticized, then you are likely not doing anything.
Fine by me that this is getting legs. In fact it’s hillarious this article is so long winded and goes on and on and on about something the author claims is nothing. The more it’s front page, the more and more sheeple will start to question if there might very well be a problem with their golden boy.
Ann Dunham was 18 years old when little Bambi was born. Her birthdate is 11/29/1942...Bambi = 8/4/1961
Great post.
Post 144 on this thread. William Blackstone, Commentaries 1765.
His Dad was not even a resident alien nor a naturalized citizen. He was here on a student visa. That makes things very murky as far as Natural Born is concerned.
When you read what the authors of the 14th Amendment felt about NBC, it is pretty clear that to be a NBC, both parents had to be citizens. Natural law practiced by the British was not what they wanted, they wanted allegiance.
Thanks but there are those that will accept no proof.
Yes, BS is an undocumented worker residing at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. Certain groups can’t govern themselves. Look at the Bahamas - Burned out ends of Grand Bahama Island are a testament to the fervor of certain groups when they feel empowerd.
reaganaut1:”It has been inspected by reporters”
Which is quite interesting since Hawaiian officials keep reminding us that these are under seal and only the individual or their family have access to the original documents. Did Hawaii violate their own law in allowing reporters access to this document?
My guess is that they are referring to the BC copy that Obama has previously presented - the one that could be easily falsified or shows only partial birth information.
The long form would answer these questions. Where is the long form?
the prize back then was to be American, even the illegals still do it.
No way would she have wanted her son to never have been allowed back in America and live illegally.
No benefits for her either back then
She would never have wanted him to have stayed in Kenya.
The mother I bet felt he would have a better life in America but if he was not born here then she could never take him back unless he was illegal.
Put an announcement in the paper(easy to do as I have done it in the UK) and when she gets over to HI she says a Doc came but she does not know his name .
It was not like the officials were going to heck out her story back then.
People were more trust worthy and easier to fool.
Like I said no matter how many times the left tries to put this to bed the more questions arise.
One poster just sent me a long post backing bozo up and then gives a link to a call which was made stating granny said he was born in HI
This is how bad the left have become
writing articles saying calls were recorded(no call released like a 911 call) and saying granny said so.
Well now more questions come with why was that call made, where is the tape for it?
Fed up of hearing journo’s saying they checked it.
HOW??????????????????????????????
Because they looked at Bozo's website, please give me a break.
Just release the thing,
Not personally. But I'm betting they exist based upon his poll numbers.
I’m not saying he purposely made this information difficult to get with this strategy in mind the whole time, but after releasing his CoLB, maybe it occurred to them that they have nothing to lose by making his birth certificate difficult to get, and a lot to gain by making a large number of their opponents look like lunatics.
I think the most logical explanation is the simplest one: He's hiding something.
Not suggesting anything. Just reporting to you what is now known...and verifiable. Obama and family never lived at the published addressed in the announcement—what that means, who the heck knows?I'm sorry but you have to be implying something. This "fact" is either true, untrue, or irrelevant. If a fact leads to you a bizarre conclusion then you should reexamine the fact. This is the what I've been telling the Trig Birthers.
really
not heard of this but like I said every time I try to reason with this subject and go against this the more I have questions.
Is it not too hard to go to Kenya and ask his family and see the place they tout as his birth place?
For heavens sake if they do not want to go give me the money and book me in a hotel and I’ll go and do their job.
Now THAT is a conspiracy theory.
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