CNN, of all outlets, let Anderson Cooper roam through Michelle Bachmann’s absurd, hoax claim that President Obama’s trip to India would cost $200 million a day. Cooper really owns Bachmann on this one.
Vodpod videos no longer available.
4 Comments | 
Barack Obama, Hoaxes, Political Smear, Politics | Tagged: Anderson Cooper, Barack Obama, CNN, Hoaxes, Michelle Bachmann, Political Smear, Politics | 
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Posted by Ed Darrell
I’m a great lover of political cartoons and political cartooning, of all stripes. Great truths sneak out of the pens that produce stunned laughter in a reader (viewer), I think, especially when they stun me into a new realization.
Political cartooning stumbles along through hard times. Where once upon a time a major U.S. city, like St. Louis, would have three or more daily newspapers, each of which would employ more than one cartoonist, the newspapers themselves disappear (more slowly this year, but no new ones have been birthed, either), and those few surviving newspapers try to get along with one or fewer political cartoonists, and they even reduce the number of syndicated cartoons.
Where U.S. history teachers revel in the glorious images and humor of Thomas Nast (even though he was a Republican sympathizer), Thomas Keppler, Berryman, Ding Darling, Herblock, Bill Mauldin, and other bright cartoonists of the 19th and 20th centuries, Daryl Cagle has gallantly tried to preserve the profession and the art, with a group that spreads cartoons of a lot of cartoonists employed by papers or free-lancing.
I subscribe to the electronic newsletter of Cagle Cartoons. I’ve found their processes for getting approval not to work well for me (or work at all — I have yet to get any response on any cartoon I’ve asked them about). But I hope cartoonists like the brilliant Sherffius, or Calvin Grondahl from my almost-native Utah, get enough additional exposure to make them comfortable and keep the cartooning.
Lately I’ve been despairing. Cagle added columns by cartoonists and others. Most of that material tends toward hard conservatism, I find, and lack of reportorial and intellectual rigor.
Like this piece of guano from a reporter named Phil Brennan. Oh, we should have expected it to be lightweight, his being a regular contributor to the disinformation source NewsMax.
But still.
Brennan argues that birthers should give up on their challenges to Obama’s eligibility, because of the chaos that would be caused were Obama to be replaced by John McCain so far into an administration. (Yeah — just hold on. I know.) All the laws Obama signed would be nullified, Brennan wrote, all his appointments nullifed, and the slate wiped clean for McCain and Palin to occupy the White House. Obama’s defended his birth in a U.S. territory successfully so far, so birthers should give up trying for change.
Just for a moment, imagine that the Court does its job and it turns out that Obama can’t come up with a legitimate birth certificate showing that he was indeed born on U.S. soil in what was then the territory of Hawaii, and the Court declares that he is therefore ineligible to serve as the nation’s chief executive.
Should that be the case nothing that he has done, no appointments that he has made nor executive orders he issued would be valid. And under the provisions of the Constitution, John McCain would be declared the legitimate President of the United States and Sarah Palin the Vice President starting with Inauguration Day, 2009.
It might cause a civil war, Brennan says.
Mr. Brennan: I know the U.S. Constitution. I’ve read the U.S. Constitution. The U.S. Constitution is a friend of mine. What you describe is not in the Constitution, and doesn’t bear any resemblance to reality.
Here’s the comment I posted to Brennan’s piece at Cagle Cartoons:
A couple of fact checking issues here:
1. Hawaii was a state in 1961, not a territory. Hawaii became a state in August 1959.
2. Under the Constitution and federal laws on succession, if the person at the top of the ticket becomes ineligible to serve, the person next in line in succession becomes president. Were Obama declared ineligible, we’d have President Joe Biden.
3. There is no provision to nullify laws and directives of a federal officer later found ineligible for the office. Under pretty well-established law, all of those actions stand unless repealed later. Congressional actions, especially, would not be rolled back. All appointments stand.
4. Obama has already provided unassailable proof of his birth. Under the full faith and credit clause of the Constitution, all states and the federal government must honor official actions of the states. Hawaii issued, under seal, a document verifying that Barack Obama was born in Honolulu in 1961. “Under seal” is the highest authority we can give a document under statutory and common law — it’s got more than 800 years of precedent behind it. The only possible way to get at a document under seal is to provide clear and convincing evidence of fraud on the state. There is no showing of any fraud that stands up in court, under Hawaii or federal rules of evidence.
In short, almost everything stated as fact for the premises of that piece, is fiction.
Bad enough that joints like the Discovery Institute, NewsMax, the Washington Times and others have fired all their fact checkers — but shouldn’t a high school-educated person know better? Is there no editing at Cagle Cartoons at all?
8 Comments | Accuracy, Barack Obama, Birth Certificate, Cartoons, Law, U.S. Constitution | Tagged: Accuracy, Barack Obama, Birthers, Cagle Cartoons, Cartoons, Fact Checkers, Journalism, Law, U.S. Constitution, U.S. Law | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
This is why I like Ed Brayton’s blog, and why you should be reading him with some regularity: his ability to distinguish dross from gold, sometimes even without turning on his solid gold Hemingway s— detector.
Today’s example comes from Brayton’s Dumb[burro] Quote of the Day feature:
From Rick “Man on Dog” Santorum:
“Obama is detached from the American experience. He just doesn’t identify with the average American because of his own background. Indonesia and Hawaii. His view is from the viewpoint of academics and the halls of the Ivy league schools that he went to and it’s not a love of this country and an understanding of the basic values and wants and desires of its people.”
Isn’t that amazing? He’s unable to understand “the American experience” both because of his humble upbringing and because of his elite Ivy League education.
That leaves completely unexplained Rick Santorum’s detachment from the American experience, and detachment from reality.
One non-explanation at a time, I suppose.
1 Comment | Humor, Politics, Quotes, Rampant stupidity, Whom the gods destroy they first make mad | Tagged: Barack Obama, Humor, Politics, Quotes, Rampant stupidity, Rick Santorum | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Justice Holmes might have said, “Three generations of this imbecilic video is enough!”
Over at GetDClue.com, where the motto is “~*~ Get a clue & wake up! ~*~ The best way to lead a nation astray of its values is to keep it ignorant of its history,” author Lisa DeClue is doing her best to lead the nation astray by planting false history to keep us all ignorant.
Today, this reeker plopped into my e-mail box — it’s a hoax video. Repeat, it’s a hoax:
The only reason Obama wouldn’t want you to see that is because it’s a waste of your time. It would be laughable were it a high school student history video (I’d flunk it on accuracy and lack of citations). It’s a hoax from set up to wind down. It should be put down.
DeClue explains the video was struck down from some site (probably for reasons of taste; this is an assault on good taste and manners, just in the insulting way it assumes the viewer is too stupid to have read a newspaper in the past three years). It’s now up again on YouTube — a recycled hoax! This one isn’t nearly as funny nor witty as the Cardiff Giant, however.
DeClue sends out e-mails alerting warning of new posts.
Hello!
I’ve just come across a disturbing video you must watch that supposedly shows Obama’s dossier from the FBI. Apparently his actions we know about are only the tip of the iceburg and portend badly for Israel, the war on terror and other foreign policy issues. Not to mention his abuse of our economy and our rights. Please post your comments on the blog and let’s get a good discussion going! We need to come up with some ideas, fellow patriots! Thank you.
Disturbing in its dishonesty, sure. I took a look. I sent her an e-mail alerting her to the hoax, and I left this comment at her site:
This is one of the most irresponsible things you’ve ever posted.
How’s the ride with Osama? Or is the White Citizen’s Council? And if a hoax, so easily disprovable, suckers you in so easily, can it be for any reason other than your own nefarious goals?
FBI doesn’t release dossiers on active politicians, nor on active investigations. That’s the first clue that it’s complete bunk.
Occidental College has a special page answering the questions so stupidly asked in the video [now moved here.] (you didn’t bother to look; you didn’t bother to look)
You could call Columbia to confirm Obama’s attendance there. Lots of others have. You could call Harvard. For the sake of Jesus, he was president of the Harvard Law Review. Nobody but students get to write on to the law review, no one but an active student can even run for president of the organization.
Obama’s birth certificate has been vetted much more than the drilling plans of any oil company.
Shame on you for posting this.
Rewind. Reboot. Time to retract.
It’s probably still up. The true birther fanatics don’t care about getting the facts. They are desperate to do damage to Obama’s reputation, no matter how false their claims may be.
Ms. DeClue wrote back wondering how I could possibly know it’s a hoax. Naif. I wrote back with more hints:
You could call the FBI and ask. In fact, I recommend it.
I spent a decade in Washington, and among other duties, I staffed the confirmation hearings before the Senate Labor, and occasionally the Senate Judiciary Committee. I’ve read hundreds of the reports, I’ve been involved in Senate investigations of how the FBI compiles them, and I’ve followed the Freedom of Information issues on the stuff, especially from the Vietnam protests, for years.
But don’t take my word for it. Check it out for yourself.
See this news story:
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2010/06/16/kennedys_widow_asked_fbi_not_to_release_personal_files/[The FBI doesn’t release dossiers on living people. The claim in this film is that they got the dossier on Obama. We know that’s false from the get-go. The Kennedy story shows how a dossier might be released publicly — a process that is not alleged by the hoax videographer.]
See this non-governmental site on how to get your own file (but not the files of others):
http://www.getmyfbifile.com/Here’s the FBI’s FOIA reading room information:
http://foia.fbi.gov/How about criminal records on others? See here:
http://www.fbi.gov/hq/cjisd/fprequest.htmI’ve listed several sites you can visit in a comment at the post — check them out, to see the education record. There’s a lot more.
It’s a hoax video.
Sorry you got taken in by it.
What is it with the birthers and other gullibles and hoaxsters around? Is the trouble we have, with Iraq, Afghanistan, the Gulf of Mexico, the mortgage and housing crisis, the banking crisis, our enormous debts, and a hundred other serious problems, not enough?
But then I listen to Mitch McConnell. He says he’s not so sure about working to make America energy independent, not when Obama can’t pull a Gandalf and wave the Gulf oil spill away.
Is crazy a virus?
How many errors did you find in that video? Does it beat Phelim McAleer’s record for errors/minute?
Get on over to Oh, For Goodness Sake, and get some real facts.
15 Comments | Accuracy, Barack Obama, Birth Certificate, History, Political Smear, Politics, President Obama, Presidents | Tagged: Barack Obama, Birth Certificate, History, Hoaxes, Political Smear, Politics, President Obama | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
What? The Texas State Board of Education is doing such a shoddy job of writing social studies standards that they don’t even name the current president of the U.S.?
It’s a cautionary tale of overprescribing, and of looking at everything as if it has some ulterior motive. But is there any rational reason why the SBOE refuses to utter the name “Obama?”
Who is this man? Texas social studies standards let his identity remain a mystery, despite the historical significance of his election.
SBOE should stop gutting social studies standards and vote to simply accept the updates provided by teachers, historians, economists and geographers. The process is out of control, embarrassing to Texas, and damaging to education.
Grading Texas has the story (from TSTA), here in its entirety (but go check out that blog):
April 28, 2010
The president has a name: it’s Barack Obama
TSTA President Rita Haecker created a stir among legislators today when she testified, at a hearing hosted by the Mexican American Legislative Caucus, that the State Board of Education, in its recent rewrite of social studies curriculum standards, had refused to name President Barack Obama.
That bit of news seemed to catch several lawmakers by surprise. They already knew that the right-wing bloc on the board had attempted to rewrite history. But to go so far as to omit the name of the historic, first African American president of the United States seemed preposterous, even by conservative leader Don (the Earth is 5,000 years old) McLeroy’s standards.
Haecker was correct. Barack Obama’s name, so far, has not been included in the history curriculum standards on which the SBOE is scheduled to take a final vote next month. The standards do note the “election of first black president” as a significant event of 2008, but they don’t say who that black president is.
Haecker urged legislators to make changes, if necessary, to the curriculum setting process to protect educator input and ensure that “scholarly, academic research and findings aren’t dismissed or diminished at the whim of a board member’s own political or religious view of the world.”
State Education Commissioner Robert Scott accepted the caucus’ invitation to voluntarily testify on the curriculum adoption process. He said his and the Texas Education Agency’s role was mostly in technical support of the SBOE.
Board Chairwoman Gail Lowe of Lampasas, who also had been invited, declined to attend, even though the caucus had offered to pay her travel expenses.
Predictably, Lowe was skewered for her failure to show up by the mostly Democratic legislators who attended the caucus hearing. Lowe must have figured it was better to be skewered in absentia than in person.
You can read Rita Haecker’s prepared testimony here:
Oh, go on — you can say it — tell your friends:
Leave a Comment » | Barack Obama, Bogus history, History, History blogs, History Revisionism, Rampant stupidity, Social Studies, State school boards, TAKS, TEKS, Texas, Voodoo history | Tagged: Barack Obama, Politics, Rampant stupidity, Social Studies, Social Studies Standards, TAKS, TEKS, Texas, Texas State Board of Education | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
With Henry Louis Mencken as his father.
No, that’s not really what they claim (I think; sometimes it’s difficult to tell). But what happened, and how it spread virally through websites of birthers and Obama haters, should provide a moral to someone’s story.
To demonstrate how easy it is to create hoax claims about Obama and birth certificates, somebody created a false MySpace page, and a story of an office supply store employee who helped the Obama campaign generate a false birth certificate.
Birthers jumped on the story as proof that the Obama birth certificate is false. Seriously. You can’t make this stuff up. Story at the aptly-named and fully entertaining Oh, For Goodness Sake! which seems dedicated to debunking all the birthers’ craziness (a mother lode of hoaxes and gullibility to be sure).
Santayana’s Ghost wags his finger, and Mencken’s Ghost has gone out in search of stronger beer. You tell ’em it’s voodoo history, you tell ’em it’s a hoax, they still suck it up. Dr. Kate, New Mexico Paralegal, Texas Darlin’, Free Republic, Orly Taitz, Tea Baggers, we know what you are and we don’t want to haggle about the price. We ain’t buyin’.
3 Comments | Accuracy, Birth Certificate, Historic documents, History, Hoaxes, President Obama, Presidential Eligibility, Presidents, Voodoo history | Tagged: Barack Obama, Birth Certificate, Birthers, History, Hoaxes, President Obama, Presidential Eligibility, Voodoo history | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Obama’s old campaign organization urges people to get out to do service to their communities this weekend, to honor the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. An e-mail from the campaign urges:
Ed —
Throughout the country, Organizing for America volunteers and staff are planning service events for this Martin Luther King Jr. Day weekend.
It’s a great chance to come together, spend time with friends and neighbors, and help create a more just and equal world as we honor Dr. King this weekend. I hope you can come out and take part in an event near you.
Sign up to participate in a Martin Luther King Jr. service event in your area. No experience is necessary and it’s a great way to give back.
Martin Luther King Jr. gave so much of his talent and energy to his family and community, his neighbors and friends. I hope you will continue in that grand tradition as we honor him this weekend.
Like so many of you did last year, OFA supporters are joining together in communities all across America — in food banks and shelters, in health clinics and nursing homes.
They’re coming together to remember the great legacy of Martin Luther King Jr. and to give back to their communities. There are so many different and fun ways to participate in this weekend of service, I hope you find one that means something special to you.
Please sign up to participate in a service event near you:
http://my.barackobama.com/MLKService
Thank you for your service,
Jeremy
Jeremy Bird
Deputy Director
Organizing for America
I’ve got school projects and Scout projects already lined up; Monday, I may need something more to do, and something more service oriented.
What sort of service are you planning to celebrate the heritage and history of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.?
2 Comments | Citizenship, Civil Rights, Holidays, Martin Luther King | Tagged: Barack Obama, Citizenship, Community Service, Holidays, Martin Luther King Jr. | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
2nd place cartoon in the 2009 Ranan Lurie/UN Awards -- by Silvan Wegmann, Sonntag (Switzerland)
What if Obama can’t live up to the hopes Europe has for him? This cartoon won 2nd place, $5000, for Swiss cartoonist Silvan Wegmann in the Ranan Lurie/UN Cartoon competition.
2 Comments | Barack Obama, Cartoons, Europe, foreign affairs, Political cartoons, Politics, President Obama, Presidents | Tagged: 2009, Barack Obama, Cartoons, Europe, Lurie/UN Awards, Political cartoons, Politics, Silvan Wegmann | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Birther “Dr. Kate” sez there’s a case coming to a hearing in Pennsylvania that will go to the Supreme Court no matter how this hearing turns out.
Here’s the table of contents to Kerchner v. Obama. Here’s the full complaint, according to Dr. Kate.
Probably the best thing going for the plaintiffs is that Orly Taitz only appears by name in a bizarre accounting of everything ever said on the issue (except for the lack of evidence and reasons this case will fail which, oddly, isn’t included in the complaint; everything else is included).
I predict the case will be dismissed, but it may be dismissed with prejudice. That is, if it really does come to a hearing. Is that really possible?
Warn others so they don’t get trampled:
17 Comments | Barack Obama, Birth Certificate, History, How do we know what we know, Jurisprudence, Justice, Law, President Obama, Presidential Eligibility, Presidents, Rampant stupidity | Tagged: Barack Obama, Birth Certificate, Birthers, denialism, History, How do we know what we know, Jurisprudence, Kerchner v Obama, Law, Presidency, Rampant stupidity, Taitz | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
You can’t make this stuff up.
Here’s a generally mean-spirited post trying to make hay from the general disinformation about about Obama’s faith and otherwise trying to stir hatred. (Here’s more of the flap on the ornaments on the White House’s Blue Room tree, and I’ve got a response in comments at this post.)
Followed by this “glowing” cross.
Merry Christmas. “We dare you,” the Right Perspective says.
Make the right wing extremely angry today: Have a good and merry Christmas. Be tolerant. Think. Smile. Act kindly. It’ll make ’em crazy.
Also:
5 Comments | Barack Obama, History, Holidays, Politics, Racism, Religion | Tagged: Barack Obama, Christmas, Christmas Tree, History, Politics, Religion, Rignt Wingnuts | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Millard Fillmore’s bathtub came out of a hoax story written in 1917 by one of America’s greatest cynics and writers, H. L. Mencken. Mencken lived to regret that he ever wrote the piece, after it was cited as fact by encyclopedias and critics of Fillmore’s presidency.
Mencken’s story holds a moral, a lesson for all critics of the American scene, and especially anyone who comments on political figures: Verify everything.
Ernest Hemingway put it best, if crudely: “The most essential gift for a good writer is a built-in, shock-proof, shit detector. This is the writer’s radar and all great writers have had it.”*
If a writer or reporter doesn’t have one of those devices built-in, he is likely to find himself up to his chin in it after having failed to detect it in time to avoid the plunge.
Rush Limbaugh is in it up to his chin right now, after following Michael Ledeen off the dock.
Faithful readers here — all dozen of ’em — may remember last January when we spotlighted a hoax at a blog called Jumping in Pools; the author claimed President Obama had ordered members our armed forces to take an oath of allegiance to Obama in place of their regular oath to the nation.
Orson Welles was on to something with his “War of the Worlds” broadcast. In fact, after that first night of panic, the same script was used on other occasions, and people still got suckered in. (Listen to the RadioLab feature on this phenomenon — it’s wonderful.)
It’s almost as if people were going around with signs on their backs that say “Lie to me, baby!” Only, the people put the signs on their shirts and blouses themselves.
For whatever ill-thought, malicious reason, somebody invented an absolutely unbelievable hoax that President Obama asked the Pentagon to have military people swear allegiance to him, instead of the nation. Jumping in Pools posted it.
Jumping in Pools also listed it as satire, in tags.
But the hoax sucked in the gullible all over the web.
Limbaugh? Ledeen? Y’all would do well to read this blog, Millard Fillmore’s Bathtub. You might have recognized the name of the blog, Jumping in Pools, that carried that phantasmagorical story about Barack Obama’s student essay, finally being released in part to Time Magazine’s Joe Klein.
Yahoo!’s Buzz Up explained the story, with links you ought to check out:
It must have seemed so perfect. An obscure blogger unearths some pages of President Obama’s college thesis. The report supposedly comes from big-time journalist Joe Klein of Time magazine. And the thesis has some real gems: like Obama’s disdain for the Constitution.
The whole thing was nothing more than a satirical post on a humor blog. But Rush Limbaugh, who quoted from the supposed thesis on his radio show, sure wasn’t laughing. Here’s how it went down.
An unknown blogger picked up on a made-up post meant as a joke, which claimed that Joe Klein had gotten his hands on 10 pages of student Obama’s college thesis. Rush Limbaugh jumped on it, which immediately sparked Web searches on “obama thesis.”
Supposedly titled “Aristocracy Revisited,” the excerpt revealed the president had “doubts” about the “so-called founders.” Juicy. Except not true. Limbaugh discovered halfway through his show that he’d been had, but defended himself by saying basically the thesis felt true. Listen in to Rush’s mea sorta culpa.
Joe Klein finally jumped in, and called the report “nonsense” on his Swampland blog, and the blogger who thought the hoax was real also apologized.
Michael Ledeen writing at Pajamas Media was that “blogger who thought the hoax was real.”
Ledeen had the good grace to apologize (and in doing so reveal that he really should have been much more en garde):
The hoax/satire was written in August, so it’s not connected to any current event. I cam across it on Twitter, read the blog, found it interesting, and posted on it. I failed to notice that one of the tags was “satire.”
So he got me, and lots of others. It worked because it’s plausible. I’ve done satirical pieces myself, and I know how they can take off. I once wrote one that said that Bill Casey did not die, and was hiding in a bunker under the St Andrews golf course from which he was running Mikhail Gorbachev. I thought it was obviously satirical, but it went like wildfire all over the world. And that was in the days before the Internet.
So I should have picked up some hint, but I didn’t. Shame on me.
But Limbaugh? He railed on for more than half an hour on the evils of Obama revealed in the completely fictional essay; and then when he was alerted to the fact that it was a hoax, he didn’t apologize. He said he was suckered in because the hoax was plausible, and Obama might have done such a thing.
“I know Obama thinks it,” Limbaugh said, purporting to channel the guy he despises only too openly.
I’m trying to suppress it, but Limbaugh’s actions remind me mightily of an old Cheech and Chong routine. One wonders what Obama’s more rabid critics would not grant credence to.
Wall of Shame
What would Hemingway have reported?
Other thoughts:
________
* I’m convinced he said it. I’m relying here on Elizabeth Dewberry’s contribution to The Cambridge Companion to Ernest Hemingway, “Hemingway’s Journalism and the Realist Dilemma,” on page 25. She cites to an interview, but I’ve misplaced the rest of that note for the moment, and for some odd reason the page with the citation isn’t included on Google Books (the pain of internet research, to get to the information you need out of the haystack, and find that particular needle has been intentionally removed). Read Dewberry, though, for a much longer and informative discussion about hoaxes and fakery in journalism, which is the problem discussed in this post.
Don’t let your friends be bamboozled, pass the word:
8 Comments | Accuracy, Barack Obama, Ethics, History, Hoaxes, Journalism, News, Politics, President Obama | Tagged: Accuracy, Barack Obama, Ethics, Hoaxes, Joe Klein, Journalism, Michael Ledeen, Politics, Rush Limbaugh | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
It’s a stark contrast to the matter-of-fact, good-for-America views of John Kennedy.
One of the Birth-Certificate-Obsessed (BCO), blogging at I Took the Red Pill, lays out the hoax-induced hysteria in a comment at his blog; I’ll take a few minutes and explain the problems. Maybe one or more of the BCOs will come to their senses. [This guy at least allows contrary views on his blog; he’s a regular at Texas Darlin’, which means his views are certifiably nuts on issues he posts about at Texas Darlin’. But I digress.]
Heh. Maybe pigs will fly to the Moon.
I Took the Red Pill (Pill) said:
This issue will not go away.
Only because of defects in the actions of BCOs. As Woody Allen’s script once noted, nothing wrong here that couldn’t be cured with Prozac and a polo mallet.
This issue is pathological in every regard.
Quite to the contrary, every day more and more people are realizing that the document produced at the Obama Camapaign Headquarters in Chicago is merely a hardcopy of the photoshopped forgery that first appeared on Daily KOS.
Wow. Where to begin, when the force of denial is so strong in the BCOs?
You can view the document’s images here, and here. It is a certified document from the State of Hawaii. It bears the Seal of the State of Hawaii as authentic. No one has produced any scintilla of evidence to suggest that the document is false. or not exactly what Hawaii swears it is with the attachment of the State Seal.
That’s a powerful attestation from the State of Hawaii — as the law sees it. If a certified document under seal is not acceptable to the BCOs, one wonders what sort of documentation would be — there isn’t anything more trustworthy under the law.
Check the Federal Rules of Evidence, for example:
Rule 902. Self-authentication
Extrinsic evidence of authenticity as a condition precedent to admissibility is not required with respect to the following:
(1) Domestic public documents under seal. A document bearing a seal purporting to be that of the United States, or of any State, district, Commonwealth, territory, or insular possession thereof, or the Panama Canal Zone, or the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands, or of a political subdivision, department, officer, or agency thereof, and a signature purporting to be an attestation or execution.
. . . (4) Certified copies of public records. A copy of an official record or report or entry therein, or of a document authorized by law to be recorded or filed and actually recorded or filed in a public office, including data compilations in any form, certified as correct by the custodian or other person authorized to make the certification, by certificate complying with paragraph (1), (2), or (3) of this rule or complying with any Act of Congress or rule prescribed by the Supreme Court pursuant to statutory authority.[courtesy of the Legal Information Institute at Cornell University’s Library]
Got that? Under federal evidence rules, that document is self-proving, self-authenticating. What evidence have the BCOs to contradict it? Absolutely nothing.
The State of Hawaii has never verified that authenticity of that forgery.
The governor and the head of vital records said it’s NOT a forgery, if that’s what you mean. In other words, they said the document is accurate in what it says: Barack Obama, Jr., was born in Honolulu in 1961.
The State of Hawaii has never released any documentation of Obama’s birth.
Well, yeah, they did. They sent to Barack Obama the certified document you claim is a forgery.
Moreover, in 1961, when Barack Obama was just a few days old and, we might assume, both physically and mentally unable to start a conspiracy to cover up the facts of his birth, the State of Hawaii released to the Hawaiian newspapers the records of births in Hawaii, including Obama’s — and those records were published in the newspaper. Such documentation, contemporary with the events and extremely unlikely to be falsified, are valid in court.
Oh, and remember those Federal Rules of Evidence? Look at what they say about such newspaper records:
Rule 902. Self-authentication
Extrinsic evidence of authenticity as a condition precedent to admissibility is not required with respect to the following:
. . . (6) Newspapers and periodicals. Printed materials purporting to be newspapers or periodicals.
So we have two releases of documentation from the State of Hawaii, vouched for by the Republican governor. What gives you the right that every state of the union is denied, to claim this documentation doesn’t exist? These are legal documents that make legal statements. You can’t just handwave them away. Pixie dust can’t cover them up, and the pixie dust of the BCOs isn’t all that powerful anyway. The courts cannot wave away this sort of evidence, nor can the BCOs.
The mere existence of the newspaper account is legal evidence vouching for Obama’s claim. BCOs must produce extraordinary evidence of fraud or mistake in order to overcome the legal presumption that newspaper account provides. BCOs have no extraordinary evidence to counter the documents. BCOs have no evidence at all.
The State of Hawaii has never claimed that Obama was “born in Honolulu”, even though the Associated Press and Fact Check.org lied and claimed that Dr. Fukino had said that.
The State of Hawaii put its seal on such a statement, and it states Obama was born in Honolulu (see “place of birth”). BCOs’ completely unevidenced and off-the-wall claim that the document was forged is evidence of BCO insanity, not Hawaii’s failure to act.
A newspaper announcement is circumstantial evidence that is not admissible as “proof” of his birth in Hawaii. Can you imagine a new employee trying to use a newspaper clipping as proof of their U.S. citizenship? It’s laughable. If that won’t work to get you a job at McDonalds, it’s certainly not acceptable for the highest office in this country.
It’s a business record, actually. When you get to your law school class on evidence, you’ll learn that contemporary accounts from unbiased sources which are difficult to fake and easy to corroborate are, indeed, acceptable in a court of law. In this case, the published account of the vital records entries corroborates exactly the information provided by the State of Hawaii under seal.
And, as I noted above, it’s a self-authenticating piece of evidence under the Federal Rules of Evidence. Pill is simply dead wrong on the acceptability of newspaper accounts.
So we have a document certified as authentic and accurate by the State of Hawaii, so solid that the state backs it with their seal, the most sacred authenticating device in a state’s arsenal of authenticating devices, supported by a valid contemporary business record published in a general circulation newspaper where the record cannot be tampered with and which U.S. courts and agencies accept as valid.
But BCOs dismiss all the official, legal evidence, and BCOs claim, without any evidence or corroboration, without ever having looked at the documents, that the official documents are forgeries.
Liar, pants, fire.
Every Member of Congress swore an Oath of office to “support and defend the Constitution of the United States”. The Constitution explicitly requires that a President be a Natural Born Citizen. It is the responsibility of Congress to honor their oath and verify the eligibility of the man who would be President.
I’ve sworn that oath myself, four times. I regard it as a sacred trust. One is never relieved of that oath, by the way. That oath requires that we follow the law, the Constitutional law, the Constitution. Barack Obama has presented clear and convincing evidence of his eligibility by right of birth on U.S. soil. The evidence is absolutely uncontradicted, plus it is corroborated by all legally-acceptable accounts.
Every member of Congress has a duty to stand up and tell the BCOs to take a chill pill and shut up. The courts have reviewed these bogus claims from BCOs more than a dozen times. Not once has any BCO offered any evidence to contradict the legal records. Not once.
Be careful what you wish for, Pill. If Congress takes their oath seriously, BCOs are in for a lot of woe.
Every member of Congress failed to uphold their oath of office. They “outsourced” their Constitutional responsibility to an unaccountable, unelected, untrustworthy third party who demonstrably lied.
I’m convinced Pill wouldn’t know a lie if it bit him on the nose. Here he’s peddling such a lie, instead of standing up for the truth.
Go to the link Pill provides, and you’ll see he claims that the certified, under seal document from the State of Hawaii should be disregarded because all it does is state what the official record is — he wants a hand-written document, as if hand-written provides some legal magic that the State Seal of the Great State of Hawaii cannot.
Look, if he won’t take the word of a self-proving document issued under seal, he’s not going to believe any document at any time.
Hawaii didn’t claim they put the State Seal on the original autograph copy; the State of Hawaii looked at the autograph and swore that the information they provided, all that is required, is accurate, is the same information that is on the original autograph.
For all legal purposes possible for Obama, the document whose image he released is THE document. The document itself, under seal, swears that the information it presents is accurate: Obama was born in Honolulu. That’s it. The end.
Two things are required to put this to rest:
1) A Supreme Court ruling on the definition of “Natural Born Citizen”. Can someone who was born with citizenship of another country (as Obama admits that he was) be considered a “Natural Born Citizen” of the United States?
The Supreme Court has spoken on this issue. A baby born on U.S. soil is a citizen with full rights of citizens, period. A baby born on U.S. soil is a natural-born citizen of the U.S. Plus, a baby born to a U.S. citizen (as was Obama’s mother), is a natural-born citizen regardless of place of birth. Obama qualifies on two separate counts. There is not an iota of evidence from the BCOs nor any other source to contradict either of those valid claims on eligibility.
But here we see the weasel ways of the BCOs: ” . . . born with citizenship of another country (as Obama admits he was) . . .”
Obama didn’t say he was a citizen of another country. He said his father was a citizen of the British Commonwealth, and under British law, he could have claimed dual-citizenship. Under U.S. law, dual citizenship would not invalidate U.S. citizenship.
In order for this to have been a problem for Obama’s eligibility, Obama would have had to have claimed exclusive British citizenship at some point — which he never did.
So this is not a new question. There is no new issue here that the courts and the Supreme Court have not looked at in the past. There is no legal argument, no case in controversy on the issue of Obama’s citizenship.
There is nothing for any court to decide. And that’s why the challenges to Obama’s eligibility have all failed.
2) If the Supreme Court finds that persons born with foreign citizenship can still be considered a “Natural Born Citizen” of the United States, then Congress needs to inspect an officially certified birth certificate for Barack Obama, delivered under seal from the State of Hawaii, just as they did with their inspection of the Certificate from the Hawaiian Secretary of State for the certification of the Electoral College vote.
That document, “delivered under seal form the State of Hawaii,” has been provided. BCOs claim, without any documentation, it’s a forgery. BCOs need to get their eyes examined.
And, if they are found to be not blind, they need to get their heads examined.
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7 Comments | Accuracy, Barack Obama, Citizenship, History, Journalism, Jurisprudence, Law, Natural Born, Newspapers, President Obama, Presidential Eligibility, Presidents, U.S. Constitution | Tagged: Accuracy, Barack Obama, Birth Certificate, Birthers, Citizenship, Elections, Natural Born, President Obama, Presidential Eligibility | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Embedding the video from NBC escapes me — but go here to see NBC’s four-minute report on the Obama birth certificate crazies.
Here’s the full video of the BCOs going crazy at a Congressman’s town meeting.
It’s really a form of mass hysteria, isn’t it?
For months the birthers, or Birth Certificate Obsessed (BCOs), have pleaded for mainstream media to take a look at this issue. NBC did just that.
Is it any surprise that this morning the crazies say “NBC lied?”
BCOs fell hard to the hoax about Obama not being eligible, and now they deny all evidence that they fell for a hoax.
BCOs/birthers? Can we have our country back, now that you’re done?
Other notes:
Be sure to see earlier material here at Millard Fillmore’s Bathtub:
Here’s a large dose of facts, including David Maraniss’s article in the Washington Post about Obama’s early life. Note that it describes details that would be impossible to fake, were the story not accurate:
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10 Comments | Accuracy, Barack Obama, Citizenship, History, Hoaxes, Natural Born, Obama 2008, Politics, President Obama, Presidential Eligibility, Presidents, U.S. Constitution | Tagged: Barack Obama, Birth Certificate, Citizenship, Hoaxes, Mass Hysteria, Natural Born, NBC News, Presidency, Presidential Eligibility, U.S. Constitution | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
You need to go to the site to see the comparison.
A blog on design issues (among other things), the View from 32, has a neat interactive image that shows the campaign website for Les Otten, a Republican already campaigning for the governorship in Maine (election next year), compared to the website for Barack Obama. You’ll notice more than a few similarities, including the “O” logo.
You don’t think . . . no Republican would copy . . . their politics must be completely different . . .
What the heck? Obama won, right? Who can argue with success?
You gotta see it to believe it.
From Fred2Blue
5 Comments | Barack Obama, Campaigns, Humor, Plagiarism, Politics, President Obama | Tagged: Barack Obama, Campaigns, Design, Les Otten, Maine, Plagiarism, Politics, Websites | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Cartoon from Lisa Benson at the Washington Post Writers Group, via the Orange County Register:
From the Washington Post Writers Group via Orange County Register
Wouldn’t that same caption work for Rush Limbaugh? How about for Newt Gingrich? Mitch McConnell?
I also note that, for a display in the U.S., the U.S. flag is on the wrong side.
Leave a Comment » | Barack Obama, Cartoons, Flag etiquette, Political cartoons, Politics | Tagged: Barack Obama, Cartoon, Lisa Benson, Osama bin Laden, Political Cartoon, U.S. Flag | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Ed Darrell on Texas's Colorado River
Come on in, the water's fine. Come often: Cleanliness is next to godliness.
Millard Fillmore's Bathtub 