In a conference today [December 5, 2008] the Supreme Court will reconsider together whether to take on a suit challenging the eligibility of Barack Obama to be president of the United States under a sometimes-arcane section of Article II of the Constitution.
Is Barack Obama a “natural born” citizen of the U.S.?
In the building where “Equal Justice Under Law” is engraved high over the front door, poker-player Leo Donofrio’s challenge will be examined to see whether at least four of the nine justices of the Court think he has enough of a case to actually merit a hearing. Justice David Souter rejected Donofrio’s case earlier, so this is a hail-Mary play on the part of Obama’s opponents.
Equal Justice Under Law, the West Pediment of the U.S. Supreme court. AAPF image
The Court takes seriously the principle engraved over the door, however. This is the same Court that ruled earlier this year an accused terrorist and all-around bad guy held at Guantanamo Bay has the right to a writ of habeas corpus over the objections of the Most Power Man in the World, U.S. President George W. Bush. The humble, gritty, or even unsavory history of litigants does not limit their rights under the law.
Leo Donofrio in his usual office. Leo Donofrio image
So the question is, what sort of case does Donofrio have against Obama’s eligibility?
Would Justice Clarence Thomas have agreed to bring this case to the conference if it doesn’t have a chance to succeed?
I’ve not lunched with Thomas in more than two decades, so I can’t speak with any inside knowledge. Historically, the Court, and indeed all the federal courts, have agreed to examine cases like this often simply to provide an authoritative close to the issue. In this case, the outright hysteria of the anti-Obama partisans suggests the issue should be put to bed if possible.
Under usual Court procedures, we won’t learn the results of the conference until Monday. I would not be surprised if the results are announced today, just to promote the settling of the issue.
Does Donofrio have a case?
I don’t see a case. It’s clear that Obama is a U.S. citizen now. Donofrio’s argument is rather strained, and sexist. He claims that Obama’s father having been a British subject in 1961 (Kenya was not yet independent), Obama had dual citizenship at birth — and, further, Donofrio alleges, this dual citizenship trumps both Obama’s birth on U.S. soil (which should be dispositive) AND Obama’s mother’s U.S. citizenship, conferring a special status that doesn’t meet the intentions of the framers of the Constitution.
Donofrio’s claim is odd in that it would grant a lesser-status to children of legal immigrants than is allowed by law to children of illegal immigrants, or temporary visitors. It also is bizarre, to me, in the way it dismisses Obama’s mother’s existence as a factor in Obama’s citizenship status — and while equal rights for women were not wholly obtained in 1961, no one has successfully argued that the citizenship of the father trumps that of the mother in citizenship cases.
Donofrio is arguing that Obama’s dual citizenship at birth disqualifies him from holding the presidency, technically, in a very narrow reading — though Obama would have absolutely every other right of a natural born citizen.
A couple of observations:
First, this is not an easy issue to litigate. Standing is the easiest way for a federal court to avoid a decision — what harm can a citizen claim from letting Obama be president? It’s difficult to find an injury even were Donofrio’s claims valid. No blood, no foul. No injury, no standing to sue. It is upon this basis that most of the cases against Obama’s eligibility have been tossed out, as Donofrio’s has been tossed, twice already.
Second, it is unclear what entity enforces the eligibility clause of the Constitution, or indeed, whether any entity can. For most of the summer Obama’s critics were pressuring the Federal Election Commission (FEC) to do something, even though the FEC lacks a quorum of members to do anything. More to the point, there is nothing in any law that confers on the FEC the function of checking the citizenship status of any candidate. Sometime in October they finally figured out that state secretaries of state might have a role, since they set up the ballots in each state.
I admit I thought that, until I reflected on the issue of the electoral college. In U.S. presidential elections, voters do not vote directly for president and vice president. Instead, we vote to elect people who will be the electors who decide — electors of the electoral college. The history of this institution can be found elsewhere. For the sake of these suits, however, it means that the secretaries of state have no role at all in the eligibility of the candidates. They rule on the eligibility of the electors, which is an entirely different kettle of fish. Some states even list the electors on the ballot.
But in any case, it means Donofrio is suing the wrong entity, even if we can’t tell him what the correct entity is.
Third and most important, Donofrio is asking for U.S. citizenship law to be overturned in a most inconvenient time and place. Dual citizenship is a bar to very little in American life. There is an assumption that people who hold that status are fully American citizens, absent a showing of contrary facts. There are no contrary facts in evidence from Donofrio, nor from anyone else, despite promises of the revelation of conspiracies.
In short, Donofrio is arguing that there is, somewhere, somehow, some information that Barack Obama is not the shining patriot his life story reveals. Donofrio doesn’t know what that information is, or where it might be found, but he thinks maybe the State of Hawaii is complicit in a conspiracy to hide this information, which is hidden on the hand-written records of Obama’s birth in 1961. You might think Donofrio has watched “National Treasure” a few too many times, and whether it’s that movie or some other source, you’d be right — paranoid suspicions of conspiracy are not the stuff good court cases are made of.
The dozen or more cases against Obama’s eligibility all suffer from this astounding, dramatic lack of evidence. Is there an affidavit from someone who alleges that Obama’s citizenship should be called into question? If so, they’ve not been presented to any court. (Obama tormentor Corsi claims to have interviewed Obama’s Kenyan grandmother, and he alleges she said through an interpreter that Obama was born in Kenya; oddly, he didn’t bother to get an affidavit from the woman, nor from anyone else — and others who listen to the tape think she thought Corsi was asking about the birth of her son, not grandson. This is not solid evidence.)
I argued earlier there is a long chain of evidence creating rebuttable presumptions that Obama’s a natural born U.S. citizen. To contradict this chain of evidence, contestants should provide extraordinary, clear evidence of contradiction. What is offered by Donofrio is neither extraordinary, nor clear, nor necessarily contradictory to the presumptions.
This is not an issue solely for the hysterical. Lawyers and scholars have looked at the issue through the years, and intensely this year, and arrived at the conclusion that Obama is perfectly eligible for the presidency.
Will sanity ever prevail?
Resources you may want to consult:
- Supreme Court Docket listing for the case, Donofrio v. Wells
- “Natural Born Citizenship — McCain OK for Presidency?” from the New York University Law Journal, August 22, 2008
-
“Obama certificate lawsuit dismissed,” Honolulu Advertiser, November 21, 2008
- “McCain’s birth abroad stirs debate,” Washington Post, May 2, 2008
- “A hint of new life to McCain birth issue,” New York Times, July 11, 2008
- Jonathan Turley’s blog, at Res Ipsa Loquitur: “Olson and Tribe argue that McCain is natural born,” and “Eligibility questions: Can Clinton serve Obama, and can Obama serve the country?”
- See below, Jonathan Turley on Keith Olberman’s “Countdown”
- The hysterics, Texas Darlin’, Donofrio’s blog Natural Born Citizen, Earth Frisk
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Millard Fillmore's Bathtub 
Your idiocy knows no bounds.
Under what law, or what premise, would John Jay or James Madison, Wilson, Jefferson, etc., consider the son of a British subject born out-of-wedlock and to a U.S. mother, a ‘natural born citizen.’
Why did the constitution single out a natural born citizen as the prime eligibility standard for president in the first place?
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Para, I’d like your real name and address. I’m going to sue you for fraud (i’ll make something up) and then if you act to defend yourself against said lawsuit, you’re admitting guilt.
Don’t play games you don’t have the intelligence to win.
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Para, Obama’s right to be President, besides the fact that he won, is this: He was born in Hawaii and his mother is a US citizen. Unless you can show a birth certificate that says he was born in whatever country you’re claiming, you’re spouting bullshit. you have no evidence, else you would have shown it. And do you really want me to call the Hawaiian department of health to see if I can get a certificate of live birth for myself?
No, Para, under US law since it is your charge it is up to you to prove it. And that he spent money defending himself from your ilks stupid charges is not proof of guilt. Else I can sue you for fraud and the second you hire a lawyer to defend yourself is the second you just admitted your guilty of whatever fraud I’m accusing you of. Hell under that argument I could accuse you of murder and the second you act to defend yourself you’re admitting guilt.
Quit throwing a hissy fit just because you’re scared that the black man won the Presidency.
Show the birth certificate for the country you claim he was born in, Para, or shut up.
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“Yes”? Well, I guess that settles it.
Both parents, diplomat or active military, must be U.S. citizens or there is foreign alienage possible, which requires naturalization law to de-alienage.
The sole purpose of the ‘natural born citizen’ clause, following law of nations § 212, is a U.S. citizen without foreign alienages, i.e., no foreign influence, allegiance, or intrigues.
The Hawaiian postings in press release and legal notices are not evidence of Hawaiian birth, and neither is the C.O.L.B.
You all get an ‘F’ . . . you are too stupid and lazy to argue with any longer.
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Yes, that child is a natural born citizen eligible to be president, as both Chester Alan Arthur and Barack Obama were.
I didn’t agree to that. As I understand the law, John McCain was eligible to run for president, so had Obama been born of a U.S. mother in Kenya, he, too, would be eligible. (McCain was born in a hospital in Panama, not a Navy hospital, not under the jurisdiction of the U.S.)
I thought we’d been asking the question correctly: Why do you have such a blinding bigotry against Barack Obama, U.S. law and the Constitution?
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Hmmm. Here, I see:
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1) Read the bottom of the Hawaiian C.O.L.B. itself and tell the group what it says.
2) As for Hawaiian law, which you can find on an official Hawaiian website: Yes, Hawaii does produce Certifications of Live Birth to people without proof of Hawaiian, or U.S. birth. Hint: It is aptly called a ‘compulsory registration.’
3) I already posted, this week in fact, the jurisprudence of challenging prima facie evidence.
4) Fer Christ’s sake, either you or Darrel cited the military/diplomat exception. The reason such a foreign soil birth qualifies as a natural born citizen is that the child is born solely of the nationality of the parents. No dealienage is required, and the child has no legal right to the foreign nationality as an adult. If the mother is a foreign national, that changes things.
You’re asking a lot of questions, but the real question is:
Is a child born with dual nationality at birth, vis a’ vis an alien father, e.g., specifically in the United States of a British subject father; is that child a natural born citizen eligible to be president under U.S. Const. Art. 2, Sec. 1, Cl. 4 [or 5, depending on your transcription]?
You already agree that if born in Kenya to an alien father, the mother’s U.S. nationality doesn’t create a natural born citizen. So, her sanguinity is moot to the argument.
Once you ask the question accurately, all one needs to do is read Article II itself . . . the only law that specifies a natural born citizen, and just happens by happy coincidence to be the law we are attempting to apply.
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Oh forgot this one last thing:
You say:
Under Hawaiian law, the C.O.L.B. is not evidence of Hawaiian birth, only a statutory registration. I’ve read Hawaiian law.
Ok, I’ll bite. Quote and cite the law. And the cite better be a website to a Hawaiian state government website.
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*yawns* Except you’re still dealing with this fact.
You are arguing that Barack Obama, his mother, his entire family, the Democratic party, the Republican party, the DNC, the RNC, the Secret Service, the CIA, the FBI, the Hawaiian state government, the Illinois state government, the George W Bush administration, the Hilliary Clinton campaign, the John McCain campaign, and the Barack Obama campaign, and the President Obama administration are all engaged in a massive conspiracy together to hide the “fact” that Barack Obama wasn’t born in this country.
Would you like to be rational enough to acknowledge the fact that is completely unrealistic? Do you really think George W Bush would hide the fact that Barack Obama was born in some other country if he was? This is the guy who’s campaign in 2000 sunk John McCain’s bid for the nomination of the Republican party for President by falsely claiming that John McCain had an illegitimate child who was half black.
They don’t hand out Certifications of Live Birth’s, Paralegal, to people who weren’t born there. Meaning, I can’t get an Certification of Live Birth from Hawaii because I wasn’t born there. The only way Obama has a Certification of Live Birth is…wait for it…if he was born there.
This stupid racist nonsense of yours and your fellow birthers is only accomplishing this fact: That you and yours are stupid idiots who are throwing a collective racist hissy fit because *gasp* a black man dared to win the Presidency.
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And yet, Paralegal, you can’t provide any evidence that he was born in any country other then the United States.
None of you birthers can.
If your claim is that he wasn’t born in the United States, little one, show the evidence of it.
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Tell me, Paralegal, how was John McCain able to run for President then? After all..he was born in the country of Panama and not in the canal zone.
Why haven’t I seen you and your fellow birthers go after McCain? Or would you like to admit that it’s because of the skin color?
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1401 is statute following the 14th Amendment and applies if . . . IF . . . Obama was born in Hawaii.
Under Hawaiian law, the C.O.L.B. is not evidence of Hawaiian birth, only a statutory registration. I’ve read Hawaiian law.
1409 is the out-of-wedlock provision allowing the mother’s nationality to devolve to a foreign born child if the father is uncertain or a bigamist. It reduces the standard 5-year U.S. residency requirement (post 14-years old) for the mother to 2-years, which was critical in the case of Stanley Dunham.
The active military and diplomat provision/exeption only applies to a married couple in active service on foreign or enemy soil.
In every case, nationality naturally passes from the father. Under British law, that nationality automatically cancels if the child is born outside of British jurisdiction, e.g., Hawaii, AND the father fails to register the child within one year.
Under U.S. law, one year suffices as proof of abandonment (8 USC 1101) and the nationality of the mother takes over.
You can not conflate ‘native-born,’ ‘citizen at birth,’ and ‘natural born citizen.’ They all have their particular distinctions.
Natural Born Citizen appears in U.S. law only once, the U.S. Constitution. Its occassional mention in dicta is a mish-mosh of unconsidered opinion inconsequential to the outcome of the case.
Only by a careful reading of Article II, and the notes and letters of the writers of the constitution can one determine the exact meaning of the term of art, natural born citizen.
What kind of students are coming out of law school these days?
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What condition nullifed U.S. law in Hawaii, or any other place, at Obama’s birth?
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More to the point, even you admit that Obama was born of a U.S. mother, and therefore had U.S. citizenship at birth. That made Obama a natural born U.S. citizen at birth. As I’ve pointed out, for U.S. law to be trumped by British law, Obama’s father would have had to have been a British soldier on assignment or a diplomat.
Since neither of those conditions was met, under both U.S. and British law, U.S. law applies in the U.S.
You don’t admit, but reality is that Obama was born on U.S. soil. Consequently, British law does not apply.
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“Also, a person who is automatically granted another citizenship does not risk losing U.S. citizenship.”
It is risky citing the State Dept. It is not authoritative, and known to be in error, as is that statement.
If you had read the law I cited earlier, you would know that Obama could have lost his U.S. nationality and been solely Indonesian.
His entry and residence in the U.S. would have required a visa if he had not fulfilled specific statutory provisions.
Your interpretation is chauvinistic and has no place in reading the laws of nations. In an atmosphere of honor and recognition of foreign laws not in conflict with your own, you do not arrogantly dismiss foreign law and jurisdiction.
To the point: Even Obama admits his father (by statute an alien student) was a British subject, and he the son of a British subject. That made Obama a natural born subject at birth, of Great Britain.
Obama’s U.S. nationality at birth did not devolve by natural law jus sanguinis from the mother, but by statute; either 8 USC 1401 or 1409.
According to Article II, only a British subject naturalized a U.S. citizen by the adoption of the constitution was eligible to be president. Those born after adoption were, and are not. That includes Obama.
Barack Hussein Obama twice took an oath to protect and defend the U.S. Constitution. He has violated that oath.
Any judge, attorney, military officer, and officer of the court has sworn that same duty and must investigate if the presidential nominee’s constitutional eligibility is questioned. The duty of that oath requires it even further if elected and inaugurated.
Obama is obligated, by sole reason of that oath, to respond co-operatively if his constitutional eligibility is questioned. He has not submitted, but has fled from investigation.
No Hawaiian long form from a licensed birthing facility was provided to at least prove native-birth. Nor has a court entertained argument and reading of the supreme law of the land, specifically Article II, Sec. 1, Cl. 4, in resolving the question.
As Emmerich de Vattel wrote, silence damns a nation to subversion and loss of its sovereignty.
I am not silent, but the courts are on the question by lying and misinterpreting the law, and silencing those who ask for a hearing on the merits.
My facts are correct, as is my reading and application of law.
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You might want to back out of the technicalities of the law, where it’s easy to get lost (or so it appears), and take a look at what the State Department actually says about dual citizenship:
You provide no scintilla of evidence of any operation of law that would deprive Obama of his natural born U.S. citizenship — no British law, no U.S. law, no Indonesian law, no adoption proceeding, no naturalization proceeding, no renouncement proceeding, no nothing. Notice carefully the State Department’s language, that a person may not lose U.S. citizenship except by choice and renunciation of free will.
A special legal proceeding would have been required — you allege a lot, but you allege legal proceeding at all, anywhere, any time.
You think maybe Sauron did it by magic?
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Due diligence isn’t necessary when the evidence demands summary judgment.
Got any indication to contradict Hawaii? No? Didn’t think so.
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Due to recent suffrage laws (actually, limited provisions began in 1855), the mother can contribute her nationality . . . but it only has force of law if the father abandons the family, or the child exercises legal rights upon reaching the age of majority.
Again, dual citizenship is not tenable under the law. Under Bellei, Obama did not revoke his U.S. citizenship by carrying an Indonesian passport, or acting in name and contract as a foreigner.
Obama was legally an Indonesian citizen until he remained continuously in the U.S. from age 14 – 19.
If Obama had returned to Lahore or Jakarta for the summer recesses, he would have lost his right to U.S. citizenship, even though he had U.S. nationality at birth.
He would have had to formally apply to the State Department, take the Oath of Allegiance, and formally revoke Indonesian citizenship.
Study the law before arguing. Read statute and case law . . .
Obama was a Natural Born British Subject. Article II only allowed for a native-born U.S. citizen, born of a British subject, to be eligible for the presidency if born prior to the adoption of the constitution, and if the father revoked his British nationality at the time of adoption.
This interpretation can be made merely by reading the text of Article II. It was written this way to allow for ‘native born,’ naturalized citizens to be president until natural born citizens reached the 35-year age requirement.
You argue Obama’s eligibility, but can’t even read Article II itself.
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Under the concept of prima facie evidence, the presumption that the fact exists fails when evidence contradicting that fact is presented and in such case the interested party needs to present other competent evidence to prove the existence of that alleged fact. If he fails to do so, the alleged fact is not proven, even if the opposing party produces no further evidence.
I am citing Atty John Hemenway from the Kerchner case. To back up his assertion of law, simply read your Black’s Law Dictionary.
As for your education in the law, demand a refund. They failed you.
Read Indonesian law, and then study up on derivative citizenships. U.S. law applies in the same circumstances. Our law does not conflict with that of Indonesia.
Read all of the 1952 Immigration and Nationality Act, § 301. I cite the specific subsections and sub-subsections in my legal blog.
Like many attorneys, several who lost their jobs after coming against me, you don’t do your due diligence.
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No, Obama’s citizenship status did not change when the elder Obama stopped communicating with the family. A father’s abandoning a family does not change the citizenship status of the children under U.S. law. Citizenship of the child rests with the child, not with the parent of the child.
Not under U.S. law. An adoption proceeding would have had to have occurred, and a citizenship change hearing, too. You have evidence of neither.
Under U.S. law, citizens do not lose their citizenship when a foreign country acts. Otherwise, foreign nations would be changing the citizenship status of presidents whenever they don’t like the president’s policies. Don’t make silly arguments, please.
A U.S. citizen adopted by a foreign national remains a U.S. citizen; parental status changes, not citizenship. We do the same thing going the other way with adoptions.
But you don’t allege any adoption. There was no adoption hearing. There was no adoption.
At 18 he achieved full rights in every category — right to vote, right to drink beer, right to contract, whole shmear. There’s a Constitutional Amendment on the right to vote issue. You can’t ignore Constitutional Amendments to suit your whims.
You’ve been doing naturalizations how long?
Ask President Arthur about that, will you?
Actually, there is case law on that point. Some statutory stuff, too. Your claim would be something to consider if Obama’s father had been either a military attache in the service of his nation, residing in the U.S. — like John McCain’s father serving the Navy in Panama, where John McCain was born — or in the service of his nation in a diplomatic status. Neither of those circumstances applies here. The elder Obama was a student at the University of Hawaii. That’s neither military service nor diplomatic service.
Surely you know that.
Yes. Like Chester Alan Arthur, vice president who was the native-born son of a British subject, and who rose to the presidency. (The chief requirement to be vice president in the U.S. is to be eligible to be president.) Arthur’s case is exactly the same as Obama’s, citizenship wise.
Maybe you should call on Congress to impeach Arthur.
Yes, like Charles Curtis, who had Native American and French ancestry at his birth in 1860 (his mother), at a time when Native Americans were regarded as foreign citizens — a status that did not change until the 1920s, and then not retroactively. Heck, Curtis wasn’t even born in a U.S. state.
Precedent is against your claim.
Alas for your case, we live under U.S. law, not British law. You can’t nullify U.S. law in a U.S. court just for the hell of it. If Obama were running for Prime Minister of Britain, you might have a chance of using that argument. But he’s president of the United States, and U.S. law would rule in U.S. courts on his U.S. citizenship.
You assume children do not have citizenship when they are born in the U.S. That’s such a bizarre claim that I can’t imagine you’d entertain it longer than a few seconds.
Have you checked U.S. law? A child born on U.S. soil is a U.S. citizen, even if both of the child’s parents are foreign citizens, of the same foreign nation or differing foreign nations.
Your best hope at this point would be to pull a Shakespeare/MacBeth trick, and claim that Obama was born by Caesarian, and therefore not “natural born.”
Alas for you, Caesarians don’t change either the soil upon which a child is born, nor the parentage of the child, the womb from which the child is born. Under U.S. law, the soil and the womb make Obama a natural born citizen.
You need a miracle to make your case. Maybe you should claim Obama was born direct from the head of Zeus — if you claim only immaculate conception, he’d still be a citizen.
But of course, to do that, you’d have to claim Obama is a god. Do you really want to go there?
Gee, willikers! You think I’m biased???!!!
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I was. National Law Center, George Washington University ’87. You?
No, that’s not how it works anywhere, not in high school debate, not in college debate, not in administrative hearings, not in court — nowhere. Prima facie evidence is required to get the case going. The case has to make sense on its first face. You’re alleging that, because you don’t like Obama, we should discount his Hawaiian birth certificate. You’re alleging, because you don’t like Obama, that Hawaii’s laws on what constitutes a birth certificate should be invalidated everywhere else. You’re alleging, because you don’t like Obama, that the Full Faith and Credit Clause, which requires all other states to give full faith and credit to the legal rulings of any other state, should not stand.
You’ve not even offered a challenge to the prima facie case offered.
But the burden of proof doesn’t change simply because evidence is challenged. In a criminal case, it doesn’t become “guilty until proven innocent” except when an affirmative defense is offered. For example, in a murder case, a claim of self-defense in some jurisdictions excuses the murder. But when a defendant alleges self-defense, the defendant then must prove that it was, indeed, self-defense. The murder is admitted.
You don’t even have an allegation with substance. Obama has conceded nothing — no affirmative defense at all. You still have to make a case.
Obama was born a U.S. citizen through his mother. Obama was born a U.S. citizen by being born on U.S. soil, regardless the citizenship of either of his parents. He has two different paths by which he is a natural born citizen of the U.S. You don’t get to ignore the law because you don’t like it.
And so it was. Obama’s a U.S. citizen by birth, by choice, and by God.
Actually, yes you can. Thousands of people hold dual citizenship.
And a red herring here. “Citizen of the world” is what we hope people are once educated, but it bears no legal standing except in human rights. People have a right to exist once born.
When you get a real case against Obama, instead of quibbles with the laws as they stand, can you let us know?
[I expect a long, long period of silence.]
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You need to be educated on the law.
Prima facie evidence, once challenged, puts the burden of proof on the defendant.
Obama was born a British Subject through his father. He was not born a “dual citizen.” It is one, or the other. You can have dual nationalities at birth, but those get sorted out by the time the child reaches the age of decision. Eventually, because of jurisdiction issues, one must be chosen and the other de-alienaged by naturalization law.
That is how the law works. You can not be a citizen of two nations at the same time. Citizen of the world? That is a concept untenable in the law.
Back to Obama — When the father essentially abandoned the family, the mother’s U.S. nationality prevailed. When the mother married an Indonesian, Indonesian citizenship replace his U.S. one.
Only when Obama became 19 did he finally become fully a U.S. citizen.
That is the law . . . that is the way it works . . . it is designed to prevent conflicts inherent in dual nationalities.
Obama can not be born both a Natural Born British Subject, and a Natural Born U.S. Citizen . . . he was born British, with inchoate U.S. nationality.
He is ineligible because he has foreign alienage both at birth, i.e., foreign allegiance by nature through the father. That violates the intent of Article II.
If your interpretation is correct, then a native-born son of a British subject would be eligible to be president. No. Under British law and law of nations, he was a natural born British Subject.
His only claim to U.S. citizenship was by abandonment of the father, the mother’s U.S. citizenship, and 1952 INA § 301’s 5-year residency requirement allowing a U.S. national at birth to qualify for citizenship, even though a foreign national at the time.
This really isn’t that difficult. You are biased because you Want to Believe any U.S. citizen at birth is eligible to be president. That contradicts the letter and intent of Article II.
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There is not even an allegation against Obama. You can’t make him prove he’s “not guilty” unless you have an allegation. To make an allegation that the document the Great State of Hawaii swears is accurate and genuine, is false, you must offer some extraordinary evidence — say, a birth certificate of equal validity from another jurisdiction.
But of course, you don’t have any documents that haven’t been debunked as crude forgeries.
He who asserts must assert a prima facie case. You’re offering only post nates claims, completely unevidenced.
So, if I sue you, and you hire a lawyer, that’s proof you did what I allege? You keep claiming to be a paralegal, but I don’t think you understand what the word means. Certainly you don’t understand the purpose of hiring a lawyer, demonstrated by your bizarre claim.
Oh, and the money spent to defend? You’re quoting an April Fool’s prank letter. There is no evidence Obama has spent anything untoward to defend his name against yoru cowardly, heckling claims.
The governor of Hawaii said that’s a lie. Why should we take your word over the word of the person charged with protecting the law, elected to do that, and who has sworn an oath to uphold the law? I do not find your unevidenced claims more reliable than the word of any state governor, not even Rick Perry.
A serious reading of Obama’s birth documents show him to have been born to a U.S. citizen parent, AND on U.S. soil, which would qualify him had he been born to foreign parents.
Don’t quote the Constitution to me if you choose to dismiss the Full Faith and Credit clause, as you do.
What about Alexander Hamilton? You claim he was disqualifying himself?
Where did Jay say that a kid born on U.S. soil is not a U.S. citizen? Nowhere.
All them lying judges. Are we going to believe you or our lying eyes, eh?
And despite five judges, in five different jurisdictions, ruling against your views, and despite the Supreme Court’s refusal to give credence to your claims — how many are Bush appointees? — you think we should believe they are all lying, and not you?
Let’s see your analysis. Citing any other source is not an across-the-board denial of British common law. U.S. contract and tort law, to mention two critical areas, rely on British common law. So what?
Nothing like a good ad hominem, red herring claim to spice things up, eh?
So what?
Oh, we’re seeing incompetence, alright. But not on the side of the opinion you see. I think the incompetence isn’t in the people who wrote the opinion, but in the reader — you.
Benedict Arnold made the same claim. He said Washington was the traitor, not he.
Have you ever heard of Georges Santayana?
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Kiesler and Darrel
Innocent till Proven Guilty? The jurisprudence of challenging prima facie evidence puts the burden of proof on the alleged violator.
When Obama pays out almost $2 million in legal fees to block challenges to his native-born citizen status and his Article II eligibility, you know he is running from the facts that; 1) He has no long form Hawaiian birth certificate, and; 2) A serious reading of Article II, Minor, Ark, and other sources prove that a Natural Born Citizen is born to U.S. parents under U.S. jurisdiction.
Conversely, John Jay et al, after 8 1/2 years of bloody war against British interference in colonial government, would not allow a native-born Natural Born Subject of Great Britain to also qualify as an Article II ‘natural born citizen.’ You are one, or the other . . . not both. Article II was written to prevent foreign influence in the highest executive office.
Why continue to object to Obama’s eligibility? First, the judges dismissing ‘birther’ challenges are lying and misinterpreting law. The latest by Judge Brown in Ankeny is a joke, when he cites a discussion in Ark in order to prove the constitution relied on British common law, when Vattel’s law of nations was cited repeatedly as well.
Judge Carter relied on a former Obama attorney, Velamoor, who as a new clerk wrote the Barnett dismissal, misinterpreting Ashwander vs Tennessee Valley Authority.
I’d call this a comedy of errors, but these errors are either direct lies, or incredible incompetence and biased psychosis . . . and I’m not laughing.
Chief Justice John Marshall’s famous dicta described the strenous effort to create the constitution, concluding that to ignore an alleged violation of constitutional law was treasonous.
So, I call you two, and Judges Surrick, Land, Robertson, Carter, and Brown ‘Traitors.’
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The claim that Obama was born in some foreign country is now dead and buried. It is time for all you birthers here to apologize for your stupidity, shut up and go away.
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Well, can we blame him? It was cleverly disguised as a U.S. passport, issued by the U.S. State Department, in a blue cover that said “U.S. Passport.”
How was he to know that, in 2009, you’d try to dispossess him of his citizenship, ParalegalNM?
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And again, para, and I find it amusing that you’re using that word considering the one fact you’re blatantly ignoring.
Obama doesn’t have to prove you wrong…you have to prove yourself right. You know..that pesky old “Innocent until proven guilty” part of US law you’re blatantly ignoring?
now would you like to admit you’re a racist pig or not? Because it’s quite telling that you and your fellow birthers keep on going after the black man on where he was born but not the white man who was actually born in a different country.
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Para, he was a US citizen from the start…he was born in Hawaii.
But tell me..why haven’t I seen any birthers go after John McCain? After all..he was born in the country of Panama.
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If Obama is eligible under Article II, then any British Subject living in the U.S. would be as well. Having a U.S. mother, or being born on U.S. soil may make you a citizen at birth, but the foreign alienage requires naturalization law to ‘de-alienage,’ the sole function of naturalization law.
You do know the writers of the Constitution were intent that no-one with foreign nationality would be eligible, unless they were naturalized by the adoption of the Constitution September of 1789. That is the meaning of Art. II, Sec. 1, Cl. 5.
When did Obama become a U.S. citizen? At age two through six, and then unbeknownst to him at age 19 when his living in the U.S. as a foreign student automatically restored his inchoate citizenship at birth under the 1952 Immigration and Nationality Act, § 301.
Obama didn’t even know he was officially a U.S. citizen . . . he kept using his Indonesian identity and passport.
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Oh and by the way, to be a natural born citizen under US law you have to be born to a US citizen. It doesn’t matter where it is. That would be how John McCain was able to run for president. After all..he was born in the country of Panama to US citizens.
It’s time for you, Eugue, and you, Betty, and the rest of you racist pigs to shut the hell up.
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Eugene, in the United States we have this little concept called “innocent until proven guilty.”
Meaning, twit, that if you want to claim the President wasn’t born in the United States then you have to prove that he wasn’t..he doesn’t have to prove he was.
And it’s completely ludicrous your claim that somehow the entire US Government as well as Hillary Clinton, John McCain, George Bush, the Obama campaign, the Obama’s and Obama’s mother some 40+ years ago are all involved in a conspiracy to cover up where he was born. What? His mother somehow knew 40+ years ago that her son would run for President and win?
Do you really think the Secret Service, the CIA, and the FBI are that completely incompentent? Or would you like to admit that you’re a racist honkey throwing a hissy fit that a black man is president?
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Whoever quotes:
we see a President that had early on promised to the American people a “complete transparency”, but yet obstinately and staunchly refuses to open so-called private records and documents (re: actual birth certificate, school records and transcripts, etc.) for public review.
Dimwit, the state Governor of Hawaii released the President’s birth certificate.
Lets face it. The only reason you are questioning where Obama was born is because he’s black. if he was white you wouldn’t be questioning his citizenship. The proof of that? You and your fellow birthers haven’t questioned whether John McCain was a natural born citizen.
And John McCain was born in the country of Panama.
It’s time for you and yours to shut the hell up.
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The report that Obama had spent “millions” was an April Fool’s prank. See here, and especially here.
You should stop spreading hoaxes.
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He never promised to allow you to rifle through his private affairs. He promised transparency in government. Many of us think he has not succeeded there — but his birth certificate, which has been publicly available for years now, is not what he promised.
If you do not believe the State of Hawaii and you think we should vitiate the Constitution’s Full Faith and Credit Clause, make your case.
But do not make that case on your desire for gossipy information, or your simple refusal to follow the Constitution or abide by the laws of Hawaii.
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Many concern Americans – from all walks of life and backgrounds – are growing in numbers questioning President Barack Hussein Obama’s eligibility to rightfully be our U.S. President. When circumstantially looking at what has so far unfolded over the past several months during Obama’s stay in office, we see a President that had early on promised to the American people a “complete transparency”, but yet obstinately and staunchly refuses to open so-called private records and documents (re: actual birth certificate, school records and transcripts, etc.) for public review. The same documentation that everyday citizens are reasonably expected and required to show to potential employers both in the private or government sectors to gain employment, or when joining the military. However to me, it seems morally and ethically wrong that politicians are completely exempt and not obligated to do the same as everyone else. I ask you, why is that?
Likewise, smart and sensible people are asking too why Obama and his apparent gaggle of loyal political supporters are spending a lot of money (it’s reported allegedly in the millions) and frenzy energy defending legal challenges by concern citizens and groups to have Obama disclose such documentation for public examination. From their constant overt behavior (legal maneuverings, undue influencing of the media, etc.) to completely evade such revelation and open review only adds fuel-to-fire that Obama definitely does have something terrible to hide. Foreseeable, as more of the general public gets on the bandwagon with a loud hue-and-cry that can no longer be ignored asking, “What does Obama got to hide and why”, if final disclosure uncovers fraud or other illegality, don’t be surprise if Barack Obama resigns the presidency (or is forced out) in full disgrace similarly to what had happen to Richard (“Tricky Dick”) Nixon.
What’s more, to those tactless imperceptive supporters of Obama that are incessantly and publicly condemning those who are dissatisfied and are legitimately pursuing their Constitutionally-guaranteed right to redress, I want to say this as well: Why do you continually attempt to furtively threaten financial and legal sanctions to silence those that are exercising their legal and ethical pursuit to seek truth and justice. If Obama is such an innocent, truthful, and decent man, one would reasonably think he would be anxious and desirous setting the record straight once and for all.
Lastly, here are some additional general facts and pointed commentary for further consideration:
Why during the Obama campaign for presidency, with questions about his birth in Kenya to his Kenyan father (a British citizen), and his years in Indonesia where he was known as Barry Soetoro (adopted by and taking the surname of his stepfather), why wasn’t Barrack Obama nearly as forthcoming about this as Republican candidate John McCain was about his past.
What was posted on Obama’s Internet website in support of Mr. Obama’s eligibility was not an actual birth certificate, but something that resembles a “Certification of Live Birth” or COLB, which, even if authentic, does not actually prove “natural born” U.S. citizenship. In Hawaii, a “Certification of Live Birth” is typically issued within a year of a child’s birth to those who register a birth overseas or one that takes place outside of a hospital.
What is most intriguing (and of course, elevated the eligibility controversy) is that it was foremost and largely fueled by a political ally of Hillary Clinton, now Obama’s Secretary of State. This also begs the question of whether Mr. Obama provided Mrs. Clinton a Cabinet post in part to make this issue hopefully go away. Phillip Berg, a DEMOCRAT who served as Deputy Attorney General in Pennsylvania, is one of many that filed suit to demand that Mr. Obama produce documents to prove his eligibility. It’s hard for Obama fans to claim this is part of a vast right-wing conspiracy when it was an obvious concerted attempt by the Clinton camp back then to derail on technical grounds, the Obama’s express train to the White House. Again I inquire why would a now sitting President, with the political campaign fully ended and behind him, not turn over the documents to finally end this still most heated controversy? If those who believe he’s hiding something are found in error, would it not be in his best political interest to clearly disprove these so-called conspiracy theorists? Logic tells anyone looking at this objectively that it is nonsensical for President Obama to retain three law firms and to expend heavy costs of legal fees to hide records, unless there is something worth hiding from the American people.
Outrageously, even Members of Congress had offered up “SNOPES” and other flawed resource websites by way of background information to constituents troubled by the refusal by President Barack Obama to disclose any vital records which would prove his eligibility to be President. During the campaign, SNOPES alleged that Obama could obtain a security clearance. Having been interviewed numerous times by investigators for colleagues and co-workers seeking security clearances or periodic updates for existing clearances, Mr. Obama had numerous “red flags” in his background which would preclude the privilege of holding a clearance and access to classified government information – including his affiliation with known “subversive” individuals and organizations such as Weather Underground/unrepentant domestic terrorist Bill Ayers, Frank Marshall Davis (CPUSA), and PLO official Rashid Khalidi (at a time that the PLO was an officially designated terrorist organization) and Obama’s admitted use of a hard drug – cocaine. SNOPES is discredited as a result of these pro-Obama, misleading assertions. (Running for high elective office obviates the requirement to undergo security clearance scrutiny since the clearance is automatically granted by virtue of the position attained.)
In addition to the indefensible references to SNOPES, it is further upsetting that the staff of some sitting Members of Congress failed to do their homework and included in letters to constituents such incorrect information as stating that Mr. Obama’s birth certificate was posted showing he was born in Hawaii. Nevertheless, the issue of Obama’s birth location still remains somewhat in dispute, especially since Obama’s own paternal Grandmother and others have asserted (mistakenly ???) that he was actually born in Kenya.
Given this level of general incompetency and sloppiness within our very own Congress, is it any shock that a sitting Judge (U.S. District Court Judge John Robertson – a Clinton appointee) would follow suit, and imply that the critical legal, Constitutional issue of whether Obama is eligible to be President, has already been determined by Internet blogging and message boards? The intellectual sloppiness and blatant disregard in not faithfully fulfilling and honoring the requirements of the Constitution are now legal issues pouring into U.S. courtrooms everywhere by concern citizens wanting final resolution to this ever burning question. In stark contrast, even Senator John McCain, born to American parents at a U.S. military base, was thoroughly officially investigated for his birth in the Panama Canal Zone and to quell the dispute, produced his birth records. The Senate voted unanimously (in a nonbinding resolution) in April 2008 to declare that McCain was indeed, an eligible candidate to run for president. Even a senior official of the McCain campaign showed the media an official copy of the senator’s birth certificate issued by Canal Zone health authorities.
Regardless what we think, feel, or believe about the present issue at hand, it must be remembered that, as a nation of people, we are, first and foremost, a nation of law where laws are supposed to apply equitably to all Americans. Barack Obama is not above the law. When I am required to produce a valid birth certificate in order to obtain a U.S. Passport or to gain entry to a protected government facility, then I expect at least the same standard of proof to be provided by a candidate for the highest elective office in our country.
This is not a political issue – it is a legal and ethical issue and one of paramount national importance. The greatest threat and danger to our personal liberties and freedom is complete disregard and disrespect of our sacred Constitution and for what it stands for. Especially by a President that fails to provide proper evidence of his eligibility for the Presidency, and by not doing so – arrogantly shows to the American people that he believes the rules should not and do not apply to himself.
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Para, you do realize that both Chester Arthur and James Buchanan held dual citizenship because of where one of their parents came from, right? Are you seeking to invalidate their presidencies?
Both their father’s were emigre’s from Ireland…i.e. Great Britain.
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The state of Hawaii validated the birth certificate, para.
Since it’s your claim the birth certificate is false…it’s up to you to prove it is. It isn’t false just because you say it is.
And for what possible reason would a woman give birth to a baby halfway around the world back in the 1960’s and then on the same day fly all the way to Hawaii to do as you claim? Because as Ed pointed out, that was an impossible flight back then just based on the time differential.
Women back then when they gave birth, Para, did not get out of the hospital on the same day. And the baby for damn sure didn’t.
He was born in Hawaii, he is a natural and native born citizen of the United States. Unless you have actual proof otherwise..it is time for you to let go of your delusional conspiracy theory. Because so far all you’ve offered is a bunch of what-if’s, maybes and utter BS.
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By your scale here, the COLB is documentary evidence.
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The C.O.L.B. is labeled at the bottom margin as ‘prima facie evidence.’
The certified copy of the original document is ‘documentary’ or ‘best evidence.’
Once admitted, documentary and best evidence is unimpeachable . . . it is probative.
Prima facie evidence can be challenged. The party relying on that evidence must produce proof the facts represented by the document are valid and probative.
The only way to do that with Obama’s C.O.L.B. is to produce, under Hawaii law, a certified copy of the 1961 birth certificate, whose data was transcribed into a database, and then printed onto the C.O.L.B. form. If there is no witnessing doctor or licensed birth facility signing the original document (information missing on the C.O.L.B.), the prima facie evidence is not probative, i.e., worthless.
You guys have to study the links and legal citations . . . you just don’t understand the distinctions between probative evidence and impeachable evidence, a natural born from a native born citizen . . . why application of natualization law to ‘dealienage’ dual nationality, and the opportunity for the dual nationality to switch citizenships when reaching the age of majority/discretion bars that person from being a natural born citizen.
Explaining things to this blog (except Wiseman) is like trying to explain Calculus to kindegartners.
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Obama’s mother would not have had to apply to be a US citizen as after all..she was born in Kansas and therefor is a NBC.
You claim that dual citizenship is incompatible with being a NBC in this country. The US Government disagrees with you. Now why should we take your word over the word of the government?
As for your claim that Islam is incompatible with allegiance to the United States..tell that to the hundreds of thousands of Muslim Americans who are indeed citizens of the United States. One of whom serves in the US Congress and more than a few others serve in the US military.
What you claim the Quran says is irrelevent. The laws of the United States no more answer to the Quran than they do the Bible. Or any other religious text. It is what the laws of the United States says regarding whether Muslims can be citizens in this country that applies and only what the laws of the United States says. The US Constitution is the Supreme Law of the Land here.
There is no time requirement on how long you have to live in the United States to be a citizen as long as you were born in this country in the first place. And both Barack Obama and his mother were born in this country. He in Hawaii and she in Kansas.
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Yeah except for the fact that he was born in Hawaii and never gave up his citizenship so therefor would not have had to apply. Same with his mother who is from Kansas.
You keep on saying things that could have happened, Para. You offer no evidence that they did happen. And I somehow suspect that if Obama’s father was a white African..say from South Africa you would not be having this hissy fit. And you sure wouldn’t be inanely claiming that Obama is a Muslim. Obama is a Christian, child, more so then you’re being right now.
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Corsi’s inability to pay off on his stupid offer doesn’t make his fictions into truth. Here’s the Snopes debunking of Corsi’s claims:
http://www.snopes.com/politics/kerry/service.asp, and
http://www.snopes.com/politics/kerry/swift.asp
Kerry’s military record is public, as much as needs to be. Your slandering American heroes on Memorial Day is particularly despicable. If you really have so much distaste for democracy and for America, why stay here?
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1. That provision does not apply to natural born U.S. citizens, like Obama and me. U.S. citizens do not need to apply for U.S. citizenship, nor take an oath. God knows some would be made better for it, but we don’t have to.
2. That provision does not apply to minors, especially minors who spent most of their life in the U.S.
3. Is there any evidence Obama’s mother ever sought citizenship in Indonesia? I’ve never seen anything. Americans living abroad do not give up their citizenship by doing so. She would have had to apply to become Indonesian, and in that naturalization process, she would have had to have given up her U.S. citizenship. There would be a legal proceeding. I suppose you’re going to claim you don’t have evidence of that proceeding, either.
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You can lose your right to U.S. citizenship. Read the Bellei case, . . . Rogers vs. Bellei http://supreme.justia.com/us/401/815/case.html
If Obama had not completed five years of continuous residency post age 14 (or starting as late as 23), he would have had to formally request citizenship with the State Department and go through the oath process, as would his mother after 30-some years as an Indonesian citizen. He was carrying an Indonesian passport back then.
There is an interesting book written just after the Civil War that concluded/summarized the denial of Christianity by Jefferson, Paine, Lincoln, Grant . . . calling them Diests or denying the Trinity. Jefferson specifically denied the Trinity, a Catholic Doctrine . . . but, most early Protestants did as well. While a Catholic or modern Trinitarian would consider such thoughts heresy, it was a common Protestant thought . . . a free belief based on reason, study, and personal freedom.
You should study up on the argument between Arius and Emperor Constantine.
Your comments and arguments reveal you have little knowledge of what you speak. Your history, geography, and logic is severely flawed. What do you think Bosnia-Herzegovina was, really?
You won’t even open Dr. Jerome Corsi’s ‘Obamanation.’ His scholarship is supported by fully documented text, vetted by attorneys before publication.
His ‘Swiftboat’ book has been ridiculed, just as you try to dismiss me, but John Kerry has never released his military records, and never collected the $1 million dollar bet if he found one inaccurate statement of fact in the book.
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Oy. This is starting to sound repetitive.
Under Hawaiian law, the COLB is, legally, equivalent to the original document. The State of Hawaii afixed a seal attesting that the information contained in the document is correct. In order to challenge the document, you need hard evidence that the information is in error, contrary to the certification from the state.
You have no evidence to contradict the State of Hawaii.
You’ve come down from $10 million, but you still have absolutely no idea how much Obama’s campaign has spent, if anything. The important thing, of course, is that any money is too much. This is a nuisance suit unsupported by real data. We might get an idea how much was required from the one suit where the judge has threatened Rule 11 sanctions.
But it’s unfair to bring a nuisance suit, and then claim the costs of defending the suit is evidence that the suit is true. The court has already ruled the claims false.
A COLB certifies that the information is correct. You have no evidence to suggest otherwise. There is no reason to get to the original document. You’ve claimed earlier that this document from the state was forged — I have no doubt that you will claim forgery for any document presented.
So, in wisdom, the Federal Election Commission and various state secretaries of state have insisted that challengers produce evidence of error in those documents. How many suits were there, 18? Not one had any evidence. You still don’t have any evidence.
It’s an unlikely scenario, and it would require fraudulent representations on the part of many people. You’ve offered not an iota of evidence to suggest that unlikely scenario occurred, though of course there should be a lot. Did Mrs. Obama, Barack Jr.’s mother, travel to Kenya while 9 months pregnant? Where is the evidence? (The Alaska governor’s having been stupid is not evidence that Mrs. Obama was stupid.)
You have presented nothing to suggest Obama’s certificate wasn’t filed by the hospital and signed by the attending physician. Why should anyone grant credence to that story since you have absolutely no corroboration?
Why would the State of Hawaii lie?
The law requires an accurate place of birth be listed. Your claim is that Mrs. Obama took a 1-day-old baby on a 12,000 mile airplane trip in 1961, and got the kid to Honolulu in time to register the birth on the same day? You can’t make that trip today in that time. In 1961, it would require as many as five legs to the trip, and absolutely no fewer than three legs. It couldn’t be done as you describe it.
You have not a scrap of evidence such a trip occurred.
That is your claim. Your claim is contrary to the state’s attesting that the information is there. You have no evidence. Obama has more than 47 years of precedent from the State of Hawaii, evidenced by a certified document the state swears is accurate. This is not a difficult case to decide on the basis of evidence.
You have absolutely no evidence to support such a claim. Birth records — vital records — cannot be sealed from view completely. Where is the report that Obama was born there? There is none. Where are the affidavits to support the claim from anyone? There are none.
In court, we need to stick with the evidence that is provable. For your unlikely scenario, there is not a shred of evidence, not even hearsay.
There is no question: The U.S. has never conceded jurisdiction over Obama’s citizenship. Obama never made a move to change his natural born citizenship status. Not only do you have no evidence, but the existence of the passport is hard evidence contradicting your claim. That the State Department issued the passport is a presumption of natural born citizenship (since we know there was no naturalization process, and no court action). This is a hard presumption for you to overcome. You need hard evidence — the court records showing Obama tried to assert British citizenship over his natural born U.S. citizenship status. Nothing like that ever occurred. Consequently, there is no such evidence.
We’ve had a couple of previous presidents in the same category, and a vice president who was born in a separate nation — as American Indian — without running afoul of the rule. Precedent is on Obama’s side, even were you able to find the evidence that this would be a problem. But you have no such evidence, and the law is clear that a child born to a U.S. citizen mother on U.S. soil is a natural born citizen eligible for the presidency.
Not under U.S. law. Islam would be no more a disqualifier than membership in the Methodist Church, though probably less a disqualifier than membership in a Southern Baptist congregation (that’s humor, folks).
Under U.S. law, the only precedent would be the 1931 case of Wilson vs. U.S.. In that case, it was Christianity that was found incompatible with citizenship. Be careful where you go with that claim. (In that case, an application for naturalization was denied; any Christian born in the U.S. can be a citizen, as Obama was, and is.)
Um, it was Christians attacking Muslims in Bosnia. “Balkanization” doesn’t have anything to do with drugs. You’re so far off, you’re not even wrong on the origin of the term.
None of which is relevant to the claims you make against Obama, and none of which necessarily makes you a more credible complainant.
Well, yeah, if you ignore his Kansas-born Christian mother, his being raised as a Christian, his attendance at a Catholic school in Indonesia, his attendance at Christian services, his complete divorce from any Islamic influence, and if you imagine the images of Jesus being replaced by (blasphemous) images of Mohammed.
You’ve stated a hallucination, not history.
So what? That’s irrelevant, and contrary to Obama’s beliefs as he carefully outlined them in two best-selling books, neither of which you appear to have read.
Why do you invent false stories, when the real story is freely available at your local library?
Farrakhan had nothing to do with anything. Jeremiah Wright is a pastor at a Christian church — and, by the way, he comes out of the Stone-Campbell movement. We’ve had three presidents out of Jeremiah Wright’s Christian tradition, James Garfield, Lyndon Johnson and Ronald Reagan. I’m working hard to avoid offense here — you’re talking about my denomination. You have no idea at all what you’re saying, and you clearly do not know much about Christianity.
You mean he sticks with the faith even after the poobahs of the church get really stupid and repudiate all common sense, tradition and history?
Is that bad? It puts him with Thomas Jefferson, George Washington and James Madison, as well as Abraham Lincoln.
Have you ever studied U.S. history?
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It’s good arguing with you, because you represent the 52% of the electorate that voted for an anti-American Commander in Chief.
So, you are saying I don’t know a Certification of Live Birth (C.O.L.B.) from a Birth Certificate? A 1961 Birth Certificate will be a form or fancy certificate with information typed in with a typewriter and signed by the attending doctor.
The original is kept in the state archives, and certified photostatic copies can be ordered for $10. Obama has spent a million dollars in legal fees to avoid doing that because the birth certificate is NOT in the Hawaiian archives. All they have is a statutory registration form.
To save time and expense, the archives were entered into a computer database. The C.O.L.B. costs only $5 and doesn’t require handling of the archived copy.
I explained and cited law how an African-born Obama could be registered as Hawaiian born without birth documents, no witnessing delivering doctor, and no confirmation by the Department of Health agent. Read the Hawaiian Statute § 338-5. That is called the Compulsory Registration Statute. The agent is forced, by law, to register as Hawaiian-born an undocumented baby.
The compulsory 1961 registration has sufficient information for the database and printing of a C.O.L.B. But, there is no witnessed birth certificate. Obama was born in Africa, where the birth certificate is sealed and on record.
As for your citing of the Dept. of State, it is true that the U.S. does not bar dual citizenship per se, but your citation admits such loose arrangements of affiliation and allegiance create complications of law due to questions of jurisdiction. (Jurisdiction = Allegiance)
That is why dual citizenship/nationality at birth is incompatible to status as a natural born citizen.
As for Islam, I was a student of the Koran and Muslim history for several years, having a pen pal over the Internet right in the middle of Tehran. I also have my own small library of texts. I’ve discussed passages of the Koran with real Muslims face-to-face.
Islam is incompatible to allegiance to any foreign or secular jurisdiction. The religion itself bans it. Christianity, as a comparison, demands obediance to local or national jurisdictions.
Look at England, France, Greece, Spain and Germany. The bombings and riots are the result of an incalcitrant Muslim population. Look what happened to Yugoslavia/Sarajevo. The ethnic Albanian Muslims (their economy based on heroin trade and other criminal activity) wiped out the Christian population through illegal immigration and eventually taking over. Where do you think the term ‘balkanization’ came from?
So, you are from Minnesota. That makes you a fool three times over, voting for Obama, Franken, and Ellison.
I’ve seen the college textbooks on comparative religion 101. What a joke. The teacher wanted me in her class, but I had already taken religion courses from Chinese and Indian guest lecturers and spent several years on-line with my penpal and corresponding with historical authors.
If you were in MY CLASS, you would not be DUMBED DOWN as you are right now . . . America is in crisis because of dummies like you.
As for Obama, he was born to a strict Muslim family and schooled up to the 4th grade in the Koran. His African grandfather had some interesting and violent comments on non-Muslims. Obama’s American tenure let him be more secular, but twenty years in Michelle Robinsons’s South Chicago Trinty Unity exposed him to the theology of Roy Cone, Jeremiah Wright, and Louis Farakhan.
Barack Obama is as much a Christian as Olivia Snow is a Republican.
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From: http://travel.state.gov/travel/cis_pa_tw/cis/cis_1753.html (I.E. the US State Department)
On the subject of dual citizenship even if it did apply:
A U.S. citizen may acquire foreign citizenship by marriage, or a person naturalized as a U.S. citizen may not lose the citizenship of the country of birth. U.S. law does not mention dual nationality or require a person to choose one citizenship or another. Also, a person who is automatically granted another citizenship does not risk losing U.S. citizenship. However, a person who acquires a foreign citizenship by applying for it may lose U.S. citizenship. In order to lose U.S. citizenship, the law requires that the person must apply for the foreign citizenship voluntarily, by free choice, and with the intention to give up U.S. citizenship.
From: http://www.usimmigrationsupport.org/dual_citizenship.html
US Dual Citizenship: The U.S. government allows dual citizenship. United States law recognizes U.S. Dual Citizenship, but the U.S. government does not encourage it is as a matter of policy due to the problems that may arise from it. It is important to understand that a foreign citizen does NOT lose his or her citizenship when becoming a U.S. citizen. An individual that becomes a U.S. citizen through naturalization may keep his or her original citizenship.
I.E. the only way, Para, for Barack Obama to lose his status as a citizen of the United States..is for him to actually voluntairly give it up. He hasn’t done so. If he was somehow also a citizen of Great Britain…he wouldn’t lose his citizenship in the United States.
Title 8 of U.S. Code says that anyone is a citizen of the U.S. at birth if they fulfill one of these qualifications:
Anyone born inside the United States *
Any Indian or Eskimo born in the United States, provided being a citizen of the U.S. does not impair the person’s status as a citizen of the tribe
Any one born outside the United States, both of whose parents are citizens of the U.S., as long as one parent has lived in the U.S.
Any one born outside the United States, if one parent is a citizen and lived in the U.S. for at least one year and the other parent is a U.S. national
Any one born in a U.S. possession, if one parent is a citizen and lived in the U.S. for at least one year
Any one found in the U.S. under the age of five, whose parentage cannot be determined, as long as proof of non-citizenship is not provided by age 21
Any one born outside the United States, if one parent is an alien and as long as the other parent is a citizen of the U.S. who lived in the U.S. for at least five years (with military and diplomatic service included in this time)
A final, historical condition: a person born before 5/24/1934 of an alien father and a U.S. citizen mother who has lived in the U.S.
Let’s see. Hawaii is a state in the United States so he’s a citizen that way. As that is where he was born despite your asinine claims otherwise. And his mother is a US Citizen so he’s a citizen that way too.
I do have to love that your claims would invalidate George Washington as President, para. Also Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, John Adams and probably most of the rest of the first 10 Presidents. After all…they weren’t born in the United States. Indeed, John Tyler would have been the first one born in the United States. Well either him or Polk depending on where you want to cut the timeline. So either 9 of the first 10 or 10 of the first 11 would be invalidated under your nitwitted claims.
And what the Koran, Haditha supposedly say and what Muslim history supposedly says is completely irrelevent. US law doesn’t answer to any religion, child. But thank you for proving that you’re as much a racist as the whackos that went after a US Representative in my state because he, a Muslim, dared to take the oath of office on the Quran. Quit trying to make Muslims into second class citizens just because you have an irrational fear.
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Yeah except for the State of Hawaii produced the birth certificate and stipulated that it was genuine.
And as for your claim that Obama is a Muslim, he’s not. Secondly, you’re engaging in what amounts to race/religion fearmongering and baiting by that claim. Thirdly, anyone born in the US is a citizen. If you’d bother to notice the 14th Admendment to the Constitution, just to name one, doesn’t say “this doesn’t apply to Muslims.”
And yes I am a liberal but no I’m not foaming at the mouth. Because you have proved nothing other then you’re an ignorant fool who is throwing a childish hissy fit because a black man and a liberal dared to win the election.
You have no proof, you’ve proved nothing, you have no evidence. All you’ve done is kept on charging the same stupid windmill, Don Quixote.
We don’t have to prove you wrong..you have to prove you’re right and you haven’t even come close.
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I proved by fact and law that 1) Obama has not produced a $10 birth certificate, and; 2) a Hawaiian Department of Health agent must, by Hawaiian statute, register a baby as Hawaiian-born even if the mother has no documentation or witnesses, and his attempts to confirm Hawaiian birth from licensed birthing facilities produce nothing.
Yet, all you can come up with is the C.O.L.B. has the state seal embossed on it, so it is official. I agree, the document is official, but the original data is the product of perjury unless you can back it up with a birth certificate.
To spend about $1 million dollars in legal fees to block pretrial Discovery and Production of the birth certificate (See the Lingle, Berg, Keyes, and Lightfoot cases against Barack Hussein Obama) when the document is available for $10 is circumstantial evidence that Obama is fraudulently avoiding being discovered he is Kenyan-born to a Kenyan, and therefore intentionally violating U.S. Const. Art. II, sec. 1, plus violating his oath of office.
We can argue the mootness of that argument in light of his father being a Kenyan alien non-resident, and the son therefore not a ‘natural born’ citizen, but naturalized at birth through statutory dealienage.
These points are impossible to impeach. The fact that the C.O.L.B. has a state seal embossed is not probative of the veracity of the data on the form.
As for Islam, read the Koran and Hadiths and Muslim history. I can recommend links such as the Voice of India and the Calcutta Quran Petition. I can show you U.S. naturalization statute that describes the Muslim religion and bars Muslims from immigration and naturalization.
But, as a liberal you are probably having a fit, foaming at the mouth. Technically, Obama was unfit to become a U.S. citizen at 19, even though he had birthright nationality. But, that is purely academic at this point.
I stand by my points, that without the birth certificate, Obama has not proven U.S. birth. I stand by my reading of history, common law, the founding fathers, authors of the constitution, and naturalization case law and statutes . . . that with an alien father and dual nationalities, Obama was not a natural born citizen.
You can’t prove otherwise.
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Ok, Para. What does whether Obama is a christian or not have to do with it?
After all…you don’t have to be Christian to be President nor do you need to be Christian to be a citizen.
And, child, fascism and Marxism are on opposite sides of the political spectrum. You can not be both a fascist and a marxist. George Bush, Dick Cheney and every Republican on the planet is far closer to being fascist then Obama is. Hell..Dick Cheney is closer to being a fascist then Obama is to being a marxist.
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Obama got the legal document and displayed it. You don’t like it. Your assumption is only an assumption by a non-party (heck, there isn’t even a case). You have no evidence to challenge Obama’s birth certificate as issued, certainly no affidavit or other evidence other than your completely unwarranted and not-admissible assumption. If wishes were horses, you know.
But you have offered no evidence — other than your pulled-from-the-gluteals assumption — that Obama was ever an undocumented baby, or that this procedure has any relevance to the Obama case at all. So far as we know from the State Department’s actions, Obama was born in Honolulu as the state certifies (but you refuse to accept, outside the law).
Witnesses would be probative, if there were any. Were there any? No one has any statements. There are no affidavits. There are no witnesses to contradict the state’s certified document. No case.
Show me the affidavit, sworn, notarized. You don’t have any such thing, nor does anyone else. No wonder the Washington federal court has moved to impose Rule 11 sanctions on the people who bother courts with this junk.
No documentation. No affidavits. Nothing that could be introduced in court. Irrelevant and non-probative even were there an affidavit.
Your claim to be human is questionable, given this exchange. It doesn’t pass the Turing Test.
So what?
Right. Like the Pope and the President, Seer and Revelator of the Mormons are Moslems. Were that relevant to your claims against Obama’s eligibility, they’d be similarly completely unevidenced.
But never saying what you claimed. That was my point. You can’t take note of Obama’s having visited Africa and claim he is a Marxist based on the existence of a photograph that documents his visit to Africa. Visiting Africa does not make one a Marxist.
It’s funny in retrospect that you were lecturing me on evidence a few posts back. I don’t think you know what a Marxist is, or what a Marxist would advocate, or why your claim is so bizarre and divorced from reality.
I didn’t say Islam has no ties to fascism. I don’t think you know the difference between communism and fascism, either.
Not that it matters. There’s no evidence to back up any of your claims. The complete lack of evidence, the lack of law to back your conspiracy claims, the complete fictions required to claim what you do — none of that has slowed you in the least.
Your claims against Obama are completely without foundation in fact. Increasingly, they are without foundation in reality. Isn’t New Mexico still part of Earth?
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I read your six items and they were not based in law or an accurate assessment of the facts.
My assumption Dunham did not have a Hawaii birth certificate is the FACT that Obama did not release a certified photostatic officially sealed copy which is available for $10.
FACT: As I demonstrated, under HRS § 338-5 you can force an agent to register an undocumented baby. If there is no document/birth certificate in the Hawaiian records, the witnesses to an African birth are significant and probative.
Your quote of the grandmother is essentially out of context and a lie of ommission. The grandmother has claimed she was present the African birth.
Obama’s associations with Rezco, his college financing and supporters for admissions, . . . all document Syrian and Palestinian connections. Obama’s claim to Christianity is questionable, considering his adherence to Cone’s writings and twenty years of Southside preaching from Rev. Wright. The Trinity Unity Church had close connections to the Black Muslim movement both personally and philosophically.
Scratch the black surface of a Trinity Unity Black Theology adherent and you get a Black Muslim.
It is obvious you are not reading my citations of law or news articles. Otherwise you would know Obama appeared several times, and was photographed speaking, with and for Raila Odinga.
Your denial Islam has any connections with Fascism or Marxism is naive to the extreme.
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Here’s a Time Magazine piece on Obama’s Kenyan step-grandmother. Notice she says nothing about his being born outside of Hawaii, but instead speaks of his first visit to Kenya as a young man.
http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1717590,00.html
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Of course he didn’t object. He lived in Hawaii at the time, too. Why would he object to noting his son’s birth in Honolulu? Sometimes people actually do tell the truth to official government bodies.
That would have been a material misstatement at the time. They were married. Obama, Jr. and his mother were not abandoned — heck, the divorce didn’t occur until 1964, nearly three years after Obama, Jr. was born. According to the divorce papers, there was no abandonment. If you wish to allege that Obama, Jr., was abandoned officially for the purposes of any immigration law, you’ll need to find the official court ruling of such abandonment. I’ve looked: There is no such document. The abandonment you allege, legally, did not happen.
In 1961? Or in your Bizarro World of Grand Conspiracies where the Baby Obama pulls miracles better than any Jesus did to plot his way to the presidency 47 years later?
If I were the Department of Health I’d be working to get accurate records. When the record of Obama’s birth came in from the hospital, I’d record it. Then I’d type up the list to send to the newspapers of births in Hawaii for the legal records section of the newspaper classifieds, which we know was done.
You assume, still, that the birth was not at a hospital, and with no attending physician. Why do you assume that? There’s no evidence to make that assertion.
But that statute is moot since Obama was born in Honolulu, according to the official, legal records which the State of Hawaii says are valid (by statute) and which the full faith and credit clause requires all states to offer, which the State Department found to be valid when they issued Obama’s passport, which the State Bar of Illinois found to be valid when they vetted Obama’s worthiness to be a lawyer, which the FBI found to be valid when they checked out Obama’s security clearance, which the CIA found to be valid when they checked out Obama to get the daily security briefing in the period between his getting the nomination and his swearing in.
You’ve never responded to the six rebuttable presumptioins I laid out describing how we know Obama’s eligibility is good. Why? (https://timpanogos.wordpress.com/2008/11/27/6-ways-challenges-to-obamas-citizenship-fail/ )
No, not without a legal proceeding. Parental rights do not lapse by mere operation of law. A court hearing is required. Where is that court hearing? Had there been such a hearing, the record would be public. You know no such hearing ever occurred, so your claims of abandonment are false.
Parental rights, governed by state law, can be severed only in a court hearing once established. Since Obama, Jr. was born in wedlock, there is a legal presumption of parental rights which would have to be severed by a court ruling even were it to be found that Obama, Sr. was not his biological father.
A court hearing is required to make your scenario work — there is no such hearing. U.S. law does not bow down to Indonesian law, nor any other. There would have to be a U.S. court procedure to make your lapse of Obama’s citizenship work, and we both know there was no such proceeding at any point.
Obama was born in wedlock, in Honolulu, and never abandoned for the purposes of this statute. Nor was there a writing putting Obama up for adoption. He was never adopted by anyone else. You know that would require a hearing, and there was no hearing.
Well, if so, I’m sure you have the photos of the two of them on the campaign stump, the reports from newspapers of record such as The New York Times or the International Herald Tribune or Agence France Presse or any of the other organizations that cover Africa — or the newspapers in Nairobi. Can we see them?
As to Obama giving $1 million, such a transfer would be flagged by the U.S. Treasury (anything larger than $10,000), would be in violation of the federal campaign laws, and would show up in the official records at the FEC. I gave you the link, and you did not find any such records. I think it’s safe to assume that no such donation was ever made. And from the wording of the e-mails you cited, I think it’s safe to say they are hoax writings, generated in Africa, and not in any way connected to Obama.
WorldNet Daily is a fiction outlet. No one should give credence to anything they publish. Especially when the official records do not corroborate their claims in any way, we can ignore those claims as wholly fictitious.
Obama also did not call on Odinga to send a man to the Moon, nor to increase or decrease use of DDT in Kenya — nor for any other purpose. It’s astounding how fiction writers can take an absence of communication to imply communication previously, when there is absolutely no evidence any communication ever took place.
Obama also didn’t call on you to stop being silly about this citizenship thing. The absence of that call would be taken as a command to proceed only by a complete fool, complete idiot, or vicious ideologue.
Male bovine excrement. Among other things, Islam is opposed to Marxism as a matter of faith. A “Marxist-Muslim” rule would be similar to a “Republican-Marxist” rule. It would be a nullity.
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Obama, Sr. did not challenge Dunham’s taking Jr. to Hawaii, or registering him as Hawaiian-born.
If born in Hawaii, the registration was a 14th Amendment issue. If asked where the father was, Dunham just had to say they were abandoned.
If you were the Dept. of Health agent taking information from Stanley Ann Dunham, holding a black baby who’s father was a non-resident alien, an ‘African,’ and she had no birth certificate, what questions would cross your mind?
There is a Hawaiian statute on how to register a foreign-born baby (citation ommitted).
However, with the father absent and refusing to live with or support the family, which his Columbia University scholarship provided, but not the Harvard scholarship, the father lost his legal definition as parent per se.
As requiring a court decision; only if that determination was challenged.
Here is 8 U.S.C. 1101(a) . . . way down near the end of the statute:
“(2) The terms “parent”, “father”, or “mother” mean a parent, father, or mother only where the relationship exists by reason of any of the circumstances set forth in subdivision (1) of this subsection, except that, for purposes of paragraph (1)(F) (other than the second proviso therein) in the case of a child born out of wedlock described in paragraph (1)(D) (and not described in paragraph (1)(C)), the term “parent” does not include the natural father of the child if the father has disappeared or abandoned or deserted the child or if the father has in writing irrevocably released the child for emigration and adoption.”
As to Obama’s involvement in the Kenyan elections, he contributed money, appeared with Raila Odinga, and did give that statement accusing Kibaki of voting “irregularities.” Thus, the riots. Instead of calming things down, as Condaleezza requested, he poured gasoline on the fire.
Here is an African condemnation of the media in general. I will continue to look for the article that specifically accuses Obama of giving Condaleezza the so-called finger by doing the opposite of what she asked.
http://www.zimbio.com/Kenya's+Political+Violence/articles/40/Journalism+Africa+Kenyan+media+accused+inciting
This isn’t the article I’m looking for, but it is close. It describes how deeply Obama was supporting the Muslim-Marxist Luo party.
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=78132
Here is a quote from near the end of the article:
“The ex-ODM sources said during the post-election violence Obama did not call on Odinga to drop his charges of voter fraud or to withdraw completely from his efforts to become head of state as a strategy to calm his Luo tribe supporters and bring a halt to the violence.”
I have a Lexis-Nexis account, but prefer to find article via Google first. ($$$)
With the problems in Somalia and Yemen, for Kenya to go from a British orderly Christian society to a Marxist-Muslim dictatorship with Sharia law written into the constitution would have been a blow to U.S. interests in Africa. Obama was supporting the Marxist-Muslim interests, a violation of the Logan Act. http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=NWIxNzA2ZmMwZTFkOWNjOWJhMmQyYWUzNTVjOGEyY2Q=
Here is a map showing the Saudi Arabian contiguous influence of Muslim terrorism into Africa. Note Yemen, Somalia, and Kenya. http://www.atlapedia.com/online/maps/political/Nth_Africa_E.htm
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Massacres in which Obama played no role, after elections in which Obama played no role, in which a man from Obama’s father’s home town whom Obama met once ran. No role for Obama, no relevance to any discussion about him.
There was a ship once named the Titanic. That does not mean that every thing that occurred in the movie of the same name is accurate. There is a politician in Kenya named Odinga. That has no bearing on anything President Obama did before or after assuming office as president.
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What abandonment? Abandonment requires a legal finding by a court. Got the records on that?
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Finally, here is a comment reply I made to a reader of my blog. I am participating on Fillmore because of Ed Darrell’s interest, and some of the strong participation in your comment section. A Mr. Wiseman mades some excellent contributions and deserves your attention.
“The Apuzzo quote from Kerchner is at http://www.therightsideoflife.com/?p=3039 . . . scroll a little over halfway down.
I quote it in my Hollister vs. Obama update at http://paralegalnm.wordpress.com/2009/03/19/hollister-vs-obama/
My research of Colon indicated it was the oldest city in Panama and, indeed, surrounded by the Panama Zone. The map also indicated this. As for not being sure, I would suggest reading case law on dual nationality. Terrazas, Bellei, and Elg come to mind. There is also the case of an American who participated in Israeli politics and joined the Army.
After reading case law and the statutes, you will understand that one of the keys to ‘natural born’ status is whether Naturalization Law had to be applied to the child’s nationality at birth, and the mechanics of birthright nationality has on choice of nationalities when the child reaches the age of majority/discretion.
In McCain’s case, while citizenship is covered by a special set of statutes, 8 U.S.C. 1403 and parallel military codes detailing registration of birth so passports and citizen status can be filed, no Naturalization Law per se had to be applied to ‘dealienage’ any Panamanian nationality. It is international practice not to confer any jus solis rights to children of active military or diplomats. This is a practice that goes back centuries, and makes very good sense.
With no jus solis Panamanian nationality, from the moment of birth and throughout his life John McCain had only one possible nationality, and was therefore a natural born citizen.
Compare this to Barack Obama. Even if the C.O.L.B. is verified by a root record of 1961 birth registration with a witnessed Hawaii birth certificate, his birth under British jurisdiction, even though shifted to U.S. jurisdiction due to abandonment by the father, allowed him birthright Kenyan citizenship. He also was naturalized as a minor and had rights to Indonesian citizenship through at least the age of 19 . . . under 1952 INA 301.
Having multiple nationalities/allegiances is contrary to the founder’s intent requiring a natural born citizen president, a special and unique stipulation designed to avoid any chances of natural foreign allegiances in a commander in chief.”
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As for Obama and his Hawaiian C.O.L.B., some of you have a real problem understanding that the Hawaiian Seal does not mean the C.O.L.B. data is confirmed, vetted, or ‘best evidence.’ It just means that document is the actual C.O.L.B., not a copy or fake.
In Mario Apuzzo’s Kerchner vs. Obama, this explanation of the potential for fraud and the necessity to double check data on a C.O.L.B. is in the complaint’s Endnote 7. Because many of you don’t read case law or the law suit complaints, I will direct you to both the complaint and my block quote of the Endnote for your convenience:
The Apuzzo quote from Kerchner is at http://www.therightsideoflife.com/?p=3039 . . . scroll a little over halfway down.
I quote it in my Hollister vs. Obama update at http://paralegalnm.wordpress.com/2009/03/19/hollister-vs-obama/
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As for WND wearing the ‘tin foil hat,’ I intentionally included parallel TIME and CNN articles whenever possible.
The TIME article about Condaleezza, Obama, and Odinga is cited in the Canadian Free Press article. There was a companion article August 28, 2008, if my memory serves, that was mostly about Odinga and the post-election massacres.
One article expanded on Condaleezza Rice being upset with Obama’s support of Odinga and when she asked him to quell the violence by making a statement to the Kenyans, Obama actually threw gasoline on the fire by insinuating that there was election fraud.
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Actually, Obama did not graduate summa cum lauda.
You’re hypnotized into the legend created by political advertising. Also, an expert has attributed the writing of his first book to Ayers based on analysis of metaphors and analogies, and paragraph structure.
If you’ve ever studied writing in preparation for doing it professionally, you’d understand how descriptive passages over thousands of words reveal the writer’s past experiences.
Obama’s writings, as well as Michelle’s, do not rise to that level of style.
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Good heavens! WND has fallen victim to a Kenyan scam!
It’s like a Nigerian scam, except it has the name Obama in it.
Paralegalnm said:
WND, assuming that readers were born yesterday, claims this was an e-mail from Obama’s office:
In other words, WND and Paralegalnm claim a guy who graduated first in his class at Harvard Law, a guy who wrote two best-selling books, writes like a Nigerian scam artist, forgetting syntax and grammar completely in corresponding with people in Africa. What are the odds?
Here, Pnm, go read the debunking of all of those claims at Snopes.com:
http://www.snopes.com/politics/obama/kenya.asp
A contribution from a U.S. PAC to a foreign campaign would be illegal. Any contribution from a U.S. federal candidate’s campaign in excess of $100,000 would be a felony of such proportions that no attorney could save the person who authorized it. There is so much wrong with that claim that any reasonable person’s excrement detector should have gone off at 120 decibels for an hour.
Here’s a good rule to follow: If WND says it, it’s probably not so.
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http://www.wnd.com/index.php?pageId=95772
That was the F.E.C. site cited in the WND article.
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Most legal fees are accrued at the beginning of a campaign when articles of incorporation and state filings are required.
See this article that cites F.E.C. records of legal fees paid out of the campaign treasury.
http://query.nictusa.com/pres/2009/Q1/C00431445/B_PAYEE_C00431445.html
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The State Seal is part of every state book of statutes, which includes the state constitution.
It makes the document official, but doesn’t guarantee the data is true. That is why, if you read the Hawaii Statutes entirely, there is a section on perjury when a citizen provides false information for official records.
Again, if there is no hospital birth certificate on record, there will still be the agent’s Compulsory Registration data . . . required under 338-5 even if the agent couldn’t confirm the parent’s claimed birth information.
That is why law suits were filed. That is why Obama refused to respond to Berg’s Rule 36 Request for Admissions. That is why Obama has spent $1 million to block access to his Hawaiian records.
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I started researching just what a C.O.L.B. was as opposed to the original birth certificate. This led to reading Hawaiian Statutes Revised, which I link in one of the previous posts.
At first I thought Obama’s mom got him registered as an out-of-state birth. That is Haw. Stat. Rev. § 338-17. However, a girl in Hawaii called the Department of Health for me and found out that the 338-17 C.O.L.B. would show the foreign state of birth.
This time, as all good paralegals (and lawyers) should do, I read all of Haw. Stat. Rev. and found § 338-5, the Compulsory Registration. I suggest you read it: http://www.capitol.hawaii.gov/hrscurrent/Vol06_Ch0321-0344/HRS0338/HRS_0338-0005.htm
Note in particular, “. . . legally authorized person in attendance at the birth; or if not so attended, by one of the parents.”
This means that if there was no official witness, the agent would rely entirely on the statement of the parent. If the child was born in a hospital, the “birth facility” would forward the appropriate documents.
That is why the original certificate is so important. If it does not exist, the Hawaiian agent would have still registered the data as supplied by the “parent.” That was compulsory.
But, without a Hawaii certificate, the child was born somewhere but an official birthing facility . . . Africa.
That is why the C.O.L.B. is deceptive. None of the information on it had to come from a birth certificate.
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Before I continue, my interest in Obama only started in Oct. 2008 when the Berg v. Obama case was publicized. As a paralegal, I read the .pdf files of Berg’s complaint and did some research of my own.
In fact, in November of 2008 I e-mailed Berg contradicting his conclusion that Stanley Ann Dunham did not fulfill a five-year residency requirement, post 14-years old, required to confer U.S. nationality upon little Obama, born on African soil, of course.
My reasoning was the Obama-Dunham marriage was void ab initio (from the outset) due to bigamy. Obama, Sr. was already married to Kezia in Kenya. This qualified Dunham for the out-of-wedlock provision. (8 U.S.C. 1409/1952 INA § 309)
I go into this further in my full blog . . . the last section. I footnote and cite all the laws, including Indonesian law and the Hague Conventions on Marriage.
This established Obama as having birthright to U.S. citizenship if born in Kenya, and 14th Amendment native birth born in Hawaii.
The questions remained, however, if Obama was a ‘natural born’ citizen, . . . and, if Obama was born in Africa as witnesses attested, how did he get a Hawaiian C.O.L.B.?
cont’d
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Wow. You’re all putting me through my paces.
Obama, as a new U.S. senator, had millions in his ‘war chest’ and donated $1 million to Raila Odinga. Raila Odinga is the son of Odinga Odinga, a fellow tribesman and friend of Obama, Sr.
http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=77508
If you don’t like WorldNetDaily, here is a very well-cited article in the Canadian Free Press
http://www.canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/4353
I used to have links to the original TIME magazine articles that confirm these stories, but the articles have been purged.
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I’d really like to know how a private citizen of not exactly uberwealthy means can influence an election in another country.
Para, the question still remains. If Barack Obama can’t legally be President…then why is it that the Republican’s didn’t jump on it?
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I’ll wager you can’t evidence that claim, either.
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There is no contrary evidence. It is backed by the State of Hawaii with its seal — the highest form of verification possible in U.S. law. There is need to produce the original only if there is a serious challenge to the accuracy of the data. Such a serious challenge would require production of evidence that, on its face (there’s that prima facie phrase again) makes a clear and credible contradiction of what is stated on the COLB.
Not to put too fine a point on it or anything, but you have no contradictory evidence for any of the information in the document. Nor does anyone else have it.
Without such a contradiction there is no genuine controversy. If you wish to get the case into court and not appear as a whining sore loser, you need firm evidence of error on that form. I don’t get to challenge your license in New Mexico by going into court and saying I suspect you’re a robot who cannot prove the place of yoru manufacture. That’s just not the way the law works. You don’t get to make similar allegations about Obama.
338-5 states the requirement that all births be registered. It does not permit fraudulent registrations. It requires that attending officials — physicians, midwives, parents, whoever — file the document. We know the document was filed as required by this law in 1961, because it was published in both local newspapers.
The law specifically says that the COLB IS THE OFFICIAL DOCUMENT. You can’t vitiate statutory law simply by saying you don’t like it.
Tell it to the Hawaii legislature. They wrote a law that says it is THE CERTIFICATE. I’ve quoted it and given you the link. Under U.S. law, we don’t get the privilege of ignoring statutory law on our own whim.
According to the statute, it means that the information contained on the certificate is backed by the State of Hawaii as accurate, and it’s valid as a birth certificate for all purposes except claiming land rights reserved for native Hawaiians. It’s fascinating to me that you can find the statute, read it, and then claim it doesn’t say what it says.
There is absolutely no evidence to support such a claim. Obama was born in a hospital. The data were reported to the state from the hospital, not from the parents, as best we know. In any case, the place of birth is Honolulu. There is no requirement that a natural born candidate for the presidency be born in a hospital. You have offered no evidence that the certified as truthful statement from the State of Hawaii is in error, nor has anyone else.
You do not know that. There is no claim that the document is unwitnessed by anyone in any position to know.
You’re assuming the report did not come from the attending physician at the hospital. You’ve offered no evidence to contradict the hospital birth, nor has anyone else.
The issue turns on evidence. Which of those statements is it that you claim to be in error, or false, and what evidence have you that would stand up in court to corroborate your claim? You have nothing.
Not to put too fine a point on it again, but there is no testimony from a grandmother claiming she witnessed the birth of Barack Obama, Jr., in Africa. There is no such affidavit. There is no corroborating evidence. There are cranks and hoaxers who claim to have such evidence, but oddly it never makes it to court where it would count.
These people are hoaxing you. Your fight is with them, not Obama.
Privacy laws in Kenya wouldn’t protect Obama. Why don’t you get the African birth certificate? This issue has been hanging fire for more than a year now, and nobody has the sense to get the evidence that would win the case for you? Excuse me, but “Your honor, a dog in Mombasa ate my evidence” isn’t going to hold up in a U.S. court.
From my perspective it seems obvious you’ve done very little litigation, very little work in evidence, and you have no clue about due diligence and how documents are proved for recording purposes. You appear to have access to a recent edition of Black’s. Look up “seal,” and look again at the seal on the document the State of Hawaii offers as proof.
Now put yourself in the position of someone doing due diligence, trying to determine whether Obama has the legal capacity to sign a document as Barack Obama, Jr. Which piece of the evidence you have suggested so far could be used to deny a document offered under seal from the State of Hawaii? None.
This is a case that turns on evidence. Got any? We’ve seen none so far. Case dismissed.
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I just explained to you how, under Hawaiian law, Obama’s birth could have been registered without proof of Hawaiian birth.
Therefore, without the birth certificate, or data in lieu of certificate (HRS 338-14.3) the information on the C.O.L.B. is unverified and possibly false.
The fact Obama refuses access to the birth data the C.O.L.B. was generated from indicates it is unverified and filed under HRS 338-5, which means he wasn’t born in Hawaii.
As for ACORN, that was his job as ‘community organizer.’ That is public knowledge. As for legal fees, the firms representing him are public knowledge, and their fees are not publicized, but reported to have been over $800,000 . . . and they have been added to since then.
You don’t know anything about your own candidate, and the media refused to publish the available facts.
I bet you don’t know anything about Obama’s interference with the 2008 Kenyan elections contrary to U.S. interests.
I may be sporting a fine tin foil chapeau, but you have a blindfold and earplugs.
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No. You don’t get it ‘fine.’ It is not ‘best evidence’ . . . it is inferior evidence that must be backed up with production of the original data.
No, I don’t need “firm” evidence of error. Doing research and noting contradicting evidence of African birth, I discovered the 338-5 statute that allows a fraudulent registration. The C.O.L.B. is fraudulent as well, unless it is backed by an official witnessed birth certificate.
No, no, no . . . it is NOT THE CERTIFICATE. It is a certification of birth data. There is a legal and evidentiary difference.
NO . . . the seal only means the C.O.L.B. is genuine. The data is still subject to the original registration information taken by the clerk in 1961.
No, again. Your citation of Hawaiian law concerning altered certificates only voids the immediate document if tampered with. If the original birth data taken by the clerk in 1961 was solely relying on the parent’s claims of time and place of birth, the data is worthless as it is unwitnessed. In the law, the clerk is required to attempt to confirm the parent’s information. If he can’t, he can’t issue a certificate but only the 338-5 compulsory registration.
Yes, you DO need to know the source of the data. Just because a clerk wrote it down and a key entry clerk typed it into a computer 20 years later doesn’t make it true . . . see the terms of the compulsory registration. Even if the parent is lying, the clerk is forced to enter the data.
Without the original certificate, there is no proof of where Obama was born except his grandmother’s personal testimony she witnessed the birth in Africa. There is also a Momabasa official who let it slip he had the African birth certificate, and the Imam who blessed the baby. These are eye-witnesses, as opposed to the Hawaiian clerk.
I truly can’t believe you are an attorney. You know nothing about evidence. Your definition of a seal is crazy.
As for 2012, Obama will not be a candidate. I can guarantee you that. Hopefully, our efforts will neuter him before the 2010 election, and his ‘Hugo Chavez’ style of governing will be seen for what it is when 15% of Americans are out of work and the banks shutting down because of Obama’s socialist policies.
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I wish I had the tinfoil hat concession for your convention. The Community Reinvestment Act required that banks not deny loans to people who qualified for them despite their property being on the poor side of town. It did not require the questionable loans that caused the current problems. If you checked the facts you’d discover that the loans under CRIA have a lower default rate than others. Perhaps the Martians are pumping gas into your bedroom at night and clouding your judgment?
What bizarre lunacy has gripped you now? “World socialism?” I’ll wager you can’t define socialism, let alone recognize it if it were to bless you with health care or some other benefit. Luo tribesmen as Marxists? It’s a bit early for the peyote crop in New Mexico, isn’t it?
You birthers keep going after you’ve cracked. What makes you think Obama wouldn’t even were you able to get to him?
There is so much contrived, wholly baseless stuff in your claims — calculating legal fees from a Google search? — it’s a wonder you can keep it straight. Courts take only real cases and controversies. Your bizarre conspiracy ideas don’t even qualify as sane, let alone real controversies.
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I get it fine. Prima facie evidence means that it makes sense on the first look. That’s not a lesser category of evidence, but rather a measure of whether it makes the case. The document from the State of Hawaii makes the case.
You appear not to get the point that in order to rebut this statement, certified as correct by the state, you need to have some firm evidence of error. A suspicion, a wild-hare wish, is not evidence. You’d need to have clear evidence that there is error in the place or parentage or other details. You’ve got none of that, nor does anyone else.
As best we know, this is based on official reports by the hospital to the state government. It’s not Mrs. Obama making any kind of claim. You’d think that, were this certificate in error, some evidence of the error would be available — and yet there is not even a whisper.
Under Hawaiian law, this IS the birth certificate. You appear to fail to understand what it means when the State of Hawaii certifies it as correct. This is a legal document, good for all purposes. Under Hawaiian law, it IS the birth certificate for all legal purposes.
See the Statutes of Hawaii, 338.13
Sections 17 and 18 deal with altered certificates, which must carry a note of the alteration on the COLB. Since there is no notation on the COLB that the place of birth has been altered, there is no reason to go any further with your bluff. Courts don’t work on bluffs anyway, but if they did, yours would be done in by anyone who reads the law.
You don’t need to know the source of the data. It’s certified as correct by Hawaii. There is no hint of any evidence to suggest Hawaii erred.
There is no Africa witness who has given a clear affidavit countering the claim, not one that will hold up in any evidentiary hearing (which is why you don’t see them in court — no attorney, even scam attorneys like Berg, wants to risk going to jail over their fraud).
The state certifies that Obama was born in Honolulu. The COLB contains no notation that the place of birth has been altered, as it would need to do according to Hawaiian statute, were that the case. The case for Obama’s Honolulu birth remains absolutely unchallenged for court purposes.
This is a document under seal. The seal from the State of Hawaii is the seal of the king in this case (almost literally)– and it certifies that the information is correct. You’ve got nothing to contradict it. A document done under seal may be rebutted, but it may not be questioned without evidence to back up the rebuttal. You’ve got no evidence.
The short form contains all the information the long form contains that is relevant to this case. In order to dispute the official records of the State of Hawaii, one would need more than hatred for Obama to get into court. None of these cases offers anything more than a blind, stupid hatred of Obama. There is no evidence to contradict the Hawaiian records.
Don’t like it? Get active in a political party, nominate someone else to run against Obama in 2012. That would be the honorable and honest thing to do.
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Actually, it was Obama who was bluffing and no-one called it except Phil Berg, Leo Donofrio, Orly Taitz, John Hemenway, Alan Keyes and researchers like me.
The C.O.L.B. was a bluff card showing and the million Obama spent was his bet raising the pot. Conservatives don’t have the lawyers or funding . . . and the bureaucrats responsible for due diligence folded as well.
‘Bluffing’ was a good analogy, I just had it reversed.
Now, to your argument.
I’ve explained the limited value of prima facie evidence, but you don’t seem to get it.
We are dealing with official documents which comes under the general heading of hearsay exemptions. The C.O.L.B. is not backed up by ‘full faith and credit’ or ‘privileges and immunities.’ It is merely a computer-generated form, like a form letter. It only represents the original document in a limited fashion.
The C.O.L.B. is challenged when its source of data is in question. In this case, we don’t know if it is off an official hospital birth certificate or the limited HRS 338-5 Compulsory registration. If the latter, the probative value of the C.O.L.B. is zero . . . especially in the face of contradictory evidence which exists in testimony of African witnesses on tape and affidavits.
The ‘form letter’ C.O.L.B. is signed and sealed by the Dept. of Health certifying it came from the department, but the accuracy and probative value of the C.O.L.B. depends on the original birth data from 1961 that was compiled into a computer database, probably in the 1990’s when computers gained popularity. Remember, there were no computers in 1961.
In 1990-something, Hawaii computerized their birth data records. Instead of taking a clerk an hour to process a birth certificate request by physically pulling the original and photocopying and stamping it, now all the clerk has to do is punch in your name and insert the proper form in the printer. It is no more complicated than getting a printout of your driving record.
So, when Obama presents the C.O.L.B. to the electorate and is sued for not complying with Article II eligibility, he has two hurdles.
1) Proof of Native Born Citizenship under the 14th Amendment and 8 U.S.C. 1401. He MUST produce the original 1961 Birth Certificate from which his 1990 Hawaiian database was compiled.
Because he spent one million dollars (Google all the law firms hired, I think in 44 states now, to fight eligibility challenges and in Hawaiian court in the Lingle case) instead of $10 for the original certificate, we have circumstantial proof he doesn’t have a Hawaii birth certificate, only the HRS 338-5 compulsory registration based on unsubstantiated claims of the mother/parent. (Did you even read the Hawaiian statute?)
Conclusion: He has no Hawaiian birth certificate and his mother committed perjury in registering him as Hawaiian born.
2) A Natural Born Citizen is distinctively different from a Native Born Citizen.
From Vattel to John Jay to the authors of the 14th Amendment, a natural born citizen is free of alienage by ‘nature.’ We are talking Natural Law and the natural flow of allegiance from the father.
You cannot have a natural born citizen with dual nationalities at birth, for upon reaching the age of discretion a choice of one nation’s jurisdiction may be that of convenience, not of birth.
Finally, it will only take a couple congressmen to justify the research and legal claims made against Barack Obama. The birth certificate and analysis of his constitutional eligibility is supported by the highest law of the land, and to ignore it is to submit to lawlessness. Look up ‘lawlessness’ in your law dictionary, and it speaks for itself.
As for G.W. Bush being AWOL, there was no ducking except for all the mud-slinging, and his paperwork and commanding officer subtantiated his fulfillment of National Guard duty.
Barack Obama is not an honest man. His earmark as a freshman senator to his wife’s hospital went right into his pocket via a 260% increase in her salary. That is conversion, a crime. It is documented.
Obama’s ‘legislated’ favors to friends resulted in hundreds of thousands of dollars disappearing. Rezco is in federal prison for fraudulent use of millions from Obama.
Obama was an attorney and trainer for Community Re-Investment Act extortion of local banks to produce CRA mortgages, which over the years practically brought down the international banking system . . . with a little help from George Soros.
Barack Obama is an enemy of the Republic . . . his loyalties are to world Socialism and by blood to his Marxist-Muslim Luo tribesmen in Kenya.
We will never stop going after Obama. Eventually he will crack and we’ll be done with him.
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Honesty wins out in the end. Of course you’re bluffing, just as you’re bluffing with the claim that Obama has spent a significant amount of money defending the case. There is no such accounting available, and certainly not in public records. That’s purely fatuous.
The State of Hawaii certifies that the document is accurate. There is not an iota of evidence from any source to challenge any part of the document.
Our prurient curiosity is not justification to require opening these records if Obama doesn’t want to.
I am reminded of an earlier case where a public official did not disclose a birth certificate. There was no compelling need, but a reporter friend was able to spend a few days on vacation and track down the document. It turned out that the certificate showed a physical condition, corrected by surgery, that the official preferred not to have disclosed. Justification enough.
Unless there is evidence to challenge the accuracy of the document, and there is not, why are y’all harassing the president? Is there any way to view this other than racist and political? No other presidential candidate has ever undergone this level of scrutiny, nor been asked to.
Your campaign against the president is Quixotic at its best, but deeply embarrassing to the nation, and damaging to the national discussion of issues.
Where were you when George Bush was ducking the explanations for his being AWOL?
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The jurisprudence of contradicting prima facie evidence does not require submitting proof of an alternative. Merely objecting to the evidence until the person relying on prima facie produces the original data or certificates is enough.
Remember, the C.O.L.B. is only a computer generated form from a database compiled in the 1990’s. I believe, the form was shortened/abbreviated further in the 2001 version of the form. The form version is in fine print at one of the bottom corners.
The challenge is not baseless. If the original birth certificate witnessed by a Hawaiian doctor is produced (best evidence rule), then the Fukino press release was intended in the best light.
But . . . Obama never released a certified photostatic sealed copy of the birth certificate, which costs $10 per statute, or current reasonable fees to pull the physical copy and photograph it.
If Obama had this copy, questions of his ‘native’ Hawaiian birth would have been put to rest, and then you just have the question of dual nationality, and the jurisdiction over the father versus the mother (jus solis).
In my study of naturalization law, jus sanguinis is primary, not the place of birth.
But, back to your demand I produce contradictory evidence. I am bluffing, based on the fact Obama has spent $1 million instead of $10, that Obama doesn’t have a Hawaiian birth certificate, and his registration data from which the C.O.L.B. was generated was perjurous information provided by the mother through the compulsory registration statute, HRS § 338-5. $1 million is quite a ‘tell.’
If all Obama can produce is the 338-5 birth data, then his claim of Hawaiian birth is impeached by the affidavits and recordings in Kenya from witnesses to his birth there. They are superior evidence contradicting the C.O.L.B.
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There is not contradictory evidence. Certainly you’ve offered none here, nor at your blog.
Summary judgment to Obama.
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Well. Now we are at least approaching a legal argument.
Here is a jpeg of Obama’s Hawaiian C.O.L.B. which I stipulate for purposes of this argument is genuine.
Fact #1 It is not a Birth Certificate but a ‘Certification of Live Birth.’ The distinction is that a certificate is produced by a hospital or licensed midwife and is signed and witnessed. The certification is merely a computer-generated form with birth information selected, albeit limited, from a computer database. Note: there were no computer databases in 1961 . . . there still are birth certificates.
Fact #2 There are no witnesses listed. The C.O.L.B. is merely an affidavit, the affiant being the mother. If the Dept of Health clerk can not confirm the verbal claims of the mother by telephone to hospitals, etc., he must still register the child. The mother may be advised this is an official document relied upon by government agencies and courts and false information is therefore perjury.
Fact #3 Use the little magnifying cursor and blow up the C.O.L.B. so you can read the fine print at the bottome. It reads, “This copy serves as prima facie evidence of the fact of the birth in any court prodedure.” Laws cited, HRS §338-13(b), HRS §338-19. If you want to review Hawaii Dept. of Health Birth and Death data law, all these statutes can accessed via the URL’s I posted in the previous comments.
Def. prima facie evidence — “Evidence that will establish a fact or sustain a judgment unless contradictory evidence is produced.” Black’s Law Dictionary. 7th Ed. West Group, St. Paul, MN (1999)
Therefore, a C.O.L.B. is not documentary evidence or best evidence. Even the signed and sealed C.O.L.B. is only proof of Hawaiian birth if witnesses other than the affiant or clerk are recorded. That data is on the original birth certificate, or official data in lieu of the certificate. HRS § 338-14.3
Conclusion #1 With the affidavits and recordings from Africa testifying an African birth, the presenter of the Hawaiian C.O.L.B. is obligated to produce the original data or birth document with witnesses.
Conclusion #2 No matter how significant proof of ‘native’ Hawaiian birth may be for press releases, the fact that Obama’s father was a non-resident alien (student) who conferred British/Kenyan nationality which remained active with Obama until the age of discretion and fulfillment of 1952 INA 301. Dual nationality and multiple choices of allegiance, citizenship, and jurisdiction of law does not rise to the level of a ‘natural born’ citizen, where only one nationality flows naturally from the parents.
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Your entire case turns on your request that we ignore the fact that the COLB is a certified document from the State of Hawaii, sufficient for all purposes except establishing membership as a member of that elite group of people known as native Hawaiians.
Obama doesn’t claim to be a member of the Hawaiian native group.
You ignore well-established case law that this is THE valid birth certificate.
Why?
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1) One must assume the Hawaiian C.O.L.B. is invalid proof of Hawaiian birth because Obama will not provide the original 1961 data used to format the computer-generated form has been sealed. Again, once prima facie evidence (the C.O.L.B. is labeled officially as prima facie evidence) its probative value relies on original data from where the computer database was generated.
That is the jurisprudence of prima facie evidence as so well-described in Endnote 12 of Kerchner vs. Obama et al. See blocked quote at http://paralegalnm.wordpress.com/2009/03/19/hollister-vs-obama/
2) The 14th Amendment defines ‘citizens and nationals’ at birth. But, there is a legal distinction between a native born citizen and natural born citizen. Sen. John Bingham, the chief author of the 14th Amendment (mirrored in 8 U.S.C. 1401) defined in the official record natural born to be of two U.S. citizens of only one possible allegiance. See my letter to the justices of the supreme court, paragraph 3, at http://paralegalnm.wordpress.com/2009/05/16/my-letter-to-justices-roberts-scalia-alito-thomas-and-kennedy/
3) The C.O.L.B. is not sufficient documentation of U.S. or Hawaii birth even under Hawaiian law. Many states require a certified copy of your birth certificate for a new drivers license application.
Hawaii’s own D.H.H.L. program, giving enhanced land ownership benefits to indiginous Hawaiians, warned applicants that the C.O.L.B. is not proof and requires the Department extra time and money to research the original birth data in lieu of the certificate. See Haw. Rev. Stat. § 338-14.3 and the ‘Hollister vs. Obama’ post on my blog, heading the Endnote 12 citation.
You can also access the Hawaii DHHL site directly. I used to have the URL for the instructions to applicants that asked for the original certificate, or the department would have to do further research to confirm Hawaiian birth. Cf. Haw. Rev. Stat. §338-5 where the compulsory registration requires the Dept. of Health clerk to search for official witnesses of birth before registering the documentless child.
4) I never suggested the Leahy commission on the 14th Amendment was authoritative, or law. It is persuasive legislative history. Unfortunately, the congressmen didn’t have the cojones to follow up on their findings to perform their constitutional duties.
Conclusion: Because Obama refused to risk perjury by answering attorney Phil Berg’s Rule 36 Request for Admissions, and continues to refuse to submit a certified witnessed copy of his 1961 birth documentation, one must conclude that the million or so dollars spent on legal fees versus the $10 to produce a birth certificate indicate lack of evidence of Hawaiian birth. See fee schedule at http://www.capitol.hawaii.gov/hrscurrent/Vol06_Ch0321-0344/HRS0338/HRS_0338-0014_0005.htm
I am arguing evidence. Such challenges in court would dismiss the C.O.L.B. as evidence under the ‘best evidence’ rule. That is why I ‘dismiss’ the C.O.L.B. as evidence of Hawaiian birth in favor of the Berg and Corsi affidavits and public recordings of African birth. The African evidence is witnessed . . . the C.O.L.B. is not.
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Generally, Paralegalnm’s claims all assume that Obama wasn’t born in Hawaii, nor to a U.S. citizen. All of the analysis depends on both of those facts being accurate — but there’s not an iota of evidence to support either claim, and we have certified documents refuting both claims. From the start, then, there is no case against Obama’s eligibility here.
Check that citation “8 U.S.C. 1101(a)(44)(b)(2).” I think it may not say what you think it says. Is there a typo in there?
You’re assuming Obama wasn’t born in the USA. As Nick indicated, Hawaii is very much a state in the union. You’d have a helluvan evidentiary slope to climb to indicate otherwise.
You’re assuming Obama’s mother was not a U.S. citizen. There’s no evidence to that claim.
You’re assuming Obama’s father’s British citizenship would be found to trump U.S. law on citizenship, and that Obama would be found to be a British citizen. Again, there’s no case law to support such an assumption, and no evidence such a claim would gain any traction anywhere.
U.S. law on citizenship most definitely does supersede Indonesian and British law. Your claim that U.S. courts would concede jurisdiction on an issue of citizenship for a kid born in the U.S. is just bizarre. Ain’t gonna happen. You want citations? Good heavens! Where is there any citation to support your claim? There is none.
You assert “abandonment,” but legally, that’s not what happened. There was a divorce. The divorce papers have been made public. There was no legal action to affect Barack Obama, Jr.’s citizenship. None whatsoever. You’ve offered no evidence, and the evidence we have refutes your claims. In the complete absence of evidence to back your claims, who needs legal citations?
And the legal documents supporting your claim are . . . where? A U.S. citizen’s marriage to a foreigner does not vitiate the U.S. citizen’s citizenship. “Accepted Indonesian jurisdiction” is a claim that would require evidence — court document, the naturalization papers, something other than a bald assertion that it happened.
Have you any evidence?
But since he didn’t either move to Kenya nor stay with his mother in Indonesia, this is of no concern whatsoever. Again, you assert an operation of law for which there is absolutely no evidence. The facts are clear: Obam, a natural born U.S. citizen since birth, after a short stay with his mother in Indonesia, a lived in Hawaii, graduated from a high school in Honolulu. His citizenship has never been questioned.
Plus, your operation of law here is based on your unevidenced and unwarranted claim that Obama was a British citizen and not a U.S. citizen. Your scenario assumes that U.S. citizenship didn’t exist. That’s not what the facts show.
There is no operation of law that would alter his citizenship if he had been abandoned by his mother, so this is an irrelevant claim. But there is no evidence that he was abandoned by his mother, either, not in the legal sense you’re trying to make it.
You’re assuming again that he was not born a U.S. citizen. No evidence. Since he was born in Hawaii, he remained a natural born U.S. citizen at age 19, and 20, and 21, and so on, until now. His birth in Hawaii to a U.S. citizen qualified him as a natural born U.S. citizen at birth.
There is no law that could have deprived Obama of U.S. citizenship at birth, since he was the child of a U.S. citizen, OR since he was born on U.S. soil. You offer no evidence of any proceeding to apply any naturalization law to change Obama’s status at any time in any place. Without such evidence, there is no claim against his eligibility.
To the contrary, we can call him a natural born citizen under even the most crabbed, conservative interpretations of the 14th Amendment. A child born on U.S. soil to a U.S. citizen is a U.S. citizen, and the full faith and credit clause, and other provisions, require all states to recognize Hawaii’s certification of that fact.
Read 8 U.S.C. 1401:
Period. End of argument.
Obama was not born out of wedlock. That provision wouldn’t apply to him. Instead, the clause that says a kid is a U.S. citizen if born on U.S. soil, covers him.
Obama is considered a natural born citizen because he was born on U.S. soil. Obama would also be considered a natural born citizen because he was born to a U.S. citizen.
I’d be surprised if the findings support any claim against Obama, and I suspect you would be, too. A footnote on a Congressional study is not U.S. law. A Congressional study is not U.S. law. It’s irrelevant to the case here.
What the case for Obama’s eligibility turns on is evidence. There is a certificate, a state certified certificate, saying he was born to a U.S. citizen on U.S. soil. You’ve got nothing to contradict that official document. That claim has been checked by the U.S. State Department when they issued Obama a passport, by the FBI and CIA when he was checked for security purposes, and John McCain’s and Hillary Clinton’s lawyers and opposition research teams checked all that stuff with a fine-toothed comb. You’ve got nothing to suggest all of those people were completely incompetent for the entire period of the last 30 years.
You’ve made no case to cite law against. You’ve offered absolutely no evidence that the Hawaiian birth certificate should not be honored as federal law and the Constitution require. Your case might be subject to a Rule 11 sanction if it were offered in federal court, but there’s no other citation required.
Summary judgment for Obama. 7.5 more years.
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As a paralegal, I researched and wrote for lawyers. My training was formal over the course of two years and intensely unforgiving. My instructors were lawyers that demanded perfection.
I also sued lawyers in small claims and Federal District court, and won. The only reason I didn’t go to law school was being hospitalized with Guillain-Barre’ Syndrome and deciding to enjoy my silver years in my photography studio.
Now, to your blog’s claim that Obama is eligible to be president, and a good man.
Your arguments are baseless. By that I mean your logic is not only completely lacking, but unsupported by law. U.S. law did not supercede British or Indonesian laws. As a baby, Obama, Jr. was abandoned. Under both British law and 8 U.S.C. 1101(a)(44)(b)(2) failure to support and/or register a child with the British secretary of state costs the father legal status as ‘parent.’
In this case, in the first year of Obama’s life, his primary nationality as British subject transferred to the mother.
When the mother remarried and moved to Indonesia, she accepted Indonesian jurisdiction and Obama was naturalized as a minor. Jumping ahead, Obama could have gone back to Kenya with his father’s family or stayed with his mother in Indonesia. In those cases, his U.S. birthright nationality would have expired at age 24. See 1952 INA §301(a), 8 U.S.C. 1401(g)
Instead, Obama was abandoned by his mother as well and grew up with his grandparents. When he reached the ‘age of discretion,’ his choice to remain in the U.S. qualified him as a U.S. citizen as early as age 19.
Naturalization law was applied twice to dealienage Obama. Once at birth, and the second time at age 19. By no means is a citizen determined by naturalization law a ‘natural born citizen.’
Even under the most liberal interpretations of the 14th Amendment, or 8 U.S.C. 1401, can you call Barack Hussen Obama a natural born citizen.
Now, for Mr. Kelsier. Place of birth, or jus soli, is a minor contributor to citizenship. Most Americans think it is because of the recent misinterpretation of the 14th Amendment.
However, the nationality of your parents and the jurisdiction of their domicile is the main determination of your citizenship. The nationality of the father is the primary determination (jus sanguinis), but with the out-of-wedlock birth rate now at 40% in the U.S., statutory provisions come into play. See 8 U.S.C. 1409(c)
Just as domicile legally determines under which jurisdiction probate is performed, domicile/legal residency and nationality of the parents is what determines the nationality and citizenship of the child.
John McCain was considered a ‘natural born’ citizen because: 1) He was born of two U.S. citizens legally residing under U.S. jurisdiction. 2) That jurisdiction was extended to their duties as active military, and on U.S. controlled territory.
Attorney Leo Donofrio has debated me, claiming the hospital in Colon was technically not ‘U.S. Territory,’ but Colon was surrounded by U.S. control, and the status of active military of the parents was more a factor than stepping across a diplomatic line to enter a hospital for one day.
When considered in the light of naturalization law, no law was required to de-alienage John McCain. Therefore, he had only one possible citizenship and nationality. No Panamanian nationality was conferred. Yes, 8 U.S.C. 1403 was written specifically for Panamanian births, but being active military put the McCains on the level of diplomatic service.
There is a court case where U.S. nationality was denied a birth to a U.S. serviceman and a Panamanian woman. It was denied because he was not active military.
If you are stuck on a ‘native born’ 14th Amendment baby being a citizen, and conflate that misconception with ‘natural born,’ you have some studying to do. In my blog, there is a footnote citing a congressional study lead by Sen. Leahy. You’d be surprised what the findings of that study were.
As for Mr. Darrell being a lawyer, I would suggest he start acting like one. Read some case law for God’s sake . . . cite some law . . . apply history . . . common law . . . common sense dammit.
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He was born in Hawaii, Para, that’s been proven. Hawaii is a state in the United States.
If John Mccain was eligble to be President despite being born in Panama, Para, then Obama is at least as eligble.
So why don’t you admit what your problem really is. Your problem..the only reason you are engaging in this nonsense is that you are pissed off that the citizens of the United States elected a Democrat President.
Because the only other possible reason for your umbrage is something far more insidious.
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And you claim to be a paralegal struggling in New Mexico, but you offer grand conclusions of law about U.S. immigration law about which you are not qualified to speak. Footnotes do not denote wisdom, nor accuracy.
I’ve noted the legal arguments — without footnotes, to your irritation I’m sure — in two earlier posts. Why not address the legal arguments, instead of trying to trump my authority? If you’ve got the legal arguments, tell us how you plan to overcome these six legal presumptions.
In the end, the fact that I am an lawyer has no particular significance, other than to trump your claims as the authority. Forget about argument from authority, and argue from fact: Who has the affidavits contesting Obama’s Honolulu birth? What do they allege that can be corroborated, that isn’t clearly whole cloth bumcombe?
If you claim British law should govern Obama’s citizenship, explain: Why do you think Americans should capitulate that point of the Constitution to Britain? Under American law, the Constitution and the laws made under it are the Supreme Law of the land; traditionally, and by statute, we have ruled who is a U.S. citizen under U.S. law. You’ve proposed to let British law prevail against the claims of a U.S. citizen and U.S. law. Why?
Ultimately, were there any hope of getting this case to court, you’d need solid evidence to overcome one of the six presumptions I noted. Legal arguments won’t cut it, no matter how clever or squirrelly. So I’m especially interested to see whether you’ve got any evidence. So far, no one has presented an iota of evidence against Obama and Hawaii in any of the cases. I cannot imagine that people would withhold such evidence if they have it, but you may have your reasons — but please tell us, what evidence have you got?
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“Lawyers and scholars have looked at the issue through the years, and intensely this year, and arrived at the conclusion that Obama is perfectly eligible for the presidency.”
You suggest you are an attorney. Yet, your blog contains no citations of law except a back-handed slap at a constitutional clause John Jay suggested to distinguish the allegiances of a natural born citizen to that of merely a native born or naturalized one.
‘Perfectly eligible?’ Well, how can one argue with that . . . except to ask, ‘What conditions of birth and nationality perfect a natural born citizen, as distinguished from a native born or naturalized citizen?’
No citations of law. No logic. No TRUTH. No Jurisprudence. No case law. Nothing . . . is this some kind of joke?
If you want citations of law, briefs of case law, statutes, codes, history, interpretations, jurisprudence . . . go to http://paralegalnm.wordpress.com/2009/02/27/barack-hussein-obama-a-natural-born-subject-of-great-britain/
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[…] Without hysterics […]
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“Crime is contagious. If the government becomes a lawbreaker, it breeds contempt for law; it invites every man to become a law unto himself; it invites anarchy.”
Given the past eight years, we are now living in an anarchy?
Seriously, using your own logic, our government should have suffered complete collapse under the majority, if not all, of the administrations in our history.
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I assume your reference to rational and informed discussion precludes me from the “Obama hating wingnut” category? I can only hope! Thank you for recognition of the effort I put into my prior post, truly a labor of love.
To address your comment “I think that had anyone posed the hypothetical of a kid born in Kentucky to an American woman and a father who was in the U.S. visiting from Britain, the sponsors wouldn’t say the child was ineligible for office. “ I would respectfully disagree, keep in mind, that the Revolution and War of 1812 were fought with Britain, moreover, Britain was a primary trade partner and benefactor of the South during the Civil War. In fact, I would venture to say that contempt for blacks, perhaps made them less a threat as who would vote for a negro? Rather, an attempt at breeding Royalists would have been a far greater threat to the founders than blacks at the time. Remember, that the majority of the Founders themselves had split loyalties owing to a “dual citizenship” by virtue of British patriarchal lineage.
Recognizing this, they made themselves ineligible by the natural born citizenship test, but grandfathered themselves in by the “or citizen at the time of ratification” clause knowing that the vast majority of Loyalists had either fled or would publically disavow their affinity for Britain knowing the backlash they would receive, legal or otherwise much less openly run for office. What would happen after their generation had all died off was unknown but they were duty bound to prevent anyone with even the hint of dual loyalties to ever become President and Commander in Chief of the armed forces.
I agree with your belief that “sometimes we should let wisdom and justice triumph over the mere letter of the law.” I question given the current state of politics, if the entire congress has the combined, could rise to the level of wisdom of one of the Founding Fathers.
I can certainly empathize with those who may feel that the significance of Obama’s election should outweigh “mere technicalities” the problem is that when we make subjective decisions to overlook technicalities, where is the line then drawn? You cannot be “sort of” pregnant or “sort of” break the law. It is fine to make exceptions when the outcome be benign or even beneficial, but racist intentions aside, the intent of the Founding Fathers and drafters of the 14th Amendment are explicit as to the definition of “natural born citizen”. If Obama is confirmed as President, may I then subjectively choose which statutes that were signed into law by his pen I want to follow or not follow? For if it is subjective upon the interests of the populous that he become president, I indeed as does every other American, would then have a technical basis upon which to claim we are not subject to his authority. Imagine the breakdown in the military chain of command if officers have no authority upon which to carry out the will of the commander in chief and enlisted men must, under the UCMJ must refuse to obey unlawful orders.
As a historical side-note, I would point out that the 14th Amendment was only meant to preclude American Indian tribes which were not taxed by the Federal Government as they were purely sovereign tribes and treated for the purposes of citizenship as foreign nationals. Even conceding that this is an outdated and perhaps even racist Constitutional prohibition, (Art. 1 Sec. 2 and 14th Amendment), which may in fact be the time to revisit and amend, but it cannot be ignored simply out of inconvenience or political correctness. I am quite aware of the fact that many voters would feel disenfranchised, but they have only their candidate to blame for such misgivings.
Consider the following: If a candidate were found to have lied about their year of birth and was born on January 21st 1975 and therefore on January 20, 2009, the day of his inauguration, he was 1 day shy of being 35, the Constitutional pre-requisite, should he be deemed as ineligible? Do we change the hour or day of the inauguration simply to conform to his birth certificate, or do we provide equal protection under the law? Should it matter that he won by a 5, 15, or 30% margin? If we were to overlook this “mere technicality” mustn’t we therefore ignore the difference between 1 day, 1 week or 1 year eligible of a similar candidate? Upon what objective basis do qualify constitutional mandates? How is the instant opinion of a multitude of people taken at a single snapshot of history, more rational and less subjective than the Constitution and Amendment thereto which was debated, deliberated and ratified by 2/3 of each house in Congress and subsequently by 2/3 of the states of the Union?
“In a government of laws, the existence of the government will be imperiled if it fails to observe the law scrupulously. Our government is the potent, the omnipresent teacher. For good or for ill, it teaches the whole people by its example. Crime is contagious. If the government becomes a lawbreaker, it breeds contempt for law; it invites every man to become a law unto himself; it invites anarchy.” Olmstead v. U.S., 277 U.S. 438
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[…] Obama’s eligibility, without hysterics Possibly related posts: (automatically generated)Hoaxers promise to slam Obama to the endChallenge to Obama’s qualificationsCataclysm…Suit Contesting Obama’s Citizenship Heads to Supreme Court Tomorrow […]
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[…] See updates: […]
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Rational and informed discussion. What a concept.
I lean to the view that jus solis wins out in this case. Apart from the racist implications, and I have no doubt that a significant portion of the U.S. Congress intended to disqualify ex-slaves and their children and descendants from the presidency for as long as possible, I think that had anyone posed the hypothetical of a kid born in Kentucky to an American woman and a father who was in the U.S. visiting from Britain, the sponsors wouldn’t say the child was ineligible for office.
And without doing the justice Christopher Wiseman’s piece deserves in reading and research, I have a couple of other observations.
First, if the issue is “allegiance,” then I think it’s unfair, unwise, and perhaps silly to attribute a problem of allegiance to a baby, or to an 8-year-old child. For the practical purposes of allegiance, Obama meets the bill. Technical disqualifications tend to overlook things like Eisenhower’s commanding troops of other nations — and being “subject to foreign commanders and heads of state” — during World War II, for example. Surely, if we are to worry seriously about Obama’s allegiances as an 8-year-old child, we should have worried about Eisenhower’s allegiances to Joseph Stalin and Winston Churchill (in equal measure, probably), and disqualified him from the job. Any red-blooded patriot in America will tell us it’s crazy and foolish to even discuss Eisenhower’s allegiances, and the point is well taken. It’s almost equally foolish to discuss Obama’s allegiances, especially as a child. The facts of the matter inform that issue better than debates from 140 years ago, I think.
But second, let’s confront the racism issue head on. Those idiots back then wanted to exclude Indians? They should have said so. They wrote the law so that it includes Indians except with some mumbo-jumbo explicit understanding that they are not included. This was an issue with one of the vice presidents, by the way, Charles Curtis who served with President Hoover — and we let him serve despite his clearly being in that group that Sen. Howard wished to exclude, having been born a Kaw in 1860. Precedent.
Sometimes we should let wisdom and justice triumph over the mere letter of the law, and even if there is a technical basis to claim Obama had split allegiances at some time as a child, that is too thin a thread upon which to hang an argument that a man who clearly won the election should be disqualified from holding the office.
In the Horatio Alger stories, the kids who rose from rags to win all the prizes never had their riches and reputation deprived them by some legal technicality. I don’t think the technical side wins here, but even were there the arguments for it, it would be foolish of us to do that.
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btw. Dinner and drinks sounds good to me.
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@ ReasonableCitizen – I appreciate your gracious words. I would refer you however to the Congressional debates for clarification.
During debate over the amendment, Senator Jacob Howard of Ohio, the author of the citizenship clause, attempted to assure skeptical colleagues that the new language was not intended to make Indians citizens of the U.S. Indians, Howard conceded, were born within the nation’s geographical limits; but he steadfastly maintained that they were not subject to its jurisdiction because they owed allegiance to their tribes. Senator Lyman Trumbull, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, rose to support his colleague, arguing that “subject to the jurisdiction thereof” meant “not owing allegiance to anybody else and being subject to the complete jurisdiction of the United States.” Jurisdiction understood as allegiance, Senator Howard interjected, excludes not only Indians but “persons born in the United States who are foreigners, aliens, [or] who belong to the families of ambassadors or foreign ministers.” Thus “subject to the jurisdiction” does not simply mean, as is commonly thought today, subject to American laws or American courts. It means owing exclusive political allegiance to the U.S.
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I think Mr. Wiseman has captured the essence of the natural born case quite well. Yet, it is the definition of ‘natural born’ that remains to be determined. I do not agree that ‘subject to the complete jurisdiction of’ implies a single loyalty or allegiance. It means the ‘control or authority of’ and not allegiance. Can a person be ‘natural born’ if either of the parents are foreign citizens at the time the child is born within American jurisdiction? I say ‘yes’. That was the whole point of the clause: whatever nationality or allegiance the parents possessed was not relevant if the child was born on American soil or under American jurisdiction. What else could be done in a nation of immigrant parents who are not required to renounce their former allegiance until they become citizens?
Birth within American jurisdiction trumps all other issues.
Perhaps one can argue ‘split loyalties’ over dinner and drinks but that is not a valid reason to prevent a person born under the jurisdiction of’ from becoming President.
(In my view, John McCain, born outside the Canal Zone, does not meet the test of natural born.) And all of this is why the Supreme Court should consider this case. We all view this differently.
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Ed – I can certainly understand your approach to this case but I think you need to go beyond Donofrio’s argument being “strained and sexist”. I do not believe it is either, regardless of whether or not it is sexist, please consider the intent of the Constitution and the 14th Amendment. Even assuming the British Nationality Act was inherently racist, the law at the time must be applied. Further, the authors of the 14th Amendment made no such distinction of the gender of the parent with respect to foreign citizenship requiring that neither parent be subject to some other foreign power. In other words, it would not matter if the British citizenship was conferred by paternal or maternal lineage.
A common misconception is that the Constitution through the Fourteenth Amendment confers natural born citizenship upon everyone born in the United States whether or not they were born to a non-citizen. Senators Howard and Trumbull the two Senators primarily credited as authoring the Fourteenth Amendment, make it clear that Article 2, Section 1 provisions which require the “natural born citizenship” eligibility for POTUS remains intact.
Howard presented to the court majority in the misapplied Wong Ark Can case, that he specifically declared the clause to be “virtue of natural law and national law” which only recognized citizenship by birth to those who were not subject to some other foreign power. The Senator also stated when he introduced the amendment: “The clause [the citizenship clause section 1] specifically excludes all persons born in the United States who are foreigners, aliens, and persons who belong to the families of ambassadors or foreign ministers accredited to the Government of the United States, but will include every other class of persons.” It seems clear that the amendment only applies to American citizens (natural law), regardless of their race – which is exactly what was intended. Senator Howard also said in May, 1868 that the “Constitution as now amended, forever withholds the right of citizenship in the case of accidental birth of a child belonging to foreign parents within the limits of the country.”
Senator Trumbull, the co-author, additionally declared: “The provision is, that ‘all persons born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens.’ That means ’subject to the complete jurisdiction thereof.’ What do we mean by ‘complete jurisdiction thereof?’ Not owing allegiance to anybody else. That is what it means.” Sen. Howard followed that up by stating that: “The word ‘jurisdiction,’ as here employed, ought to be construed so as to imply a full and complete jurisdiction on the part of the United States, whether exercised by Congress, by the executive, or by the judicial department; that is to say, the same jurisdiction in extent and quality as applies to every citizen of the United States now.” Senator Howard clearly intended that the phrase “subject to the jurisdiction” does not apply to anyone other than American citizens.
The writer, John A. Bingham, of the 14th amendment’s first section, considered the proposed national law on citizenship as “simply declaratory of what is written in the Constitution, that every human being born within the jurisdiction of the United States of parents not owing allegiance to any foreign sovereignty is, in the language of your Constitution itself, a natural born citizen…”
By his own admission as stated on his website and on Factcheck.org, Obama has clearly stated:
“‘When Barack Obama Jr. was born on Aug. 4, 1961, in Honolulu, Kenya was a British colony, still part of the United Kingdom’s dwindling empire. As a Kenyan native, Barack Obama Sr. was a British subject whose citizenship status was governed by The British Nationality Act of 1948. That same act governed the status of Obama Sr.’s children…”
1. Barack Obama Sr. was a Britsh subject.
2. Barack Obama Sr. was governed by the British Nationality Act of 1948.
3. Barack Obama Jr. was born to a British subject.
4. Barack Obama Jr. was also governed by the British Nationality Act of 1948.
5. ‘[S]ubject to the complete jurisdiction thereof’ means ‘complete jurisdiction thereof,’ not owing allegiance to anybody else.
6. The authors of the 14th Amendment recognized citizenship by birth to those who were not subject to some other foreign power.
7. On Aug. 4, 1961, Barack Obama Sr. and Barack Obama Jr. were subject to another foreign power.
8. On Aug. 4, 1961, Barack Obama Jr. owed at least partial allegiance to another foreign power.
9. Barack Obama Jr. is not a natural born citizen by virtue of the 14th Amendment.
10. Barack Obama Jr. does not meet the Constitutional eligibilty requirement to be natural born citizen.
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There is no question that fairness and justice should prevail. However When we should be focusing on economy, jobs, war and all the other problems we have at hand, this is a very obsurd way of wasting everyone’s time. It’s time to move on, look forward and not constantly question this guys authenticity – not that he did not go through this enough times during his campaign.
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I do believe that, apart from the Court itself, the only entity that could conceivably have authority under the Constitution to address this issue is the College of Electors. They’re about to issue a very forceful opinion of their own.
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Inconvenient? Well since the people were asking long before the election and the DNC and press would not publish truth, then who is to blame that it went this far? It should have been vetted long before now.
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