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Post by wisechild on Mar 9, 2009 14:29:21 GMT -5
It seems that on Rapture Ready, Free Republic and other places on the Internets, this whole Birth Certificate Conspiracy has reached consensus. And they are over confident about this, too.
There are some lawyers with dubious credentials who have filed suit on behalf of the "Birthers" to make the State of Hawaii release his original Birth Certificate. States generally don't do that, and the Birthers claim that the provided legitimate Certificate of Live Birth is not valid. If Obama was not constitutionally qualified, then this would have surfaced a long time ago. Hack lawyers had (and are having) their cases thrown out in court.
I guess politics is a spectator's sport now, and the goal is impeachment. No matter how dubious. Obama's Taliban strategy won't help things, either - I don't completely understand Obama's plan on that, actually.
So many of them don't want to face up to what seems to be the end of The Reagan Era. They really think they can extend the Reagan Era.
This "Birther" Bullshit is, of course, about latent and not-so-latent racism. Didn't this Birth Certificate Conspiracy start on Stormfront? It also seems that through the Birther position, they can maintain their more patriotic-than-thou position. Because, *pfft!* a Black man can't be president!
I attacked their absurd Birth Certificate allegations on Rapture Ready, got labeled as a "kool-aid drinker" and was banned as an "Obamabot".
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Post by m52nickerson on Mar 9, 2009 14:53:36 GMT -5
My son was born in Florida and his original certificate is titled "Certificate of live birth".
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Post by scienceisgreen on Mar 9, 2009 16:11:55 GMT -5
Heh, I too was born in Florida mine also says "certificate of live birth"
on a side note- native Floridians FTW
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Post by Caitshidhe on Mar 9, 2009 16:19:27 GMT -5
I was born in Florida as well. Anybody here NOT born in Florida?
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Post by JonathanE on Mar 9, 2009 16:34:58 GMT -5
I was born in Florida as well. Anybody here NOT born in Florida? I wasn't, but my wife is from FLA, although she was born in Philly, go figure...
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Post by Paradox on Mar 9, 2009 16:56:30 GMT -5
I was born in Florida, but was smart enough to get out of there when I was just a month old.
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Post by skyfire on Mar 9, 2009 17:05:14 GMT -5
From what I understand, the controversy came about because Hawaii has two different forms of birth certificates, with the Certificate of Live Birth being an entirely separate document.
Supposedly, in Hawaii there are loopholes to where a person not born in the state can still get a Certificate even though they didn't have a state birth certificate.
The argument goes that because Obama showed the certificate in question and not the full birth certificate, it means he's got something to hide. Given the whole flap about his father being a British citizen and the rumor that one of his grandmothers said he was born in Africa, these people think that it all adds up to Obama not being a legal US citizen.
Thing is, Obama's mother was a US citizen, and so under US law Obama himself slides right on into citizenship as well. Unless these people can prove that Obama's mother somehow lost her citizenship before he was born or that Obama somehow lost his citizenship over the years, there's no real case.
Even if they can prove Obama wasn't a legal citizen, the best-case scenario is merely Obama getting ejected, Biden becoming the next President, and a few intense months of political infighting among the DNC's elite as to who should become the VP. If the election actually is declared invalid, it'd raise a massive shitstorm so epic that people might just forget about the Bush years for a little while.
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Post by erictheblue on Mar 9, 2009 17:15:58 GMT -5
Thing is, Obama's mother was a US citizen, and so under US law Obama himself slides right on into citizenship as well. Unless these people can prove that Obama's mother somehow lost her citizenship before he was born or that Obama somehow lost his citizenship over the years, there's no real case. Due to interesting phrasing of the Constitution, even if Obama lost his citizenship (somehow), he would still be eligible. Article II, Section 1 of the Constitution says "No Person except a natural born Citizen... shall be eligible to the Office of President." It doesn't say you still have to be a citizen, just that you were born one.
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Post by wackadoodle on Mar 9, 2009 17:19:58 GMT -5
The republicans had an army of lawyers digging through Obama's past. If they didn't find anything interesting during the campaign theirs nothing abunch of racist tinfoil hatters are gonna discover.
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Post by MozMode on Mar 9, 2009 17:28:27 GMT -5
The republicans had an army of lawyers digging through Obama's past. If they didn't find anything interesting during the campaign theirs nothing abunch of racist tinfoil hatters are gonna discover. My thoughts exactly. I mean, when was this guy announced as the Dem Prez Nominee?? Like over a year ago?? And they haven't found anything yet. So, what makes them think they're going to find anything now? I can assure you that since he was announced as the Dem frontrunner, they've been trying feverishly to find some dirt.
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Post by skyfire on Mar 9, 2009 17:42:53 GMT -5
The republicans had an army of lawyers digging through Obama's past. If they didn't find anything interesting during the campaign theirs nothing abunch of racist tinfoil hatters are gonna discover. My thoughts exactly. I mean, when was this guy announced as the Dem Prez Nominee?? Like over a year ago?? And they haven't found anything yet. So, what makes them think they're going to find anything now? I can assure you that since he was announced as the Dem frontrunner, they've been trying feverishly to find some dirt. In all honesty tho, if Obama wanted to shut them up in a heartbeat he'd show the full birth certificate. They'd be publicly humiliated, and Obama would have some additional cred for standing up to them.
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Post by JonathanE on Mar 9, 2009 17:45:48 GMT -5
Why should he? McCain never had to "publicly" show his. If the Supreme Court accepts his election, as did the Electoral College, screw 'em. They would just claim it was a forgery anyway, and we're back where we started. It's a tempest in a teapot, anyway. Even FOX doesn't lend it any credence, and if it were even remotely possible, they would be all over it like flies on shit.
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Post by Lady Renae on Mar 9, 2009 18:06:15 GMT -5
Additionally, showing a valid USA birth certificate would prove nothing to his detractors. They would claim it was faked or something. There were documents that were 'brought to light' concerning Bush and his history in the military that were immediately jumped upon by his supporters as being fake. I do not know personally whether they were or not, but detractors of Obama would likely do the same thing. Nothing will be good enough for them. They aren't really mad because they think he isn't American. They are mad because they didn't get their way.
EDIT: Yes, someone else made this point and I missed it, but I'm leaving this up because I had different supporting evidence and whatnot.
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Post by skyfire on Mar 9, 2009 18:46:53 GMT -5
Additionally, showing a valid USA birth certificate would prove nothing to his detractors. They would claim it was faked or something. There were documents that were 'brought to light' concerning Bush and his history in the military that were immediately jumped upon by his supporters as being fake. If it's the Killian documents that CBS procured, then yes; they were ultimately borne out as forgeries created by one of Bush's political opponents. CBS both failed to properly vet them before airing them and refused to retract the story they did about them until long after even the general public became aware of the situation. The incident cost several CBS staffers their jobs, led to Dan Rather's downfall, and is believed to have played a key role in Kerry's narrow defeat. Other documents that did come up were legit; the disputes were merely over how the documents were interpreted by the media and pundits. IE, the phrase "not observed at this station" is a standard phrase meaning that a person got transferred between posts during an observation period and so the official observer could not complete the task; it was frequently misrepresented as meaning that Bush was AWOL or had failed to report.
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Post by antichrist on Mar 9, 2009 18:56:16 GMT -5
Additionally, showing a valid USA birth certificate would prove nothing to his detractors. They would claim it was faked or something. There were documents that were 'brought to light' concerning Bush and his history in the military that were immediately jumped upon by his supporters as being fake. I do not know personally whether they were or not, but detractors of Obama would likely do the same thing. Nothing will be good enough for them. They aren't really mad because they think he isn't American. They are mad because they didn't get their way. EDIT: Yes, someone else made this point and I missed it, but I'm leaving this up because I had different supporting evidence and whatnot. And he has shown his birth certificate. It was good enough for him to sit in the Senate, it's good enough for him to be POTUS. Even if he went door to door, shoving his BC in every fundies face, it would still be called fake. I think he's taking the upper road by ignoring the bullshit. As far as the lawsuit goes. Well I'm sure I could find a lawyer willing to sue Bigfoot for me, if I had the cash up front.
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