The profession encompasses people with a wide range of professional and ethical standards. But I don't view this as unethical conduct, where the certificate may or may not be genuine, and Orly is not claiming it is genuine but rather seeking discovery in order to authenticate it.
Look, Orly is no Ken Starr. But I don't see any of the Ken Starrs of the world willing to take on the fight against Obama, as Orly is doing. So I would give her a bit of latitude in trying to pry open information about Obama's background and legal status.
Obama is the most arrogant president since Jimmy Carter. It is outrageous that he is stiff-arming Americans who expect him, as our highest public servant, to provide reasonable transparency about his background.
The legal hurdle Orly has to overcome is access to information.
There may be questions about the authenticity of the Kenyan birth certificate, but the easiest way to resolve the questions is to ask an employee in the Kenyan registrar's office to simply check their records.
Furthermore, if a court would simply authorize her and the State Department to make a request to the proper Kenyan agency for their records, it may well be that Kenya could check their birth records and put to rest the issue not only as to this particular birth certificate but whether they have any record of a birth for Barack Obama.
If there is no record for Obama, Kenya may well be happy to receive a discovery order from a court allowing them to make an official response on this matter and clear the air, which otherwise they may be restricted from doing under privacy law.
Now if there is something in Kenya's records that would contradict the story that Obama has laid about his background, it is possible that there may be shenanigans, especially if the relevant state employees are Odinga supporters.
So I would hope that, as a check on the Kenyan records, a discovery request could also be directed to the British Colonial Office to see whether they have in their records in London a copy of vital records registers maintained during the colonial period, and whether there is any reference therein to Barack Obama.
I have read criticism of Orly. But...Geeze! She's an inexperienced attorney with an on-line degree. Naturally, she is not going to be polished and will make naive mistakes. She likely doing many things for the first time.
And... I don't see many other attorneys stepping up to the challenge. May God bless Orly's efforts and keep her very safe.