As an author with a new book on a controversial topic, I’ve suddenly been flooded with a whole series of personal attacks by people who don’t like the results of my 3-month investigation.
First let me comment that I am personally kind of ashamed to have to answer these attacks — ashamed not for myself, but for the fact that people who seem to be mostly conservative are making such attacks on anybody.
I do not feel that such non-fact-based, personal public attacks express conservative values. They don’t express my family’s conservative values, that’s for sure.
To me, being a conservative means, among other things: traditional values of honesty, truth, and kindness whenever possible to other people. And they include not judging until I know the facts.
The latter is part of why it took me 3 months to publish a book on the Obama birth certificate: I wanted to know what I was talking about before I said too much on the matter.
To conservatives who mount personal attacks on others: You are not helping our cause. You are not portraying conservatives in a good light.
Of course, I understand that both sides of the aisle have people who do this.
Would my position that personal attacks are wrong make me a hypocrite if I should end up publicly questioning whether Paul Irey’s qualifications, or Doug Vogt’s, are quite up to the task of the analysis they’ve attempted? No, because such commentary, within reason, is fact-based and directly relevant to the quality of their analysis. And they’re free to question my qualifications as well. But to the best of my ability, I pledge not to engage in the kinds of personal attacks that others have tried to hit me with lately.
Over the last week or two, various people have tried to make all of the following accusations against me… (except for one):
“You’re an ‘Obot’ (short for ‘Obama-bot’) — an Obama supporter just masquerading as a conservative. You’re a Communist. etc.”
Actually, I’m a conservative who supports: the Constitution, clear thinking, reality, and the truth.
And my support of the Constitution and the rule of law was one of the major reasons I undertook the investigation in the first place.
If Barack Obama is truly ineligible to hold the Presidency, then he needs to be removed from that office. It’s as simple as that.
On the other hand, if we have no good evidence that the birth certificate is a forgery, then the Constitution must still be preserved and followed. In that case, the recourse for a misguided President is simply to vote him out.
And either way, given the significant doubts a lot of people had, I regarded the question as an important and interesting one. Since many of the issues regarding the long-form birth certificate were computer-related — and computer technology is my field — I decided to take a look. One thing led to another.
As far as being a conservative goes: The first vote I ever cast was for Ronald Reagan in 1980. And I’ve voted Republican consistently ever since. I believe I cast a vote for a Libertarian recently, but I don’t recall ever voting for a Democrat. I might do so, if I ever found one that truly matched my values better than any of the other candidates and would do a better job. But in the course of 30 years, I haven’t so far.
I also used to be reasonably active in local conservative political circles. I’ve helped campaign a bit. I went over to Strafford to see Matt Blunt announce his run for Governor in 2004. I went to see Sarah Palin when she visited Springfield in 2008.
I had to step back from active participation a few years ago, though, in order to try and better make a living for myself and my family. But there are a few people who still know me from those days. I ran into one of these at Barnes & Noble recently. I mentioned I was writing a book on Obama’s birth certificate. He said, “I hope you can prove it’s a fake.” He didn’t ask me what I had actually found out, so I didn’t foist it on him.
My investigation, in fact, was very possibly one of the better chances that conservatives had of actually finding good evidence of forgery or fraud — if it had been there to find. And if I’d found it, I’d be famous by now, and universally hailed as a hero by some who are accusing me of being an “Obot” right now.
It’s interesting that some of the folks who wanted somebody to seriously look into the birth certificate now seem to be deeply unhappy that someone has.
“You’re ‘in cahoots’ with the Fogbow people (an online community who have as their goal to debunk eligibility skeptics).”
I’ve been in a bit of contact — or at least tried to be — with interested people on all sides of the issue: Jerome Corsi, Joseph Farah, “Foggy” (yes, the proprietor of Fogbow), “Reality Check” of Reality Check Radio, Paul Irey, Douglas Vogt, Karl Denninger, Albert Renshaw, Ivan Zatkovich, Neal Krawetz, “Citizen Wells,” “Dr. Conspiracy,” Dave of thoughtsaloud.com, and others. Most of those are actually on the “birther” side. A couple of these that I tried to contact have never responded to date. I would’ve contacted Mara Zebest as well, but she’s made it very difficult to find her.
I didn’t come from the Fogbow community, generally don’t frequent their forum, and have never posted there at all except in response to comments about my book.
Some of the folks who are happy with what I found in my investigation have been willing to highlight it. The Fogbow people have a thread on my book at their forum, and Reality Check Radio did a nearly two-hour interview with me (whew!). Also, Dr. Conspiracy has featured my book at his site.
It’s only natural that people who like the results would want to make them known — and frankly, I thank them for doing so. So far, the only significant coverage that I’ve received from those who are skeptical of Mr. Obama has been from Dave of www.thoughtsaloud.com and from Citizen Wells of citizenwells.wordpress.com. I very much appreciate the coverage from these guys, too, and I warmly thank them for it — even though I did note some significant disagreements with what Citizen Wells wrote. But I still link to his review whenever there’s a reasonable chance to do so.
“You’re being paid by the government, Obama, a rich Obama supporter, etc.”
I haven’t been on anybody’s payroll for years. In my work as an independent computer professional, I do work for businesses and individuals, produce genuine value, and get paid in return.
The Obama birth certificate book project has been entirely self-financed, from the moment I said to myself, “I know enough about this to write a book.” No one other than myself contributed a single penny to its development.
In fact, if you want a confession, this has been a genuine David-and-Goliath project from the very beginning, done on an astonishingly cheap budget.
How cheap? Aside from the cost of a few books, the major expenses have been 10 ISBNs ($250), a dba certificate from the state ($7), two domain names ($20), some hosting expenses ($50), and a press release ($290). That adds up to around $620 total that I invested in setting up my own publishing sideline and promoting the first book, and almost all of that went into setup and marketing.
Yes, this book is indie-published! I could’ve tried sending it off to a bunch of agents and editors, but even if I’d been successful in finding a big publisher, it most likely would’ve taken at least a year and a half to get it out. By that time, we may well have a new President.
So indie-publishing the book was really the only option.
The $620 or so that I invested in setting up my own small publishing operation doesn’t count the 4 months (so far) of really hard sweat equity I’ve put in as well. I’ve done virtually everything myself — including all of the research (and that has been very substantial), the writing, illustration, typesetting, cover design, graphics, barcode, logo, editing, publishing business setup, publishing, ebook conversion and publishing, web site design and construction, marketing, shipping, and customer service.
In fact, there are only three things that I haven’t done. I received a bit of additional editorial input, gratis, from several people including my wife. I recruited a bit of help at the local university with the library data in the inside cover. And my wife helps out with customer service & shipping on the autographed copies.
And that’s how I’ve attempted to put forth a significant book that makes a major contribution to a national controversy: on a few hundred bucks and a heck of a lot of sweat equity. Why did I take that approach? Because I’m not backed by any organization, and it’s the only approach I had available.
So am I crazy for investing 4 months of my life (so far) into this project? Maybe.
On the other hand, you can’t do anything significant in life if you don’t take a risk. And I’m now a published author — with a book that I’m frankly very proud of. Because I know the quality of the research and the conclusions. Because — even though it may not win a Nobel Prize for Literature — I’m satisfied with the writing. And because it tells the truth, reveals a lot of new information, and really and truly contributes to our knowledge of an important national issue in a meaningful way.
When you buy a book and/ or promote the project to others, you’re supporting honest reporting of the facts. You’re also promoting both the truth and an entrepreneurial, all-American, two-parent family, married 21 years through thick and thin and with 6 kids, who are (frankly) trying to show that it’s still possible in America to make a really honest buck by being bold enough to publish… the absolute truth.
“You’re biased.”
Well.. of course I am. And so, to some degree, is every other human being on the planet… including you. I don’t think anybody is perfectly objective. And I don’t claim to be. Nonetheless, I believe I’ve managed to give the issues a pretty fair hearing. I’ve certainly tried my best to do so. And again, I think I’ve done fairly well in that regard. If you disagree, that’s fine. Feel free to do so.
But I notice that every single person who makes this charge has a particular outcome that they would very much like to be different from what I found, and how I saw it. In other words, it seems to me that every single person who makes the charge is guilty of what they’re accusing me of — and usually, pretty strongly!
Actually, I started my investigation tending to believe that Barack Obama was probably born somewhere other than the United States.
As a result of 3 months of testing the fraud theories and thinking long and hard about the evidence, I now tend to believe he was born in Honolulu, just as the Hawaii Department of Health has been telling us. That still doesn’t make him a decent President — but at least it reassures me that our American system hasn’t failed us quite as badly as a lot of people seem to think it has.
“You’re a liar.”
This is an inevitable charge from uncivil people who simply don’t like the results. Quite frankly, if I were a liar, I would be selling a much more popular, easy-to-sell book.
“You’re a hypocrite.”
Somebody charged me with this simply because they thought I hadn’t been quite even in what I’d said about two different people.
Like the major cell phone carriers, I don’t claim evenly-distributed universal coverage across 100% of the territory. That doesn’t make me a hypocrite, though. It only makes me a human being.
“You’re an arrogant know-it-all. There’s nothing you can tell without seeing the original and submitting it to a full forensic analysis.”
This point was made, interestingly, by someone who apparently hadn’t read any of what I wrote in the book.
“You’re just another book-selling whore.”
Yes, somebody actually used that phrase. Unfortunately for the accuser, it simply doesn’t fit.
It’s now two weeks after the announcement of my book’s official release, and to this point, I still haven’t cleared one single penny from my months of hard work. If I had really just wanted to make money selling books, I could’ve done so very easily.
All I needed to do was write a book listing all of the forgery theories, add a couple of original twists of my own, and then claim that it all added up to irrefutable proof that the birth certificate was a forgery. It seems quite clear to me from the wide coverage given to Paul Irey, Mara Zebest and Doug Vogt that WorldNetDaily would’ve been happy to promote such a book — and these are folks who have sold literally millions of books. Millions.
The fact that I chose to write my understanding of the truth instead demonstrates quite clearly that I’m pretty much the exact opposite of a “book-selling whore.”
“Your analysis is incorrect — and here’s why.”
Oddly enough, two weeks after publishing the book, that’s the one accusation in this entire list that I haven’t heard so far.
well said amigo.. you should do your best work and put it forward, and i believe you have..
this is going to take a long time to unravel. i say the more experts the better.
i challenged the incoming freshman class at m.i.t. to do an analysis, no response so far… all colleges should do the same.
anyway, i respect your stance, and don’t let the bastards get you down.. all the best, scott e.
Scott — I truly, truly appreciate your comment!
It seems the discussion has died hereabouts. Where did everyone go, John? I am curious, how are book sales going? I don’t ever see it mentioned anywhere I surf… ◄Dave►
WorldNetDaily’s strategy of how to respond to my book has been to studiously pretend that it — and I — simply don’t exist.
They’ve known about my initial analysis for more than 3 months; and Joseph Farah was given a copy of the book, electronically — at his request — just prior to its release. And the book was a significant topic of discussion on their own web site during the recent Paul Irey article. But, as far as they’re concerned publicly, I don’t exist.
It’s not a bad strategy on their part. On the contrary, it’s been effective so far. If they admit my analysis exists, then people are likely to read it. If people read it, they’ll discover that WND and Corsi have been feeding their readers huge amounts of complete nonsense on an almost daily basis for the past 5 months, and that in fact, NOTHING they’ve told their readers about the long form birth certificate being a forgery holds water.
Out of sight, out of mind.
WND has a big megaphone they can use to push their book sales. I don’t. And they also have an attractive message: “the President’s birth certificate is a ‘proven forgery.'”
Corsi also has relationships with quite a few people — radio hosts and others — who are willing to help him push his message. And he’s continued to push it, even though it’s been disproven, and even though he has certainly been made aware (including by myself, directly to Corsi in addition to the communication with Farah) of the analysis that disproves it.
My book certainly isn’t “dead,” but as I’ve said before, this is a David and Goliath endeavor. So far, I frankly haven’t gotten any traction with the media. That doesn’t mean I won’t. But it hasn’t happened so far.
As far as the site goes, I’m well aware I could facilitate participation here by posting a lot more. The sad fact is, I have to try and make a living for my family. If I could sell a lot of books, then maybe I could post more. If I could post on a daily basis, then maybe it would help sell a few books. More likely, it would simply retain an audience of people who already know about the book. So far, the book sales haven’t been great. It’s a Catch-22. I don’t have the resources to promote heavily without a lot of sales. I probably won’t get a lot of sales without heavy promotion.
Any help in getting word of the truth out, and in selling books, is appreciated. I’ve published the truth. But will enough people read it for the truth to ever be known?
You have run into the same issue I have.
When people see that you don’t believe the birth certificate is forged, or believe as I do the evidence is not there or fully developed, you are called every name in the book.
I got a flood of emails on my site just as you did. I started responding to them with the following:
A few things that we have noticed over the years is that conspiracy theorists not only have the mentality of a 5 year old, but have a thought process that relies more on perception rather than reality. For example, a conspiracy theorist will say, “Look at ‘A’!” as support for his theory. When “A” is de-bunked, the conspiracy theorist will respond with “but look at ‘B’!” After debunking “B,” the conspiracy theorist will say, “Ah! But look at ‘C’!” When “C” is debunked also, they will return to “A” or a variation of “A.” After awhile, with all the permutations of the debunked theories they maintain are legitimate, a person is tired of the battle and simply says “whatever.” The conspiracy theorist will then say “you need to look at all the evidence!” even though you have discredited all of the evidence.
We have also noticed that conspiracy theorists like to call others names or make up what they think are “cute” monikers for people they don’t like. These monikers add nothing to the discussion, but conspiracy theorists are not interested in discussion. They are not interested in debate. They just want you to believe what they believe in spite of evidence to the contrary.
Lastly, we also have noticed that conspiracy theorists will repeat the same, tired arguments that have been discussed and laid to rest over and over, as if their screaming the same thing repeatedly like a 5 year old wanting a cookie means anything. They also have a tendency to try and project their own insecurities and emotional issues onto others.
They cannot discuss facts, so they resort to their childhood, wearing intellectual diapers. English is not their strong point, wishing words to only mean what they want.
We hope one day they can mature both mentally and emotionally, but we doubt it.
There is very little difference between “birthers,” “truthers,” those who believe we never went to the moon and believers in the “grassy knoll.”
They aren’t interested in true debate because they have formed their opinions based on what they feel, and not facts.
It is tough when you are standing up for truth and you get slammed by people who for the most part agree with you ideologically, (conservatives) and people who despise what you believe (the Fogbow people.)
There is no rest other than resting in the truth.
A.Afterwit,
Thanks for your very cogent and enlightening description of how the discussion sometimes works. That’s an excellent contribution to the discussion.
I notice a couple of other dynamics at work as well.
Claims that have been shown not to hold water continue to pop up simply because they’re “sexy” and are continuously repeated at a higher rate than the accurate information. So there are always people who simply haven’t heard the true discrediting of false (“sexy”) information who continue to repeat the discredited claims.
Also, some of those who are exposed to clear, accurate information simply continue to believe the false information. I’m not always sure why this is. A good part of it, I’m convinced, is an emotional inability to let go of a theory in which the person is highly invested. And some of it I think is often due to the mistaken belief that a couple dozen meritless accusations must mean that there’s actually something to the overall claim. In reality, it only means that we have people who are highly motivated enough to come up with a couple dozen meritless accusations.
There’s also another fallacy at work as well: the “20 experts” fallacy.
This one goes like this: “There are more ‘experts’ claiming that the birth certificate’s a forgery than the number of experts claiming it isn’t. Therefore, it must be a forgery.”
What matters isn’t how many people publicly advocate a position. What matters is the quality of analysis, and whether or not they’re right.
There’s also another fallacy at work as well: the “20 experts” fallacy.
Or how about the “it appeared on 57 websites so it must be true!” argument? Even though the websites are quoting the same article, people think that the more sites that publish an article gives it more weight.
Frankly, I think the biggest issue is that people have looked at “evidence” they do not understand and fall into the trap of believing a so called “expert” without ever examining the expert or what they say. They want the person to be right, so they just go with them instead of actually becoming informed of the issues.
Or as I heard the other day, “you cannot reason a person out of an opinion they did not reason themselves into.”
Oh, yes. I think you’re exactly right. 🙂
Mr. Woodman,
I would point out that no one (or at least virtually no one) reasoned themselves into the position that the long form was a forgery. The only people who came to that conclusion got there because (like Paul Irey) they started from the assumption that it was true. Since merely being a birther is an indication of a powerful prejudice against President Obama AND a severe confirmation bias, all birthers viewed the release of President Obama’s LFBC as fraudulent in some way. The funny part is that they picked the stupidest form of fraud imaginable in this case. Consider the following:
Any document that the Hawai’i DoH claims as an official Hawai’ian BC is one – they are the sole and final authority on who was born in Hawai’i. If, as every scrap of evidence suggests, there is a document in the vault which, by its very presence in the DoH archives, is valid (even if, e.g., that document were the result of fraud on the part of Dr. Dunham and her mother – a fraud for which no evidence has ever been introduced, by the way…[although numerous accusations have been made]). Therefore, the DoH could produce exactly what they said they did (and there is no reason to suspect that they are complicit thus no reason they should be lying) – a electronic copy of that document which they then stamped and sealed. Furthermore, they put a link to the WhiteHouse.gov pdf saying that it was an image of the document that they produced. If, in fact, the Hawai’i DoH produced the document they said they did, and gave it to President Obama’s lawyer like they said they did, then there is clearly no motive for the White House to do anything but exhibit said document to the press and post an image on the web as they said. If, on the other hand, there is no document in the vault, then the past and present heads of the DoH (and many other Hawai’ian officials and the list doesn’t stop there…) are necessarily complicit. Being complicit, they would have had motive, means, and opportunity to produce a forgery which, by the very fact that they produced it, would be a valid, self-certifying document in any US court. The only way such a document could be invalidated would be if fraudulent acts on the part of the Hawai’i DoH could be proven (in court). Not even the birthers were desperate enough to try to argue this theory (or maybe they just didn’t have the imagination to come up with it…). So no matter what what happened, the forgery alleged by the birthers was ridiculous on its face – even without considering the merits of their “expert” arguments.
In light of this I ask you: Do you think I was making the same mistake as Paul Irey when I assumed that all of the birther expert analysis of the LFBC was a steaming pile of excrement just like all of the birther expert analysis of the COLB had already proven itself to be? Was I wrong to think that just because the birthers are working on a perfect 0-85 record in court with over $20,000 in sanctions, have endlessly repeated completely debunked arguments over and over again without ever producing a single one with any objective merit whatsoever, and have been unable to produce even ordinary evidence to support their claims – let alone the extraordinary evidence that their wild claims would require? Such as the claim that the Founders used a definition of “natural born citizen” which was improperly translated from a Swiss philosopher’s French writing (Vattel’s “Law of Nations”) and indicated this fact by using the term “law of nations” elsewhere in the Constitution – while referring to the laws that apply to the interaction of different nations. A text, I might add, who’s sole citation by the SCOTUS on the subject of citizenship was as an integral part of the holding of the Dred Scott decision, generally considered the worst court ruling in US history…
Personally I think that, based on all of this, any expectation that the birther technical analysis was anything but complete and utter nonsense would be irrational (at least for those who had been following the birthers). Which is not to say that what you did was in any way irrational (I assume that you didn’t know any of this), but I think it goes a long way towards explaining why your book doesn’t have a very big market…
I see on the part of those who favor Obama an inclination to simply believe the Hawaii Department of Health and the media on the topic. And I see on the part of those who dislike him an inclination to distrust the HDOH and the media on the matter.
I for one do not necessarily trust the government, or the media. As Ronald Reagan said of the USSR: “Trust, but verify.”
At a bare minimum, government workers often do their jobs inefficiently and place sometimes ridiculous burdens on our society in two ways: first by wasting our taxpayer dollars on inefficient and sometimes needless processes, and secondly by wasting the time and effort resources of citizens they deal with.
The classic example of this, for me, was when a government worker in the State of Maryland hijacked our daughter’s last name and utterly refused to give it back.
When our 4th child was born, we didn’t settle on a name immediately, so she was issued a birth certificate with the last name Woodman, but no given names. So when we decided, we filled out a government form that was specifically for the purpose of adding given names to an infant.
The instructions were clear and specific: Put the given names you would like to ADD to this child’s certificate in this blank. So we followed the instructions, to the letter.
Because we gave her three given names, not two, the idiot government worker who received the form stripped her of her surname (Woodman) and issued her a brand new family name: “Destiny.” When we contacted them about THEIR error (and it very clearly WAS THEIR ERROR, NOT OURS), they insisted that in order to get her surname changed back to Woodman, we would have to go to court and get a judge to issue a court order requiring the changing of her surname.
We had to appeal all the way up the line to the DIRECTOR of Vital Records for the State of Maryland.
I fortunately have not had to deal with government workers a great deal. But in those instances when I have, I have too often NOT been at all impressed. This isn’t the only instance of petty despotism I’ve seen; and I’ve seen it with other people as well.
Another example: Months after we moved away from Maryland, we received a forwarded letter from the State of Maryland demanding proof that our automobile insurance was in force. We wrote them back a letter pointing out that we had long ago moved halfway across the United States, that we had been insured continuously in both Maryland and Missouri, and that in any event we had moved away from Maryland long ago.
They responded with a letter demanding that we prove our car had been continuously insured up until the time we left Maryland. Since the demand was total BS, and since it was going to take significant effort on our part to produce documentation proving our INNOCENCE in a matter in which NOBODY had ANY report or indication whatsoever that we had EVER been anything BUT innocent, and since we hadn’t even lived in Maryland for like a YEAR at this point, we ignored the letter.
They followed up a few months later with a letter demanding several hundred dollars in fines, and telling us that unless we immediately produced the several hundred dollars in fines, they were going to contact the Missouri law enforcement authorities and have them issue a warrant for our arrest, with various penalties attached. Maybe jail time, I don’t remember.
So eventually we were FORCED to beg our insurance company for the proof of innocence they demanded. We were guilty until proven innocent.
In any event, based on my personal experiences, AND based on historical reports of:
* electoral fraud on the part of LBJ;
* electoral manipulation by the Kennedys;
* routine lying to the public and cover-ups of various issues (most prominently, his health issues) on the part of JFK;
* lying to the public by Richard Nixon;
* lying to the public by Bill Clinton;
* and lying to the public by various other government officials including (most recently) Anthony Weiner,
I personally DO NOT necessarily trust people in the government.
Nor do I necessarily trust the media; and I’m sure we could come up with quite a few examples as well of cases in which the media has misled the public, either by commission, or (much more often) by omission of relevant facts.
So yes, I do think those who simply assumed that government officials and media were telling the truth may have assumed too much.
In any event, the point for me is now (somewhat) moot, as I have examined the facts for myself, in great detail, and proven for myself that I could find no decent evidence of a forgery.
But I think the fact it took me three months to really come to that conclusion is an indication of how deep you sometimes have to dig in order to know what’s really correct and what isn’t.
As for those who’ve been notified of the 3-month investigation and given an opportunity to examine and prove the facts for themselves, who still continue to believe the nonsense put forth by Corsi and company, I consider them at this point to be dedicated to their beliefs, whether true or not.
I do think you have quite a valid point that I might not have undertaken the work I did, if I had followed the issue closely before and been much more “up on” the background. And you might be correct. However, there were several attractions for me in doing the research and writing the book.
There was mystery, and the opportunity to solve it. When I was a teenager, I used to read Agatha Christie novels and try to arrive at the solution.
There was the opportunity to change my own personal status clearly and permanently to that of a published author.
There was the chance, maybe, if I could find good evidence of forgery, to change history and become famous in the process. And there was the possibility of bringing in some good income as well. As the head of a family of eight, income is always needed and welcome.
There was the opportunity to reveal and promote truth. That was attractive to me, as I value truth. There was the opportunity to make a public contribution to our society’s understanding of a controversial issue.
And finally, there was the opportunity to quite publicly demonstrate my expertise, both technically in the computer realm and in general problem-solving, by producing a professional analysis that was better, more informative, and more accurate than anything put forth by any of the highly-touted “experts.” And that, I am confident, I have done.
In the end, will I find it was all worth it? The jury is still out. But I can tell you this: whatever the final outcome, and whether I personally directly benefit or not, I do feel I did a good job and made a contribution. So to that extent, I’m proud that I have. And I’m also glad to have made the acquaintance of a few good people along the way. 🙂
Mr. Woodman,
My views of the broader context not withstanding, I feel that you did a good job, made a valuable contribution, and displayed a refreshing integrity and I hope that you feel that what you did was worth it. I just wanted to point out that while your solid scientific demonstration that the birther’s allegations of forgery had no merit whatsoever was well and ably done, it was not the only valid way to arrive at the same conclusion. In fact, the birther arguments on the law have, if anything, LESS merit than their claims of forgery (what can you say about a legal theory who’s sole supporting citation from a SCOTUS ruling comes from the majority in what’s generally considered the most egregious (and, I think it’s fair to say, racist) miscarriage of justice authored by the high court?). And while I don’t disagree with you regarding the petty despotism of some government employees, what the birthers have been doing is far different that accusing someone of abusing their authority – they are making accusations that necessarily assume that specific people are guilty of fraud without a shred of evidence (certainly nothing that could be brought anywhere near a courthouse [by a sane and honest attorney, anyway…]). I believe that people are still innocent until proven guilty in this country and the despicable (and frequently racist) lies of the birthers urging sedition and a coup against the lawfully elected POTUS on the strength of their baseless accusations against innocent people (and other equally absurd theories) show the birthers to be on a moral, ethical, and intellectual level below that of common pond scum. Just my opinion.
I believe that people are still innocent until proven guilty in this country and the despicable (and frequently racist) lies of the birthers urging sedition and a coup against the lawfully elected POTUS on the strength of their baseless accusations against innocent people (and other equally absurd theories) show the birthers to be on a moral, ethical, and intellectual level below that of common pond scum. Just my opinion.
Okay, you have made some interesting claims here.
I have never seen any mainstream conservative or birther advocate a “coup” or seditious activity. Most of the birthers (and unlike many, I use that term just to describe them as a group, not to disparage them) are decent, honest, hard working people who have legitimate concerns about Obama and the direction of the country.
Their concerns and position on the birth certificate issue are not racist, and not based on racism.
It is disingenuous to throw the “race card” out there. I have never seen a serious discussion of the birth certificate that can be thought of as racist. The charge of “racist” seems more to be rooted in the fantasy that any criticism of Obama must be because he is black.
That is simply not the case.
If you feel better believing that all birthers are racists or even that the belief in the birther issues a “frequently” based on race, you are sadly mistaken.
In fact, you are just as mistaken and just as bad as the birthers in that while many of them do not truly understand the technical issues and have fallen into the world of conspiracy theory, you have made the same outlandish type of claim against them in calling them “racists.”
The claims of the “birthers” lack evidence and so does you claim they are racists.
A couple of quick comments.
First, I think it’s certainly true that the Supreme Court decision that some are quoting from, that used the Vattel definition for natural born citizen, was one that could accurately be characterized as having been a “racist” decision.
I don’t think it follows that the Vattel birthers of today are motivated by racism, however. I see the motivation of that particular Court decision as more coincidental.
“In related news,” the American Nazi Party has apparently (from what I understand) endorsed the Occupy Wall Street movement.
It doesn’t follow that the Occupy-Wall-Streeters are Nazis, or even that they have any Nazi sympathies or leanings.
I would have to come down more on A Afterwit’s side of this issue: that most birthers (and I’m aware that there are really two groups of “birthers,” those are “big” in the “movement” and are actively (and sometimes disingenuously, in my opinion) pushing the movment; and those who are following them) are simply normal people.
The followers are much greater in number. And I think the vast majority of them are decent people, who a) are not particularly technically savvy, and not particularly good at thinking things through logically, and b) really dislike Obama (and I would argue that there are some very valid reasons to dislike this President), and who therefore would really like for there to be an easy way to remove him from office. It’s very easy for people in general to believe things that align with what they want to believe.
Is it possible there are a few racists in the bunch? Certainly it’s possible, just as there is at least one person in the Occupy Wall Street bunch who defecates on police cars. Do all the Wall Street protestors defecate on police cars? Frankly, I’ve only heard of one who has, and while I think there are some generalizations that could be made of the protestors as a whole, I think it would be unfair to characterize the protestors in general as “people who defecate on police vehicles.”
Extremely well put, John. I have at various times been called a birther by the Left, and an Obot by the right, because I think for myself with an open mind, and am unafraid to call them as I see them. I will admit that as a Constitutionalist, I have profound enmity for the Obamunist, who is dismantling my country, and have considered him not to be a NBC from the first moment I heard his father was a British subject.
Nothing would please me more than to see him dethroned as a usurper, because that would nullify all of the legislation he has signed. His racial heritage has zero to do with it, and since he freely admits to being a dual citizen at birth, the place and documentation of that blessed event doesn’t either.
Your comment and the longer one above, have convinced me of your sincerity, and that I have not been wrong to defend your motives and character from some of your detractors. I appreciate your uncommonly open mind. I do look forward to your reaction to Dr. Polland’s newest offering, which I presume will be forthcoming. ◄Dave►
I thought you might find this interesting:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/69215253/Dr-Ron-Polland-How-I-Made-Obama-s-Long-Form-Birth-Certificate
First, I never suggested that any mainstream conservative advocated a coup (Rick Perry has suggested that Texas might consider seceding and he is certainly mainstream and that could be considered seditious, but that’s not what I was talking about…). If you’ve never seen a birther advocate a military coup or make other seditious remarks then you simply haven’t been paying attention to the birthers – after all, their entire purpose is to usurp the lawfully elected POTUS and overthrow the Constitutionally guaranteed right of the people to elect the president. How is that not seditious?
No, they are not. There’s nothing wrong with asking the question “is President Obama eligible”, but when every credible source comes back with a resounding “YES!”, then pretending that you haven’t gotten an answer and asking the “question” again and again is disingenuous. Every birther is willfully ignorant at best (if they haven’t looked at the opposing arguments), and most are either stupid (if they think that the birther arguments are meritorious and, for example, the arguments of the court in Ankeny or those of the obots are not) or dishonest (if they are aware of how frivolous their arguments are but try to use them to propagandize anyway). The large majority of birthers, however, combine all three of these characteristics (my opinion). It’s all right to have concerns about President Obama and the direction of the country provided those concerns are based on facts – if you’re concerned that your taxes are at the lowest rate of any modern president, for instance, or if you are concerned that your child is able to keep sucking off of your insurance company’s teat until they turn 26, or if you think that the assassination of Osama Bin Laden was unjustified, or that we shouldn’t be intervening in Libya, or if you are concerned that the president has asserted his right (and used said right) to assassinate a US citizen on foreign soil, or that the stimulus did too little or too much (while admitting that the stimulus did do SOMETHING), or that raising taxes on earnings of over $1,000,000 per year is a bad idea, or that we would be better off without GM or Chrysler (or, more importantly, the 30 million jobs in the auto parts industry which would have been devastated if they collapsed…), or any of a wide host of fact-based objections to President Obama’s proposed or enacted legislation or executive actions or stated policy positions or goals. However, when you are concerned that President Obama has raised your taxes (he hasn’t), or is a liberal (he isn’t – I wish he was), or a socialist (he could use a stronger commitment to socialist policies – that’s my opinion, but the fact is that President Obama isn’t a socialist…), or a communist, or a nazi, or a Muslim (General Powell had the best response to this one in 2008, I thought – what if he is?), or that he has usurped the presidency (which is, at its core, the defining characteristic of birtherism), that’s another thing entirely. An objective look at President Obama’s policies places him to the right of President Nixon – certainly not what I would consider a progressive…
If you’ve never seen a birther advocate a military coup or make other seditious remarks then you simply haven’t been paying attention to the birthers
I suspect that given the amount of mail I get from birthers and others, I am far more familiar with the birthers than you are. That is evidenced by your next statement.
…after all, their entire purpose is to usurp the lawfully elected POTUS and overthrow the Constitutionally guaranteed right of the people to elect the president.
That is factually false. Their whole purpose it to make sure the Constitution was followed when any president is elected.
Please explain to me how asking the darkie for his papers doesn’t smack of racism
Please explain when that was done.
No other president has been asked – or produced – their birth certificate, but President Obama has been continually hounded by the birthers to produce his — starting just after he voluntarily released the document himself (to put down baseless rumors regarding his middle name),
Other candidates have been asked to verify their eligibility. And the birthers didn’t ask for the birth certificate after Obama released the document, the Clinton camp raised the eligibility long before Obama was the nominee.
(in an English translation published 10 years after the Constitution was ratified, by the way…)
This is the second time you have made this argument. The founders were not only familiar with Vattel’s work, but used the 1758 edition of Law of Nations as part of the backbone of the country.
Sorry, but that couldn’t be further from the truth – at the very least you should be able to see that I’m not making a frivolous accusation of racism
I see nothing of the sort. Your initial post here put forth the idea that as Obama had made a request to the DOH and a lawyer had gotten the document, there could not ever be any question about the document’s authenticity. (After all, we have never seen a President or lawyer lie before.)
You then launched into an attack on people based on a Supreme Court ruling. Your position there was that as the only reference to the “Law of Nations” in a SCOTUS ruling is in a case with racial overtones, the Law of Nations reference must be racist as well as any citation of the Dred Scott decision. That is an astounding leap of logic for which there is no support.
If you are referring to your baseless accusation that I was playing the race card in an inappropriate way, I agree
And yet you continue to do so in your response.
No, I’m saying that they are all bigots who are silently complicit with the racists in their midst – if they wanted to make clear that they weren’t racists they shouldn’t have gotten so chummy with them…
I have never seen racists in the midst of birthers. That does not mean they are not there, but even the sites you gave as evidence only show a deep hatred of Obama and his policies, but no racism.
I suspect that you are a person who goes looking for racism. Whether or not racism actually is present doesn’t matter to you. You are only interested in the charge of racism to dismiss any and all criticism.
That is dishonest at a level than is higher than some of the dishonesty of the birthers. The average birther is, for the most part, looking for truth.
You aren’t.
You only want to shut down any discussion on the issue by claiming racism where the vast majority of birthers are not racists.
Aafterwit,
Do you like apples?
I’m not trying to shut down conversations with accusations of racism – I’m trying to provoke a conversation on the merits (to test my theory that no birther argument has merit…). I like debating birthers – it’s like playing a video game on cheat mode (although it’s not quite that hard…). I’ll address your points one-by-one as I have the time to do so.
First, some friendly advice – you stepped in it. You saw some arrogant, bleeding heart librul jerk being mean to fellow conservatives without providing much of anything in the way of support to back up his argument and you decided to help defend the guys that you see as on your side from what you seem to view as an unjustified attack (or at least the enemy of your enemy [I’m just assuming you see President Obama as your enemy {and me by proxy}, please correct me if I’m wrong…]). Probably thought that you could shoot off a quick post full of snark and try to call me on a couple of things and I’d run away with my tail between my legs. Unfortunately (for you), what you found is someone who likes to debate the merits of birthism and realizes how hard it is to get the birthers to engage (let’s see if Dave comes back to explain why James Madison is wrong about President Obama being a natural born citizen… I doubt it). So if you’d like to debate the merits of birfing or defend a bunch of stupid, dishonest, willfully ignorant bigots from my scurrilous charges that their movement is chock full of racism, that’s fine with me, but you might want to ask yourself if you’re sure that the people that you are defending are really worth the effort.
Anyway, you posted:
Really? Now I know that you have your vast expertise based on your extensive correspondence with birthers and whatnot, and all I’ve got is an opinion born of following the birthers from the early days of Texas Darlin’s blog before the 2008 election and listening to what real (i.e. competent) lawyers said about the relevant law with the mindset of a scientist (which I am, by the way…), but here goes:
The Founders, most likely, read Vattel in the original French rather than the English translation you cite, but what they clearly did not do is read Vattel from the English translation published 10 years after the Constitution was ratified – which is the translation which contains the phrase “natural born citizen”. A phrase which does not appear in the edition you cite. Oopsie! What should we do? A reasonable solution would be to find the French version and a reliable translation thereof. Fortunately, a French lawyer did just that over at Doc Conspiracy’s:
http://www.obamaconspiracy.org/bookmarks/fact-checking-and-debunking/the-translation-of-vattel-from-the-french/
Now, putting aside the fact that Vattel didn’t say what the birthers say he did, let’s examine your claim that Vattel helped form the “backbone of the Constitution”. My understanding (gleaned from listing to lawyers who appear competent to me) is that mostly what the Founders took from Vattel was about law on the high seas (or the “law of nations” as referred to in the text of the Constitution on that subject – the Constitution never refers to “The Law of Nations” [Vattel’s book], by the way…), not about citizenship. In fact, to the best of my understanding, the sole citation of Vattel’s work on the subject of citizenship in any decision by a US court is the citation by the majority in the racist (it’s okay to call it that, right? ;-)) Dread Scott decision (which, I’m pretty sure, cites the version published after the Constitution as well). Can you give me any citation of law or statute that would indicate that the Founders were using a definition of natural born citizen from a book to be published in a decade rather than the common law definition of natural born established by Calvin’s case two centuries earlier? I’m guessing that you can’t (unless you, of all people, have recently stumbled across the Vattelist holy grail…). That just leaves you with the choice of admitting that I know more about the subject than you and that the birther argument has no merit, running away with your tail between your legs, or taking one of the birther options of either ignoring what I said, failing to understand what I said, or lying about what I said.
How do you like them apples?
So if you’d like to debate the merits of birfing or defend a bunch of stupid, dishonest, willfully ignorant bigots from my scurrilous charges that their movement is chock full of racism, that’s fine with me, but you might want to ask yourself if you’re sure that the people that you are defending are really worth the effort.
Actually, I am wondering if debating you is worth the effort.
Now, putting aside the fact that Vattel didn’t say what the birthers say he did,
Nice try. The birthers say that Vattel supported and continued the understanding that a “natural born citizen” was that of a person who was born in a country and is from parents of two citizens. Vattel in both the French and the later English translation supports that theory.
You don’t even have applesause.
You said:
Given that I know how to debunk every birther argument I’ve ever heard (and I think I’ve pretty much heard them all – from Indonesian adoption to lizard person…) and given the number of errors of fact and indications of misunderstanding in your comment, I’m pretty confident that you don’t know Jack about the birthers compared to me.
I’m wondering why you would trot out the standard birther refrain of “just asking questions”… The question was answered (President Obama is eligible for his office) before the birthers started asking it and has been confirmed and reconfirmed in the over three years since. That being the case, one has to ask of the birthers, “why are you still asking a question to which you know the answer?” None of the possible answers to this question flatter the birthers.
But let’s play along with your inane assertion. How was the Constitution not followed in President Obama’s case? He was presumably certified to be a natural born citizen (which the campaign had prima facie evidence of) to the satisfaction of all 57* presidential voting districts – in most cases under the signature of Nancy Pelosi (I’ve seen the images of several). In any case, none of them have brought suit against the president for fraud (they are the only entities [besides opponents – why did John McCain and Hillary Clinton both give President Obama a pass on this if it were a viable issue, by the way?] that would have standing to do so according to the Constitution). I’m assuming that neither you nor the birthers have any evidence of fraud in the election or the electoral college, so the next Constitutionally mandated step is Congress certifying the election. The Constitution specifies that objections can only be made if at least one Senator and one Representative object in writing before the vice president certifies the vote. This did not happen. Maybe the Congressmen didn’t remember how – after all, Congress hasn’t objected to the certification of a presidential election since 2004… 😉 Moving on, although the Constitution is pretty clear that the president-elect assumes the office, oath or no, at 12 noon on January 20th, President Obama (and Justice Roberts) did manage to get through that even if it took Justice Roberts two takes to get it right. It seems to me that there is absolutely no evidence that the Constitutionally prescribed procedure wasn’t followed to the letter and that, like everything the birthers do, this is about holding President Obama to a higher standard than any of his predecessors (and ignoring the fact that the standard is either impossibly high, wrong, or that he meets it) – why is that?
*It’s a pet peeve of mine that people make fun of President Obama referring to visiting “57 States” during the campaign. There are 57 entities with electoral votes and no good way to describe them as a whole – but most of them are states… A note to any conservatives reading this – next time you make fun of this “gaffe”, you’ll just be revealing your ignorance.
So there’s one more piece of your “birther apologia” down in flames – are you having fun yet? 😉
I’m wondering why you would trot out the standard birther refrain of “just asking questions”… The question was answered (President Obama is eligible for his office) before the birthers started asking it and has been confirmed and reconfirmed in the over three years since.
Your logic is that since you believe the answers are settled, the birthers must be attacking the birth certificate for another reason. You then make the jump without support, I might add, that the only reason they are questioning the certificate is due to racism.
Actually, the better answer is they are distrustful of the answers they have gotten to their questions. They see a pattern of distrust and lies from this president and now his word and the word of those who surround him is suspect.
You seem to think because the answer is settled in your mind it is settled in theirs. That is not logical and frankly, is ridiculous.
*It’s a pet peeve of mine that people make fun of President Obama referring to visiting “57 States” during the campaign.
Right. Of course a lawyer like Obama would equate a state to a electoral region because the two are the same.
News flash: they are not.
Now personally, I think the gaffe occurred, as do most gaffes like this, because the candidate is tired. It is difficult to be on the campaign trail and being “up” all the time.
He made a mistake. It is a humorous moment.
You defense of this is so far out and into the realm of bizarre that you have only shown how logic is not your strong point.
And yes, I am having fun.
You said you didn’t see any racism over at the Post&Email – I guess you missed this gem from “One Pissed Off Vietnam Vet”:
This charming gentleman has spewed plenty of racist bile both in the comments section and in the columns that harpist and fellow racist Sharon Rondeau publishes for him. This particular example is pretty mild, but both Rondeau and OPOVV have said much worse at the P&E…
You said you didn’t see any racism over at the Post&Email – I guess you missed this gem from “One Pissed Off Vietnam Vet”:….
Let’s see……
There are two groups mentioned in your citation. Let’s examine both of them for “racism,” shall we?
First, let’s start with the definition of racism:
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/racism
1. a belief or doctrine that inherent differences among the various human races determine cultural or individual achievement, usually involving the idea that one’s own race is superior and has the right to rule others.
2. a policy, system of government, etc., based upon or fostering such a doctrine; discrimination.
3. hatred or intolerance of another race or other races.
Now, let’s look at the two groups:
1) Muslim. I am pretty sure that “Muslim” is not a race. You will be hard pressed to find anyone who thinks that it is. Therefore your charge of “racism” against Muslims is impossible.
2) “illegal immigrants.” What race is an “illegal immigrant?” By definition, an “illegal immigrant” is an immigrant (no race) that is in a country illegally.
As you like to say… “Ooopsie!”
But you really should examine the lack of critical thinking when you make the charge that because there may be some racists in the birther group or some racists that support the birthers, that all birthers are racists.
That just doesn’t track.
For example, no sane person could ever say that the teachings of Jeremiah Wright do not have racism in them. It just can’t be done. Is Obama a racist for having sat under Wright’s teaching for 20 years?
Because Obama defends himself against the birthers and sat under a racist pastor, does it follow that people such as yourself who attack birthers are racists?
That is the exact logic you are spewing forth, and it makes no sense.
But I doubt you’ll see it that way.
In your mind you believe that birthers are racists. You have formed your own little conspiracy theory on that point just as the birthers have formed their conspiracy theory on Obama.
No one will able to talk you away from that illogical position because it is clear that you see yourself as some superior person with superior intellect.
It is tough to argue with someone like that.
I am not sure I want to try because in the end, the person who is injecting race and painting broadly with the charge of “racism” is you.
The only reason you want to make that charge is to shut down anyone who disagrees with you as the charge itself does not have merit.
I think there’s confirmation bias on both sides of the aisle. Plenty of it on the birther side — they want Obama to be ineligible so they tend to believe any possible indication that he is — but also a bit as well on the anti-birther side. Some (not all but some) want to believe that racism is a prime motivation for birtherism, so they tend to look for and believe any indication that that’s the case.
I see a whole multitude of reasons for people to believe in and/ or promote birtherism.
* distrust of Obama and dislike of his policies leading to desire to believe ineligibility.
* wanting to be rid of him and hoping there’s an easy, no-effort way for that to happen
* gullibility on the part of people who’ve been told things, and/or inability to test the facts for themselves
* the belief that even if the allegations aren’t true, they constitute a way to hurt a political opponent
* opportunities for some to make money, become famous, or be a hero off of birtherism; or to be seen as an “expert” — which is easy to do since Corsi and WND have been willing to promote just about any “expert” who’s stepped forward to declare the birth certificate fake
* “so-and-so said he’s ineligible, and so-and-so is a ‘trustworthy man of integrity;’ therefore it must be true.
And yes, I’m sure there are some folks out there who actually do have some racist motivation and don’t like the man simply because of the color of his skin. I’d be naive to say there’s nobody out there for whom that’s the case. But I just don’t think that’s very significant at all as a reason.
The fact is, we have two major political parties in this country, and both of them have demonstrated enthusiastic support for Presidential candidates who happen to be black.
Racism certainly still exists; and not just on the part of white people, either. But there’s another force at work as well, which is the desire to see everybody given a fair shot. And that force is strong enough that, as far as I see, neither race nor gender are insurmountable impediments, whatever one’s politics might be, to winning even the White House.
Mr. Woodman,
I’d like to point out that I’ve been saying that birtherism is rife with racists, not that all birthers (or all Obama Derangement Syndrome victims) are racists – racism is merely one possible cause. I am saying that all birthers (and ODS sufferers) are bigots due to their undeniable prejudice against President Obama.
Aafterwit,
I was going to answer your comments, but as I seem to be coming down with a cold, I think a nap is more in order – I’ll reply to you later…
I’d call it the canonical racist decision, in fact.
If someone is arguing that separate but equal is still the law then I don’t really care what their motivations are – their actions brand them as a racist. Similarly, those that argue that the SCOTUS got it right in Dred Scott are pretty much racist by definition in my mind…
That’s a false equivalence – the birthers theories are based on incredibly racist arguments, many of them have repeatedly made grossly racist statements (Lame Cherry, Sharon Rondeau, Dr. Kate, to name but a few) for which they have never been admonished by their peers, and they are trying to hold the first African-American president to an impossibly high standard when he has cleared a far higher standard than any of his predecessors (a standard, I would note, that is more than sufficient to prove him a natural born citizen in any US court – including the SCOTUS). Your comment implies that there are just some racists who have endorsed the birthers when, in fact, a significant fraction of the birthers are vocal racists, they all use profoundly racist (and unAmerican) arguments, and their goals are classically racist goals (they’re essentially demanding of the President of the United States, “show me your papers, boy” – even though he has gone far beyond any reasonable standard to try and do just that). The birthers are a bunch of small-minded, ignorant, bigots who are pretty much doing the equivalent of proudly marching in a Klan parade – they embarrass this country every time they exercise their right of free speech to spread baseless lies and fallacious accusations.
In my opinion, you’ve got your true believers (like Dr. Orly Taitz – I don’t know if she’s the worst lawyer in the country, but I’ve never heard of anyone else that was even in her league of incompetence…), and your con artists (like Farah and Corsi), but the vast majority of birthers are just ignorant dupes who looked at the “evidence” and saw exactly what their confirmation bias told them to. Or, as I said above, birthers are either stupid, dishonest, or ignorant or a combination of all three (there’s nothing wrong with ignorance, in my opinion, until it becomes willful – and the best thing a birther can be is willfully ignorant…).
It’s called a confirmation bias and just because everyone has them doesn’t make it okay. Both you and Aafterwit have shown the integrity to trust the evidence over your own confirmation biases, but don’t think that just because all of the birthers are slaves to their prejudices that the same holds of obots. I challenge you to come up with any example of confirmation bias in anything I’ve said. I know that you wont be able to, because I came to this issue with the same scientifically open mind that you did – it was just long ago (October 2008 – I was worried that the birthers were right so I investigated both sides of the issue. In three years I have yet to find a valid birther argument and I can give the citations of law that show that every single one of them is fallacious [thanks to many real lawyers who follow the birthers and explain to the rest of us why they are so very wrong…]). You made a hypothesis and tested it (and had the strength of character so necessary to any true scientist to publish your results whether you liked them or not) and you’re not making any claims beyond what you can justify by your experience – I get that (and applaud it). Do you understand that my confidence in my theory of birther fuckwittery is on the same order of my confidence in the theory of evolution and for roughly the same reason? Go read a few posts at the Post & Email – then go read some of the filth that spews from Lame Cherry’s cesspool and top it off with a stroll through the racism, sedition, and insane conspiracy mongering in the comments at drk(H)ate’s view… Look at moderated site after moderated site of birthers who wont allow anyone who doesn’t tow the party line into their echo chambers. Your experiences with the birthers, thought they may have surprised you, were exactly what all of us obots would have expected – I’ve spent three years watching these scumbags and have seen nothing to contradict my views regarding the vast majority of birthers and all of their arguments. If I were you, I’d be trying to get the birthers to STFU – if you don’t shout them down, then people like myself will tie them to the right (did you notice the rapid decline of “birther-curious” politicians after Barack “whipped out” his long form – I sure did [and I hope that all of their opponents in 2012 noted it as well… with video]) – inasmuch as they are a political force, they drive a wedge between the right and independents. Personally, I’m happy if you don’t – the more credibility they get, the more it helps President Obama’s re-election chances…
Sorry, but that’s just another false equivalence – all birthers are bigots due to their prejudice against President Obama (if this wasn’t true, you could exhibit a birther that would vote for President Obama if he only showed his birth certificate [except he already has…] – that would falsify my theory as nicely as a chimera would falsify evolution), all “Vattelist” birthers are pushing a frivolous, racist argument that hasn’t been made since Dred Scott (find me someone arguing the “Vattel” theory before 2004 – again, you can’t do it), all “born in Kenya” birthers are rocking a major-league confirmation bias and packing some weapons-grade stupid as well (as you yourself have shown), and I bet you can’t point to a single one who has denounced even one of the many outspoken racists in their midst.
First, given the birther propensity for circular firing squads, being called an obot by the birthers is pretty much meaningless. The obots (some of whom are on the right, by the way…) call you a birther because you are – you question President Obama’s eligibility even though according to every credible source he is eligible. (by the way, I’m using my definition of birthers and obots – namely that birthers are people who question the president’s eligibility [for whatever reason] and obots are anti-birthers)
Neither am I – you’ve got a pretty severe confirmation bias.
You birthers keep using that word – I do not think it means what you think it means. According to the Constitution Barack Obama is the lawful POTUS until removed by impeachment – birthers call themselves Constitutionalists while ignoring any of its provisions that they don’t like or don’t understand. In other words they wrap themselves in the Constitution while spitting on it.
You do realize that we fought a war so that we wouldn’t be subject to British law? It always amazes me how birthers are so willing to cede US sovereignity to anyone if they think it will advance their argument (by your reasoning, “Dear Leader” could make every child born in the US a North Korean citizen and after 35 years we would never again have any new natural born citizens – does that make sense to you?) By US law anyone born in the US save the children of diplomats are natural born citizens – you remember the James Madison quote that I berated you with over at Bernie Goldberg’s blog? You know, the one no birther will touch with a 10-foot pole? The one where the Father of the Constitution says that we are a jus soli nation? Who should we believe, you or Jimmy Madison? Or should we believe you or that nice Sandy O’Conner lady – or Justice O’Conner as I believe she is called? Should we take your word over that of the court in Ankeny? (A court, I might add, that declared President Obama a natural born citizen – something which, even if it isn’t binding precedent, would be extremely hard to overcome in any US court – and, quite frankly, birther lawyers are worse than the Washington Generals…) Where was the outrage at the Greek a heartbeat away from the Oval Office? (VP Agnew’s dad was an unnaturalized Greek citizen when he was born – making him a Greek citizen come hell or high water according to Greek law) Or how about the French citizen that was in the Oval Office? I would also note that according to the birther’s theories President Washington and President Jefferson (or Monsieur President as they would say in his adoptive country of France) would not have been natural born citizens of the United States. How may times do you have to be hit with the stupid stick to believe something as ridiculous as that? Both men were natural born citizens of the Commonwealth of Virginia every day of their life and became natural born citizens of the United States upon its creation (you may have heard about that – it happened on July 4, 1776…).
In other words, you want a coup – all Constitutional provisions were followed in his election, confirmation, and inauguration (if you feel differently, then quote the portion of the Constitution which was violated and the portion that gives you standing to make your allegation in the courts…). He’s your president and if you respect the Constitution you should show him the respect due to his office.
Do you really believe this? What portion of the Constitution provides for nullifying the actions of a lawfully elected POTUS? Even if there were it would be totally impossible – laws can only be overturned by the SCOTUS or repealed by the Congress (with the president’s approval). Unless you are planning on usurping the Constitution via a coup…
So here’s something I don’t get: if dual citizenship at birth was disqualifying, why wasn’t it brought up from the start? It’s not like he hid the fact. Why wasn’t it brought up regarding VP Agnew? The only reason I can think of is that every credible authority on the matter didn’t think it was an issue since he was born in the US – I’ll just stick with one: James Madison says that you are full of it.
I have no doubt that Mr. Woodman will find (if he bothers to look) that Polarik’s new crap – like his old crap – is completely without merit. He’s probably trying to get his mojo back after being shut out of the LFBC analysis (in other words, he wasn’t good enough to make the cut to get into the group that Mr. Woodman has already completely debunked – what makes you think his new analysis will be anything but completely incompetent?
I’ve definitely seen some stuff from Polland (fairly recently, I might add) that was completely, totally, slam-dunk without any merit whatsoever. None. Zero. Zip. That fact alone makes literally anything he puts out significantly suspect.
I’ve also seen a few things that (like so much of the stuff promoted by Corsi) seemed to have possible merit, but which on closer examination really did not hold up.
I’ve only given his latest publication the most cursory of glances. Having said that, it doesn’t look to me as if he’s duplicated the long form birth certificate to the degree he claims he has. In other words, after two months of trying to hand-duplicated the LFBC, he’s produced a document that’s at least somewhat similar. What has he proven? Well, in fact, for one thing, he’s proven my point that it would take a HECK of a lot of work to produce that thing manually. His explanation as to “why it was done that way” is almost certainly going to turn out to be woefully inadequate.
If I were you, I wouldn’t waste any of my time on Polarik (I generally refer to him by the pseudonym he clung to for 2 years rather that by his real name and the title that is completely irrelevant to his work as a pseudo-expert…). I think that he feels that as the first “expert” to make up lies about the COLB he should have gotten more attention after President Obama whipped out his long form and now he’s desperately stomping his feet and screaming “pay attention to me!”. It’s probably best to ignore him until he goes away…
I cut my teeth on mathematics. For that reason, I’m fond of QED — good, old-fashioned, solid proof. I’m not as fond of anybody’s opinion — even my own, until I prove it one way or the other.
And as I say, I’ve only given Polland’s latest work the quick glance. But based on what I’ve seen of his previous work, I do actually suspect that the likelihood is fairly high that you’ll be correct about it turning out to be a waste of time.
I’m a mathematician by training (I got my PhD at Duke) who is a scientist by profession – while I am a great fan of beautiful and elegant proofs (and even have a theorem of my own which may not be beautiful or elegant [or even terribly significant], but it’s mine – I proved something no one else had before me… ;-)), but in this instance (as with most relating to the physical universe), the scientific method is the superior investigative tool (as you yourself have proved [pun intended]). You have no idea how much crap I weighed on the merits before I decided to assume that all birther arguments were meritless (until some evidence to the contrary turns up, at least…). The downfall of conspiracy theories is that it is impossible for the conspiracy theorist to come up with a falsifiable hypothesis which explains the whole conspiracy (and isn’t already falsified…). In other words – conspiracy theories aren’t scientific. The birthers are no exception to this rule. Ockham’s razor cuts them to shreds every time…
Here’s some of what Fox News Latino had to say about the recent birther attacks on Marco Rubio (that seems to have raised a small kerfuffle regarding his parents emigration from Cuba…):
I guess it was my mistake to forget that racists are always so eager that everyone know them as such that they eschew the use of code words in favor of openly broadcasting their views…
Aafterwit said:
That’s an awfully nice straw man there. I’ve never said that all birthers are racist, just that there are some racists in the movement (that none of the birthers denounce), their arguments are unquestionably racist, and that every single one of them is a bigot due to their prejudice against President Obama (for whatever reason). If I were you, instead of questioning my critical thinking (which is just fine, by the way…) I would try to avoid this sort of intellectually dishonest argument.
Aafterwit said:
If I wanted applesauce (note spelling) I’d make some from the fresh Michigan apples I bought the other day (yum!). What I would really like, however, is for you to explain to me how you reconcile your naive interpretation of Vattel’s writing (which you share with the birthers – why is that?) and it’s importance to a term of art never mentioned in said work with the words of James Madison:
It sure sounds like the Father of our Constitution was an obot. Maybe the obots have really been the Constitutionalists all along – hmm… But that would make all of the birthers either stupid, ignorant, or dishonest, wouldn’t it?
Note: my link is to an obot site, so at the link you will find not only the quote, but a link to the full context in which the quote was found as well – can you cite an example of a birther site that operates in a similar manner?
I find it curious that someone like you who clearly understands that none of the birther arguments of forgery have any merit wouldn’t at least consider the possibility that their legal arguments are likewise frivolous. Since you obviously can’t give an example of a birther argument with merit, can you at least tell me why you wish to defend a bunch of bigoted incompetent idiots who pal around with racists?
Mr. Woodman,
Well, I guess Aafterwit is incapable of responding to my arguments. As you can see, birthers (and birther apologists) have no defense at all against someone with even a moderate understanding of the relevant law. I suspect that Mr. A was a closet Vattelist birther — he seemed pretty knowledgable about their claims when he was repeating their fallacious propaganda.
April 2012: Having reached firm conclusions on the birther movement (see my various most recent and wrap-up posts), I’m moving on, and to facilitate that I’m closing comment sections of this blog as I do so.
My feeling is that the things that need to be said have already been said.
That said, if you feel you have a comment to some post here that’s really, REALLY important and ought to be added to the site, email it to me. If I agree, I’ll add it.
Sincerely,
John Woodman