Authenticity of Obama's Long-Form Birth Certificate Disputed (Yawn)

Various graphic experts are now making YouTube videos explaining why Obama's recently-released long-form birth certificate is "a fake." (See this, this, this, and this, for instance [hat tip Thomas Lifton at American Thinker for these links].) Thomas Lifton, at the above link, believes the BC has been digitally manipulated on purpose, to stoke even more speculation on the right.

I don't think these videos prove the document is a fake, only that it has been digitally manipulated, perhaps as a way of streamlining the reproduction process.

In any case, speculation will continue from now until doomsday.  I think, however, that such speculation is likely to do more harm than good.  It will be used by Obama to paint his opponents as conspiracy-theorists, and to distract voters from other issues -- rising food and energy prices, inflation and continuing joblessness, to mention a few.

It is possible that the long-form BC is a fake?  Sure, anything is possible; however, it is unlikely that it is fake.  Personally, I am satisfied with its authenticity and relieved that Obama finally released it.  It is a relief to know that he is not getting away with fraud.  However, that does not make him one whit more acceptable as a president:  he continues to be a far-left, dogma-driven ideologue who is bankrupting the country.

Others have pointed out that, birth certificate or not, Obama is still ineligible to be president based on this law or that.  At this point the public may be tired of this controversy and unwilling to hear more arguments.  Further ruminations on the birth certificate are unlikely to yield fruit.  Let's drop it and move on.

Obama Finally Releases the Birth Certificate!

Bowing to the pressure put upon him by Donald Trump, Barack Obama has released, finally, a certified copy of his long-form birth certificate.  There is nothing immediately visible in the document that would explain the long delay.  It clearly shows that Obama was born in Honolulu, Hawaii in August of 1961, to Barack Obama Sr. and Stanley Ann Dunham Obama.  The hospital and the attending physician are both identified.

Case closed.  Obama was born in the United States.

The only question is:  why did he wait so long to release the document?  Apparently, getting a copy was fast and easy, once he finally decided to release it to the public.

What kind of game was he playing?  And Why?

Hat tip:  Legal Insurrection

Obama's Birth Certificate: Legitimate Questions Still Go Unanswered

Neil Abercrombie, new Democrat governor of Hawaii, revived the Obama birth certificate controversy this week.  He publicly announced that he was determined to refute and rebut all theories, questions and doubts about Obama's Hawaiian birth.  All he did was to reignite the debate:  was Obama born in Hawaii or Kenya? And why doesn't Obama release his long-form birth certificate and settle the issue once and for all?

Some media reports state that Obama has spent around two million dollars in court to avoid releasing the long-form birth certificate.   Is it because he really does have something to hide?  What other plausible explanation is there?

These are legitimate questions, in spite of the left's frenzied attempts to shout down, marginalize and denigrate those who are asking them.  A case in point is Wikipedia's highly biased page on the issue, in which doubters and skeptics are called a "fringe" group and "conspiracy theorists" comparable to the 9/11 Truthers.  Ridiculous!

Mondo Frazier at Death by a Thousand Paper Cuts says the left is using Alinsky tactics to shut down discussion of the subject.  They do this by substituting scorn and ridicule for reasoned arguments.  However, their tactic isn't working:  a recent poll shows large numbers of Americans have their doubts about the facts of Obama's birthplace.

Now there are even  people on the left who are asking the obvious question:  "Why doesn't Obama just release the birth certificate?"  Chris Matthews of Hard Ball said:

"Why doesn't the president just say, 'Send me a copy right now?' Why doesn't Gibbs and Axelrod say, 'Let's just get this crappy story dead?' Why not do it? ... If it exists, why not put it out?"

Matthews was joined by Clarence Page of the Chicago Tribune and David Corn of Mother Jones, who both agreed with the call for Obama to publicly release the document and end the controversy.


Here are some hard facts:
1.  A short-form Hawaiian Certificate of Live Birth (COLB) is not irrefutable proof of Obama's birth place.  In 2008, a liberal website, the Daily Kos, published a COLB purporting to be that of Barack Obama.  Digital analysis indicated that it was a forgery.  A COLB does not specify the hospital or doctor involved in the birth and offers very little information.  Further, there are rumors on the internet that Obama's half-sister, Maya Soetoro, was born in Indonesia but also was issued a Hawaiian Certificate of Live Birth, allegedly proving that a COLB is not the final answer.  I have not verified the accuracy of these rumors, but they again furnish a strong reason why Obama should release his long-form birth certificate, if only to spike such rumors.

2.  A newspaper announcement is not a legal substitute for a long form birth certificate.   A couple of Hawaiian newspapers have released microfiche copies of their 1961 pages announcing Obama's birth.  Such clippings are evidence, but not conclusive -- could they just be repeating unverified and even inaccurate information supplied to them?

3.  A Congressional resolution is not proof of Obama's birth place.  This proves absolutely nothing.

4.  A Wall Street Journal article is not a birth certificate.  James Taranto has been a useful idiot on the birth certificate question from the beginning, and his opinion does not constitute persuasive proof of Obama's place of birth.

5.  The ONLY item that will prove Obama's place of birth is the long-form birth certificate.  I am willing to be convinced, but only by that item.  There is sufficient doubt that one exists, and that doubt can only be overcome by releasing the official document.  Any other discussion short of that release is mere rhetoric, rationalization or opinion and devoutly to be ignored.

Lawrence Auster Makes Sense on the Birther Issue

Lawrence Auster of View From the Right says Obama's birth certificate continues to be a problem for Obama and that the issue is not going away.  Today he responded to a "birther" about what birthers believe, and separates the wheat from the chaff on what is important:

I've read this comment which must have taken you a while to write. I'm sorry, but I don't want to post it. My reason is this. By throwing out so many aspects of what "birthers" believe,--and some of these beliefs are plainly false, are contrary to U.S. law, and would add massive confusion to the issue, such as the belief that both a person's parents must be U.S. citizens in order for him to be a natural born citizen--you are inadvertently adding to the picture of a "birther" movement that is out of whack, irrational, and to be dismissed.

This is why it is counterproductive to the rational birther movement to bring in all kinds of theories about where Obama may have been born, who his father may have been, etc. Such theories make the birthers and their theories the focus of attention and the problem. By contrast, there is one issue that makes Obama the focus of attention and the problem: We the American people need to see Obama's birth certificate. Let us see it. Why has he refused to release it? This is the one solid, undeniable fact upon which the birthers stand, that Obama's birth certificate has not been released. Birthers who focus on this cannot not credibly be dismissed as nutcases. This is the issue that even some liberals are, despite themselves, and despite their belief that birthers are crazy anti-Obama haters, starting to recognize as a legitimate problem for Obama. 

Read it all here.

Unfortunately, there are some conservative bloggers who are played like a harp by the liberal media, and have jumped on the anti-birther bandwagon.  The fact is, Obama has never released his actual birth certificate and until he does, this issue will not go away -- nor should it.

How to Discredit the Obama "Birthers"

Doin' That Old Soft Shoe

The new Democrat governor of Hawaii is determined to "discredit the anti-Obama birthers."  Doubts about Obama's place of birth really annoy him.

The easiest way to "discredit the birthers" is to release the long form birth certificate.  Of course, that's not going to happen.  What do you do if you have something to hide about the nationality of Barack Hussein Obama?  You do the following:

1.  Denounce those who want to see the long form birth certificate as "extremists" or "conspiracy theorists"
2.  Pass house resolutions stating that Obama was born in Hawaii
3.  Claim that requiring Obama to prove his citizenship is "self-evisceration" of politics that will lead to our downfall
4.  Claim that the release of the long form birth certificate will only fuel greater speculation and greater conspiracy theories and do more harm than good
5.  Claim that the release of the long form birth certificate will impinge "citizen privacy rights to appease 'extreme' views"
6.  Claim that doubts about Obama's birthplace is bias against Hawaiians and a feeling that they are not as American as mainlanders
7.  Shuck and jive, do the old soft-shoe, tap dance around the issue and moonwalk off the stage

Read all about these stratagems in the Los Angeles Times, that bastion of objective journalism and no-nonsense news:  For Hawaii governor, discrediting anti-Obama 'birthers' is a top priority.

Update:  Memeorandum now has a thread for this LA Times article.

Barack Obama's Birth Certificate - the Saga Continues

Donald Douglas has an interesting post about the re-emergence of the birth certificate controversy.

Apparenty, World Net Daily has interviewed a former Hawaii elections clerk, who claims that Obama was not born in Hawaii, and that this fact is known among Hawaii officials.  The clerk, Tim Adams, says:

"There is no birth certificate," said Tim Adams, a graduate assistant who teaches English at Western Kentucky University in Bowling Green, Ky. "It's like an open secret. There isn't one. Everyone in the government there knows this."

Adams also claims he tried to verify Obama's birth with two Hawaiian hospitals that had been identified as his probable birth site.  Both hospitals said they had no record of Obama having been born there.

World Net Daily has been passionately attempting to disprove Obama's U.S. birth since before the 2009 elections.  They have periodically produced evidence to that effect, only to have the evidence later proven fraudulent or forged.

My personal feeling is that I am suspicious. I include myself among those who want to see the long form of Obama's original birth certificate.  If it turns out he is not U.S. born, perhaps he could be removed from office on that basis.  Any legal reason to remove this walking disaster is okay by me.

I Am A Birther

I am a "Birther."

Here's why.

Barack Obama: Another Birth Certificate Surfaces...From Kenya?

World Net Daily has obtained a copy of a Kenyan birth certificate purporting to record the Kenyan birth of Barack Obama. The document looks real in a photograph and WND says it contains no tell tale signs of being fraudulent.

The birth certificate is being used as evidence by an attorney who has filed multiple lawsuits in an effort to obtain certification of Obama's birthplace.

Read it all here.

Via Memeorandum

Update: Joseph Fara of World Net Daily discusses WND's decision to publish the purported birth certificate. He makes a lot of sense. Read it here.

Update: Not surprisingly, this birth certificate also turned out to be a fake and was a joke by a liberal.