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Hopefully this is the last time we have to say this, but once again Hawaii has checked and triplechecked the Obama birth certificate and guess what - it shows that the POTUS is a natural-born citizen. (Whether you like it or not.) From the Swamp: "I ... have seen the original vital records maintained on file by the Hawaii State Department of Health verifying Barack Hussein Obama was born in Hawaii and is a natural-born American citizen," Health Director Dr. Chiyome Fukino said in a brief statement.
Well, that should settle that. White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs took it a step further: "Here's the deal,'' Gibbs said. "If I had some DNA, it wouldn't assuage those that don't believe he was born here. But I have news for them and for all of us...He's a citizen.''
Unfortunately, that's not entirely true: While DNA would prove that Obama is indeed human (angels and deities don't have genetic structures, do they?) it wouldn't prove the location of his birth. However, since Birthers wouldn't be satisfied even if they had a post-birth video of Obama dancing the hula and nursing on shave ice while volcanoes erupt and palm trees sway in the background, it doesn't much matter anyways.
BTW, If you haven't seen the video of Chris Matthews absolutely demolishing a mushmouthed G. Gordon Liddy over his Birther beliefs, it's worth spending a few minutes watching. It's almost cruelty.
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Wow...at what point did Liddy become a feeble old man? Just desserts for a man who single-handedly destroyed all faith in government. Fuck you you bald-headed white-Gordon-From-Sesame-Street-Looking Mother Fucker
You know what? The more we keep calling attention to these looney tunes, even if it's to point out their looney-tune-ness, the more credibility they get. Right now, there are actually people in this country who think this is an ACTUAL controversy.
This is the same mistake people made with the "creationists." Every time a scientist pipes up to counter their claims, all it does is legitimize those claims. Ignore these goofballs. Don't give them air time, column inches, or bandwidth. Don't waste time with them. Laugh them off, let them whither away, and save your energy for genuine issues.
I tend to disagree. For example, the Truthers have been for the most part ignored (save for websites and the occasional PopSci article) and they had a good 7 year run. And since most everyone wanted to ignore them they could play the "they're scared of us because and they're trying to hide from reality" card.
Sunlight combined with ridicule is the best way to eradicate foolish stubborn beliefs like these. It gets a bit repetitive, yes, and the True Believers will never be convinced (like I said above) but the people right on the edge are the ones that need to be grabbed hold of and shaken vigorously.
I agree...plus the fact that NOTHING will ever come of The Birthers and their claims. So it's harmless for Obama as far as I'm concerned and we also get to rip on idiots who have ruined this country, like G. Gordon Liddy.
Karl, how do you define a "good seven year run"? Yeah, they're still "around," but they're almost completely marginalized. They were never given a serious platform by the mainstream media. Today, they start talking and people roll their eyes. Which is exactly how we should respond to the "birthers."
And Scooter, as far as the "creationists" go, I think there's a bit of chicken and egg going on there. There were undoubtedly attempts to push their agenda in schools going way back, but the movement picked up steam, leading to the "teach the controversy" nonsense once their proponents started being taken seriously outside of fundie circles. Which led to more attempts to push the agenda in schools, which led to more serious mainstream attention, which led to more attempts...
Of course, having said all that, the Matthews/Liddy thing was utterly hilarious.
Considering that the 9/11 conspiracy theories started almost as soon as the dust had settled, then gradually morphed into a lunatic leftist "Bush is also the Antichrist" thing, and is now on life-support since the GWB/Cheney/Rummy triumverate no longer have power, that's about a good 7 years from '01 to '08. Rough guesstimate.
I wasn't thinking so much in terms of time, but more in terms of "good". Like I said, they were marginalized from the get go, and never really progressed beyond that, no matter how long they've been around. That's how these "Birthers" should be treated.
You are totally wrong vis-a-vis the creationists.
They were getting their crap put into public school textbooks as the equal of evolution.
They were demanding that Genesis be taught as truth!
Then the scientists stepped in.
The right-wing lunatics who are championing this cause took their cue from the 9/11 conspiracy playbook: If we make enough noise on the internet, people will listen! Finally, the voices in my head will be heard by the masses!
Even O'Reilly and Coulter have yawned about this. Lou Dobbs will beat this into the ground, though.
The sickening part are the craven scum members of congress who won't go on record that the PRESIDENT is a CITIZEN and put up ludicrous bills about "verifying future elected officials"
The scary thing is, these bastards only further "verify" that this nonsense is a real conspiracy for the believers. That only serves to radicalize them further, as even congress is powerless as the nation is stolen by some bizarre Hawaiian/Muslim/Liberal trifecta.
The right-wingers are quite well-armed. I fear one of these idiots will get worked up enough watching Lou Dobbs and O'Reilly and Beck and actually go out and hurt someone.
Frankly, I love it. Every time they bring this up they further divide themselves from the majority of voting Americans. I say let the birthers go on and on about this, they will never find any proof that he was born on foreign soil so what's the harm?
It's better for them to be wasting their time with this than on universal health care or gay rights or evolution or whatever else the is on the GOP hate/fear mongering agenda.
But don't you see...once they prove Obama wasn't born here then somehow a Republican will magically become president. Then they won't have to worry about universal health care and gay marriage.
Actually, on one of the cable talking head shows (Rachel Maddow?), they did deduce that a Repub would be president is Obama were disqualified. He'd be out, in turn Biden would be out, some other stuff, and they determined that Robert Byrd would take the office. A Klan man in the president's chair. Guess they'd be happy then.
Despite his possible Klan affiliation, Robert Byrd's a Democrat.
Weird - 9 comments in and no posts of "WHY DOESN'T HE JUST RELEASE THE ORIGINAL IF HE'S GOT NOTHING TO HIDE?!?!" from newly registered commenters. Did a meteor hit the back room of an army surplus store this morning, and I missed it?
huh-larious!
While it's definite that he was born in Hawaii, the newspaper notices are the capstone that proves it, I too am baffled as to why he doesn't either release it himself if he has a copy or tell Hawaii to do so if he doesn't.
Even if they have to go through mountains of boxes stored in a salt mine in Kansas to find it, that is the baffling part.
It's not like the governor of Hawaii would refuse the president!
my theory on why the Obama administration has not "publicly released" his birth certificate (whatever that would entail) is they want to stoke the flames of this absurd conspiracy theory. The more the Republicans and the right accept the absolutely bat-shit crazy notion that Obama is a part of some decades long conspiracy, the more insane they appear to be. They are playing a chess game with marginalization of the right wing is the check mate.
Obama wins more points if he allows this issue to just fester than he would if he gave into right wing pressure.
Scooter, Hi. Yes, I'm an official card carrying birther, so I'm going to pause now and let you vent at me for a moment .... there, feel better? Glad we got that out of the way without anyone getting hurt feelings.
Now, on to facts. You say it's definite he was born in Hawaii. I'm an agnostic on that point. I don't have as much confidence in partisan government officials as you do. Fukina gets out there and says, "I say so," and you all say in unison, "then it must be so." Weird. BTW, I thought there was a law she breaks if she says anything about somebody's birth certificate without their permission. So you are trusting the word of a probable law-breaker more than you trust the physical evidence? No, I like my agnosticism on this issue. It keeps me honest with myself and with the talking heads.
But the real capper is your so-called "capstone" proof, the newspaper announcements. lol. You do know, I hope, that O never lived at 6085 Kalanianaole Highway, right? But then why is that address given in the birth announcement? It makes no sense, because a guy named Orland Lefforge lived there, apparently moved in as of August, 1961. Odd coincidence, isn't it? A big, empty house in a rich part of town far from the university, given as the address of birth for a boy born to two struggling university students, just before somebody verifiable moves in? Hardly the kind of "capstone" proof I'd be looking for to build my case, especially since birth announcements generally can't be used in court as evidence of anything. I think that's a hearsay rule. Been a while since I studied it.
Well, nice try. Next time you have a stunner like that, let me know. I can be moved off my agnosticism. But it will take hard evidence to do it. Like, dare I say it, a vintage 1961 original birth certificate? Just sayin ...
Hawaii went paperless, therefore Obama has no document to go get.
PLus, the heavily Republican Supreme Court refused to hear any cases dealing with Obama's birthplace or legitimacy.
Take the word of the Governor of Hawaii already and focus on the real issues.
Hawaii did go paperless, but there was no mass destruction of paper records. Practice is to bulk store them after a digitization project. You, know, like the warehouse in the last scene of Raiders of the Lost Birth Certificate, or whatever. How do I know this? Janice Okubo told us so. If a Hawaiian official says its so, then by golly willikers ya just can't doubt it. Do I believe it? You betcha!
All the dismissed cases? Ever heard of a legal principle call standing? You can't sue somebody unless what they are doing or have done is going to injure you in some real way unique to you. If you don't have that uniquely personal injury, you don't have standing. Taxpayers who don't like some congressional policy? Too bad. No standing. Can't sue. See ya at the ballot box. Almost all the eligibility cases have failed on this technicality of standing. The raw data concerning O, and the law of natural born citizenship, have not even been looked at yet.
But there are other cases brewing. For example, what about a soldier who has to go onto the battlefield on orders of the President? There's a good shot at standing there. A real and uniquely personal risk of injury. Why do you think the military dropped those Afghanistan deployment orders in the Cook case? To wipe out standing. To avoid getting to the real merits, not to mention the compulsory discovery of O's documentary history. Theoretically, it shouldn't work, because the circumstance can and likely will come up again. An objective jurist would take up the case despite the clever escape maneuver.
But judges are people too. I'm a lawyer. I've seen it happen in family court. Judges make decisions based partly on law, partly on fact, and partly on some inner swirl of emotion and opinion that influences their view of the parties standing before them. You go in hoping for the best, but in the end, the lawyers with the good acting skills will win a lot of cases. Use mindless propaganda to prejudice an entire movement as crazies, and most judges will not look deeply into the facts at all. "Just get the losers out of my court room. I don't have time for this." Not to mention the political factor. No judge wants to go on record as controversial. It can ruin your career. So do I trust the current judiciary's objectivity on O's natural born citizen problem? Sure, about as much as Dred Scott trusted SCOTUS in 1857.
The only part of this worth mentioning is to point out that for some reason, conservative nutjobs have a complete inability to type out an entire name. Why O? Are the other four letters of the name too hard for you to type? Are you really saving that much time?
This is even more stupid when you consider the length of a typical nutjob screed.
Oh man, you guys going to feel dumb when the truth actually comes out that Obama was born in Kenya!
(You know I'm only kidding, right?)
I want to know what sarah palin thinks about this.....has she held a press conference about this yet? Maybe it will be a chapter in her upcoming, highly anticipated, book.
Oh, is she reading a book?
Palin is reading 'all of them'
I want to know what sarah palin thinks about this.....
"This is one of those time when the REAL Americans are standing up showing their patriotism...the troops...and not letting the liberal media elite from Hollywood...our brave soldiers in Afghanistan...tell Joe Sixpack and Mary Lou PitBull Hockey Mom how they should be thinkin' ... the fearless fighting men and women... I betcha they'll stop makin' stuff up and let the true greatness of this country that we stand on in true God-fearing shoes shine like the horns of a seven-point buck that feeds our family ... my son's in the Army... and God Bless American, don'tchaknow."
This is entirely too coherent for Mrs. Palin. Try this:
"Dijon mustard is people!"