Or, an Entire Year’s Understanding of Obama Eligibility Claims Condensed Into One Single Article
For anyone who is interested in the conclusions of someone who has examined the claims regarding Barack Obama’s eligibility and the Birther Movement in great detail, and who was very willing from the beginning to believe — or not believe — any or all of the claims, based on whichever direction the evidence led, I would like to state the following conclusions of close to a year of investigation.
I have reached these conclusions after hundreds of hours of research, reading, and exploring the arguments on both sides. For a certain portion of 2011, particularly while looking into all the technical details and allegations regarding the long form birth certificate, my investigation was like a second full-time job.
The Two Issues: The Place of Birth of Barack Obama; and the Meaning of “Natural Born Citizen”
There are two basic issues regarding Presidential eligibility: Place of birth, and the meaning of the phrase “natural born citizen.” I began my journey (back in the spring of 2011) with a tendency to think that Barack Obama was probably either born outside of the United States, or that his long form birth certificate probably contained information that he did not want publicly revealed. I didn’t start with any firm opinion, either way, on whether or not the Founding Fathers would have required two citizen parents to make a natural born citizen.
Obviously, conclusions have consequences. But an honest conclusion is not based on its consequence. In other words, you don’t choose your conclusion based on what you want it to be. Unless, of course, you’re like a lot of people with an axe to grind on this particular issue.
The following are not tentative conclusions. They are quite firm. I don’t care whether you like the conclusions or not. It doesn’t matter whether the conclusions are politically convenient or not. If you want to know the honest truth, here it is. If you don’t want to know the honest truth, then there are plenty of places that will quite happily tell you untruths in regard to the matter.
Note that this is just a bare-bones summary of actual conclusions. If you want any of the substantial evidence and reasoning behind these conclusions, you’re going to have to read a lot more of this blog (which has dozens of other published posts), read some of my writing at a few other locations on the web (you can start by searching for “John Woodman” and “Obama”), listen to a few of the interviews I’ve done at Reality Check Radio, and/or go through the 221-page book I wrote on the forgery theories. Reading the rest of this blog (including comments on both sides of the issue) is a very good place to begin. There are also other places on the web where some solid and truthful analysis has been done.
I don’t guarantee that I’ve put everything I know about the issue into the public realm. Most of it, though, should now be available.
Note that on every single one of these issues, a seemingly persuasive argument can be made by either side. Just because you showed up here quite rationally and completely convinced of a conclusion doesn’t mean your conclusion is right. Nor does it mean that you were wrong in drawing that conclusion based on the evidence you had! But an awful lot of apparently convincing statements have been pulled out of their proper context and twisted, leading otherwise rational people quite reasonably to conclusions that are completely wrong. Only by doing in-depth and HONEST analysis of both sides — or relying on somebody who has — can one come to a proper conclusion.
Note again: I am not presenting the details on this particular page — only my conclusions. For some of the more detailed analyses, see here (particularly in regard to the historical and legal meaning of “natural born citizen”), or get the book (particularly in regard to the forgery theories.)
On Claims That Obama’s Birth Certificate Is a Forgery
- In spite of what you may have heard, there is no credible technical or other evidence that Barack Obama’s long form birth certificate is a forgery (see the full explanations of technical issues in my 221-page book, and further comments on this site).
- There is no credible evidence that Barack Obama’s short form birth certificate is a forgery.
- The investigation conducted by Maricopa County, Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s “Cold Case Posse” shows every sign of being a complete sham, effectively controlled by forgery-theory activists Jerome Corsi and Mara Zebest. All indications are that the posse made no attempt to look at both sides of the issue. I conclude that they simply ran with what Corsi, Zebest, and company told them.
For example, Jerome Corsi had 18 hours to present his “evidence” to the posse, and Mara Zebest prepared the official report. I twice contacted the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office to offer my help, mentioning that I had spent at least 500 hours of research into the specific matter and had authored the only book on the forgery theories. I was never contacted. Nor, reportedly, did they so much as place a phone call to the Hawaii Department of Health, who maintains the actual birth records.
The posse’s lack of hearing both sides is completely unprofessional. It’s kind of like having Crystal Gail Mangum’s brother in a key position on the investigative team looking into the Duke lacrosse case.
- I find it highly unethical that before the press conference was even held, an ebook (which would have found no significant audience if the posse had concluded differently) was already on sale — with the profits to be split between forgery-theory proponent Jerome Corsi and the posse’s lead investigator Michael Zullo.
- Virtually every claim of evidence for forgery, including those brought forward by Arpaio’s posse at their press conference, in Zebest’s official report, and in the subsequent for-profit ebook, has been factually debunked. Almost all of what Arpaio’s posse said had been factually discredited before they ever even started their “investigation.” There are one, maybe two, minor points — out of literally dozens of claims — that to my knowledge haven’t yet been debunked publicly. But those are just as factually debunkable as all the others.
- [Update:] The main specific item I was really referring to in the point above was the claim that the “clipping mask” in the PDF file is evidence of forgery. I have now commented on that. There is reason to believe that this, again, was the result of the scanning and optimization process. At most, it would seem to be the result of someone “cleaning up” the image to make it more presentable, by extending the blank margins to hide two small blemishes in the scan that do not appear in the photo by Savannah Guthrie. The people claiming “forgery” have no good explanation at all for why these blemishes should be there in the first place. By their theory, the supposed forger first created these no-purpose blemishes and then hid them (using different methods for the PDF, the AP document and the Guthrie photo) from all viewable images of the certificate. In the real world, it’s obvious why they’re there — as often happens, there were a couple of small bits of gunk on the scanner.
- [Update:] The Posse also claimed to have invalidated my evidence regarding layers, by making the false claim that optimizing a “more complex” file would necessarily produce dozens of layers — far, far more than those in the example I showed. Their claim is easily seen to be entirely false, based on the reasonable view that Obama’s birth certificate is roughly twice as “complex” as the example I presented. That being the case, we would expect somewhere around 10 layers (give or take) in the Obama certificate. It has 9. So their own reasoning confirms that my claim, and not theirs, is correct.
- There were very few new claims by Arpaio’s posse, and almost all of the few new things that they did put forth were debunked literally within days. This is not the mark of a credible investigation.
No evidence put forth by Zebest and the posse justifies any different conclusion than that which I had earlier reached: that Ms. Zebest’s claims of evidence for forgery, whether backed by Joe Arpaio or not, are complete rubbish. Her technical claims regarding the birth certificate have been refuted by multiple writers, including (at the very least) myself, a man named Frank Arduini, and a writer with the nickname of “NBC.”
- The claims made by the Arpaio “investigation” included some very easily debunked assertions. One was that a postmark on Obama’s selective service registration was created by a 2008 stamp — when the postmark itself said “USPO,” an abbreviation that was obsoleted by a name change in 1971 and that is not known to have occurred in a legitimate stamp since 1987. Another was the claim that a failure to locate immigration records of people flying into Hawaii during the first week of August 1961 was suspicious evidence suggesting a Kenyan birth. But any traveler going from Kenya to Honolulu would have cleared immigration in the Eastern United States, probably in New York City. (See also an additional debunking update in the following section on place of birth, below).
- In spite of their claims to the contrary, Corsi and Zebest have in no way answered the analysis and conclusions presented in my book.
- The sum total of the evidence, far from indicating forgery, is fairly overwhelming that all “anomalies” in the PDF file posted by the White House are artifacts of innocent processes, the most notable of which is optimization.
My overall conclusion is therefore that nearly one year after the publication of images of Obama’s birth certificate and many thousands of hours of examination and analysis by various persons, myself included, no one — specifically including Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s Cold Case Posse — has presented any credible evidence for forgery at all.
This is not a defense of Mr. Obama — whose policies I don’t even like and will be glad to be done with — and I am manifestly not an “Obot.” As for liking the man as a person, I can’t say, since I don’t know him. All of the above is simply a statement of my evaluation of the facts.
On Barack Obama’s Place of Birth
- We have plenty of decent evidence that Barack Obama was born in Hawaii — including:
- repeated, official and emphatic statements by a variety of Hawaii State officials of both Democratic and Republican parties,
- the State of Hawaii’s link to the birth certificate image posted by the White House,
- a personal statement by his high school English teacher who says an obstetrician friend mentioned the birth in Honolulu at that time,
- INS records of Obama’s father and stepfather which mention their American-citizen son/ stepson,
- a specific government statement from the 1960s that Obama was a US citizen,
- birth announcements from two newspapers, still available on microfilm in perhaps dozens of libraries across the United States,
- and the fact that his father is known to have been enrolled in school in Hawaii at the time of Obama’s birth.
- There is no credible evidence of birth in any other place.
- Specifically, for Obama to have been born in Kenya, as alleged by some, is pretty much a practical impossibility.
[Update:] We now have specific information from the US Immigration and Naturalization Service that their records showed a grand total of zero US citizen travelers embarking by airplane with a starting point of Kenya and ending anywhere in the United States during the entire year of July 1, 1961 to June 30, 1962.
My overall conclusion is therefore that Barack Obama was born in Honolulu, Hawaii. All of the evidence, taken together, points strongly in this direction. This is even allowing for a healthy suspicion of government employees and government agencies, which I have from personal experience.
On the Claim that Two Citizen Parents Are Required to Produce a Natural-Born Citizen
The claim has been made by lawyers Leo Donofrio and Mario Apuzzo, and others, that the Founding Fathers and Framers of the Constitution relied upon Swiss philosopher Emmerich de Vattel for their definition of “natural born citizen,” and that therefore “natural born citizen” means “someone who is born in the United States of two US citizen parents.”
- The idea that “natural born citizen” is restricted to someone who is born BOTH on US soil AND to two citizen parents is pretty much of a novel legal theory, in the sense that there seems to be no evidence at all of anybody making this claim at any time since 1900, until the last few years.
- The only other period of history during which there seems to have been substantial debate regarding these issues is between the end of the Civil War in 1865 and the year 1898. This debate was sparked by the infamous Dred Scott Supreme Court case of 1857 which found that black Americans, whether slaves or free, were not and never could become citizens of the United States. It continued with Congressional debates on whether black people (including the freed slaves) were or could be declared citizens, and with disputes regarding the exact status of children of Asian subjects resident in the United States.
- [Update]: I have now been through the long Congressional debates concerning the Civil Rights Act of 1866 (the precursor to the 14th Amendment), and regarding the 14th Amendment itself.
Given some of the quotes produced by birthers, I was frankly expecting significantly much more support for their position than I found. Just as in many other historical instances, they have pulled quotes completely out of context. They have chosen quotes that when divorced of their context would appear to mean one thing, but when read in their actual context and together with other statements by the exact same speaker actually do mean something altogether different. They have therefore significantly misrepresented the views of some of those who made the quotes that they cite. I found virtually no actual support for the birther position or claims — and significant support for the traditional understanding of the meaning of “natural born citizen.”
This is frankly a different result than I was expecting. Quite honestly, I was expecting to find a small, anomalous pocket of support for the birther position which would go against the totality of the other evidence. I certainly did not expect anything that would warrant a change in any overall conclusions, but I did expect a bit of a “speed bump.” The “speed bump” never appeared.
- This debate (during which Vattel was appealed to) was settled by the United States Supreme Court in 1898, which included a review of past history and the intentions of the Founding Fathers and Framers of the Constitution.
- There is no significant evidence whatsoever that the Founding Fathers or the Framers relied upon Vattel to define “natural born citizen,” or that they used his idea.
- There is plenty of evidence for the sweeping influence the English common law held for the Founders and for the Framers of the Constitution.
- The term “natural born citizen” INDISPUTABLY derived from English common law, and dates back for centuries.
- According to the common law, anyone born in the country was a “natural born subject” (or later, “citizen.”) It didn’t matter whether their parents were citizens or not.
- Vattel’s word “indigenes” wasn’t even translated as “natural born citizens” until 10 years AFTER the Presidential eligibility clause was written.
- Contrary to birther claims, the 1875 Supreme Court case Minor v Happersett created no definition for “natural born citizen” — and it absolutely didn’t create a “binding precedent” that only a person who meets the restrictive birther definition qualifies.
- Finally, directly contrary to birther claims, the Supreme Court quite clearly found that Wong Kim Ark, born in San Francisco to non-US-citizen-parents, was a natural born citizen. In doing so, they also mentioned the implications for Presidential eligibility, and established a clear and binding precedent that citizenship of parents is not a condition for natural born citizen status or Presidential eligibility.
- [Update]: I have now also gone through the dissent of Justice Fuller (who was joined by only one other Justice) in US v Wong Kim Ark, armed with a much better understanding of the history and law leading up to this case. Previously, I had understood what the Wong Kim Ark ruling was — that the Supreme Court found Wong to be a natural born citizen and thus established a binding precedent — but I did not have a good basis in the underlying history and law for stating whether I personally believed the ruling to be correct. In this tour through, armed with far more information, numerous errors seem evident on the part of Justice Fuller in his dissenting opinion. It is a novel and quite interesting thing for me to read through a judicial Supreme Court dissent and have a very clear and decisive experience of conviction that the judge writing the dissent has it all wrong, and to know exactly WHY he has it wrong. In any event, I have arrived at the personal conclusion that on the basis of previous law, history and precedent — yes, United States v Wong Kim Ark was correctly decided.
- [Update:] ehancock (who is a reader of this blog) and I have now engaged in a detailed debate of the two-citizen-parent claim with its major remaining proponent, New Jersey attorney Mario Apuzzo. Mr. Apuzzo did not fare at all well in this debate.
During the course of the debate, I identified a total of 11 specific claims on Apuzzo’s part that fail to match reality, the facts, and proper interpretation of history and the law; and I showed exactly why. Mr. Apuzzo has failed to justify any of these claims on his part. Also, when asked repeatedly by ehancock for an actual quote to back up one of these specific claims, he completely failed to produce it. He was asked for this quote at least five times. The fact that at least four state courts and three federal courts have directly refuted Mr. Apuzzo’s claim (and none have ruled in favor of it) makes up the twelfth “fail” that I mentioned in the debate.
- The core of Mr. Apuzzo’s arguments are found in the 42-page amicus curiae (“friend of the court”) brief that he filed in the 4th Circuit case of Tisdale v. Obama. A comparison of this brief with the points made in the debate mentioned shows that, with the exception of only a few minor points, Mr. Apuzzo’s claim that two citizen parents are required to make a natural born citizen has been utterly devastated. He has no leg left to stand on. Perhaps most embarrassing for Mr. Apuzzo is the fact that neither ehancock (as admitted in a comment below) nor I are lawyers. So it didn’t even take lawyers to show what a complete load of nonsense Mario Apuzzo’s claims are.
- [Update:] The research that I’ve personally done on the issue has really been completely independent from the separate report on the matter prepared by the Congressional Research Service, which comes to pretty much the same conclusions.
My overall conclusion is that Barack Obama, Bobby Jindal, and Marco Rubio, born in the United States to one or both parents who were not at the time US citizens, are all perfectly qualified to run for and serve as President of the United States. This is a positive thing for conservatives, as it seems possible to me that Rubio’s selection as Vice-President could end up giving us a close 2012 election.
On the Birther Movement and Its Claims in General
- Those who are publicly pushing either the claims of forgery or that being a natural born citizen requires two citizen parents generally do not provide a look at both sides of the issue. Their purpose is not to allow their audiences to arrive at whatever conclusion is correct; their purpose is to push their particular agenda.
- Most of the blogs and forums run by birthers are heavily moderated or censored. This is certainly not a matter of limiting improper conduct; it is a matter of censoring contrary views and facts. I personally have had factual comments fail to show up at The Post & Email, BirtherReport.com, and a forum run by another birther whose name I will not give the dignity of a mention here. In the latter case, I made a factual reply to publicly-posted false allegations regarding myself. My factual reply was immediately and completely removed; I was banned from making any further posts or private-messaging any other member of the forum; and additional vicious and completely false personal attacks concerning me were posted. The only birther site I can think of offhand where comments are apparently unmoderated except possibly for spam, and uncensored, is WorldNetDaily.
- The birther “truth” is that Barack Obama is ineligible — period. It doesn’t matter what the facts or evidence — on both sides of the question, not just one — say. No facts or evidence against the proposition matter, only such facts and evidence as may be presented for the birther claims.
- Anyone who disagrees with the claims, no matter what the rationale for doing so, is an “Obot” (“Obama robot”) or Obama supporter, or is being paid or threatened.
- Contrary evidence is ignored, ridiculed, glossed over, or simply denied. I wrote close to 100 pages regarding the PDF file alone. The birther response (after first ignoring, then publicly ridiculing and literally shouting down my presentation of the results) was to publicly mount a completely invalid attack against ONE point made in the entire 100 pages — while being careful not to actually call attention to the fact that I disagreed with the birther claims! — and then claim that the entire 100-page argument had been comprehensively disproven based on the one invalid attack. One additional technique that is used, when someone’s claims have been factually disproven, even comprehensively and point by point, is simple, bald-faced denial: “You haven’t proven anything.”
- Any theoretical possibility that something supporting a birther claim could have happened, no matter how remote the possibility of its having actually happened, is often counted as “proof” that it actually did happen.
- [Update:] As I’ve noted elsewhere, conversing with the people producing these theories is a lot like playing Whack-a-Mole — except that you don’t get any points for whacking the moles.
We’ve been presented with false claim after false claim after false claim. It doesn’t matter how many false claims are presented, either that we have good evidence Obama was born abroad, or that we have good evidence his birth certificate is a forgery, or that evidence supports the two-citizen-parents-required theory. It doesn’t matter how many dozens of these claims are shown to be absolutely false. Nor does it matter that generally speaking, all of the debunkings have been completely factual and true. The people presenting the false claims will accept no penalty for their repeated presentation of literally dozens of proven falsehoods to the public. So you don’t get any points for whacking the moles, and there are always either new ones that they pop up, or — far more likely — old, disproven ones that have already been whacked back into the hole a few times, that they will soon present to the public once again… perhaps this time with a 79-year-old, computer-illiterate Sheriff to back them up.
- It is my firm conviction that many — not all, but many — of those still pushing the birther claims are doing so in full and absolute awareness that their claims do not hold water. Nonetheless, they continue to make the claims for agenda-driven reasons. This agenda, depending on the person involved, may include personal fame and popularity, personal financial gain (yes, there is significant money in pushing birtherism), political agenda, hatred, or sense of personal importance. In other words, many of those pushing the birther claims are simply liars. They know that what they’re pushing is false, but they continue to push it, encouraged by the number of people who give the claims credence and finding plausible deniability in the complexity of the arguments. There are others pushing the claims who do actually sincerely believe them, but who are sincerely deluded.
- Quite a few of the sources referenced by birthers are completely twisted. Most people won’t actually look up the sources referred to. I have particularly had the experience again and again and again of looking up a source that Mario Apuzzo or Leo Donofrio claim support their arguments, reading the entire thing in context, and finding that the authority claimed to support the birther position actually contradicts it. Just in the last few days, I’ve noted that Leo Donofrio pulled a quote from a major Supreme Court decision to claim that it supported him, selectively omitting from that very quote a phrase that completely and directly contradicted his claim. Earlier today, I looked up one of the earliest birther claims, claiming support from a Representative Smyth in 1820. What I found what that Smyth’s entire speech was quite specifically against citizenship for free black people — solely on the basis of their race — and that after the referenced quote Smyth quite specifically stated that anyone born on US soil of white alien parents was a citizen. Such discoveries are very typical.
- Birthers are not upholding the truth. They are not upholding the Constitution and the rule of law. And they are no friends to either. Nor are they friends to conservatives or the Republican party. In fact, they could do significant damage to conservatism by falsely depriving us of some of our best conservative candidates.
My overall conclusion is that the birther movement is not founded on truth, does not respect truth, and does not have truth as its goal. The birther movement is built upon a mosaic of goals including the personal benefit of individuals involved, political agenda, personal dislike of an individual President (for whatever reasons), and so forth.
Future Prospects for the Birther Movement
For the reasons stated above, the prospects of any birther claims succeeding in any court of law are essentially zero. And any such success would inevitably be overruled by a higher court. Their track record of the past — a loss on EVERY case ever filed — is completely predictive of their track record in any and all court proceedings for the future. And it’s not because the courts are rigged, or because judges have been bribed or threatened. It’s because their cases, even if admitted on standing, have no merit. When they presented the merits of their claims in Georgia, and lost to an empty table (Obama’s attorney refused to even show up), the ruling — on the merits of the case, even though they were not explored to the depth that the court might have done — was an accurate one.
The “political” or “popular myth” prospects of the birther movement, unfortunately, are somewhat better. Now that Jerome Corsi and Mara Zebest have enlisted an ostensibly credible political figure — Sheriff Joe Arpaio — to back their bogus claims of forgery, a certain number of people who would not have given the conspiracy theory any credibility in the past will now do so. It does not matter that Arpaio himself has no technical expertise at all. It does not matter that his “posse” did not conduct a credible investigation, as long as it can be claimed that they did. This is unfortunate, as the conspiracy theory, aside from being completely unsupported by the facts, is not in the interests of the country as a whole. It is only of benefit to a few people.
Both those birthers who know their claims are without merit, and those who are sincerely deluded, will continue to push the birther doctrines. The exploiters may be able to wring a bit more personal benefit out of the issue. The deluded are doomed to the frustration and despair of continuing on in a Quixotic quest of continual and ultimate failure.
By the way, a good example of birther fraud is an article this week by birthers Penbrook Johannson and Daniel Crosby of The Daily Pen, exposed as a lie by Kevin Davidson of ObamaConspiracy.org. One does not “accidentally” remove a single key word right out of the middle of a footnote in a government document image. I note that the neat and careful excision of that single word transformed the footnote’s meaning from failure to support the birther claim into a statement that supported the bogus claim.
Conclusion
To those who would disagree with any of these conclusions: Thoroughly research BOTH sides of the issue. You will find that the birther assertions are not only claimed to have been debunked. They actually have been debunked, again and again and again.
The conclusions above are honest, based on hundreds of hours of research, and firm.
At this time, while I am perfectly open to revising ANY of my opinions based on new evidence, all areas of question have been researched so thoroughly that I have no expectation whatsoever that any of these conclusions are going to change in the future.
At ORYR there is an interview with Ben Shapiro a Breitbart Editor. Mark Gellar asks him about the birthers and he says they are wasting their time and that they (Breitbart) will not investigate it.
http://obamareleaseyourrecords.blogspot.com/2012/03/breitbart-editor-ben-shapiro-were-going.html
Naturally, the commentators at ORYR are none too happy.
I love the typical birther responses, especially this one which (without any evidence whatsoever) accuses Ben Shapiro — one of Breitbart’s editors! — of having been planted by Obama and of murdering Mr. Breitbart:
This is all typical birther. Attacking innocent people in the name of their ideology. That people ignore their claims of conspiracy is further “evidence” of a vast and powerful conspiracy. And anyone who disagrees with them has to be evil, bought, or threatened.
HOW CAN I EXAMINE OBAMA’S BIRTH CERTIFICATE AND KNOW IT IS A FRAUD?
You will need a few things:
1) A copy of the fraudulent birth certificate, directly from the whitehouse website:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/rss_viewer/birth-certificate-long-form.pdf
1a.) You will also need Adobe Reader to open the web file, and download/save it to your hard drive:
http://get.adobe.com/reader
2) A free trial copy of Adobe Illustrator:
http://www.adobe.com/cfusion/tdrc/index.cfm?product=illustrator
(this will allow you to open the birth certificate with software which is capable of displaying the layers, accurately, and allowing the fraud to be seen in detail.)
3) Arpaio’s full video report, to show you a few things to look for. It discusses important evidence of fraud:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F1wiGDYPALI
(duplicating the demonstrations, with the tools given above, will allow you to do much of the same investigation Arapio’s team did.)
4) Tom Harrison’s report on defects/artifacts in birth certificate, proving fraud:
http://www.wnd.com/files/2011/07/110726whitedots.pdf
(following Tom’s guide, you will be able to see that that obama’s birth certificate is an ABSOLUTE FRAUD!)
The web is also full of other inconsistencies and evidence of the fraud, mismatched type imported from other documents, mixed, modern day computer type with 1961 typewriter type, etc.
There is little doubt that the birth certificate is a fraud (but, hey, if obama can explain the posting of a fraudulent document to the whitehouse website — and how he became so confused as to think it is his birth certificate, I will listen.) And, one must wonder why a criminal is being allowed to remain in the public servant office of president. There are obvious problems with a criminal occupying the office of president, one is the military being unable to follow unlawful orders, since a criminal issuing orders from the whitehouse, and acting as commander in chief would be unlawful, all of his orders would be unlawful, and the military would be unable to act, lawfully, on such orders.
Also, any and all actions, bill, laws, executive orders, decisions, etc. would be unlawful, illegal, unbinding and without validity — if done by an illegal and criminally treasonous president. As more and more American citizens wake up to these truths, there is only one way to accurately describe the situation we are in, or simply, “WE ARE IN DEEP DUDU!”
And remember, while Angels may have halos, birth certificates DON’T! (you will learn about this while examing the materials, above.)
duplicating the demonstrations, with the tools given above, will allow you to do much of the same investigation Arapio’s team did.
That’s about the most meaningful thing you’ve said.
For those of us who’ve followed the issue for a long time, and examined the birth certificate file in great detail, there seems to be very little that’s new about Arpaio’s investigation. Almost all of it is a retread of birther propaganda that was debunked — virtually all of it in my book — six months before Arpaio’s press conference.
Arpaio’s team supposedly printed out a print duplicate — to the extent that they could — of Obama’s birth certificate, scanned it back in, optimized it using whatever software and settings they had available, didn’t duplicate the effects — because they weren’t using the right software and the right settings, and claimed on that basis that the birth certificate is a “forgery.”
So yeah, you can pretty well duplicate their “2,200 hours of investigation” in a day or two. Maybe even an hour or two.
What Arpaio’s report (prepared by none other than long-time birther “expert” Mara Zebest who publicly stated online that her “goal,” what she “lived for,” was to “make [Obama] a mockery of the very crowds he seeks for adultation” — how’s that for an objective and credible investigation?) — what Arpaio’s report neglected to tell you is that there are far, FAR more ways to optimize a PDF than there are people on the planet.
So their exercise was very much like someone going to 10 villages in the backwaters of the Congo (and I may be being generous here when I say “10 villages”) and then proclaiming, “Hey, we visited TEN VILLAGES, and we didn’t see one single person who had straight hair. We didn’t see a single person who had white skin. We didn’t see a single person who had yellow hair. We didn’t see a single person who has blue eyes. So we KNOW that such people do not exist. And there CERTAINLY is no such thing as a white-skinned, blue-eyed person with straight yellow hair. We have established that human beings have black skin, dark eyes and black curly hair. There is no such thing as a human being with any of these other characteristics.”
And then, when confronted with a blonde-haired, blue-eyed girl from Sweden, they proclaim, “This woman is a FAKE! She has shaved her head, put in blue contact lenses, painted her skin white, and glued corn silk to her scalp!”
The other thing that Arpaio and the birther propagandists won’t tell you is that most of the “anomalies” they talk about are KNOWN AND DEMONSTRATED artifacts of OPTIMIZATION.
Every single characteristic you mention — the white dots, criticisms of the type characters, the halo — was thoroughly investigated and shown to be simply nonsense by last August. The birther “experts” have never satisfactorily answered even one of these criticisms.
Instead of successfully defending the observations and analysis — not just by me, but by others as well — that their claims are completely bogus, they have simply ignored the truth, gone out and found someone to give their bogus conclusions “weight” — Joe Arpaio, who apparently doesn’t even know how to use a computer.
Here’s another thing Arpaio’s posse won’t point out to you. The author who came up with a profit-making ebook deal on the investigation, splitting the profits with their lead investigator — and make no mistake, if they had NOT found it was a forgery an ebook on the investigation would’ve had little to no sales appeal — is Jerome Corsi, senior reporter for WorldNetDaily. WorldNetDaily hired their own professional forensic document examiners — apparently (if I recall correctly) three different professionals — none of whom found any evidence for forgery.
Here’s something else Arpaio’s posse won’t tell you: WorldNetDaily was in possession of the evidence that refutes the claims made by Arpaio’s posse on August 29, 2011. I personally sent a copy of my own book, in electronic format, to Joseph Farah, CEO of WorldNetDaily, and followed up with a free hard copy sent to Farah within a couple of weeks. They never covered any of the analysis in the book. Why not? Because it refutes the claims that they wanted to, and proceeded to, make before the public.
Here’s another thing Arpaio’s office won’t tell you about their completely one-sided, invalid investigation: I twice contacted them offering my assistance with the investigation, letting them know that I had personally spent some 500 hours objectively investigating the claims of forgery, and that I wrote a book on them. Jerome Corsi had 18 hours of presenting his debunked “evidence” to Arpaio’s posse. They never returned either of my messages. Nor do they seem to have even phoned the Hawaii Department of Health, who are in charge of Obama’s actual birth records.
You call that an “investigation?”
The only real question here is whether Arpaio actually believes the birthers, or knows their claims are bogus and is willing to go along anyway.
This article is a piece of shit, bottomline. You just made it up as you went. You have your nose stuck up Obama’s ass . You know and everyone knows this guy is a fraud.
Johnny, thanks for providing a living illustration of the hubris, refusal to even consider reality, and personal attack on anyone who dares to speak the truth and stand up for the rule of law that I’ve come to so fondly associate with birthers.
I am fascinated by the idea that you think people should disregard nearly a year’s worth of careful and honest research based merely on your ignorant and unconsidered personal opinion that the conclusions are “a piece of shit.” I am also fascinated that you think your statement that “everyone knows this guy is a fraud” has any authority or somehow changes reality.
I recommend you go to Congress on that authority, address a joint session, and ask Congress to impeach the man. Better yet, as one birther did, why don’t you go and attempt to “arrest” Mr. Obama yourself, on the basis of your own uninformed and erroneous opinion? Good luck with that!
Thank you, Johnny, for your assistance in re-electing President Obama.
People like you are so toxic that sane voters will be running away from Republicans in this election in droves. The sad thing is, it is unfair (to a large extent) to lump mainstream Republicans in with people like you, but that’s politics for ya.
Mr. Woodman’s article is a terrific synopsis of the Birther lunacy, and I believe his factual statements to be bullet-proof; they could be confirmed by any intelligent, impartial observer from any end of the political spectrum.
Small wonder that you dispute them.
Mr. Woodman, by the way is NOT an Obama fan. I am, so my gratitude to you for giving us an example of how virulently anti-Obama people are generally ignorant, racist bullies is mine alone and should not be attributed to John. He is, however, much like the dozens of sane conservatives I know personally who would like to get as far away from lugnuts like you as they can.
Every even semi-sane person knows that Birthers are the frauds.
An update: I just learned that 4 days ago, Leo Donofrio posted that he is hanging it up and retiring from the eligibility issue.
While I have had few good words (actually, I can’t think of any) to say regarding Mr. Donofrio’s handling of the natural born citizen issue, on this matter I think he displays some quite excellent sense. I commend him for the move.
this has become such a sad and vague obama propoganda site john… sorry
Scott,
You know what I’m sorry about? I’m sorry that for whatever reason, you simply can’t see or won’t accept what has become clear to me over the past year, and what is becoming increasingly clear to everybody.
You seem like a pretty nice guy. I’m certain that if we were to meet in person, we could happily sit down and enjoy that beer.
But for whatever reason, you’re committed to your fantasy that Obama is ineligible. And on a personal level, that’s fine by me. I don’t judge people on the basis of their beliefs.
Some day, hopefully, you’re going to look back on all of this and say: “Oh my. What a fool I was. John was so right on all of this stuff.”
The conclusions are firm, Scott. And they’re based on hundreds and hundreds of hours of careful thought and research. I don’t draw firm conclusions casually. And I certainly don’t go public and proclaim them as solid conclusions unless I’m very, very confident in the facts.
that you spent hundreds of hours on a digital representation for something that would have taken two minutes with the original, is a red flag by the way…
you’re too scripted amigo. you know a digital can’t be proven either way, only impuned.
and i told you, you suddenly started to be a constitutional expert that writes a lot like frankie.
Scott, I’m still wondering what’s your thesis here? Do you think that I am secretly Frank Arduini? Is that it?
Or do you think that Frank Arduini (who I still can’t say I personally know, by the way, even though I tried to contact him yesterday to find out for certain whether Arpaio’s office asked his opinion, a question that I think I already know the answer to) — do you think that Frank Arduini, whom I’ve never met, and I are somehow colluding? That Frank’s writing stuff for me? Is that the conspiracy theory?
If Frank is writing stuff, why isn’t he publishing it himself? Why on earth would he give it to someone else to be published under someone else’s name?
You’re just not making any sense. Except, of course, to someone for whom there must be a conspiracy behind every tree.
When I read Scott’s comments I cannot help but thinking how many of Frank Arduini’s Ten Key Characteristics of Nut-Job Conspiracy Theorists he embodies. I see 2-3-4-5 and 8 for sure.
1. Religious zeal.
Nut-jobs generally believe that they are participants in a holy / patriotic / moral crusade, and hence their opponents are not merely political or ideological opponents, they are evil infidels.
2. Impermeability to incontrovertible fact.
It does not matter how conclusively or comprehensively an argument or assertion has been refuted, nut-jobs never abandon an argument once ventured. Nut-job lies never die.
3. Willingness to embrace the impossible.
Nut-job arguments regularly cross the line from excruciatingly improbable to physically impossible. Nut-jobs fearlessly violate the laws of physics and propose theories that rend the time-space continuum.
4. Abhorrence of simplicity (Rube Goldberg’s Razor) .
Nut-jobs never settle for a simple solution to a problem when a hopelessly complex and idiotic alternative can be proposed. “Occams Razor” is anathema to nut-jobs.
5. Emotional (and other) projection.
It is almost impossible to read someone else’s emotional state or actually know anything about them across the Internet. So nut-jobs regularly attribute their own emotional states, prejudices and motives to their opponents. This is often also called “Irony blindness.”
6. Anomaly Mining.
Nut-jobs are tireless in their search for minuscule anomalies and coincidences around which they assemble vast complexes of suspicion, most of which are actually irrelevant to their cause. The tiniest and most meaningless detail will often take on a life of its own, rendering their theories even more opaque and incomprehensible to rational observers.
7. Simultaneous contradictory beliefs.
Nut-jobs often imagine at the same time and even in the same sentence that (for example) they are fighting forces which are both super-humanly brilliant and powerful … and completely incompetent.
8. Irrational anticipation of imminent victory.
Nut-jobs are often convinced that they are just one day/argument/case away from completely vanquishing their rhetorical foes. They will believe this for years and years and years and…
9. Inability to comprehend disagreement.
Nut-jobs cannot conceive of anybody honestly disagreeing with them. Therefore anybody who disagrees must be either “part of the conspiracy,” paid to pretend they believe something they do not, or victims of violent extortion.
10. The Appeal to Galileo.
Nut-jobs know that they are considered nut-jobs. So they regularly appeal to “great nut-jobs of history” ; who were eventually proven to not be so nutty after all. Ignoring that Galileo was actually never considered a nut-job in the first place, for every nut-job rehabilitated by history ten thousand nut-jobs resolutely remained nut-jobs.
I didn’t pay much attention to this when Arduini came out with it, but he’s got a point. I mean, I have a point. Because Scott apparently thinks I’m either Frank Arduini or am being fed information by him.
It just doesn’t make sense to Scott that there’s this guy in Missouri, completely independent from the great Frank Arduini (wherever he is), who has done a bunch of research and independently arrived at a lot of the same conclusions as Frank. I mean, the United States is too small to have TWO people who are interested in and capable of researching both the technical and historical/legal aspects, right? — see #4.
Anyway, Frank has some points here, and they’re pretty darn good ones.
I don’t see #5 necessarily as much, probably because I don’t pretend to know Scott’s motives. I do feel like I see #1, #7, and a lot of #9. And unfortunately, he seems incapable of self-diagnosis, and unwilling to listen to anybody else.
Scott
Spoken like a true chicken.
You know what they say: reality has a liberal bias.
punked fogbow… deal with it..
Scott
I bet John Woodman wishes you would punk his blog the same way too. 😆
You know I was pretty nice to you before you turned out to be such a vindictive nincompoop.
aren’t you the guy who emailed me to say he didn’t want to tell me his real name… rc ?
How would I know whether scott erlandson is your real name? Or washingtonamerica.com Or bernadine ayers? Or coloradoamerica.com. Or vermontamerica.com.
I have already been featured in one of Tracy Fair’s videos. I don’t need Jerome Corsi calling my employer or urging his nutty readers to call my place of business.
Never understood that, Scott.
Asking to participate in a debate, confirming that you knew the time, allowing your opponent to prepare, having the host expect you to show up… and then just not showing up… that’s not honorable behavior.
That’s nothing to be proud of. It’s behavior that merits, at the very least, a profound and contrite apology to the other persons involved.
really ?? you want to discuss fogbow behavior ??
It’s never clear to me what you mean by “fogbow.” Honestly. Perhaps you might like to explain that.
If I recall correctly, the guy who runs the Fogbow forum did something like send a fake Kenyan birth certificate to Orly Taitz, which she subsequently filed in a court of law (if I both understand and remember correctly). I find such behavior uncivil, unkind, and wrong — much like what you did in asking for a debate, allowing others to count on you to show up for the debate, and then never showing up.
I don’t condone such behavior on any side.
Sometimes when you say “fogbow,” it sounds as if you are referring personally to the person known as Reality Check, who runs a radio show and who has, as far as I know, some association with people at that forum, but whose main gig is the radio show.
I have dealt with Reality Check now on many occasions, including being interviewed by him several times. I have also listened to him interview both birthers and non-birthers on his show. For the most part he has been very civil, polite and considerate even to people with whom he disagrees profoundly — sometimes surprisingly so. He continued to tolerate the inane and in my judgment disingenuous ramblings of one MichaelN (on his blog, not the radio show) frankly a fair bit after I would’ve taken a potato and stuck it in Michael’s mouth.
I started out assuming that people on both sides were probably people of good will. I’m not impressed with some of Foggy’s behavior, although I’ve talked to him on the phone last year and he seemed nice enough in person. But when it comes to a scorecard of who has behaved well and who’s behaved badly, what I’ve seen is no contest — particularly in regard to what I’ve experienced personally. I’ve been censored, slandered, called names, shouted down, publicly ridiculed, accused of being a paid shill — all for simply telling the truth as I understand it, and backing it up with facts.
Even in regard to just you — I’ve now seen you treat others like dirt by ducking out of a commitment you made, and then laugh it off rather than apologize. I can’t say that I’m impressed.
You talk about The Fogbow as if it were a person. Like any forum it has hundreds of members who are all individuals. Orly Taitz was a member. She broke the rules and got banned. Sharon Meroni was a member until she sued one of the moderators. The Fogbow exists to track and debunk Birtherism and does a very good job at that. Just compare what is published there with at places like Orly Taitz blog where treasonous comments and calls to violence happen weekly.
I’m thinking Scott told me he is a member. But I can’t find the message, so I may be wrong about that.
In Scott’s mind, “The Fogbow” isn’t a forum on the internet. It’s a secret club, a conspiracy of evil supporters of an illegitimate President, organized and paid for secretly by the same illegitimate President.
Why does Scott believe — no, know that Obama is illegitimate? Because Scott is certain that he is. Because Obama is evil. Therefore, he must be illegitimate. Besides, all of these nice people keep telling Scott that Obama is illegitimate.
It doesn’t matter that the nice people are wrong or flat-out lying to Scott. In fact, it doesn’t matter in the slightest that multiple people have caught them in falsehood after falsehood. It doesn’t matter that Corsi was caught by Loren Collins plagiarizing directly from a British newspaper. It doesn’t matter that Corsi is known to have based one of his major theories on an obviously false statement (the false claim about the Charles Bennett article) that he’s never retracted. It doesn’t matter that every theory that Corsi had backed — 23 of them — was factually debunked in my book, and it was shown that he was therefore basically misleading the public 23 flipping times in a row. It doesn’t matter that Donofrio and Apuzzo’s claims have been debunked again and again and again. These are still honest, decent people, in spite of repeated falsehoods. And the people who’ve caught them in falsehoods and BS arguments are the ones who are evil.
Why? Because Obama is illegitimate. Why is Obama illegitimate? Because Scott knows he is. How does Scott know Obama’s illegitimate? Because all of these nice people keep telling him so. Why are these people nice people and not either wrong or lying scam artists in it for their own personal benefit?
Because Obama’s illegitimate.
It also follows that I am secretly an evil Obot who is collusion with the secret conspiracy, and being fed propaganda information by Frank Arduini. Why? Because I must be. Because Obama is ineligible. So therefore, he must have an army of secret agents covering up for him. And I obviously must be one of them.
It doesn’t matter that everything I’ve said has been factual and verifiable, and that I’ve uncovered numerous examples of bad arguments, falsehoods, etc. on the part of the birthers. I’m the one who’s evil, and they’re the good people fighting the evil conspiracy. Why? Because Obama is ineligible. But why is Obama ineligible? Well, it’s because the good people (who have a documented track record of a constant and unrelenting stream of bad arguments, accusations without any adequate supporting evidence, and outright falsehoods) say so, and the evil people (who have a documented track record of facts and well-reasoned arguments) say they see no evidence that Obama’s ineligible.
But wait… why are the good people good and the bad people bad? Well, that’s simple. It’s because Obama’s ineligible, so therefore the good people are telling the truth (in spite of their numerous documented falsehoods), and the bad people are telling lies (in spite of their long history of documented truth).
But how do we know Obama’s ineligible? Easy. Because that’s what all the good people tell us.
Scott,
You will undoubtedly be interested to know that I have done some further reading this weekend, regarding the debates around the 14th Amendment and the Civil Rights Act of 1866. Those debates have been probably my least-explored corner of the “natural born citizen” issue.
I expected to find a mixed bag, with some statements, at least, supporting the birther point of view. So far, I really have found none. Not one single statement supporting the two-citizen-parent rule. And I have found clear statements supporting an understanding that birth on US soil, as long as parents were not ambassadors or invading army, was ALL that was required to be a natural born citizen.
What I found was that quotations from that period, just like quotations from elsewhere in our history, have been grotesquely twisted by birthers and made to say things they do not say.
You’ve been sold an entire truckload of snake oil by smooth-talking snake oil salesmen — and you bought it, hook, line, and sinker. And now you’re stuck with the embarrassment of having been made a complete fool of.
I’ve been most impressed with just how willing John Woodman has been to explicitly state that he doesn’t agree with Obama’s policies. That he probably wouldn’t vote for him. He’s stated all that and put his reputation on the line. He has actually researched different claims and points of view. He’s displaying incredible personal integrity.
And the birthers just write him off as an obot.
Bang, one word and he’s consigned to irrelevancy in their eyes.
Obama is eligible for the Presidency. The sun rises in the east.
They are facts, whether you are a Democrat or a Republican, whether you plan to vote for him or not. That’s where John is coming from.
How hard is that? Why does that make him contemptible in Birthers’ eyes?
I just don’t get it.
i’ll give you credit, you’re not a hateful site like “doctor” goldcoins or the fogbow secret decoder ring society…
we’ll see… i hear there’s a new poll out….
america still has doubts, i do too…. one thing for sure, it ain’t over….
you know, obama just missed a window where he wouldn’t have had to register for the draft. too bad.
i think the missing flight archives, and the breaking into the passport files will be the undoing in the end.. either way, people are asking, “why does’t he just show the original or the fisch,,,” i’m sure they’ll just “stop wondering” before the election… lol
>> we’ll see… i hear there’s a new poll out….
Okay… but the truth is not determined by taking an opinion poll. Even if 99 out of 100 Americans express the view that Scott Erlandson is secretly the grandson of Mao Zedong, that doesn’t make it so.
I have no idea what you mean about “the breaking into the passport files.” But if by “the missing flight archives,” you mean the supposed — or real — lack of INS records into Honolulu for the first week of August, 1961, that particular issue couldn’t be any more irrelevant. A passenger on a series of flights — almost certainly ANY remotely conceivable series of flights — from Kenya to Honolulu would’ve passed immigration IN THE EASTERN UNITED STATES, and most likely in New York.
You should read my article on Stanley Ann Dunham’s month off.
None of this garbage holds together, Scott. And it doesn’t matter at all how very badly you want it to. You can close your eyes and wish you were a billionaire all day, or that Charlize Theron is going to ring your doorbell and smother you with kisses when you answer the door, or that Obama was born in Kenya. Wishing won’t change reality.
http://puzo1.blogspot.com/2012/03/catalog-of-evidence-concerned-americans.html
A Catalog of Evidence – Concerned Americans
Have Good Reason to Doubt
that Putative President Barack Obama Was Born in Hawaii
by: Mario Apuzzo, Esq.
Originally Posted: April 25, 2010
Last Update: March 4, 2012
http://cdrkerchner.wordpress.com/2012/03/04/a-suggested-narrative-how-obama-is-born-in-kenya-and-has-hawaiian-birth-registration-record/
Suggested Narrative – How Obama is Born in Kenya and yet has a Hawaiian Birth Registration Record
This is hardly more than spam, but I’ll let it go anyway.
I’ve seen Apuzzo’s catalog of nonsense before. Once again, a truckload of hogwash that’s been factually debunked. Let’s take just one point that caught my eye:
(12) No witness with any personal information has come forward to confirm he was born in Honolulu;
First of all, Obama’s birth was more than 50 years ago; and his parents, grandparents and obstetrician are quite understandably dead. I daresay there’s virtually nobody who could personally confirm my own birth either, except for the fact that my biological mother is still living. That’s what we have birth certificates for. Secondly, I wonder what Mario Apuzzo calls Obama’s teacher, Barbara Nelson, who testified in no uncertain terms that she personally heard of the birth AT THE TIME, IN HONOLULU.
The rest of it is similar trash.
As for Kerchner’s narrative, it’s like a lot of the other birther stuff. The fact that Kerchner can think up a remotely possible way that it might have happened — even though he has absolutely no, none, zero, zip, zilch, nada, actual proof or even good EVIDENCE that it DID happen that way — is taken as “proof” or “evidence” that that’s what happened. Again, this is typical birther claptrap.
I have a different theory. I think it’s just possible that Commander Charles Kerchner was hired in June of 2008 by agents of the Russian secret services, acting at the direct behest of Vladimir Putin, through secret channels, to undermine truth and the rule of law in the United States.
In fact, it is entirely plausible that Kerchner is actually the great nephew of Putin’s great-aunt; that he has disguised his identity and falsified the appropriate documents needed in order to establish himself as a deep cover agent working in the United States; and that Kerchner is actually one Georgiy Sergeyevich Kozlov, who mysteriously disappeared from near Serpukhov, Russia in May of 1993. The secret meeting between Kerchner (aka Kozlov) and Putin’s agent could have taken place in any of several quiet, known coffee-shops in the Denver suburbs.
Such a scenario, of course, is total hogwash, and I have no evidence for it at all. Which, coincidentally, is almost exactly the amount of evidence Kerchner has for his claimed scenario. Kerchner does have a bit more hearsay and gossip (on the part of people who were in no position to know) than I do, to support his bogus theory. But that’s about it.
I stand by my conclusions as stated in this article, because they’re the only conclusions that are based on any real evidence. Interested persons should also read my post on “Stanley Ann Dunham Obama’s Month Off,” particularly including some of the comments regarding why a Kenyan birth is wildly implausible. Yes, I know Kerchner’s scenario is different. But some of the same factors still apply. I find it particularly unbelievable that an 18-year-old married expectant mother — who EVERYBODY already knew was MARRIED TO A GUY WHO WAS PRETTY OBVIOUSLY BLACK — HELLO???!!! — would be sent off to Kenya by her parents, at the expense of about six months’ income, to supposedly have her baby there in an African hospital among total strangers. Leave her BABY in Africa? When she wasn’t even having a baby out of wedlock? And Mrs. Obama would have willingly gone along with that plan, right up until the moment she sees the tyke?
The whole thing just isn’t remotely credible. It’s moonbat crazy. Unless, of course, you’re dead-set determined to find that Obama is ineligible, at any and all cost and no matter what the facts.
all we have to do is tear a little hole in your tent john…
http://thehill.com/blogs/e2-wire/e2-wire/217071-stearns-says-hes-not-yet-certain-obamas-birth-certificate-is-legitimate
Tear a hole in my tent?
You know, Scott, I feel like I’ve had a lot of patience for you. At times you’ve seemed like a nice guy. Or at least, that you might be capable of being a nice guy. But the more I look at it, the more I know about you, the more it seems that you’re not actually a nice guy at all. You seem to have no concern at all for the truth, no willingness to believe that anybody who disagrees with you is anything less than evil… from where I’m sitting, you’re not looking like an honorable human being.
Sorry to say it so plainly, but there it is. I suppose you could prove me wrong, but you haven’t done so thus far.
If it were me, I would’ve apologized profusely to Reality Check and to Frank Arduini as well. It doesn’t matter that someone is on the other side of the debate from me. That doesn’t give me — or you — the excuse to treat them in any way less than you would hope and expect others would treat you.
sounds like your getting ready to ban me from your happy little forum, that’s what doc goldcoins and the other forums do..
but i’d be happy to discuss fog protocol and honor anytime, i know you’ve seen their nice forum… we’re both members there you know..
i especially loved when bill (the big rooster) played the victim when corsi went after him… lol
we will see where the honor lands in the end… i’m betting on terry lakin….
we’re on to you guys and you know it..
Scott, you’re welcome to stay as long as you’re civil. Which you aren’t, really, but I’ll make it “halfway civil.”
But to say I am anything other than profoundly disappointed in your behavior would be to lie.
how have i not been civil john ?
because i don’t agree with your hundreds of hours of research ?
No, not agreeing with my hundreds of hours of research is simply utterly foolish on your part, or willful ignorance, or something like that. I find it astonishing, because I know how extremely solid that research is. I find it astonishing, because you’ve (I’m going to be frank here) been flat-out lied to, manipulated and exploited again and again by various birthers — while I’ve told you the utter bald-faced truth — and still you heartily prefer to be lied to, deceived and live in your delusions. That in itself is not uncivil. It is incredibly foolish, or willfully ignorant, but it’s not inherently uncivil.
You’ve recently been uncivil to me in private email, even though as far as I’m aware, I’ve been nothing but civil to you. In this thread, you talk of “tearing a hole in my tent” (whatever that means) and you make statements like:
we’re on to you guys and you know it..
Scott, that’s a pretty outrageous statement. I have done about all that one person can do to simply tell you where I’m coming from, and still you don’t accept it. Still you want to cast me — probably the only human being in this affair on either side who has tried as hard as I have to treat you as if you are a decent human being — as a villain.
Not to put too fine a point on it, but I honestly find that pretty much beyond the pale.
the other thing is the bullied media is beginning to talk…
the media was always the most interesting aspect (of the caper) for me… being from chicago, i already knew obamavich was corrupt… lol
You want to know who the bully is, Scott? It’s you.
Always on your perpetual witch-hunt. Always prepared not to love thy neighbor as thyself, but on a quest to find reason to burn him at the stake. If you can only find that reason! If you can only prove that he’s got the devil in him. Then you’ll “light him up.”
Guilty until proven innocent. Nay! Guilty, period! The evidence doesn’t matter. He’s eeeevil. He’s an “Alinskyite” — never mind that you’re the one supporting twisted facts and lies and using the tactics of bullying and intimidation.
And the sad thing is, I don’t know whether you’re capable of even recognizing, much less removing, the evil in your own soul.
Terry Lakin? Alea iacta est my friend. Unfortunately for Lakin, his outcome was not that of Caesar. I hope he is enjoying his civilian life with no pension and no ability to practice medicine.
pseudo-intellectual
you and frankie take great glee in that…
why ?
whatever your name is…
that’s kind of distracting…
shall i call you ayers or alinsky ??
Why don’t you call him RC?
You know, birthers are real fond of accusing others of being terrorists, “alinskyites,” whatever — all the while using techniques of name-calling (“shall i call you ayers or alinsky?”), intimidation, as much force aand bullying as possible.
You want to see Alinsky, Scott? Go to the bathroom and look in the mirror.
do you know his name ??
i’m sure i could easily find out… what’s the point, i don’t really care.
why would they be so delighted at the demise of a distinguished military medical career, the guy (lakin) was a volunteer fireman too…
especially frank, a west point grad… seems unbecoming.
after i listened to the rc radio show with tim adams and a few others, i thought, what could i possibly accomplish at fogbow ? so i decided to have a few laughs a their expense, why should you take it personally john ?
they really stalked out the lakin trial, it’s in their own forum i’ve asked frank twenty times if he was there.
he’s connected to horst/ the whitehouse. foggy admits to forgery and interfering with justice…
now bill ayers… which i knew from the beginning…
i don’t think the issue of obama’s past being looked at is over… quite… maybe i’m wrong, i’m certainly in no hurry to finish this…
FWIW, I don’t agree with or condone anyone taking any pleasure in someone else having lost their career, retirement, etc.
so i decided to have a few laughs a their expense, why should you take it personally john ?
I don’t take it personally. Why would I? But I observe. I observe other people quite a bit. And your behavior — first in asking for a debate and having an opponent prepare and then just not showing up, and then even such things as your response to my observation that the appropriate and decent thing to do would be to apologize for the inappropriate behavior — informs me as to who you are, and what kind of person.
And when you act like I’m this evil person, that you’re just waiting to “get something on” — even though I’ve probably spent more effort trying to treat you as a respectable human being than anyone on either side of this issue — well, that tells me a great deal about you as well.
I have pity for Terrance Lakin and more so for his family . However, it is hard to empathize with someone who exhibits such outright stupidity. Every honorable person around him told him not to disobey his deployment orders. He was told exactly what would happen. So instead he listened to a bunch of Birthers who were cheering him on who themselves had nothing to lose.
I told this story on my radio show before the trial. I was on a flight with a young man coming back from his second or third tour in Iraq and Afghanistan. We had a conversation about life over there. He told me he had helped string up network cable so his buddies could have Internet access from their quarters. He said the weather ranged from intense cold in the winter to 100+ in the summer. He had lost a good friend when a convoy was attacked. I asked him if he had ever heard of Terry Lakin? He said sure we know about him; we think he is a t&%d. (I think you understand the expletive.)
I believe this young man’s sentiment is probably what the vast majority of the military thinks about Terry Lakin. I would bet a lot of money on that.
pretty obviously black….
lol
He laughs best, who laughs last.
And we most certainly will be doing just that, when nobody sane— moreover, nobody important— buys your Birther bullguano.
Welcome to the Flat Earth Society.
You want somebody to send flying monkeys after? I post under my real name; I own a woodworking business in Baltimore, MD. I am afraid of no Birthers, least of all cowards like you, “Scott” or whatever your name is.
Nobody pays me for hammering the clods who think there is anything to this crap. In fact, I am doing well enough to contribute the maximum allowed to re-elect one of the finest men who ever attained the office of the President. And I started with nothing. No government help, no family money, nothing. I had a hand saw and a day job 20 years ago, and now I’m an employer and teacher of craft.
You know where I am. Come on by, call me a mindless Obot, a Socialist tool, in person, instead of from behind a jizz-stained keyboard. Bring it the hell on.
Any day, pal.
We will bury you. Politically speaking, of course.
i might try that “real name” bit.. thanks
http://www.infowars.com/obama-chides-birthers-while-media-spikes-ayers-bombshell/
i have no idea where you are, or who you are, should i ?? website ??
bury me ??
Have at it. I told you where I am. You don’t scare me. Just the opposite; I laugh my ass off at your inane self-pleasuring comments.
you don’t scare me either, none of you do. that’s my whole point. obama and holder don’t scare me, why would you guys ?
let’s wait and see if any media people come forward.
This conversation has kind of devolved into a fairly adversarial one on both sides.
I don’t think anyone ought to be showing up at anyone’s door (unless it’s for a friendly beer), and no one should be encouraging anybody else to harass someone just because they see things differently from somebody else.
I’ve no doubt there have been some attempts of things like intimidation on both sides. I also have little doubt that there is potential concern by people on both sides about such things.
I respect RC’s desire to remain anonymous. It’s frankly justified.
I would like to express my hope that we can all hate each other in as amicable a way as possible.
Thank you. Good day.
I second that.
I would agree too except that I disagree with John: the wielding of intimidation has been pretty one-sided… Orly and the Birthers have threatened and actually harrassed folks who oppose them. What have we done to intimidate Birthers? Ridicule, yes. Shamelessly belittle? Speaking for myself, guilty as charged. But threatening? Harrassing? Calling their employers? Show me where we have done that sort of humorless and obnoxious off-line bullying.
I responded to Scott’s canard about anonymous posting, that it evinces cowardice. I wanted him to know that some of us are just sick to death of their calling us Usurper Enablers, Alinsky types, etc. etc. and call them out for their keyboard bravado.
Scott wouldn’t have the guts to call me in person what he calls me online. In which case calling me a Socialist and all online is chickenspit.
That was my only point.
Thomas, I actually agree with you that — as far as I’ve seen, at least at the levels of normal conversation through the internet — the intimidation has been pretty one-sided.
I do note, however, that an anti-birther or at least, Obama supporter, one Adam Cox, posted actual death threats against Sheriff Joe Arpaio on the internet. That’s heavy-duty, and counts for quite a bit in my book.
And of course, as you note, there’s been ridicule from the non-birther side, and so forth.
Particularly because of the Adam Cox situation, I figured it wasn’t too much worth getting into a discussion of whose offense is bigger or more justified. My point is that when one gets past the disagreements on this particular issue, hopefully, we actually have some common ground. Hopefully we love our country. Hopefully we are decent to other people, at least when we meet them in person. Hopefully, we’re not making this one issue so important that we lose sight of the more important bigger picture.
And I honestly think that’s more difficult for Scott than it is for some of the rest of us. Scott, for whatever reason, has bought into the birther mythology. He seems to me to really believe it; or at least he’s telling himself he does. And part of the birther mythology is that all those who oppose the sacred birther claim (“Obama is ineligible and his origin is illegitimate”) don’t just have a different opinion or understanding of the world; the disbelievers are (supposedly) heretics. They are (supposedly) evil.
And yes, that’s a downright cultish view. And somehow Scott needs to get free of the Birther cult. I don’t know what will do that. Evidence seems to avail nothing. In the meantime, though, I certainly wouldn’t want to see anything like the disagreements ending up in some kind of face-to-face confrontation which might come to blows. All of us on both sides of this issue, are going to need our teeth to chew with. And dental work is darn expensive. 😉
For Scott
It appears Blue Falcon Lakin will have a new club member:
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2012/03/marine-sergeant-being-dismissed-for-criticizing-commander-in-chief.html
RC, you may be interested in my two “Updates” for today to my list of conclusions (see above).
It has taken many additional hours to come to those additional conclusions. But they are adding another piece of the puzzle, which is now pretty close to complete. I kind of expected one of those pieces to be rather discordant with the rest of the puzzle. I was a bit surprised when it wasn’t.
Like so many others they’ve quoted, birthers have misquoted Lyman Trumbull — or at least excised words of his severely out of their context — to make him seem to hold a position he didn’t hold.
It is difficult for me to come to any conclusion other than that many of the birther proponents are simply liars.
John
I will give kudos to you. When you research something you don’t go half way. I bet you are one of a handful of people who have actually read the 1866 Senate debates and Justice Fuller’s dissenting opinion in WKA. It is ironic that even Fuller’s dissent does not help the Birther claims since he says that since the majority ruled Wong Kim Ark was a citizen he would be a natural born citizen and [the horror of it all!] could run for president.
I have pondered the question of whether all Birther leaders are liars for a couple of years. Certainly some of them are. For example, the ones who say that they were taught in high school that you had to have two citizen parents to run for president are obviously just lying. Jerome Corsi is obviously a liar and as and is very good at it. I think even the ones who are likely mentally ill like Orly Taitz lie knowingly because they think that lying about the perceived evil of President Obama is justified. Patrick Colliano is another conservative who has delved into the Birther claims has concluded they all have to be liars.
Did you see that Mario Apuzzo has filed a friend of the court brief in the Tisdale appeal in Virginia?
Patrick Colliano is a conservative? I’ve certainly heard his name (and maybe talked to him on your show at some point, I don’t know) but didn’t know he was a conservative.
The National Review — a bastion of conservatism — has quite definitely and clearly concluded that Corsi and Zebest are full of it. The owner of the “Raised on Hoecakes” blog, a conservative, concurs. Bob Quasius, the head of Cafe Con Leche Republicans, has written that the Arpaio investigation “lacks credibility.” And Bruce Ross, editor at the Redding Record Searchlight (whose politics I don’t know but who sounds like a conservative) has this week written that the birth certificate claims are “a scam pulled on conservatives.”
Ross writes:
“Look, I’m not in the business of offering political advice. But this much I know: Every minute that conservatives who’d like to see Obama be a one-term president spend poring over birth certificates on the Internet is a minute they didn’t spend actually organizing to help their guy win the next election. And every minute they spend talking about the subject persuades a swing voter that conservatives have lost their minds. I wouldn’t be surprised if Obama’s campaign team is fanning these flames on the sly. Those Chicago guys have a reputation for playing rough.”
I am glad to hear that Colliano is a conservative as well. I’m sure there are others.
I probably should not speak for Patrick. He has said he does not care for President Obama. That does not make him a conservative.
You must read Apuzzo’s Amicus Curiae brief in Tisdale. http://www.scribd.com/doc/86241834/Tisdale-v-Obama-4th-Cir-Appeal-2012-03-20-Apuzzo-Amicus-Brief
He says that WKA confirmed the doubts on NBC in Minor.
I’ve skimmed Apuzzo’s brief. Like all of his writing, it sounds perfectly plausible, even well-reasoned and correct — to the ignorant. But as always, Mario twists words, ignores better evidence, and cherry-picks quotes to support his completely bogus claims.
From an honest historical, legal and even logical point of view, I can’t tell you what an enormous pile of horse manure Apuzzo’s writing on this topic is. If I were a judge in any state of the Union (which I am not), and if I were at least as well informed on the issue as I have become now through my non-lawyer-profession but nonetheless fairly extensive reading and analysis, and Apuzzo brought this truckload of fertilizer into my court room, I would honestly slap the guy all the way back to New Jersey — and make him pay double or quadruple for the trip.
Yes, we’re talking sanctions here for some frivolous rubbish — probably to the maximum degree judicially possible. If I were the judge. I find Apuzzo’s claims, and his supposed justifications for them, ludicrous.
Mario does not, in my view, have a promising future as a Constitutional lawyer.
By the way, I’m glad someone appreciates the hours of effort that even a minimal reading of those Senate debates requires. First task was simply to locate them. Then you have to kind of squint at dozens of pages of very tiny print.
I’ll say this, though: There are some fascinating exchanges in there. The Senate vote in favor of the Civil Rights Act (which the 14th Amendment was basically a Constitutional restatement of) was 33-12… however, 11 states that had formerly been in rebellion were excluded from representation! And the opposition was led — no, more than just led, almost solely expressed by Senator Davis of Kentucky — who was very clear in his position that black people were not citizens and could never become citizens by any means. Needless to say, he was voted down. And from a factual point of view — just like the birthers — some of his claims, such as the claims that black people had never been citizens, were shown to be bogus.
There’s a lot I could write about those debates. Critically, for our purposes, even Garrett Davis admitted, in essence, that the rule that had always applied in the United States — in regard to all children born on the soil of any and every kind of European ancestry — was the same as had always applied. If born in the United States, they were citizens.
I want to add: There is a lot of dust to sift through in those Congressional records. But for those who are willing to sift, there are some beautiful and stirring moments. The future destinies of millions of people were shaped in those conversations, and there is recorded there a struggle of good against evil, and drama worthy of Hollywood. For those who love real history and appreciate the beauty of its drama, there is gold to be found in the Congressional record.
John
I am not sure if you had a chance to listen to Arthur Goldwag on my show Tuesday night. If you missed it I think you would enjoy listening to the archive. He talked about how the hatred that created Birtherism is nothing new and that there has always been of people who believe that another group is threatening to take away “their country” and if that group would go away everything thing would be fine. At different times the “villains” have been the Illuminati, the Freemasons, the Catholics, the Chinese, and the blacks. For Birthers it is Obama, George Soros and Saul Alinsky. It was funny because just a few hours before the Show scott e. had called me Saul Alinsky here.
As far as Fuller’s dissent, I could certainly do some writing on that as well.
Beyond what you’ve observed, I find Fuller’s dissent frankly astonishing. It is very difficult for me to conceive exactly how he came up with it. It can only have arisen, in my opinion, either through profound error on Fuller’s part, or on a deliberate choice to make mischief.
As far as I can recall offhand, Fuller’s only potentially decent point would be in his claim that Wong Kim Ark’s parents were here only temporarily. And that one’s weak.
He begins by noting:
Thus, the Fourteenth Amendment is held [by the majority] to be merely declaratory except that it brings all persons, irrespective of color, within the scope of the alleged rule, and puts that rule beyond he control of the legislative power.
Fuller disagrees. But if he had actually read the Senate debates, then he ought to well know that the whole thing began with Senator Lyman Trumbull’s sponsoring, in the Senate, of the Civil Rights Act of 1866 — and that Trumbull himself stated that he believed that their legislation declaring that all black people were citizens was merely declaratory of the law as it was and had always been; and that the purpose of the 14th Amendment had been to solidify that Act and remove it from the possibility of future legislative repeal.
Fuller then continues with an absolutely bogus claim that the majority opinion implies that the children born abroad of US citizens are thereby disqualifies from natural-born citizenship. He then factually misrepresents the position of the majority. And he actually, by my reading, actually contradicts himself on the born-abroad issue!
There’s a lot that I could write about Fuller’s dissent as well.
For those who may be interested, Mario is up and debating on this site, which does not censor anything written and allows long replies.
http://www.ballot-access.org/2012/03/20/larry-klayman-files-presidential-qualifications-lawsuit-in-florida/comment-page-1/#comment-910917
Okay. I’ve taken him on, with the following post, which I may actually repost here as its own full post.
Mario,
I. Quoting US v Wong Kim Ark:
“It thus clearly appears that, by the law of England for the last three centuries, beginning before the settlement of this country and continuing to the present day, aliens, while residing in the dominions possessed by the Crown of England, were within the allegiance, the obedience, the faith or loyalty, the protection, the power, the jurisdiction of the English Sovereign, and therefore every child born in England of alien parents was a natural-born subject unless the child of an ambassador or other diplomatic agent of a foreign State or of an alien enemy in hostile occupation of the place where the child was born.
III. The same rule was in force in all the English Colonies upon this continent down to the time of the Declaration of Independence, and in the United States afterwards, and continued to prevail under the Constitution as originally established.”
1. The Court in this brief passage therefore made the following CLEAR AND UNAMBIGUOUS STATEMENT:
Every child born in England of alien parents was a NATURAL-BORN SUBJECT unless the child of an ambassador or other diplomatic agent of a foreign State or of an alien enemy in hostile occupation of the place where the child was born.
2. The phrases “natural born citizen” and “natural born subject” were clearly and undeniably used INTERCHANGEABLY in the early United States. The following link alone is solid PROOF of that:
http://bit.ly/GRoSAo
As if that were not enough, the Supreme Court in Wong Kim Ark also approvingly quoted Justice Gaston of the Supreme Court of North Carolina, in his statement that the term “citizen” is “PRECISELY ANALOGOUS” to the term “subject:”
“Upon the Revolution, no other change took place in the law of North Carolina than was consequent upon the transition from a colony dependent on an European King to a free and sovereign State; . . . British subjects in North Carolina became North Carolina freemen; . . . and all free persons born within the State are born citizens of the State. . . . The term ‘citizen,’ as understood in our law, is precisely analogous to the term ‘subject’ in the common law, and the change of phrase has entirely resulted from the change of government. The sovereignty has been transferred from one man to the collective body of the people, and he who before as a ‘subject of the king’ is now ‘a citizen of the State.'”
3. The Court in the brief passage above also made the following CLEAR AND UNAMBIGUOUS STATEMENT:
“The same rule was in force in all the English Colonies upon this continent down to the time of the Declaration of Independence, and in the United States afterwards, and continued to prevail under the Constitution as originally established.”
The Supreme Court in US v Wong Kim Ark therefore CLEARLY stated that THE RULE IN FORCE IN THE ENGLISH COLONIES BEFORE INDEPENDENCE, IN THE UNITED STATES AFTER INDEPENDENCE, AND IN THE UNITED STATES AFTER THE ESTABLISHMENT OF THE CONSTITUTION WAS THAT EVERY CHILD BORN ON OUR SOIL OF ALIEN PARENTS (unless meeting those limited exceptions) WAS A NATURAL BORN CITIZEN OR SUBJECT HERE.
To claim that the Supreme Court stated otherwise, or that they failed to make the claim that they made above, is simply a lie.
II. Quoting US v Wong Kim Ark again:
“The foregoing considerations and authorities [that is, the Court’s entire discussion to date] irresistibly lead us to these conclusions: the Fourteenth Amendment affirms the ancient and fundamental rule of citizenship by birth within the territory, in the allegiance and under the protection of the country, including all children here born of resident aliens, with the exceptions or qualifications (as old as the rule itself) of children of foreign sovereigns or their ministers, or born on foreign public ships, or of enemies within and during a hostile occupation of part of our territory, and with the single additional exception of children of members of the Indian tribes owing direct allegiance to their several tribes. The Amendment, in clear words and in manifest intent, includes the children born, within the territory of the United States, of all other persons, of whatever race or color, domiciled within the United States. Every citizen or subject of another country, while domiciled here, is within the allegiance and the protection, and consequently subject to the jurisdiction, of the United States. His allegiance to the United States is direct and immediate, and, although but local and temporary, continuing only so long as he remains within our territory, is yet, in the words of Lord Coke in Calvin’s Case, 7 Rep. 6a, “strong enough to make a natural subject, for if he hath issue here, that issue is a natural-born subject;” and his child, as said by Mr. Binney in his essay before quoted, “if born in the country, is as much a citizen as the natural-born child of a citizen, and by operation of the same principle.” It can hardly be denied that an alien is completely subject to the political jurisdiction of the country in which he resides…”
Let’s condense that and pull out the most relevant parts:
The allegiance TO THE UNITED STATES of every citizen or subject of another country, while domiciled here, is “strong enough to make a natural subject,” and “IF HE HATH ISSUE [a CHILD] HERE, THAT ISSUE [or, that CHILD] IS A NATURAL-BORN SUBJECT” [quoting the words of English Lord Coke or, in United States terms — a NATURAL-BORN CITIZEN.]
It is therefore CLEAR and UNDENIABLE that the United States Supreme Court found Wong Kim Ark to be not ONLY a “citizen” — they ALSO found — and they stated it as an “IRRESISTIBLE” “CONCLUSION” — that Wong Kim Ark was “NATURAL BORN.”
And they stated that, clearly, not once but twice.
The Supreme Court CLEARLY found that Wong Kim Ark was a NATURAL BORN CITIZEN.
III. Furthermore, even Justice Fuller in the dissent in the case recognized that the majority had found Wong Kim Ark to be a natural born citizen and therefore eligible to be President:
“I submit that it is unreasonable to conclude that “natural-born citizen” applied to everybody born within the geographical tract known as the United States, irrespective of circumstances, and that the children of foreigners, happening to be born to them while passing through the country, whether of royal parentage or not, or whether of the Mongolian, Malay or other race, were eligible to the Presidency, while children of our citizens, born abroad, were not.”
All of these being the case, it is PERFECTLY CLEAR that the Supreme Court in US v Wong Kim Ark found young Mr Wong to be NOT ONLY “a citizen,” but a NATURAL BORN CITIZEN. To deny their plain words and state that they made no such clear statement is simply to lie; and if you deny those plain words and claim that they failed to find Wong Kim Ark to be a natural born citizen, then you, sir, are a liar.
Superbly written, Sir. Kudos.
Thanks!
There’s a bit more conversation at the link, though no further replies at this point from Apuzzo.
ehancock posted:
To which I replied:
“Demo Rep” also makes the excellent point that Farrand’s Records of the Federal Convention of 1787 (which according to the Library of Congress “remains the single best source for discussions of the Constitutional Convention) shows absolutely…
ZERO debate on the NBC language — ALL of the delegates knew what it meant.
Now Farrand put together 4 volumes of records of the Constitutional Convention, three main volumes and a later additional volume. Only volumes 1 through 3 are searchable at the Library of Congress site. However, James Hutson published a Supplement to Max Farrand’s The records of the Federal Convention of 1787, which he states contains all of the records in the fourth volume, and more besides. This is searchable via google books, with exactly TWO hits on the phrase “natural born,” which are both merely mentions of the phrase and NOT the record of any debate whatsoever on the meaning of the term.
I think it is therefore quite accurate to say that the Constitutional Convention appears to have included
ZERO debate on the NBC language — ALL of the delegates knew what it meant.
If it had meant anything other than the obvious meaning — which was the one derived from English common law and NOTHING BUT the meaning derived from the common law, then there CERTAINLY would have been debate, and the Founders CERTAINLY would have told us what their new meaning was.
Any slight credibility Apuzzo might have had is, as far as I’m concerned, utterly destroyed.
Here is a good example of how dishonest Mario is. In his Amicus Curiae brief in Tisdale he says on page 7 “Vattel’s definition became American common law and was incorporated into Article III “Laws of the United States.”7
Footnote 7 refers to a paper (unpublished at this point I believe) by Patrick Charles. Here is the footnote:
“7 John Jay considered the laws of nations part of the “laws of the United
States.” Patrick J. Charles, Decoding the Fourteenth Amendment’s
Citizenship Clause: Unlawful Immigration, Allegiance, Personal
Subjection, and the Law, 51 Washburn L.J., Issue 2 (forthcoming Spring
2012)”
Doctor Conspiracy has reviewed this paper and it says nothing about presidential eligibility. But what about the Jay quote? Apuzzo is implying here that Jay is saying Vattel’s work “The Law of Nations” is part of the law of the Untied States. I believe the quote from Jay that Patrick Charles might referencing is from John Jay’s famous charge to the Eastern District grand juries in 1790. Here is the entire paragraph:
“The extent of your district, gentlemen, which is commensurate with the State, necessarily extends your duty throughout every county in it, and demands proportionate diligence in your inquiries and circumspection in your presentments. The objects of your inquiry are all offences committed against the laws of the United States in this district, or on the high seas, by persons now in the district. You will recollect that the laws of nations make part of the laws of this and of every other civilized nation. They consist of those rules for regulating the conduct of nations towards each other which, resulting from right reason, receive their obligations from that principle and from general assent and practice. To this head also belong those rules or laws which by agreement become established between particular nations, and of this kind are treaties, conventions, and the like compacts; as in private life a fair and legal contract between two men cannot be annulled nor altered by either without the consent of the other, so neither can treaties between nations. States and legislatures may repeal their regulating statutes, but they cannot repeal their bargains. Hence it is that treaties fairly made and concluded are perfectly obligatory, and ought to be punctually observed. We are now a nation, and it equally becomes us to perform our duties as to assert our rights. The penal statutes of the United States are few, and principally respect the revenue. The right ordering and management of this important business is very essential to the credit, character, and prosperity of our country. On the citizens at large is placed the burthen of providing for the public exigencies; whoever, therefore, fraudulently withdraws his shoulder from that common burthen[28] necessarily leaves his portion of the weight to be borne by the others, and thereby does injustice not only to the government but to them.”
So was Jay referring to Vattel’s “The Law of Nations from 1758? Or Blackstone’s chapter “Of Offenses Against the Law of Nations” in his Commentaries that were published 10 years later? It certainly pertains to something other than citizenship. I think it was a generic reference to the conduct between nations just as it was in the Constitution. However, if one were to imply a connection to a specific work why would it not be to Blackstone whom Jay probably could quote in his sleep and to a chapter with a title identical to the phrasing in the recently adopted US Constitution?
I offer this as one small example of Apuzzo’s dishonesty.
I wish to point out an error I made. I downloaded and read Patrick Charles paper, Decoding the Fourteenth Amendment’s Citizenship Clause: Unlawful Immigrants, Allegiance, Personal Subjection, and the Law . I should have read the paper before posting the comment. Now I have. Professor Charles mentions Vattel as one who could have influenced Jay’s views on the laws of nations. However, he does not in any way mention the Birther twisting of Vattel’s comments on natural born citizenship. Here is what Professor Charles said about John Jay and the laws of nations where he quoted from John Jay’s charge to the grand juries:
However, in the very next paragraph he quotes James Madison.
Charles quotes Lynch v Clarke
If Charles agreed with Apuzzo’s notion that citizens born to aliens were not “natural born citizens wouldn’t his have been an ideal place to point that out? Charles also makes it clear that the authors of the 14th amendment were not creating a new class of citizenship but were primarily reversing the decision in the Dred Scott case:
He also quotes Bingham:
Again Charles says nothing about a distinction between citizens at birth and natural born citizens. Why? Because Professor Charles knows they are equivalent.
One correction to my previous post. The quote is on page 19 of the brief.
Mario Appuzo is up and debating in great detail on http://www.ballot-access.org/2012/03/20/larry-klayman-files-presidential-qualifications-lawsuit-in-florida/comment-page-2/#comment-911844
And, while I think that the anti-birthers are doing just fine so far, I think someone with a legal background would do even better.
So then, why write the paragraph the way it is written? why not simply say that the requirement for president is to be a citizen of the US, period. What was the special need to separate “citizens at the time of the founding” from “natural born citizens”. Afterall, all became citizens at the time of the founding. The only difference would be parentage. Now, over the years many rulings have been viewed on both sides of controversial issues. The supreme court once ruled slavery constitutional. States courts have allowed brown v board to be used to forcefully integrate schools when the actual intention of BVB was to prevent forced segregation. Not segregation that is the natural result of a neighborhood. It is not uncommon to revisit these things over time.
Because they wanted to guard against the kind of thing that happened, in fact, to England.
In March of 1603, Queen Elizabeth the 1st died. She was unmarried and childless. Within hours, there was a new King.
But he wasn’t from England.
He was the King of Scotland, a relative of Queen Elizabeth’s.
So you had a situation in which an entire country was taken over by royalty from another country.
John Jay suggested the head of our military should be “a natural born citizen.” (And note that he placed the emphasis on the word “born” rather than on the word “natural.”)
Alexander Hamilton was thinking in terms of slightly different wording: “born a Citizen.”
In the end, “natural born citizen” is the wording they chose. There is no record of any debate whatsoever on the topic. Why? Because “natural born citizen” was a familiar term in law, and all the Founders knew exactly what it meant. The term had been used for centuries. And it always included anybody born on the soil of the country — except the children of foreign royalty, ambassadors, and occupying armies.
Now, over the years many rulings have been viewed on both sides of controversial issues… It is not uncommon to revisit these things over time.
In the entire history of the United States of America, this has never really been a controversial issue — at least insofar as it applied to white European alien parents — until now. In fact, I can pretty well give you the entire history of the supposed controvery in a few sentences.
In the wake of the Civil War and the abolition of slavery and freeing of 4 million black people, it was claimed that this rule didn’t apply to black people. The Civil Rights Act of 1866, and then the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, were passed to affirm that it did Then in 1898, the US government said it didn’t apply to Chinese people born in the United States, whose parents could never become US citizens. The US Supreme Court said that it did. Finally, in 1939 the question was revisited in the Supreme Court case of Perkins v Elg. Once again, the same rule was applied.
The fact is, this rule has always applied — albeit unequally for an unfortunate long period of our history — in the United States, for as long as there’s been a United States.
Now we have people appearing and arguing against the entire history, tradition and law of our country — twisting the words of our Founding Fathers, misrepresenting our law and the decisions of our Supreme Court, and misleading, apparently, millions of Americans. They want to convince us not only that Barack Obama is ineligible, but that Bobby Jindal and Marco Rubio are as well.
The truth is clear for anyone who wants to dig hard enough into the facts and sort through the claims on both sides. As for the courts, they have and will continue to rule consistently on the side of what the legal and historical consensus is and always has been.
Oh — as for the question about persons who were citizens at the time of the Founding being specifically eligible for the Presidency —
I used to think that if they hadn’t included that clause, then nobody would’ve been eligible to be President! The reasoning was that you couldn’t be a “natural born citizen” of a country that didn’t exist when you were born.
A different Kevin corrected me on that notion, and I thank him for that. James Madison, the “Father of the Constitution,” seems to have believed that those born on the soil were already natural born citizens of the US. So I now believe that anyone born in the colonies would’ve been considered a natural born citizen of the United States. This is because they were a natural born citizen of one of the entities that became one of the States of the USA.
So why was the exception in there for people who were merely citizens at the time of the Founding? It was to recognize the contribution of all those who had fought for the founding of the new nation. They helped create it. So they were eligible to the highest office. Among these was Alexander Hamilton, who was born not in one of the colonies, but on the island of Nevis in the Caribbean, and who was quite manifestly one of our Founding Fathers.
He was a man who, in fact, might have been President had he not fallen to a bullet in a duel with Aaron Burr (who had been one electoral vote from the Presidency and at the time of the duel was Vice-President of the United States!) while Hamilton was still in his 40s.
Hi John. First time here checking out the blog and just want to say I’m impressed with the scholarship you have shown here. Not to mention your patience.
Oh and Birthers, My name is John O’Shaughnessy, I live in Co. Limerick, Ireland. I go by the name Suranis as it is an amalgam of the irish “Sur” and “Anois” which I take to mean “Be sure of now.”
Anyway, after reading RCs posts above, I think I’ll join in on a short examination of the Venus case. Vattel Birthers love this case and sometimes refer to it as it quotes the relevant part of Vattel. However, firstly it does not translate Indigenes as Natural Born Citizen, but simply says “Natives, or Indigenes.” This was 36 years after the drafting of the constitution, and 26 years after the first english translation of Vattel that had the phrase “Natural Born Citizen” so one would think they would have gotten the memo. Also the court quotes far more than that paragraph.
Secondly NBC Status was irrelevant to the case as none of the principles were NBCs. They were both British citizens who had naturalised and were living at different times in both countries. What brought about the Venus case was their rights to property due to the fact that the US and Britain were currently at war.
Following on from that, the third point is that the court discusses Vattel remarks on the notion of “Domicile,” and peoples’ rights under international law depending on where they are living at the time. The court does not discuss citizenship at all as was not a factor in the case.
Not up to your fine standards, but I have read the case fairly recently so I thought I’d add a little to the knowledge base.
Take care!
Thanks, Suranis — and great observations on the Venus case.
If you’d like in on a whole big debate on the “natural born citizen” side of things, see this thread over at ballot-access.org. ehancock found Mr. Mario Apuzzo, Esq. willing to debate the issues outside of the confines of his well-moderated blog.
I’m afraid the debate seems to have now been discontinued, though. I don’t think Mr. Apuzzo was having that good a time.
Call me a skeptic as I’ve always felt that where there’s smoke, there’s fire. I have read both sides of the “Birther” debate and I feel there is no real reason to even pursue the issue at this point, even though the question once existed in my mind. I am past it, as both sides have their arguments, and call the other side ideological Robots defending their beliefs. The Left wins by default. By the way, the name “Birther” itself may as well be a 4-letter put down its so gleefully tossed around and at anyone who dares question Obama’s history and upbringing. The venom with which the Left treats the Right, and has since the Days of Bush, is toxic indeed. And laughably, they would have everyone believe it is the Left who is persecuted! Give me a break. How many times was Bush called a Chimp, drawn as a Chimp, and otherwise disrespected? Yet he never resorted to name calling the other way. He kept putting himself out there to answer the Media’s questions, and to be painted into corner after corner. But he tried to LEAD, not AVOID, as Obama is so adept at doing.
One thing I have to say is that if nobody is around who actually recalls your birth or early childhood in person, and you are only just past 50 years old, I’d say that speaks volumes as to why questions exist about your past. It certainly should be considered quite unusual at Obama’s age….its not like he’s 75.
But oh….that’s right, he was off to Indonesia at some point in his early childhood to be partially raised in a Muslim country by a transsexual nanny. Nothing unusual there.
You see….I DON’ T CARE where Obama was born at this point.
I DO CARE about how he was raised and what his history taught him, especially about America. WHY there is so much hidden about that childhood and his college days.
I do care that he would consider himself (at his word) “friends” with the likes of a Bill Ayers who by his own admission participated in the bombings of New York City Police Department headquarters in 1970, the United States Capitol building in 1971, and the Pentagon in 1972. Seriously? A President of the United States who would consider a Domestic Terrorist a friend?
I mean, what would the Media make of a situation where hypothetically, say Bush was friends with somebody like Tim McVeigh? A Heinous Criminal like McVeigh! And don’t tell me that just because Ayers bombs didn’t kill it makes a difference, because they damn well could have killed.
And there is so much more. Yet its ignored and/or simply dismissed as unimportant by those that blindly adore their God, Obama. Not to mention essentially hidden by the Mainstream Media, who would happily paste every picture of President Bush carousing at a fraternity party, or cheerleading, on the Nightly News, and do whatever else was in their power to make him look ridiculous, yet protect Obama with the zeal of the Greek Gods protecting Olympus. No….Mr. 57 States Obama, Mr. Marine Corpse Obama….no he never has any flubs. He is PERFECT, they would have you believe.
And now even a MODERATE, a centrist Republican like Olympia Snowe, resigns because there is nothing coming from Obama and his minions other than derision and spite for everything to their Right. He would do well to put a little Bill Clinton in his act, but the Narcissist Knows Best.
As for this site, I guess it has its place, though with the conclusions presented it seems to have turned into a bit of a Liberal Glad-Handing Soiree.
Hey….I’ll look at the bright side….at least I know that Marco Rubio and/or Bobby Jindal should have no reason to expect they couldn’t be President now, right?
A few quick comments.
Sometimes smoke is just a smokescreen. Frankly, there’s an awful lot of smokescreen going on engineered by some who support the forgery theories, and by some who support the two-citizen-parent claims.
Secondly, I share some of your concerns regarding Obama’s past associations (and I would add regarding his origin in Chicago politics), regarding his entire philosophy, and regarding the direction he’s trying to take the country. I’ve no problem whatsoever with people going after the guy on legitimate and true issues.
Third:
I’ll look at the bright side….at least I know that Marco Rubio and/or Bobby Jindal should have no reason to expect they couldn’t be President now, right?
And that, for me, is the bright side. Or at least part of it.
A wrong belief on the part of conservatives that folks like Jindal and Rubio are “ineligible” won’t just deprive us of those candidates, although that would be bad enough. Such a belief will also deprive us of the political support of ethnic communities — particularly the Hispanic community — that support folks like Rubio. That’s not a place that conservatives want to go.
Nor is it particularly American. I remember hearing when I was a child growing up: Any kid born in America can grow up to be President. And that was (and still is) part of the greatness of our nation.
I like Jindal pretty well. I’m not sure he’s got what it takes to be President, but I like the guy. I like Rubio too. And I’m glad that either one of them is eligible to run for President of the United States.
This is a nice example od sliding in venom and lies by proxy.
“I do care that he would consider himself (at his word) “friends” with the likes of a Bill Ayers who by his own admission participated in the bombings of New York City Police Department headquarters in 1970, the United States Capitol building in 1971, and the Pentagon in 1972. Seriously? A President of the United States who would consider a Domestic Terrorist a friend?”
Firstly Barack obama never said he was friends with Bill Ayers. The McCain Campaign did, so you have to change that “His words comment” He also never denied knowing him
” ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos, April 16: An early organizing meeting for your state senate campaign was held at his house, and your campaign has said you are friendly. Can you explain that relationship for the voters, and explain to Democrats why it won’t be a problem?
Obama: George, but this is an example of what I’m talking about.
This is a guy who lives in my neighborhood, who’s a professor of English in Chicago, who I know and who I have not received some official endorsement from. He’s not somebody who I exchange ideas from on a regular basis.
And the notion that somehow as a consequence of me knowing somebody who engaged in detestable acts 40 years ago when I was 8 years old, somehow reflects on me and my values, doesn’t make much sense, George.”
“Obama, Oct. 8: This is a guy who engaged in some despicable acts 40 years ago when I was eight years old. By the time I met him, 10 or 15 years ago, he was a college professor of education at the University of Illinois. … And the notion that somehow he has been involved in my campaign, that he is an adviser of mine, that … I’ve ‘palled around with a terrorist’, all these statements are made simply to try to score cheap political points.”
And the fact is, Chicago republicans came out in support of Bill Ayers. They were just as mich freinds with Bill Ayers as anyone
From Wiki
“In late May 2008, Michael Kinsley, a longtime critic of Ayers,[56] argued in Time that Obama’s relationship with Ayers should not be a campaign issue:
If Obama’s relationship with Ayers, however tangential, exposes Obama as a radical himself, or at least as a man with terrible judgment, he shares that radicalism or terrible judgment with a comically respectable list of Chicagoans and others—including Republicans and conservatives—who have embraced Ayers and Dohrn as good company, good citizens, even experts on children’s issues … Ayers and Dohrn are despicable, and yet making an issue of Obama’s relationship with them is absurd.[57]”
And what about the guy who prosicuted the weather underground cases? William C. Ibershof, the lead federal prosecutor of the Weather Underground case, wrote to The New York Times on October 9, 2008:
” I am amazed and outraged that Senator Barack Obama is being linked to William Ayers’s terrorist activities 40 years ago when Mr. Obama was, as he has noted, just a child. Although I dearly wanted to obtain convictions against all the Weathermen, including Bill Ayers, I am very pleased to learn that he has become a responsible citizen”
And the fact is the weather underground killed nobody but themselves and never tried to kill anyone. All the bombs they left had warnings and when some of them accidently blew themselves up they called it quits. That the difference between them and Tim Mc Viegh.
False equivalence is a falsehood.
“And now even a MODERATE, a centrist Republican like Olympia Snowe, resigns because there is nothing coming from Obama and his minions other than derision and spite for everything to their Right. He would do well to put a little Bill Clinton in his act, but the Narcissist Knows Best.”
Sure. thats why Obama sat with Eric Cantor and Juhn Boehner for 3 solid months trying to hammer out a comprimise. For someone unwilling to talk he sure spent a long time in silence. Pity that John Boehner walked away when Obama actually offered that chetished prize of cuts in benefits. But hey Obama never compromises. And its amazing that Sen. Snow didn;t single out the Democratic Party when she spoke of the partianship in recent politics. I wonder why you are not talking about another “Moderate” Ben Nelson, also is resigning? Maybe becasue even admitting the possibility of Democratic moderats would not suit your purpose of gluing horns on their heads.
“One thing I have to say is that if nobody is around who actually recalls your birth or early childhood in person, and you are only just past 50 years old, I’d say that speaks volumes as to why questions exist about your past. It certainly should be considered quite unusual at Obama’s age….its not like he’s 75.”
Lots of people remember Obamas birth and Childhood, Including the governer of Hawaii who spoke about seeing Obama when he was born and watching him grow up as a child. There is a lot more people listed at this link that remember him as a baby and growign up
http://www.thefogbow.com/special-reports/people-remember-president-obama/friends/#Hawaii%201
“But oh….that’s right, he was off to Indonesia at some point in his early childhood to be partially raised in a Muslim country by a transsexual nanny. Nothing unusual there.
You see….I DON’ T CARE where Obama was born at this point.
I DO CARE about how he was raised and what his history taught him, especially about America. WHY there is so much hidden about that childhood and his college days. ”
A transsexual nanny? Is that your idea of a slur? And by the way, the school he went to was not a madrassa, it was a Christian school.
And there is nothing hidden about his childhood. He wrote a bestselling book, “Dreams from my father” talking about his childhood. Buy it and have a read about what he was taught about america. And theres plenty of people who know him from college, but everything is hidden if you dont dare open your eyes
Here is a list of people who remember the guy from his college and workplace days.
http://www.thefogbow.com/special-reports/people-remember-president-obama/friends-2/#Oxy
http://www.thefogbow.com/special-reports/people-remember-president-obama/friends-3/
http://www.thefogbow.com/special-reports/people-remember-president-obama/friends-4/
If you are truley worried about Obama, thise links will reasure you. But I’m willing to bet you wont even click on them. You don;t want to be relieved. You want to be scared and you want to live in the lie.
Finally, one of the great conservitive Presidents did not ave a birth certificate till he was 60. It was given on the reccolection of his brother. He spent a long period of his life abroad, and met and worked with communists. He also had dual citizenship (German in this case) and he had a social security number from a different state than he was born or lived.
His name was Dwight D. Eisenhower.
I don’t recall saying Obama was there when Ayers performed his criminal malfeasance….BUT the past relationships of ANY man or woman running for public office are fair game for inspection. Dems certainly let NOTHING slide in the case of Sarah Palin.
We cannot be inside a man’s head, but we may gather an idea about a man based on whom he has chosen to surround himself with, and what he has done in the past. Much of what Obama has done has been obscured. Much of what he did in the Illinois legislature, and much of what he did as a youth, and in college…..namely in his formative years.
Oh….and I did make a mistake and say Obama called Ayers his “friend” “by his own word”….maybe I should correct my mistake as Ayers tried to clarify things in an op-ed piece after the election. Ayers denied any close association with Obama, and castigated the Republican campaign (big surprise there) for its use of guilt by association tactics, yet this IS his quote:
“[W]e had served together on the board of a foundation, knew one another as neighbors and family friends, held an initial fund-raiser at my house, where I’d made a small donation to his earliest political campaign.”
When is a “close association” NOT a “close association”? Apparently when its Bill Ayers and BHO! Right.
So…we are to glean from this that Ayers says he is “family friends” with the Obamas, but Obama is not their friend in return? In fact, that they’re NOT friends? Ridiculous.
So Obama says Ayers is just “a guy who lives in my neighborhood,” and “not somebody who I exchange ideas from on a regular basis.” Maybe on an “occasional” basis then, Barry?
Obama’s own website says that they “have encountered each other occasionally in public life or in the neighborhood.”
There is quite obviously a game of semantics being played here.
Make no mistake, Ayers may be a professor who no longer leaves bombs in his wake, who his prosecutor calls a “responsible citizen” (I guess that means he pays his taxes and isn’t out committing crime), but he still harbors radical views as he himself said in April 2002 interview on a California radio station:
“I considered myself partly an anarchist then and I consider myself partly an anarchist now. I mean I’m as much an anarchist as I am a Marxist which is to say you know I find a lot of the ideas in anarchism appealing. I’m very open about what I think, and nobody here is surprised about what I think.”
And of course, Barack as he is wont to do is right there with a quip and a thumb of the nose at those dastardly Republicans, making light of the matter by referring to it as “palling around with a terrorist”, as if its just so impossible. Actually, its very possible. But the name of the game is Minimalization here, and Obama is quite a skilled player.
As I said in my initial post, this is but the tip of the iceberg when it comes to Mr. Soetoro….oops, I mean Obama.
I have little patience in getting into any more of a back and forth with an ardent Obama supporter, and especially one in Ireland of all places, as one hard lesson I’ve learned over the years is that they only see things one way….Obama lovers are blinded by their love for Barry. Obama could “hypothetically” commit a murder by his own hand in the Oval Office, all the while smiling that ear to ear grin at the camera as America watches live, and 40% wouldn’t waver in their support…especially if the victim were conservative.
We could go back and forth forever here. Neither side will give, of that I’m sure. Its really no surprise that so many from Socialist-leaning Europe love and adore the current POTUS as its apparently his dream to turn the United States into a political replica of your fine continent. Hey, his energy secretary even wants our gas prices to mimic yours, and they’re well on their way.
Good ol’ Barry. If only he was President Of The World!
“We cannot be inside a man’s head, but we may gather an idea about a man based on whom he has chosen to surround himself with, and what he has done in the past. Much of what Obama has done has been obscured. Much of what he did in the Illinois legislature, and much of what he did as a youth, and in college…..namely in his formative years.”
In that case most of the Republicans in Chicago are Anarchists or Marxists, becasue they assiciated with Bill Ayers. How come you are not painting them with the same brush?
And how the heck is anything that he did in the illinois leg obscured. Is it becasue you had your eyes shut when you were viewing the records of every vote Obama ever made? And I’ve already shown you a sample of the hundreds of people that have come out and said they knew the guy.
“And of course, Barack as he is wont to do is right there with a quip and a thumb of the nose at those dastardly Republicans, making light of the matter by referring to it as “palling around with a terrorist”, as if its just so impossible. Actually, its very possible. But the name of the game is Minimalization here, and Obama is quite a skilled player.”
Yep, thats why he was quoting and responding to what Sarah Palin said when she said he was ‘palling around with a terrorist’. “Palin, Oct. 5: Our opponents see America as imperfect enough to pal around with terrorists who would bomb their own country.” Thats why it was in single quotes. You are raging about something that your own icon said.
“When is a “close association” NOT a “close association”? Apparently when its Bill Ayers and BHO! Right.”
You mean when it’s most of the republicans in Chigago.
“Make no mistake, Ayers may be a professor who no longer leaves bombs in his wake, who his prosecutor calls a “responsible citizen” (I guess that means he pays his taxes and isn’t out committing crime), but he still harbors radical views as he himself said in April 2002 interview on a California radio station:
“I considered myself partly an anarchist then and I consider myself partly an anarchist now. I mean I’m as much an anarchist as I am a Marxist which is to say you know I find a lot of the ideas in anarchism appealing. I’m very open about what I think, and nobody here is surprised about what I think.””
And I repeat, by your standards every Republican who knows and worked with Bill Ayers is an Anarchist and a Marxist. That includes some pillars of the Republican community. But since you have to take what people say now at face value…
“Ayers: My memoir is from start to finish a condemnation of terrorism, of the indiscriminate murder of human beings, whether driven by fanaticism or official policy. …
I said I had a thousand regrets, but no regrets for opposing the war with every ounce of my strength.”
So you have to admit, if you are intulectually consistent, that Obama condems terrorism and the indescriminate murder of human biengs. And regrets the bad things he did.
“As I said in my initial post, this is but the tip of the iceberg when it comes to Mr. Soetoro….oops, I mean Obama. ”
The only document that has barry Soetoro is an entrance form for a catholic school in Indeonisia. It also lists his birthplace as hololulu, thereby “proving” his birthplace. There are good reasons why Leo Soetoro would have lied about his name. Leo had to go back to Indonesia as every nationals visa was revoked, and those that came back from Communist countries typicly dissapeared. He himself has to serve a year in the army before his new wife arrived to Join him. In that environment, anything that avoided people asking questions about his family was to be avoided. It was a white lie, done for good reasons. And guess what, Barry was too old for adoption under Indonisian law, and he was too young to renounce his citizenship, as he was under 18.
If you were indulectually honest you would have to say there is precisely zero official documentation with his name as Soetoro. Its not on his passport or any of his records, and the one scrap of non goverment stationary can be explained.
If you were intulectually honest, you would not be ignoring every piece of documentation rather than the one that supports what you desperatly want to believe.
Now we’re talking.
Listen up folks. We need to take a forum survey for what would be the proper title for this excellent posting by Nobama2012.
The 2 choices are:
“You become known by the company you keep”
or
“Birds of the marxist feather flock together”
Right…”Dreams from my Father”….you mean the book Ayers admitted twice that he co-wrote….in 2009 at Reagan Airport in DC and in 2011 at Montclair State University (on tape).
Oh….but he was just being facetious, right?
I get it. Funny.
I read it. Great work of fiction.
Though the part about ol’ Barry using Cocaine and Weed in both High School AND College was VERY believable
“From the Choom Gang to the White House” might have been a better title.
Or maybe “The New Bible for Liberals”. After all…its the story of their Savior.
Too bad he didn’t include his transcripts free with the book.
Seriously….this is my last post here. I have better things to do with my time. I’ll probably get a kick out of your replies, and I’m sure I’ll read ’em.
But you know, I’m just another “close-minded”, skeered Con “living the lie” who’s too stupid to acknowledge the Greatness that is Obama.
Victory is yours.
You actually thought Ayers was serious? I guess you thought since Obama “admitted” being sent here from Planet Krypton by his father Jor-El, that he can bend steel and leap over tall buildings too.
But I guess I can see how you’d be deceived, since you obviously believe nobody with brown skin could actually write a book.
Maybe you could see that our President is neither a Marxist nor a terrorist sympathizer if you could just pull that white hood off for a minute.
“Right…”Dreams from my Father”….you mean the book Ayers admitted twice that he co-wrote….in 2009 at Reagan Airport in DC and in 2011 at Montclair State University (on tape).
Oh….but he was just being facetious, right?
I get it. Funny.
I read it. Great work of fiction.”
Uh, yes, he was joking. From Wiki
In 2008 and 2009 some conservative commentators advanced claims that Obama’s autobiography, Dreams from My Father was written or ghost-written by Ayers. In a series of articles in American Thinker and WorldNetDaily, author Jack Cashill claimed that his own analysis of the book showed Ayers’ writing style. In late October, US Congressman Chris Cannon and his brother-in-law attempted to hire an Oxford University professor, Peter Millican, to prove Ayers’ authorship using computer analysis. Millican refused after they would not assure him in advance that his results would be published regardless of the outcome.[45][46][47][48] Millican later criticized the claim, saying variously that he had “found no evidence for Cashill’s ghostwriting hypothesis,” that it was “unlikely”[49] and that he felt “totally confident that it is false.”[47] In his 2009 unauthorized biography Barack and Michelle, author Christopher Andersen repeated Cashill’s claim.[50] When asked about the claims in 2009 Ayers admitted, as an apparent joke, that he wrote the book at Michelle Obama’s request, setting off renewed coverage of the claims on conservative blogs.[51]”
So yes, he was poking fun at idiots who had been trying to tie him with a book he had nothing to do with for 2 years, regardless of the evidence presented to the contrary from their own research.
Once again you believe what you want to believe regardless of all the contrary evidence based on one piece of evidence that came AFTER you decided that WIlliam Ayers wrote the book. After all, if Obama wrote a book he would have to be somewhat intellegent and thats too horrible a concept to contimplate.
“Though the part about ol’ Barry using Cocaine and Weed in both High School AND College was VERY believable”
Yep, the american people elected a guy that used drugs 30 years beforehand, and admited it 15 years before he ran for president. As before you cling to anything that validates what you want to believe, and you dont care whether its true or not.
“From the Choom Gang to the White House” might have been a better title.”
Nothing like a bit of racial slurring to help your argument
“Or maybe “The New Bible for Liberals”. After all…its the story of their Savior.”
Dude, have you read liberal websites? They bitch about Obama constantly. Go to firedoglake if you want a nice example. The only one that calls him the Savior or the Great one is Sean Hannity. Seriously if you think that Liberals think that Obama is their saviour then you live in a bubble projecting what you want liberals to be thinking onto them.
“But you know, I’m just another “close-minded”, skeered Con “living the lie” who’s too stupid to acknowledge the Greatness that is Obama.
Victory is yours.”
What the hell does simply acknolaging that the guy was born in Hawai’i and eligible to the office he is holding to do with whether the guy is great or not?
What the hell does simply acknolaging that the guy was born in Hawai’i and eligible to the office he is holding to do with whether the guy is great or not?
I’ll answer that: Nothing.
I’ve made no secret of the fact that I don’t consider Obama to be a great President. In fact, personally speaking, I don’t even consider him to be a good President.
His greatness, or lack thereof, has nothing at all to do with whether or not he was born in Hawaii, or whether he was legally elected and is legally occupying the Office of President.
I find, based on a VERY thorough and detailed investigation of the matter, that there is no reason at all to believe that Mr. Obama was born anywhere other than Hawaii. I find that there is strong evidence that he was born in Honolulu on August 4, 1961. I also conclude that he is Constitutionally a natural born citizen, more than 35 years old, and has resided in the United States for more than fourteen years.
I therefore conclude that Barack Obama is entirely eligible to serve as President, was legally elected, and is legally President of the United States. I may not agree with him, but I agree with our Constitution and our laws, by which President Obama is legally elected and legally qualified to serve.
In other words, John Woodman’s “strong evidence” is not conclusive tangible proof, and he is only arguing that Obama is a citizen based on a belief that Director Fuddy & State Registar Onaka are telling the truth.
We all should beable to recall from past incidents how easily one can be fooled into believing something that we later found out were boldfaced lies. Remember Monicagate & Rathergate. Will we at some point in the future be calling this Birthgate?
Additionally, his partner Dr. Conspiracy is on record, regarding Woodman’s potentially gullible position, stating, if they are right about their research, it is at best only a theory.
First of all, I’m not the person making extraordinary claims. The burden of proof is on those making the claims, and in spite of literally dozens of allegations, they’ve produced no good evidence at all that Mr. Obama was born anywhere other than Hawaii, the state in which both his mother and father are KNOWN to have resided at the time of Mr. Obama’s birth.
In fact, we have specific record that Obama’s father was in Honolulu when he was born.
But the facts are: 1) even the short-form birth certificate alone is sufficient proof for any court of law. 2) we have FAR more evidence than the short-form birth certificate. Just for starters, we have the long-form certificate (and no, there’s no decent evidence whatsoever that it’s a forgery), which shows the hospital and delivering doctor.
We also have quite a few other points of evidence, enumerated above in the section, “On Barack Obama’s Place of Birth.”
Against this, “Rambo” Ike and his ilk have speculation, rumors, hearsay, and outright demonstrated lies, including multiple forged “Kenyan” birth certificates.
As for Kevin Davidson, I don’t believe he’s said any such thing. If he has said something similar, then you have misrepresented him — which is characteristic. A high percentage of birthers misrepresent the words of people they quote almost every time they open their mouths. So produce the quote, and its context, if you want anyone to believe you. I won’t be holding my breath.
Finally, are you a teenager or a child? I keep wondering this. I keep wondering what kind of person other than a teenager would post online using a nickname like “Rambo Ike.”
Article titled: Birther backfire
By Dr. Conspiracy on March 29, 2012
“Despite what birthers say, my experience is that those of us who believe that Barack Obama is an eligible President don’t put much effort into supporting that hypothesis. We it take for granted. What gets folks like me energized is a false or suspect statement of fact and perhaps birthers would be better off letting sleeping dogs lie.
If I and the majority of Americans are right about Obama’s eligibility, then one would expect that the results of careful research would support that theory and work against those who disagree. And from that, one would expect that the more research a birther does, the worse off they are in the evidence department. Indeed there are notable examples where birther research backfired or it goaded opponents to dig deeper and find evidence to refute the birthers, evidence that normally one wouldn’t look for.”
What we have in the 1st paragraph is Dr. Conspiracy using the term “those of us who believe”. He has to state it that way because he lacks conclusive proof. He further goes on to call that belief an hypothesis.
In the 2nd paragraph he uses the term “theory” to refer back to what he believes he and other Americans are right about.
Hypothesis & Theory are NOT in anyway conclusive proof. It’s just a belief, supposition, or something you’re proposing MIGHT be true.
Additionally, I have several responses to my comments in the 0b0t forums that further advance the position that you and fellow 0b0ts are working on a “leap of faith” with regards to your theory or hypothesis {take your pick of the term you prefer] that you’ve been told the truth.
Here’s 1 of the many. Dr. Conspiracy’s response to one of my comments addressing 2 separate issue:
March 23, 2012 at 10:00 am
Rambo Ike: “Has Sheriff Joe stated that he has “probable cause” to believe the document(s) are a forgery and fraud has been committed? How can we determine who is telling the truth without examining the original document(s) alleged to be on file at the HDOH?”
March 23, 2012 at 10:41 am
Dr. Conspiracy: “While one may not be able to determine if the document is a fake or not without looking at the original, one can certainly determine if a claim of “probably cause” is true without looking at the original.”
Exactly. My position now for over 3 years. There is noway to determine if the document presented is a true copy without inspecting the original. In other words, all your work is a theory/hypothesis based on what “you believe” in your mind MIGHT be true.
Note: The above is only an appetiser, I haven’t served the main course.
On the lighter side: When I read you and Dr. Conspiracy it reminds me of the Tammy Wynette song, “Stand By Your Man”. I just hope your heads are standing by and not stuck in the wrong place.
Ike,
I hate to put it this way, but your post only highlights your general ignorance.
I understand Mr. Davidson’s phrasing because of my education. Others who have similar education understand the phrasing perfectly as well.
What’s your education, by the way? It’s clearly not academic and scientific.
To anyone with academic and scientific training, EVERYTHING is a “hypothesis.” It doesn’t matter how much evidence you have. Nothing is EVER considered to be 100% proven.
99.999% proven? That would leave only one infinitesimally small chance out of one hundred thousand of being wrong about it. Such a thing, at pretty much the highest level of confidence humanly possible, is still a “hypothesis” to the scientific mind.
So your claim couldn’t possibly be more wrong. The question you should be asking is: What odds does Davidson give to the two possible hypotheses?
I’ll tell you mine.
This is merely an unscientific guesstimation. But I would say the odds of Obama being a legitimate president are something better than 99.6%, and the odds of him having been born somewhere other than Honolulu are something LESS than 0.4%.
And I think I’m being generous there.
So the hypothesis that Obama was born in Hawaii seems something better than 99.6%. And the hypothesis that Obama was born anywhere else has odds of being true (by my guesstimation) of something LESS than one out of 250.
Cue a line from “Dumb and Dumber.”
“So what you’re saying is… there’s a chance?!”
There’s always a chance. But the chance is almost vanishingly small. The chance is so very, very small that you need a bright light and a microscope to look at it.
Or to put it another way, I see virtually no chance that Obama is not eligible to be President.
By the way: You haven’t answered my other question.
How old are you?
This is a test.
I’ve been having some technical difficulties with this article, and may have to rebuild it.
Comments were apparently closed — through no action of my own. This is a test of whether I’ve successfully reenabled them.
It is working now.
You have a perfect example of self-serving, wrong-headed Birfoon word-twisting in RoombaIke’s reading of Doc’s use of the word ‘believe.’
In Birfistan that is an admission that we’re really in doubt. Hardly. One can say ‘believe’ about things of which we are essentially certain, as in “I believe the sun will rise tomorrow.”
BTW, I think your estimation of the probability that BHO was born in Hawaii is off by an order of magnitude or so. I’d put it at more like 99.95%. Remember, when he was born, he was socio-politically almost a nobody. Certainly (there’s that word again) NOBODY was thinking he might be President. But merely by being bi-racial in 1961 his birth was remarked on and remembered by numerous people.
Add to that that with his mother being a citizen, wherever he was born he’d still be a US citizen, so there would be not even the need for the common-ish subterfuge of foreign parents trying to fake US citizenship for their progeny. So considering as well the other documentary evidence, it may be a higher likelihood still, but I’m being generous.
BTW, I think your estimation of the probability that BHO was born in Hawaii is off by an order of magnitude or so. I’d put it at more like 99.95%.
I try to be conservative.
And once you reach a particular conclusion, even if it’s well justified, it can lead you to bias in that direction. So I don’t want to overstate the case.
Woodman & Brown want to stand logic on its head. I see nothing wrong with Dr. Conspiracy’s response to my question. It would make perfect sense to any normal intellectually honest person.
As theory goes there are many, all based on beliefs and possibilities. You 2 have your’s, I have mine, people up in Canada & down in Mexico have their’s, and that guy over in Kathmandu has his. At best it all forms around the softer side of hard evidence.
Woodman, have you ever went back to the start of Obama’s political career, then came forward looking at all the controversies that developed? I did.
No, I’ve never done a historical survey of Obama controversies, although I tend to be aware of what’s going on in politics, and have noticed a number of controversies along the way.
I’ll tell you this, though: Nothing stands out from my year of researching the birther claims as clearly as the stark understanding that not all controversies are valid; that some of them are entirely bogus and manufactured.
The ideas of forgery came initally from some entirely valid questions. Those questions were answered, but a number of people who were in a position to either tell the truth, or to continue promoting ideas that had been shown to be without merit, chose to reject the truth and promote false claims.
At that point, the forgery theories ceased to be a legitimate issue and became a scam upon the public, and particularly upon conservatives.
The “two citizen parents” claim, as far as I can tell, seems to have been pretty much of a manufactured controversy from the beginning.
Yes, everyone has an opinion and everyone has a theory. But not all theories are equal, and not all theories are valid. Some can be reasonably believed by an honest and intelligent person who has all of the available facts. Others are just complete rubbish.
I would venture to hazard a guess here and say that the theory that Barack Obama is actually a disguised reptilian alien from Alpha Draconis is probably one of those “complete rubbish” theories.
I would also hazard an evaluation informed by many hundreds of hours of careful research, and say that the claims that some good evidence has been produced that Mr. Obama’s birth certificate is a forgery, or that it takes two citizen parents to make a natural born citizen, for a great many reasons documented here, in a 221-page book, and elsewhere on the web, do not appear to be very much better founded than the “reptilian alien from Alpha Draconis” claims.
“Woodman, have you ever went back …”
The defense rests.
Lol.
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John,
Obviously it only took a smart guy like you a couple days to figure out the “Alpha Draconis” claimed belonged in the ‘Probability File’. Now with a mental midget like Thomas Brown it’s a different story. With his calculations he thinks maybe the Birthers are trying to trick him. I’m still laughing at his Hitler-Mein Kampf lunacy.
That’s nothing new for the ObOts. So far I’ve only found them to be right on 1 issue, that was Monicagate, and then they didn’t understand it. They are clueless on Big Lie Theory, Rathergate, Iraq War, Terrorist Groups, Swiftboat Vets, and Vattel. They’re remaking history. That chart you’re using showing Vattel down near the bottom with Machiavelli is worthless. Too open for manipulation with the small sampling used.
John: “Nothing stands out from my year of researching the birther claims as clearly as the stark understanding that not all controversies are valid; that some of them are entirely bogus and manufactured.”
You think? Great deduction there, Watson. I can agree with you on that. It’s the valid ones we should be looking at. For example: claiming the long-form copy of his birth certificate is a fake. Like I said, how can we determine who is telling the truth without examining the original document? Your partner Dr. Conspiracy confirms that we need to see the original to determine if the copy is a fake or not. Do you agree with that?
I miss the humor in asking you if you went back an researched the many controversies surrounding Obama at the beginning of his political career. How can anyone write a book if they haven’t a thorough understanding of what caused the Birthers to question, form suspicions and mistrust of Obama?
Ike,
Your language toward others is ugly, and you’re honestly getting tiresome. I would advise you to knock off the insults of other people if you wish to continue posting here.
As far as missing the humor, Thomas’ point was that your sentence was not even proper English. That honestly tends to imply a lack of education.
I agree that an examination of the original document would be best. Nonetheless, that’s never going to happen. And there’s an awful lot we can tell from the information available.
I understand very well birthers’ mistrust of Mr. Obama. I personally don’t trust politicians in general, and (being a lifelong conservative) I frankly trust politicians from the Democratic Party even less. And given the reputation and track record of politicians from Chicago, Democratic Party politicians from Chicago are frankly in my least-trusted category.
Just a couple of days ago, a fellow conservative here in my own town asked me about this, and whether I trusted Mr. Obama. “Oh no,” I replied. “I don’t trust Mr. Obama any further than I can throw him — while he’s sitting in a pickup truck.”
It’s not a matter of trust. It’s a matter of facts, reality, and evidence.
Last year I understood that people were wanting someone to fully investigate the birth certificate issues and find out the truth. I did that investigation, only to discover that apparently very few of those who were asking the question (and obviously you yourself are in this category) actually wanted the truth. What they wanted was a confirmation — whether based in truth and reality or not — that Obama was ineligible.
Since that’s not what I found, that’s not what I delivered. As I’ve said before, if you want the honest truth, you’ve come to the right place. If that’s not what you want, there are honestly plenty of other places that will tell you the falsehoods your itching ears want to hear.
Ok….NON BIRHTERS…..what do you say now that Obama’s lawyer, Alexandra Hill, has now admitted that the long form BC that the White House posted online, is a forgery.
I guess all us “Birthers” made this up…??? We did this some how? Whats up with this all you Obots???
Like literally EVERY other claim that I have EVER seen from “birthers” — and there have now been many dozens of those — the claim is absolute hooey.
BirtherReport.com confirms that the claim is completely false.
But here: I’ll post the confirming quote directly.
UPDATE: After re-watching the 3+ hour hearing there is no admission that the birth certificate is a forgery by Obama’s paid lackey. Where Dan Crosby heard that who knows. You will have to follow the link and ask him.
Crosby and Johannson of “The Daily Pen” are documented liars. Last month they falsified an image of a government document on their web site, carefully and neatly editing out one word that, when removed, made the statement on the government document appear to support their claim.
That’s no “error” or “accident.” And they got caught at it.
You’ll want the link for that, too.
Others have stated that “birthers are liars.” I didn’t believe it. At this point, though, I am much more inclined to. And there are certainly some of whom I have little doubt.
And in general, I think most birthers who were originally more sincere in their claims have realized that they had not a leg to stand on, and have crept quietly away.
So the pool of people we are left with contains a much higher concentration of people who actually are simply liars.
And of course, there are still a few people out there who just want to believe whatever rubbish the birther propagandists throw out, and so do. It sounds to me as if you are probably among those who really want to believe.
Update: Dan Crosby attempts to defend his false claim, by making the equally false claim that when someone notes a particular image of a document doesn’t meet the standards for admission into a courtroom as legal proof, then that is an admission that that image is a “forgery.”
By that standard, any authentic photo of the President’s birth certificate, published in any newspaper, would be a “forgery.” It would also follow logically that people ought to be arrested and charged with “forgery” for publishing a photo of the President’s birth certificate.
So that claim is as false as the original one. I’ll go one further: The first claim is merely false. The second claim, intended to justify it, is (frankly) downright idiotic.
These are the kind of pied pipers you’re following over the cliff.
Oh JohnBoy,
It’s time to pack it in. Noone is buying that rubbish you’ve been peddling.
An American citizenship IS NOT a dime store novelty.
Hey, Ike! Good to see ya, buddy!
Did you hear the good news from today?
The United States Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals ACCEPTED Mario Apuzzo’s Amicus Brief as evidence they would consider in the appeal of Tisdale v Obama!
This means they agreed to take into account all of Mario’s arguments in his 42-page brief!
This includes Mario’s very best claims, regarding:
— as well as his legal arguments regarding:
So the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals agreed to ADMIT all of the stuff that I (non-lawyer that I am) had been saying was without merit!
Oh…
But there’s some bad news, as well.
The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals today issued a summary 1-page flat-out unceremonious rejection of ALL of Mario’s arguments and claims — every single one of them —
“for the reasons stated by the district court.”
Among those reasons: “It is well settled that those born in the United States are considered natural born citizens.”
In other words… the United States Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals not only fully agreed with me (non-lawyer that I am) that essentially every claim Mario has made is FALSE, they dispensed with him in one page.
It wasn’t even worth their time to comment.
Oh — and just a few days ago, the Appellate Division of the Superior Court of New Jersey, after hearing oral arguments from Mario and considering all of his written submissions, tossed Purpura v Obama into the bin without even writing a full formal Opinion. Instead, they merely referenced a section of the law that allows them to skip the time and effort of writing the opinion —
When in a civil appeal the Appellate Division determines that any one or more of the following circumstances exists and is dispositive of a matter submitted to the court for decision:
(E) that some or all of the arguments made are without sufficient merit to warrant discussion in a written opinion.
Did you get that? They threw Mario out on his ear without even the dignity of writing an OPINION on his nonsense, stating that some or all of his arguments were “without sufficient merit to warrant discussion in a written opinion.”
Wow. What a judicial slap.
By the way, I do believe this makes a perfect 0 for 8 record for Mario in the courts?
Truly a landmark week for birthers, and for Mr. Apuzzo in particular.
😆
This quest has passed on. The issue is no more; it has ceased to be. It’s expired and gone to meet its maker. Birtherism’s a stiff! Bereft of life, it rests in peace. If you hadn’t paid dishonest lawyers to keep it moving it’d be pushing up the daisies! Its legal premises are now history. The Birther movement’s kicked the bucket, shuffled off its mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the bleedin’ choir invisible! It is an ex-movement!
Rotfl!
On target. 😆
You are right about one thing, though — it’s time to pack it in.
The issue has been so thoroughly examined, and Mario’s claims have been so thoroughly refuted, that there’s almost nothing left of his claims, and almost nothing left for me to do.
It’s time to wrap this puppy up and move on with the rest of my life.
I have one more article to finish, and then I am outta here.
The funny thing is that you and Mario both will probably spend at least the next 6 months or so — who knows? maybe the next several years — on your futile and quixotic quest to spread falsehoods about our Constitution, our laws, and our history — never getting anywhere, and never giving up the chase.
I wish you well in your quixotic quest, my friend!
Hey JohnBoy,
As usual, the ship has departed and you’re AWOL.
I have yet to see anyone show Mario’s explanation on “natural born Citizen” to be wrong. While you’ve built an argument based on theories & hypotheticals, Mario has provided the actual historical cases & statements that define it.
From my research on factors in other areas regarding this, you show a haphazard understanding of 18th century colonial America, the founders thoughts as provided by their writings against a king, Blackstone and English Common Law, your misuse of Lutz’s chart, and the importance of Vattel’s work & natural law.
But, you’re not alone. I took a 4 month plunge into the marxist influenced mindset of those passing themselves off in the CyberWorld as anti-Birthers and found the same with them – little to no understanding. Mostly like you, just a bunch of cherry pickers.
What you or anyone else didn’t know who were reading the threads I posted on in Fatty McKinnion and Dr. Con’s forums was they blocked more than 20 of my responses trying to correct their propaganda. The French socialist Lupin & Dr. Con still haven’t provided any proof in the necessary time frame of the scam they’re pushing; “footnote for mother” & “set of blood relatives”. The best they’ve showed so far is more than a 1/2 century after the Constitution was ratified.
Personal question for you: Do you have any idea who these people are that you’ve crawled in bed with on Obama’s birth issues?
Rambo Ike says: “I have yet to see anyone show Mario’s explanation on “natural born Citizen” to be wrong. While you’ve built an argument based on theories & hypotheticals, Mario has provided the actual historical cases & statements that define it.”
Not according to the courts, which sorta overrides your opinion there Ike.
Jim.
You’re missed the point. I’m not referring to Judge/Court rulings.
I haven’t seen anyone refute what Mario has put up at his site over the past couple weeks explaning the citizenship and/or natural born Citizen subject matter.
Rambo
You either have not been reading, have no reading comprehension, or both.
I have yet to see anyone show Mario’s explanation on “natural born Citizen” to be wrong. While you’ve built an argument based on theories & hypotheticals, Mario has provided the actual historical cases & statements that define it.
Personally, I’d call my writings on the historical cases pretty definitive. Mario won’t even attempt any direct answer to my observations on either Minor v Happersett — the biggest case that he claims defines the issue or or US v Wong Kim Ark — the biggest case that actually does define the issue.
Why is that?
Secondly, you’ve accused me of “cherry-picking.”
On the pages of this blog, I’ve written the equivalent of an entire 200-page book on the legal and historical “natural born citizen.” Provide one example of cherry-picking on my part, and prove it.
Otherwise — admit your claim that I have “cherry-picked” is a lie.
Otherwise — frankly — shut up.
Do you have any idea who these people are that you’ve crawled in bed with on Obama’s birth issues?
Yes. Some are people who like Obama. Others are simply people who care about the truth, and who aren’t keen on the damage that birthers like yourself are doing to conservative and Constitutional American causes.
I quit posting at Mario’s poor excuse for a blog because he selectively holds comments he doesn’t like in moderation. He is not interested in an honest discussion on any of the issues. He is a liar and will resort to any tactic to avoid facing the truth. He has a hand full of sycophants like MichaelN to cheer him on and that is it. He will continue to lose where it counts.
His latest funny is that he is taking credit and claiming a victory because the 4th Circuit issued a non-published opinion in the Tisdale case. Let me repeat that in case you did not catch the absurdity: He is claiming the fact that the 4th Circuit saw fit to dismiss Tisdale’s case where Apuzzo filed a long amicus brief as a win. How pathetic is that?
The fact is that the 4th Circuit publishes fewer opinions than any other circuit and Mario had nothing to do with the decision not to publish. The 4th Circuit only averaged 8% published opinions from 2000 – 2008. An affirmance of a sua sponte dismissal at the district level is not a likely decision to be published regardless. Now Apuzzo is crowing about his big “win”. As I said, he is pathetic.
Didn’t I hear somewhere that Mario is zero for eight in the courts?
I thought I heard that. Somewhere.
It’s truly a clown show over at Mario’s blog.
4zoltan has cited two separate INS records from 1961 and 1967 clearly stating that Obama was born in Honolulu. Mario’s response: “But you have produced no evidence existing in the INS file showing that Obama was born in Hawaii, which makes my point.”
In other words, the specific notes by the INS isn’t enough. We have to have some documentation placed in the file (like a copy of Obama’s birth certificate which I’m sure they would never have placed in the file) to confirm the INS’s determination.
Doesn’t matter what evidence is produced. The flimsiest of things (uninformed remark by some Kenyan politician, or someone who claims he remembers a conversation with some total stranger he’s “sure” was Obama 32 years ago) is conclusive evidence if it’s in favor of their claim. Hard documentation from Hawaii, various Hawaii state officials who swear he was born there (including Republican Chiyome Fukino), Governor of Hawaii who remembers him as an infant in Honolulu, copy of long form birth certificate, testimony of his high school English teacher, INS records — well, all that counts for nothing.
And a court case Mario lost in federal court with the court noting some or all of his arguments were “without sufficient merit to warrant discussion in a written opinion” is counted as a “win,” because it won’t be listed as a precedent.
Personally, I’m done playing the games over there.
Hi John,
It’s Cherry-Picking time. While I believe all of us use it occasionally to help the positions we take, I’ve also noticed that some have become addicted and have made a career out of doing it.
http://www.constitution.org/primarysources/influences.html
Woodman: “According to the research conducted in 1984 by Professor Donald Lutz, Emer de Vattel was the 30th most cited author by the Founding Fathers. Out of every 200 times they quoted an authority to support their views, they quoted Vattel once. Lutz’s research shows clearly that for every one time the Founding Fathers quoted Vattel, they quoted Blackstone, the authority on the common law, a whopping sixteen times.”
Fatty McKinnion used that chart to support his claim that Blackstone, a legal expert, was the one the founders/framers used for the Constitution and not Vattel, and it looks like you’re doing the same. At the time it had been over 2 years since I had researched the subject plus I had never seen that chart before. I had forgotten alot and it showed in some of the comments I made. By the time I did some research to refresh my memory on the subject to do some posts pointing out how misleading it could be using that chart for his claim, he blocked them, then banned me. Lmao.
The problem using that chart is Lutz doesn’t specify that it’s for legal discussion, it’s only 30% of significant secular literature in general over a 45 year period, and for at least the 1st 20 yrs there shouldn’t have been any citings of contributing authors for the Constitution. The labels attached to the authors in some cases seem misleading. For example, Locke considered one of the greatest of the Enlightenment thinkers is listed as a Whig, whereas Vattel known for Natural Law & being a legal expert is listed as Enlightenment. Where’s Burlamaqui – one of Jefferson’s favorites? Which founders/framers were used in the citings, it makes a difference; Federalist or anti-Federalist? You also have to wonder, since Lutz doesn’t give any details, if possibly the authors that the founders were citing were themselves citing the works of other philosophers. It’s a fact that Cicero’s writings during that period were highly acclaimed by the founders and European philosophers and even more so by the English writers. John Adams had hero worship for Cicero. 3 of the top 5 on the list – Montesquieu, Locke, and especially Hume – were profoundly influenced by Cicero. No doubt Blackstone & English Common Law were cited alot, but was it always in a positive way? Take note of my cherry-picking from some articles to show another side of Blackstone, and that is less than 1/2 of what I found:
*Parts of Blackstone’s Commentaries were viciously attacked by many of the American founders, especially his emphasis on the King and Parliament being the sovereignty instead of the common people [subjects]. Among the members of English House of Commons he was known as the King’s “apple polisher”, and was viewed by the members as a monarchist. He wrote: “The king is not only incapable of doing wrong, but even of thinking wrong: in him there is no folly or weakness.” He writes: “To bereave a man of life, or by violence to confiscate his estate, without accusation or trial, may be a necessary and proper action.” Philosopher Bentham denounced Blackstone’s writings on the King, and called his work “ignorance on stilts”. Blackstone was a loyalist to the King and supported the “Stamp Act” being placed on the American colonists. Thomas Jefferson in his writings stated that Blackstone’s works “have done more towards the suppression of the liberties of man, than all the millions of men in arms of Bonaparte”. Jefferson’s core disagreement with Blackstone was Jefferson’s disdain to English Common Law being adopted in America [subjects to a monarchy]. As a side note: Later during the 1800s Alexis de Tocqueville wrote that Blackstone was an inferior writer & lacked a “liberty mindset”. Later day historians & legal scholars studying Blackstone wrote that by any standard Blackstone was a failure and his works flawed.*
An inquisitive mind then wonders why the founders/framers would use Blackstone? I have found among the writings of the founders Vattel’s work being used as an argument against the English Common Law. Through a custom search an online library brings back results that shows Blackstone citing Vattel and the Laws of Nations in his Commentaries. It makes sense since Blackstone had about 7 years to study Vattel’s work before the 1st Commentary was released.
According to what I researched 2 years ago, online sources cite Vattel as a legal expert whose work, the Law of Nations, laid the foundation for modern international law. On America’s Declaration of Independence, Vattel’s work gets cited the most as the biggest influence on America’s Declaration of Independence. Then we have this from Jon Roland of the Constitution Society: “This 1758 work [The Law of Nations] by Swiss legal philosopher Emmerich de Vattel is of special importance to scholars of constitutional history and law, for it was read by many of the Founders of the United States of America, and informed their understanding of the principles of law which became established in the Constitution of 1787.”
Fine. I myself have noted that “by some accounts Vattel was the most influential writer on the Law of Nations.” As I recall, he was cited more than the other writers on the Law of Nations in actual court cases in the early days of the American Republic.
Now to me that doesn’t illustrate his importance to the Founders or Framers of the Constitution, since it was the Constitution that actually established our federal court system in the first place. It would therefore reflect Vattel’s popularity after the Constitution was established, and not before.
But, whatever. Let’s say, for the sake of argument, that Vattel was definitely the most popular of the Law of Nations writers. Let’s even imagine that 4 out of every 5 times the Founders mentioned Blackstone they were bad-mouthing him — which is almost certainly a ludicrous thing to imagine — and that every single time they spoke of Vattel they were quoting him as an authority.
Under those circumstances, they would still have positively quoted Blackstone three times for every one time they quoted Vattel.
But the real point is this: No matter how positively any one Founder spoke of Vattel, and no matter how well the Founders and Framers liked Vattel as a whole, there is not the slightest shred of evidence ANYWHERE to link Vattel to the “natural born citizen” clause, except for well after the fact.
And all of the evidence linking him or his concept with the clause after the fact is extremely tenuous and sketchy. It’s literally a vapor.
Kevin Davidson — known on the web as Dr. Conspiracy — has also given Vattel his due. But there are two problems here. One is that all of the “give” — in terms of any kind of balanced presentation — is on the side of those of us who don’t buy into the two citizen parent claims. The other is that even when we make any and all reasonable or even more than reasonable allowances — as I have just done above with Vattel and Blackstone — it still comes up with a big fat zero for the birther position.
This, of course, is as it necessarily must be. Because if birthers were to attempt to apply any bit of even-handedness to their arguments, then their arguments would collapse. They would no longer be birthers. And there would be no more “controversy.”
Here’s one I got a chuckle out of:
You ridicule the Birthers over the marine that claims to have seen and talked to Obama, while others of your ilk bemock the birthers over the mailman for having a similar chance meeting with The One, and yet you use a 3rd party teacher’s statement that’s based on Hearsay. A proverb from Franklin’s Poor Richard’s Almanac fits this situation: “Believe none of what you hear and half of what you see.” In other words; you struck out while the Birthers at least got a couple 1/2 pts.
Except we have two birth certificates, multiple verifications from Hawaii, two contemporary newspaper announcements, an investigation by a state department officer in the 1960’s, and 130 court decisions, and you have statements from a mailman and a marine? So what is the score?
Not to mention the fact that the Barbara Nelson story is generally used to debunk the “nobody remembers President Obama” meme (for which an anecdote is evidence) while the birthers think that the stories of the mailman and the marine are sufficient evidence to usurp the will of the American voters and overthrow the Constitution–when they wouldn’t be sufficient evidence to accuse someone of jaywalking. Not to mention the numerous red flags that suggest falsehood in the stories Ike touts and, on the other side, the straightforward reasons that Ms. Nelson would remember the anecdote 50 years later.
I can’t comment on what Mario does or doesn’t do regarding moderation since I’ve never posted there. I can tell you what I’ve experienced posting on McKinnion, Dr. Con, and Woodman’s forums. By my unofficial count [guesstimate] there were over 20 blocked. Two banned me, and I expect anytime now to hit the Trifecta. All had & have me on moderation – Woodman’s is 30 mins, and Dr. Con’s was infinite. At Dr. Con’s, his flock at times was changing up some of the words when they quoted me. The last one Dr. Con blocked prior to banning me was me suggesting to Lupin where he might find the evidence in the time frame for what he was claiming. I was trying to help him. Personally, I believe they are all hypersensitive to Ol’ Ike’s Conservative Curriculum for Truth.
Is it true that in the 4th Circuit an unpublished Court opinion is not a binding precedent inside or outside the 4th circuit?
One of your ilk should go help Andy. He’s trying to carry the water for all of yas but his bucket has a hole in it. Mario & Michael have been playing ping pong with him, and Andy is the ball.
Oh, phooey. I don’t think I’ve ever had you on moderation. If I’m wrong about this, and I have, it’s because you jolly well deserved it.
You can’t come on here and use the insulting word “Obot.” You can’t keep posting the same debunked nonsense over and over like MichaelN does without coming up with something new that hasn’t been debunked. You can’t come on here and just spam with links to birther sites as one or two people have tried. You can’t repeatedly accuse someone of lying, cherry-picking, etc., without factually backing up your claim. You can’t post dozens of contentless one-liners that are merely insults. And you can’t use R-rated language.
That might seem like several different rules, but it’s really only one: Behave like a decent human being.
In any event, you’re not on moderation now, and weren’t before this post. You post, it shows up instantly. As long as you don’t do something like call someone an “Obot.”
Oh, and the degree to which birthers are allowed to speak freely here is shown by the large number of comments by birthers, and by the fact that you aren’t on censorship or even moderation — unlike me, at every single birther blog I can think of except WorldNetDaily.
“Obot” is insulting ? They themselves use it. How do they want to be called ?
Antibirthers ?
Are birthers happy with being called birthers ?
Well, I personally am not an “Obot,” and don’t appreciate being called one.
At this point, I would suppose “anti-birther” is okay. I’m not exactly an “anti-birther,” either, as I didn’t get in this to be “anti” one thing or another.
Frankly, I am simply a researcher.
Are birthers happy with being called birthers ?
Probably not. But it’s descriptive of their position, and I really can’t think of any other readily workable term that is.
Oh, and I should add — this is in spite of the fact that like Harry Mudd, you’re an irritant.
maybe anti-obots then
or anti-anti-birthers when dealing with you
can I get a file with the bitmap values of all the pixels in the 9 layers ?
can we just “or” them to get the “original-like” one before compression
and then deducte the layering algorithm from it ?
i.e. what algorithm was used to separate the top-white dots into an extra layer
gsgs…you are funny. You probably don’t know what an algorithm is.
We have a pretty good idea of what the algorithm is. Roughly speaking, it goes something like this:
1. Examine all pixels in the scanned image.
2. Divide the pixels up into blobs. If a pixel touches another pixel that is very, very close to the same color value, those pixels tentatively belong in the same blob.
3. As you read the pixels and divide them up into blobs, check to see whether the pattern of the current blob closely matches another blob you already have. If so, you can save space by not storing it separately. Instead, just create a reference to the closely matching blob you already have stored. This space-saving technique accounts for the duplicate characters.
4. You will have one great big blob that contains most of the pixels. This blob is the background layer.
5. Where you don’t have a certain number of pixels of thickness, those pixels are probably not members of a blob you want to separate out. Kick those pixels out to the background layer group.
6. Check your blobs to see whether they have a reasonably sharp variation in color against the pixels bordering them. If they don’t — if you have a series of pixels that fades away rather than has a distinct and more sudden difference in color — then the blob you’re dealing with is probably part of a picture which you want to have subtle tones, and not part of the text that you want to make all one solid color. In that case, kick the blob back out to the background.
7. Compute an average color value for each blob. Then take the set of average color values and organize them. You will be able to compute that they group close around certain distinct values.
8. Divide all blobs whose average color values are close into groups. (A blob will typically be a letter, and a group will be a group of letters that are all close in color). When you do this on this particular file, you end up with 7 different groups of blobs, or similarly-colored characters.
9. Replace the locations in the background that those came from with white pixels, since white is the color you’re least likely to get into trouble with.
10. For each group of blobs (that is, characters) track the location information for each pixel and compute the average color value for that group.
11. Examine the pattern for each group to see whether it contains a huge empty space that would allow you to save a lot of array space if you were to divide it up into smaller units. If so, divide the group and save some space. (This is how we got two layers that have the same pixel color).
12. Store the following information for each group:
a) starting location — probably the upper left corner — for each array.
b) the location in the individual array (or “layer,” except the only “layer” that will fill the entire space of your document is the background one) for each pixel. Probably what we actually have is a two-dimensional array that contains a 0 if a pixel is not present, and a 1 if it is.
c) the color value for the entire group of pixels. Since the color value only needs to be stored once for all of the pixels, we’ve just saved a bunch of space.
13. The above step applied to each group represents the creation of the 8 layers other than the background.
14. Return to the background. Cut the number of pixels to one fourth by producing an average value for every four contiguous pixels and temporarily writing that. This saves a bunch more space. You’ve just eliminated 75% of the storage space required for the background layer in this one step, without cutting any relevant quality that much.
15. Now, optimize your background as a JPEG file. This saves a bunch more space.
16. Write the result, in PDF format. Voila. You have saved an enormous amount of space.
That basic algorithm explains pretty much all of the major “anomalies” of the PDF. There is a reason for every one of those, and the reason in each case is the same: Doing things in this particular way allows the optimizing program to save space while still presenting a legible result to the end user.
Do you have 1000 clones of yourself we could chain to desks and have them re-write every instruction manual in existence? Starting with those written by someone whose second language is English, and who barely understands the item in question in the first place?
I’m sure I could explain it better, and make it clearer. But thanks for the compliment! 😉
The thing to note is that there are at least 5 space-saving techniques in the process.
One creates the to-the-pixel duplicate characters.
One creates the 8 single-color layers, and explains why we have 8 of them, and why they are each entirely single-color. (The recognition process also explains why — when I add step 6 which I forgot — letters that touch a line are generally left in the background)
One creates the fact that we have two single-color layers that are the same color. There is a rational, space-saving reason for this.
One creates the difference in scaling between the background layer and all the other layers.
And one creates some blurring, the virtual elimination of any chromatic aberration that Denninger whines about (perhaps combined with a higher-quality optical scanner that didn’t produce a lot of chromatic aberration in the first place), and the very characteristic “scattered pixels” that are evident in the background image.
Have I missed anything? Can’t think of anything important offhand, but I’m doing this from memory and it’s been a while since I’ve really looked at it.
There are of course a few other things, such as the clipping mask (which I’ve commented on elsewhere). There’s the supposed “smiley face” (a silly man-on-Mars mental construction that you can hardly get from the AP document and can’t get at all from the Guthrie photo, even though you can see in that photo that the stamp has, for example, the characteristic break in the “l” to the right, so it has to be the same stamp.) There’s the supposed “TXE” which, when you look at it, shows evidence of being a deteriorated “THE” rather than a “TXE” at all.
And we have concrete known examples in optimized files of the first, second, fourth and fifth space-saving techniques. I’m sure we have examples of the third one as well, I just haven’t looked for them.
> [Update:] … “clipping mask” …
> John Woodman March 26th, 2012 at 2:24 am …
> … as often happens, there were a couple of small bits of gunk on the scanner.
they claim the color codes were identical to the other NCHS – pencil marks
on Apr.2 Gillar talked with Harrison ~1 hours on his teapartypowerhour
repeating the claims about white dots and clipping mask. Presumably he was on the
squeeky blog some days before that to prepare – but didn’t mention much of
it in his show
> [Update:] …layers…
> Gillar has a video at youtube where he got 45 layers
> blogs and forums run by birthers
can you name those forums ? I couldn’t find them
> I personally have had factual comments fail to show up at The Post & Email,
> BirtherReport.com, and a forum run by another birther whose name I will not
> give the dignity of a mention here.
birtherreport.com redirects to:
http://obamareleaseyourrecords.blogspot.de/
hmm, they have a “messagebourd” Topics: 84, Posts: 261, Members: 154
tickerforum by Denninger
WND apparently has no forum
http://www.ballot-access.org
you talk about the birther forums, but what about the obot forums ?
your experience ?
….
this thread is too long to read all the replies
Most of these are blogs that have comments on articles. I’ve named 3 birther places above that have censored my comments in the past.
Actually, there are about 12 different birther blogs or sites that I have at least some personal knowledge or experience of.
Of these, at least 6 censor factual comments contrary to birtherism. It’s probably more than that, but I’m only speaking of what I know.
Of the 6 remaining, I have personally been slandered by the owners of 2 of them.
3 of the 4 that remain are run by persons who have told other documented falsehoods, which they knew or should have known were false. I personally believe that all 3 of those knew their statements were false.
Only 1 out of the 12 is run by someone I really have any respect for at all. I think the proprietor is deeply misguided, but still seems to be a sincere and decent person.
That’s about as specific as I’m going to get. You’ll have to research the birther blogs for yourself, I’m afraid.
Looking again at the above, that’s really a demonstration of falsehood on the part of 11 out of 12 birther sites.
On the part of the first 6, it’s falsehood through omission: they censor out truths that conflict with the story they want to present to the public. (Of course, they may also themselves make false statements. The categories aren’t necessarily exclusive.)
5 out of the remaining 6 have made false statements.
So that’s 11 out of 12 presenting, in my judgment, untrue information to the public, whether overtly or through censorship.
Is that surprising? No. It’s what the “movement” is built on.
PS – Please don’t use the term “Obot” here. Thanks.
Oh, and as far as anti-birther blogs are concerned:
I have experience with about 5, including my own.
Obviously, I let birthers make their arguments here. I do have certain rules which all boil down to “please behave like a decent human being.”
Dr. Conspiracy also lets birthers make their arguments freely. Ike complains he was banned from there. I don’t doubt it. Dr. C’s rules seem similar to my own. See the previous paragraph.
Squeeky Fromm, as far as I can tell, lets birthers speak freely. She used to be a birther, by the way.
Reality Check let MichaelN ramble on and on repeating the same discredited nonsense well after I personally would’ve told him he was done. I thought his patience was remarkable.
I’m not certain about the Fogbow’s policy — I’ve only posted in a couple of threads over there and can’t access it right now as they seem to be down for a database backup — but I think they do let birthers participate in the conversation, with some limitations as to behavior, etc.
In short, I don’t know of any anti-birther blogs that censor posts, except for things like profanity. Why should they? They don’t need to. The facts are on their side.
Some long time anti-birthers could tell you about moderation and censoring better than me. There is less outright deletion and censoring than there used to be on Birther forums and blogs. I believe the success of truth-oriented (my new term instead of saying the O-word 😉 ) blogs and forums like Obama Conspiracy, The Fogbow, Squeeky Fromm’s and of course this one have shamed them into not censoring as much. Some blogs still ruthlessly censor. Orly’s, Dr. Kate’s, and Sam Sewell’s The Steady Drip are three I can name off the top of my head. WND has been known to remove comments they find uncomfortable too.
Some use moderation as a mild form of censoring. At Mario’s blog he will hold comments he doesn’t like for hours or until he has written his response. That is why I quit commenting there. I don’t believe in moderation. After you have confirmed that an email address is not from a spammer they should be approved and allowed to post until they become abusive. “Abusive” is of course a subjective term. Sometimes it is obvious when someone defames other members over and over. Others think posting the same questions that have been answered over and over or the same lies that have been debunked many times crosses the line of being abusive .
PS
The other reasons I quit posting at Apuzzo’s blog is that he threatened to sue me libel for merely posting link to a motion made by the defendant in a case made in Tennessee that said that he was sanctioned for filing a frivolous appeal in Kerchner v Obama. That threat of course was silly since he had to approve my comment in the first place and if he thought the statement was untrue he needed to take it up with the Democratic Party in Tennessee. Last time a looked at the case no correction had been filed.
Then he and others tried to out me as college professor at a university in the northeast and for whatever weird reason that was supposed to make me a socialist and a bad person. I am not that person and told him so. John Woodman knows I am not that person and told Mario that. Mario still refused to retract the defamatory statements he made about an innocent third party. He has also allowed MichaelN and Charles Kerchenr to post links to defamatory videos that attempt to “out” innocent members of the Fogbow including me.
Mario is a liar, a coward and and all-around terrible human being.
And that’s being polite.
There is an element here that you don’t understand. The video CDR Kerchner posted confirmed what I was profiling. It’s not on the Birther issues, it’s when I got yas off of it and on other issues is where it showed up. This is not a new revelation. Back in January I told McKinnion what I was doing. I was asked to do it over a year ago and couldn’t at that time except for a couple quick posts on Bad Fiction.
I wasn’t posting to argue with anyone over Obama’s Birth Certificate, I had that figured out 2 years ago, and also that the founders knew “naturels” in Vattel’s work meant “natural born” as early as 1775* and no later that 1781. Also, from using Lutz’s work 7 years ago and what he said on it, I knew that the Chart on the contributing Authors was being misused, and Blackstone, English Common Law, and the English Bill of Rights were minor players with the founders who crafted the US Constitution and the original Bill of Rights. And to be fair, I need to add that none of the European writers, including Vattel, were major players in the penning of those 2 Freedom Charters.
*There’s 1 hitch on that year concerning Franklin’s letter to Dumas that I’m not completely clear on. I tried to get Lupin, the self-promoting Vattel expert, to tell me what the French notes & literature said that Dumas sent to Franklin, but Dr. Con blocked it.
Pondering: Why aren’t the anti-Birthers promoting their alleged eye witness to Obama’s birth – a Swedish woman?
“Why aren’t the anti-Birthers promoting their alleged eye witness to Obama’s birth – a Swedish woman?”
Speaking for myself, I try not to depend on anecdotal evidence from 50 years ago. Memories are a funny thing and it is easy for someone to get confused and misstate the facts or even embellish them unintentionally. When there is so much credible documentation on President Obama’s birth narrative why bother to use information that might be wrong or misremembered.
Okay, your information shifts things a little.
8 out of 13: known to censor. Some of these are known to have actively presented falsehoods in a way that was irresponsible, or apparently deliberate, etc.
4 of 5 remaining: have presented falsehoods that were irresponsible, apparently deliberate, or that they should have known were falsehoods.
1 out of 13: not known to present a false picture through commission or omission, etc.
We might differ in opinion on this, but I don’t think all anti-birthers are necessarily truth-oriented, at least not fully. For some, the anti-birther motivation has come first, and the truth has become something to use to forward that end.
Here’s an acid test: Out of those who are currently illuminating the situation with the truth, how many would be holding Mr. Obama’s feet to the fire if the truth were in the birthers’ favor? I would have done so. Squeeky Fromm would. I know that for sure, because her blog used to be a birther blog! But I don’t know that it’s the same for everyone. I would think there are probably some folks who simply started as Obama supporters and have gone from there. Not that there’s anything particularly abnormal or necessarily wrong about that. One starts with a political opinion — on whatever side — and it is okay to support a candidate and express a political opinion. That’s a lot of how our system works.
What I look for is an eagerness to explain away or excuse bad acts. That’s the sure sign of someone who cannot admit their guy is less than perfect, and what are the chances of that? And how seriously should one take such a sycophantic apologist?
I tolerate any and all criticisms of President Obama which are based in fact. Why shouldn’t I? Is he an angel? Hardly. I like the guy, but fair is fair. And on the more serious left-wing media, it is very easy indeed to find stiff criticism of the President.
I also tried during the Bush years to call out anyone who said about him (as the RWNJs do about BHO all day, every day) that he was “trying to destroy America.” What nonsense. I am certain that both men were and are doing what they think is best for America.
It would go a long way toward healing the partisan rancor if Conservatives would give BHO credit when he does something right in their opinion. That has occasionally happened, but usually it’s from “old school” Republicans, not the current crop of rabid Tea-Party types. To them, he is Satan incarnate.
Example: the killing of OBL. I took my time to personally write people like John McCain who commented that it took guts and was pulled off expertly. That was an act of political maturity and generosity. But the folks who try to deny BHO credit for it… what can I say? That really cheeses my grits. Are they so petty, so locked into permanent campaign mode, that they can’t say something positive about him, ever?
I also tried during the Bush years to call out anyone who said about him (as the RWNJs do about BHO all day, every day) that he was “trying to destroy America.” What nonsense. I am certain that both men were and are doing what they think is best for America.
Thank you, sir. 😉
Of course all we can do is speculate since the Birthers are completely wrong. I think I can speak for the Fogbow and I believe most there would want the truth no matter where it would lead. I can think of one example recently (not that it is anything bad about Obama but where Fogbow people were debunking a debunking that favored Obama). Recently, a DVD was been released the claims to show that Frank Marshall Davis is President Obama’s real father and that Ann Dunham posed for nude photo shots while staying at his house. Apparently Snopes debunked this and claimed to have identified the real model in the photos. Several, including Loren and others cautioned that they didn’t think Snopes had done adequate research to positively identify the model. I can’t post links to the Snopes article because it got pulled because it was getting flagged as porn.
Comparing a forum to a blog is tricky though. If a forum is open (as Fogbow is except some Birthers are relegated to their own special section) there are many diverse opinions. As John learned while posting there some welcomed him for his debunking work but some did not like his conservative politics. On the other hand on a blog the owner controls the content except for comments if he chooses to allow other opinions.
I can think of one example recently (not that it is anything bad about Obama but where Fogbow people were debunking a debunking that favored Obama).
Good. I do know that there are all kinds of people on both sides of the aisle. Unfortunately, there seem to be more scoundrels, charlatans and reprobates on my side of the aisle than I had previously been forced to acknowledge the existence of. Or maybe they’re just so vocal it seems like there are a lot of them.
In any event, they certainly do not speak for me or for the absolute vast majority of the conservatives I know. They are an embarrassment and I wish they would not portray themselves as conservatives.
To give you an idea of what it’s like in the birther world, there was a fairly random birther internet radio broadcast today. There’s a chat room where people can comment, etc. Itdidn’t take long for them to ban multiple people who don’t agree.
I am following the topic NBC for some time now – from the sidelines. I have found the one author who has the balls to call a spade a spade:
Andrew Fraser, a Canadian / Australian professor.
Read more here:
http://www.theoccidentalobserver.net/2012/06/natural-born-citizen-obama-and-the-fourth-american-revolution-part-1/
A. Fraser has found the truth:
only WhiteAngloSaxonProtestants (WASPs) are NBCs and can be POTUS. No Catholics, no Hispanics, No Jews, No Blacks. And no women !
I only doubt that with the actual SCOTUS this goal can be achieved:
not one of the actual Justices is a WASP ! Check yourself.
And look at the people on the forefront of the Birther Cause: most are Italians like Apuzzo and Arpaio or Jews like Orly (Orlana!) Taitz and Klayman. Farrar is Lebanese, just like Issa !
And look at Jerome Corsi. He is a mixture of all the bloods of the meditarranean coasts. Even BHO looks more like a (suntanned) Anglo-Saxon warrior than this sad example of the human race.
There is no hope. These people will only destroy the cause.
ProudWASP