A friend called me out of the blue to tell me that he just saw the funniest bumper sticker…
Now, I am by no means a “birther” (one who believes that Barack Obama is ineligible for the Presidency of the United States based on questions surrounding his citizenship). In fact, it’s not really a subject that I’ve given much thought. As with 29% of Americans, according to a July 2010 CNN poll, I’ve always accepted that Obama was probably born in the United States. Afterall, Hawaii has his birth certificate on file, right?
It wasn’t until recently that I started to really think about this subject. I suppose we can credit the new Democratic Governor of Hawaii and ardent Obama supporter, Neil Abercrombie, for revisiting the issue when he gave a December 24, 2010 interview to the New York Times. In that interview Abercrombie grumbled, “There’s no reason on earth to have the memory of [Obama’s] parents insulted by people whose motivation is solely political. Let’s put this particular canard to rest.” He went on to say, “My thought is, rather than get into some kind of argument or play into that mentality, why not just simply try to authenticate this and let the facts speak for themselves?” Sounds good to me.
Four days later another Democrat and tingly-leg feeler, MSNBC’s Chris Matthews, decided to dedicate a segment of his show “Hardball with Chris Matthews” to Abercrombie’s mission to silence the “birthers” once and for all. In that segment, Matthews posed the following questions, “I don’t understand why the governor doesn’t just say, ‘Snap it up, who’s ever over there in the department of records, send me a copy right now’? And why doesn’t the president just say, ‘Send me a copy right now?’ Why doesn’t [press secretary Robert] Gibbs and [Obama aide David] Axelrod say, ‘Let’s just get this crappy story dead’?” He continued, “If it exists, why not put it out? I’m just asking the obvious questions why?” It’s not everyday that Chris Matthews makes sense, but he does have a point.
Why?!
Since the inception of the Obama birth certificate controversy in early 2008, I finally took an interest. So, I started to do a little research and the following is what I learned.
Obama’s birth certificate initially became an issue during the Democratic Primary in early 2008 when Hillary Clinton supporters, from a blog called The Blue State, began questioning Obama’s eligibility to be President. As per Article 2, Section 1, Clause 5 of the United States Constitution it states, “No person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the Office of President…” It wasn’t enough to derail the Obama campaign and by June, 2008, Obama squeezed Hillary out to become the Democratic Nominee for President.
But the issue wouldn’t go away. NPR, National Review Online, CNN’s Lou Dobbs Tonight, and many other media outlets began to raise the same citizenship issues in regard to Obama’s eligibility to run for president.
In an effort to nip the controversy in the bud, Obama released what his campaign called his “Official Birth Certificate” on a website called fightthesmears.com and at about the same time, the Daily Kos presented a copy of Obama’s Certification of Live Birth. Left wing leaning fact checking organizations such as FactCheck.org, MediaMatters.org, Politifact.com and Snopes.com all confirmed authenticity of the birth certificate documents that indicate Obama was born in Hawaii and therefore eligible to be President. It was even enough for the McCain campaign, who ironically had his citizenship status challenged by the Obama campaign, which issued the following statement:
To the extent that we could, we looked into the substantive side of these allegations. We never saw any evidence that then-Senator Obama had been born outside of the United States. We saw rumors, but nothing that could be sourced to evidence. There were no statements and no documents that suggested he was born somewhere else. On the other side, there was proof that he was born in Hawaii. There was a certificate issued by the state’s Department of Health, and the responsible official in the state saying that he had personally seen the original certificate. There was a birth announcement in the Honolulu Advertiser, which would be very difficult to invent or plant 47 years in advance.
By this time, various theories began to emerge regarding Obama’s citizenship. One suggested that he was actually born in Kenya, another was that he was born in Indonesia, yet another proposed that being Hawaiian born is not a “natural-born” citizen, and so on. The idea that Obama was born in a foreign country, then smuggled into the U.S., that his parents somehow deceived Hawaiian authorities into falsely certifying his birth and had the wherewithal to place birth announcements in the local paper really does sound absurd. So why did the first “birther,” Democrat activist lawyer Phil Berg, file a lawsuit challenging Obama eligibility in on August 21, 2008? Why does White House Press Secretary Gibbs mock those who seek more evidence with comments like, “I will seek to interview whoever brought the president into this world”?
Here’s the problem for the critics of birthers.
Hawaii has two ways to “prove” citizenship. One way is by producing the CERTIFICATION OF LIVE BIRTH, which is the short form computer-generated printout that provides specific details of a person’s birth that can be printed out at any time. This document is what Obama produced with a 2007 stamp on it. This document is what all the Left wing fact checker organizations use to confirm Obama’s eligibility to be President.
The other way of proving citizenship is by producing a CERTIFICATE OF LIVE BIRTH, which is the long form original birth certificate document produced at the time of birth with the name of the hospital, hand written dates, signatures of the doctor, the registrar, the director of health, and the state registrar. This is the document that Governor Neil Abercrombie, MSNBC’s Chris Matthews and the birthers all want to see produced.
And since Hawaii has a privacy law that bars the disclosure of an individual’s birth documentation without the person’s consent, no objective eye has ever seen Obama’s actual birth certificate. This is the crux of the problem and what fuels the birther’s fire.
So how does Obama’s name get in Hawaii’s database if no birth certificate was ever created?
I wondered the same thing and found something interesting on a recent trip to Hawaii where I met with the statue of Sun Yat-Sen, the Founding Father of Nationalist China which paved the road to the authoritarian Chinese regime we know today. He was born in the village of Cuiheng, near Hong Kong in China, in 1866. Like Obama, Sun Yat-Sen spent several years going to school in Oahu. And in March 1904, he obtained a Certificate of Hawaiian Birth, issued by the Territory of Hawaii, stating he was born on November 24, 1870 in Kula, Maui.
It was possible for the Sun Yat-Sen to obtain a Hawaiian birth certificate simply by submitting an Affidavit to the Office of the Secretary stating he was born in Hawaii. This practice evolved and in 1911 became a law that allowed foreign born person to be registered as though they were born in Hawaii. All that was required was to simply fill out an application, be presented to a representative to the Secretary of Hawaii and have a witness testimony that could include family and friends. The practice continued until 1972.
So, it is not unfathomable that Hawaii would issue a birth certificate to a foreign born person. Or that said person could go on to become a world leader. All that was required in 1961 was Obama’s grandparents to recognize the fact that having U.S. citizenship would provide him with a better life and his mother with a better opportunity in the event a divorce and custody hearing arose in her first marriage. If this were the case, all that would actually exist is the short form computer generated certification of live birth. In other words, no actual long form original certificate of live birth would exist. This is consistent with what Obama and his campaign and staff have presented to date.
And how was an announcement made of Obama’s birth if he was never born in Hawaii? The announcements were automatically issued whenever a certification of live birth was issued. Once Obama’s name was in the system, the birth announcement was issued.
What is fascinating is that for about a period of 4 years between 2004 and 2008, the American Left made issue that no evidence of WMDs were ever found. They successfully demonized President George W. Bush regarding the Iraq invasion and eventually took Congress and the office of the President with large margins. For the next couple years, a group of people take issue with Obama’s citizenship calling for the president to produce evidence of his long form certificate of live birth, of which Obama refuses to do. And instead of Obama getting demonized, those on the Left have successfully marginalized and vilified the individuals demanding proof of citizenship as if they were on equal footing as the 9/11 “truthers.” Stalin had the “bourgeois” and now Obama has the “birthers.”
So, did Hawaiian Governor Abercrombie simply authenticate Obama’s certificate of live birth and let the facts speak for themselves as he said he would at the end of December 2010?
On January 20, 2011, Governor Abercrombie declared that State Attorney General David Louie told him that privacy laws bar him from disclosing an individual’s birth documentation without the person’s consent (how convenient); however, Abercrombie contended, without seeing it first hand, that Obama’s long form birth certificate “exists in archives.” That fruitless effort certainly did not put the issue at rest for good. Apparently, the only person who can legally put the issue to rest for good is Obama himself. So, when he is done with the rhetoric that he “can’t spend all of [his] time with [his] birth certificate plastered on [his] forehead,” maybe he will spend the two minutes to call his attorney and instruct them to coordinate with the Hawaiian Department of Health to obtain the long form certificate of live birth.
Until this document is produced, examined and authenticated, more “Where’s the Birth Certificate?” billboards will be erected, more blogs will push the story and more Americans will begin to change their attitude from Obama probably is a citizen to Obama is probably not a citizen… like me.
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If the Certificate of Birth never proves anything, then the State Department needs to get to work revoking all the passports (and states need to get busy revoking the DLs and any other state documents) issued to people who presented only the Certificate of Birth as proof of who they were, etc.
Also, if opposing the release of something means that the charges against a person are true, then Rick Perry must know that he murdered an innocent man when he refused to issue a stay in the Cameron Todd Willingham case. Gov. Perry has done everything he can to prevent the Texas Forensic Science Commission from investigating the arson science and issuing a report on the findings (mostly through his appointed lacked John Bradley).
No one works that hard to prevent a report on something they thought they did right.
Therefore, Rick Perry is a murderer.
Also, instead of defending himself and his wife, Texas Supreme Court Justice David Medina worked behind the scenes to get the indictments related to a fire at their home (ruled by a Harris County Fire Marshal to be arson) quashed. If his wife really didn’t burn down the house, they would’ve gone to court and proven their innocence.
Therefore, Mrs. David Medina is an arsonist and Justice Medina is guilty of obstruction of justice.
This is a fun game.
Great Article Tim – Glad to have you with us.
Fair enough, revoke all passports where no certificate of live birth exists.
There is no comparison with Governor Rick Perry. You’re comparing apples with oranges. Besides, I don’t think anyone is saying that anyone is opposing the release of the documents, they are saying that the documents simply don’t exist. And if they do, legally, the only person who can release them is Obama. Yet he won’t. Why? It’s just not a question anyone on the Left, with the exception of Chris Matthews in his snide little way, is willing to ask.
Perhaps they fear the answer?
This is an excellent report, very well done, about this ongoing issue. And, from the many additional reports I have read about this, it is not at all unusual that China’s (and China-born) Sun Yat-Sen would have the same document from Hawaii as Obama (so far) has reproduced as an image file on the internet: many a person foreign-born used Hawaii for decades for this very same purpose and that’s a little-exposed fact from the state’s history, that it was well known to be a leading document mill state to, particularly, people born in Asia (easy access to Hawaii from Asia). And once a Cert. of Birth was obtained from Hawaii, the access to state driver’s license and then to assuming U.S. citizenship was easy (and was the easy practice by many foreign-born persons as to Hawaii’s document mill availability). It is not at all unusual nor unnecessary that “Barack Obama” should be required to substantiate his place and time of his birth. If such a document exists, then he should have no issues providing it. That he won’t provide it indicates the obvious: he’s hiding something.
This is becoming new/old news these days but the facts just won’t go away.
I totally agree that this is a matter of importance. Somewhere along the line our state and Government officials became untouchable in the sense that instead of being held to a higher standard which is my take on it all…they are allowed to dodge, side step and just plain not answer questions of all types.
The most cowardly approach of this type is the use of the “National Security Act” that hides their criminal activity not only from any investigation but from the very Americans that put them in office or a period of 50 years.
I have been deemed a conspiracy theorist through the years and the only reason for this is that I demand an answer. That coupled with the fact that when a State or Government official gives an answer and it is proven to not be true and in many cases not even possible to be true…I demand the truth. Why doesn’t everyone?
How does Bill Clinton claim he’s worth $900,000 upon swearing in and $230,000,000 on the way out and we are not only stopped cold from commencing an audit of his finances but we are not even allowed to ask him a question?
This all needs to stop…in this case Obama could silence all this in a short period of time as you stated but he insists on side stepping the matter. He is to blame for any and all skepticism revolving around this issue.
@ Tim Ross: also, the U.S. has recently revoked all birth certificates and related passports as issued by Puerto Rico, based upon the eventual discovery of long-standing document-mill forgeries from that territory. It needs to be done as to the state of Hawaii for whatever decades were more clearly identified from there (but I doubt that will happen, given the impact on the Democratic Party that this would have, Hawaii being majority Democrat at present).
I’d also suggest Florida and California and Texas be put to the reality test as to birth records, documents produced…but Hawaii was well known for being an easy-in state as to obtaining documents for foreign-born individuals, to then pose as U.S. citizens afterward. Long, long story that needs greater exposure.
The first comment here clearly is for purposes of ridiculing the inquiries and important issues involved and not for purposes of understanding the issues.
The point is that Certificates of Birth as issued BY THE STATE OF HAWAII were, for years there, done colloquially: state your story, the Hawaii state employee who heard or read it on a form would accept it, without too much greater inquiry or substantiation.
So many a foreign-born individual who had a friend or could purchase one would go to Hawaii, present their “story” (“I was born at home,” or “my mother was alone when I was born” or “we didn’t go to the hospital” or “the clinic where I was born isn’t there any longer and I can’t recall the name of it” or anything else that would work to dodge establishing the facts of birth — just TELL a story, it was considered to be “evidence of birth” and the Cert. of Birth was issued by the State. Worse, stories exist of purchasing these forms by paying state employees. Either way, both are fraud with state employees’ participation in it.
These are known issues as to the State of Hawaii’s history. Colloquial testimony passed and still does in many cases as “fact,” so a long-time person or one who “looks like” they are simply asks for the Cert. and obtains one by easy-tell of whatever the story may be. More complicated is that the Communist Party from China used Hawaii for decades for just such a document-mill purpose, to gain greater “community” in the state.
How timely was this article? This just in from the White House…
In today’s White House briefing with press secretary Robert Gibbs, Gibbs snuck a jab at the so-called birthers who don’t believe Obama was born in Hawaii. “I think rational people have — have long ago, many when they first heard and saw the president, come to the conclusion of his citizenship,” he said.
http://www.politico.com/politico44/perm/0111/key_gibbs_takeaways_ef25f6e6-0d60-4f79-89bc-dfc5b86c0b3a.html
What an excellent article Tim. I was one that wanted to see the long form ever since I returned from a school trip to Europe the summer of 2008. When I saw first hand Barack Obama campaigning for the US presidency all over Europe. Since Obama came onto the scene ,and declared his presidental candidacy nothing he did was normal. It is only logical to want to question him. Way too many Obama answers don’t pass the smell test.
I’m glad you have seen the light.
The problem is, the majority of people say there is no reason to doubt, but like you, never did any research on it. Then their opinion is given the same weigh as those of us who have known the facts you quoted here for a couple of years/
I wish that before people speak up about “birther” “Tea Partiers: racist” Bush liked about WMD’s, islam as ROP, etc., would do their reseaerch first and then form an opinion, instead of the other way around.
If those who have not researched these matters would refrain from forcefully stating their “opinions” as fact, we would not be in a lot of messes we are in right now.
I think it’s time we get the answers. Typically, when asked for information and you don’t provide it you’re hiding something. For example, in a divorce case when one of the spouses fails to show financial documents that would indicate money being hidden and not wanting full disclosure. I believe the same applies here, Obama doesn’t want to reveal his NON_US birth and therefore would be removed from office. I would think it’d be something the Congress and House would be moving towards to either prove us wrong or him right. Let’s get some answers to this!
Big Dan,
You sir, are an idiot. So somehow, pointing at an obscure and legally settled case in Texas is the equivalent of our president not providing his birth certificate. Leader of the free world obstructing the truth — some scumbag criminal in Texas… Hmm. Yeah, makes total sense to compare these two things. Fun game indeed. Dimwits clearly entertain themselves easily.
Whether Obama was born in Hawaii shouldn’t matter at all. The US Government definition of “Natural Born Citizen” is as follows:
“The Conclusive Definition Of “Natural-Born Citizen” Natural-born citizens of the United States are those who are citizens of the United States from birth without having to perform any act to acquire or perfect their American citizenship. These are those whose parents are citizens of the United States at the time of their birth. Natural-born American citizens are those born of American citizen parents, within or without the American Republic, provided in the latter case that one of the parents had resided in the United States prior to the birth of the child. Their American citizenship is natural, the result of parentage, and not artificial or acquired by compliance with legislative provisions. A natural-born citizen is one not made by law or otherwise, but born. And this class is the large majority, in fact, the mass of our citizens; all others are exceptions specially provided for by law. A natural-born citizen is defined as one whose citizenship is established by the jurisdiction which the United States already has over the parents of the child, not what is thereafter acquired by choice of residence in this country. It is not necessary that a man should be born in this country, to be “a natural born citizen.” It is only requisite he should be a citizen by birth, and that is the case with all the children of citizens who have ever resided in this country, though born in a foreign country. Natural-born citizens, as distinguished from aliens and naturalized citizens, are those born in the United States of parents who are citizens. Natural-born citizens are also those born outside the United States and its outlying possessions of parents both of whom are citizens of the United States and one of whom has had a residence in the United States or one of its outlying possessions prior to the birth of the child. Hence, a child born abroad to two US citizen parents is a natural-born citizen: Provided, That at least one citizen parent had previously resided in the United States or one of its outlying possessions. U.S. Code: Title 8, 1401.”
To be a “Natural Born Citizen” Both parents must be American Citizens.
Very interesting. When my children were born I was sent home with “birth certificates”. It frustrated me no end that they could not be used as proof for anything. I’m not sure what they were for.
I was born in this country at home with the help of a physician. I don’t know why a certificate was never issued but I was never asked for one. As my parents aged though I thought I should get one, which I did according to the state. Then after my parents passed away I went to get a passport and was told the certificate I had was not valid and spent untold hours and much money to get a passport. If a person has to go through what I did for a passport, it sure isn’t unreasonable to ask one from someone who will be in charge of governing this powerful country and spending our money.
Interesting except for the non-existent comparison with Bush and the WMDs. I’m not sure a war that has caused thousands of lives and devastated the US economy (not to mention that NO WMDs have been found to this date) can be compared to Obama’s birth certificate ‘issue’ which is a simple case of “we still haven’t seen enough”. Unless you value bureaucracy and procedure as much as American’s lives. And for the record, you are a ‘Birther, you just aren’t proud about it.
“Now, I am by no means a “birther””
Oh yes you certainly are. In fact you are the worst kind of birther… the “concern troll”
[...] am so tired of arguing with uneducated people on the facts of this topic, that I decide that I would compile the information in an easy to use [...]
[...] first encounter with Robert Garcia was when I wrote my first Hollywood Republican article on January 24, 2011. He didn’t comment directly on the website at the time, but used Facebook [...]
Obama finally released his long form birth certificate on April 27, 2011 and put it on the White House website for everyone to download. This was just before Jerome Corsi’s book “Where’s the Birth Certificate” was released. So Obama and the mainstream media said that it was case closed.
However all of the experts and many amateurs said that Obama’s long form birth certificate was a poor forgery. Major General Paul Vallely states, “I’ve had ex-CIA and investigators look at Obama’s birth certificate and 10 out of 10 say it’s a forgery.” Here are a number of articles documenting that it is fraudulent.
http://www.scribd.com/collections/3166684/Obama-Birth-Certificate-Other-Docs-Forged-Expert-Reports
Obama is also using a stolen social security number 042-68-4425 that was originally issued in Connecticut to a man born in 1890. Obama used this number on a 2009 IRS tax return, yet eVerify and SelfCheck flag this SSN as likely fraudulent.
http://cdrkerchner.wordpress.com/2011/09/13/proof-obama-uses-stolen-connecticut-ssn-obama-2009-irs-tax-return-cdr-kerchners-blog/
This would seem to indicate that Obama was not born in Hawaii, since if Obama was born in Hawaii, why would he release a fraudulent birth certificate? Why would he be using a stolen SSN? Maybe that also explains why the Kenyan National Security Intelligence Service indicated that the Kenyan government had commissioned a museum in Obama’s home village of Kogelo to honor the “birthplace of President Barack Obama.” Some have said that the creation of this forgery of a public document constitutes a class B felony in Hawaii and multiple violations under U.S. Code section Title 18, Part 1, Chapter 47, Sec.1028.