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SQUAWCRAW

Articles Posted: 13  Links Seeded: 25
Member Since: 4/2011  Last Seen: 12/19/2011

Putting the "Birthers" to Bed, Once and For All

Tue Apr 12, 2011 9:14 PM EDT
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By SquawCraw
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During the 2008 election campaign, candidate Obama presented a CERTIFIED, OFFICIAL "Certificate of Live Birth" from the government of Hawaii and which is valid for ANY AND ALL official business that an "original"/"long form" birth certificate is valid for. The "original"/"long form" birth certificate that the "birthers" keep demanding to see may be AN official birth certificate but SO IS the "Certificate of Live Birth" that Obama presented during the 2008 campaign and which is the EXACT SAME form that ANY Hawaiian receives when they fill out the form requesting their “birth certificate”.

According to Josh Wisch (spokesman for the Hawaii attorney general's office), state law does not permit the release of the original of ANY "vital record" (including an original "record of live birth"/"long form" birth certificate) — even to the individual whose birth it records.

"It's a Department of Health record and it can't be released to anybody," he said. Nor does state law authorize such records to be photocopied. If Obama wanted to personally visit the state health department, he would be permitted to inspect his birth record, according to the spokesman.

But if he or anybody else wanted a copy of their birth records, they would be told to fill out the appropriate state form and receive back the same computer generated "certification of live birth" form that everybody else gets — which is exactly what Obama did four years ago.

Besides, if Obama was faking his American birth and there was a birth certificate that could satisfy the whacko birthers, don't you think he would have come up with one, EVEN IF IT WAS FAKE? After all, according to the birthers he has an "army" of lawyers and has spent MILLIONS perpetuating the lie, so why wouldn't he have the best fake documents that money could buy? Almost anyone can go online or to any number of "back alley" shops in any big city in America and, for a few hundred (maybe a few thousand) dollars get all the fake documents (including BCs) one can think of. So why didn't Barrack (or at least someone in his "army") do that?

That's a tough one to get around, isn't it?

Furthermore, according to FactCheck.org:

"In June [2008], the Obama campaign released a digitally scanned image of his birth certificate to quell speculative charges that he might not be a natural-born citizen. But the image prompted more blog-based skepticism about the document's authenticity."

We beg to differ. FactCheck.org staffers have now seen, touched, examined and photographed the original birth certificate. We conclude that it meets all of the requirements from the State Department for proving U.S. citizenship. Claims that the document lacks a raised seal or a signature are false. We have posted high-resolution photographs of the document as "supporting documents" to this article. Our conclusion: Obama was born in the U.S.A. just as he has always said.

Update, Nov. 1, 2008: The director of Hawaii’s Department of Health confirmed Oct. 31 that Obama was born in Honolulu."

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Fufu

It's a noble effort, but there is no "putting to bed" willful stupidity, which is what the "birthers" choose.

  • 7 votes
Reply#1 - Tue Apr 12, 2011 9:39 PM EDT
seastar

It goes beyond "willful stupidity". For many it's simply willful subversion; anything to undermine the duly elected president they won't accept because he isn't the typical white, male next-door kind of guy.

  • 7 votes
#1.1 - Tue Apr 12, 2011 10:14 PM EDT
thelopes

It has gone beyond being able to answer for them. It has become circular.

If you pay attention to any one of the arguments, like here on Newsvine (and I've been involved in a few) - they present a topic, it gets shut down, they move on to another topic. After the 6th or 7th shutting down, either they or someone else returns to an earlier topic.

It never fails - and you end up having to make the exact same arguments all over again.

  • 6 votes
#1.2 - Wed Apr 13, 2011 10:22 AM EDT
Reply
Student of Life

Article IV section 1 - The full faith and credit clause also serves well.

Especially when you inform them that undermining it/ignoring it would be the largest socialistic manuever in the history of our country, as it would give full purview of any state decision/law/election to the federal government.

They usually shut up then.

  • 5 votes
Reply#2 - Tue Apr 12, 2011 10:23 PM EDT
Texasguy01

What about the Constitutional issue of a "Natural Born Citizen", a specific legal term used to indicate the Office of the President is only to be held by the child of two American Citizens. John McCain had to fight that one in 2008. Why does Obama get a pass on this?

http://www.thepostemail.com/2010/04/05/why-obama-cannot-be-a-natural-born-citizen/

Obama, born in 1961 of a U.S. Citizen mother and a British Citizen (born in Kenya) father, was born a “U.S. Citizen” by virtue of his mother’s U.S. Citizenship; however, since Obama’s father was not a U.S. Citizen and thus not “attached to the U.S.,” Obama, even if born of a U.S. Citizen mother within the jurisdiction of the United States, is not, by definition and Constitutional intent, a “natural born Citizen” as is specifically required by Article II, Section 1 (the Presidential Clause) of the U.S. Constitution, and is, therefore, ineligible to serve as President.

British citizenship was conferred to Obama at birth by act of British law. Thus, he is born of dual citizenship.

Article II, Section 1 of the Constitution stipulates that “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 the President; neither shall any Person be eligible to that Office who shall not have attained the Age of thirty five Years, and been fourteen Years a Resident within the United States.”

Within the context of the Framers’ actual meaning (letter of the law) and express purpose (spirit of the law), being a “natural born Citizen” requires that citizenship must be passed on by the constitutionally pertinent principle of natural law (see Law of Nations by E. Vattel, 1758, which consistently and profoundly influenced the Framers’ intent when fashioning the Constitution), which assumes that citizenship is inherited from one’s father’s citizenship.

The intent of the Framers with respect to the meaning of “natural born Citizen” (vs. “born in the U.S.” or U.S. Citizen”) within the context of the Presidential Clause specifically takes into account the father’s allegiance and citizenship at the time of a child’s birth. Thus, the father’s citizenship and, thus, his “attachment to the U.S.” at the time of the child’s birth, carried more weight than merely the geographic location of the child’s birth. Why? Still reeling from British rule, the Framers, as represented by the words of John Jay in a July 1787 letter to George Washington, who presided over the Constitutional Convention, wanted to avoid dual citizenship or dual loyalties of any future Commander-in-Chief by declaring expressly “that the Commander-in-Chief…shall not be given to nor devolve on, any but a natural born citizen,” thus to insure future leadership’s freedom from foreign influences.

  • 3 votes
Reply#3 - Tue Apr 12, 2011 11:47 PM EDT
BAD1V

Because President Obama was born in the USA and John McCain was not! That is really easy to understand.

  • 8 votes
#3.1 - Tue Apr 12, 2011 11:52 PM EDT
VerbalBarb

What about the Constitutional issue of a "Natural Born Citizen", a specific legal term used to indicate the Office of the President is only to be held by the child of two American Citizens.

Where in actual U.S. law has it been definitively decided that "Natural Born Citizen" means both parents have to be American citizens?

Intent is one thing - the actual interpretation under U.S. law is another.

  • 9 votes
#3.2 - Wed Apr 13, 2011 1:02 AM EDT
stonesoup68

Because President Obama was born in the USA

LOL...

Race card played in the second post #1.1 . Always so lightning fast. Like some kind of conditioning.

  • 5 votes
#3.3 - Wed Apr 13, 2011 1:52 AM EDT
DonnaJ

Deflection bomb planted in post 3.3. Talk about conditioning.

SQUIRREL!

  • 4 votes
#3.4 - Wed Apr 13, 2011 8:45 AM EDT
thelopes

Within the context of the Framers’ actual meaning (letter of the law) and express purpose (spirit of the law), being a “natural born Citizen” requires that citizenship must be passed on by the constitutionally pertinent principle of natural law (see Law of Nations by E. Vattel, 1758, which consistently and profoundly influenced the Framers’ intent when fashioning the Constitution), which assumes that citizenship is inherited from one’s father’s citizenship.

Except, no.

Supreme Court Case - US. V. Kim Wong Ark

http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/historics/USSC_CR_0169_0649_ZO.html

The language of the Constitution, as has been well said, could not be understood without reference to the common law.

...

It thus clearly appears that, by the law of England for the last three centuries, beginning before the settlement of this country and continuing to the present day, aliens, while residing in the dominions possessed by the Crown of England, were within the allegiance, the obedience, the faith or loyalty, the protection, the power, the jurisdiction of the English Sovereign, and therefore every child born in England of alien parents was a natural-born subject unless the child of an ambassador or other diplomatic agent of a foreign State or of an alien enemy in hostile occupation of the place where the child was born.

Lemme isolate the important line.

Children, born in England, of such aliens were therefore natural-born subjects.

In this case, he references Calvin's Case, from 1608. Settled LONG before Vattel was ever born.

  • 5 votes
#3.5 - Wed Apr 13, 2011 10:20 AM EDT
VerbalBarb

Always so lightning fast. Like some kind of conditioning.

You mean the way you immediately jumped on that comment?

  • 1 vote
#3.6 - Wed Apr 13, 2011 2:33 PM EDT
Reply
Boudicea

WHY oh WHY is www.factcheck.org accepted as "gospel?"

  • 1 vote
Reply#4 - Wed Apr 13, 2011 11:16 AM EDT
Fufu

On this issue?

Because they're right.

On other issues?

Because they're right.

  • 2 votes
#4.1 - Wed Apr 13, 2011 12:27 PM EDT
thelopes

WHY oh WHY is www.factcheck.org accepted as "gospel?"

Personally - I never implicitly believed what they had to say. However, it confirmed what other sources of information was stating. The pictures, with placement of seal and signature, match what you can see reversed in the flat scans.

I'd say they're part of a much broader picture of confirming information.

  • 4 votes
#4.2 - Wed Apr 13, 2011 12:35 PM EDT
Boudicea

not just on this issue. Everybody quotes it like it's the source of the 10 Commandments.

    #4.3 - Wed Apr 13, 2011 1:00 PM EDT
    SquawCraw

    FactCheck.org is not "gospel', by any means, but it IS a thousand times more credible than ANY (and I mean ANY) source the birthers can come up with. It's also one of many credible sources that debunk the birther myth.

    • 3 votes
    #4.4 - Wed Apr 13, 2011 1:41 PM EDT
    Fufu

    FactCheck.org is a project of the well-respected Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania. Most importantly, like most academic institutions, they provide evidence and citations for their assertions.

    That is why FactCheck.org has become a leading source of information for countering jackass claims.

    • 5 votes
    #4.5 - Wed Apr 13, 2011 4:06 PM EDT
    JackOL-1666973

    kjmgirl -

    Which findings of factcheck do you dispute (with credible evidence to back it up)?

    • 4 votes
    #4.6 - Thu Apr 14, 2011 12:13 AM EDT
    Chasing

    If you don't like FactCheck, there is of course also PolitiFact, and, ahem, the National Review.

    • 4 votes
    #4.7 - Thu Apr 14, 2011 12:30 AM EDT
    Boudicea

    Hello, people, I asked a QUESTION. Jack - you seem to ASSUME that I have a particular issue that I dispute?

    The last time I checked, I don't need "credible evidence" to ask a friggin question.

    I'm outta here.

      #4.8 - Thu Apr 14, 2011 9:42 AM EDT
      Reply
      SquawCraw

      kjmgirl1: why so sensitive? I've reread all the post replying to your question and they all (except Jack's) are simple and polite answers to your question. And Jack was just asking you a question back to clarify your obvious "issue" with FactCheck.org, not attacking you in any way. Methinks you are a lot off in your response...

      • 3 votes
      Reply#5 - Thu Apr 14, 2011 3:17 PM EDT
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