Comments on: That Bleeping Birth Certificate

By: mike.musculus

mike.musculus — Tue, 09 Dec 2008 21:53:33 +0000

The view that citizens have no standing in Constitutional issues turns the Constitution from a comptract between Citizens, (as the senior partner) and their government (junior partner) to a contract of government (as the senior partner) with government (junior partner)!

And so, we see the groundwork laid for tyranny, for if government’s only overseer is itself we have become slaves, simply to serve at its pleasure.

By: sedonaman

sedonaman — Tue, 09 Dec 2008 16:23:33 +0000

“The state of Hawaii is asserting that privacy laws forbid it from revealing the certificate. This should be considered a bogus claim.”

What information is on birth certificates that make them private? Social Security numbers were not required until recently. I thought birth records were public information, not to the extent that anyone could get a legal copy or even a photocopy, but that anyone could look at a microfilm version. Anyone out there familiar with privacy laws?

P.S. Why 0bama continues to let this fester is beyond me. He’s only perpetuating the impression that he has something to hide.

By: Mickey G

Mickey G — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 21:32:16 +0000

Let’s put at least part of this issue under the correct law:
December 24, 1952 to November 13, 1986
If, at the time of your birth, both your parents were U.S. citizens and at least one had a prior residence in the United States, you automatically acquired U.S. citizenship with no conditions for retaining it.

If only one parent was a U.S. citizen at the time of your birth, that parent must have resided in the United States for at least ten years, at least five of which had to be after the age of 16. There are no conditions placed on retaining this type of citizenship. If your one U.S. citizen parent is your father and you were born outside of marriage, the same rules apply if your father legally legitimated you before your 21st birthday and you were unmarried at the time. If legitimation occurred after November 14, 1986, your father must have established paternity prior to your 18th birthday, either by acknowledgment or by court order, and must have stated in writing that he would support you financially until your 18th birthday.

By: rxsid

rxsid — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 18:25:00 +0000

@harriet.killjoy. Correct, the Constitution or subsequent amendments never explicitly defined ‘Natural Born’ citizen. Thus the need for this case to be heard and decided by the SCOTUS.
The ‘intent’ of that Constitutional requirement was to prevent divided loyalties. After all, as Leo Donofrio points out, how can one be a U.S. Natural born citizen but have allegiance and be under governance and jurisdiction of a foreign power? I think we would agree that the founders and framers would not have wanted such a person (past their generation of course) to become POTUS.

Your point about D) advances the point I was making. That is, he could not have received U.S. Citizenship from his mother being a citizen. Some folks have tried to argue that that makes his eligible. Of course, it doesn’t.

And, as far as F goes, it was never intended to trump the others. How did you arrive at that conclusion? I was merely stating some points of information. All of which is connected, in some way, to some degree, with the others. Simply points. ‘Bullet’ points if you will.

By: harriet.killjoy

harriet.killjoy — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 03:14:51 +0000

@rxsid -

I’ll let A, B, and C go since they don’t actually speak to the facts of the case. However, your point in D is moot. If in fact Obama were born in Kenya his mother’s citizenship status would have been governed by the policy stated here (http://travel.state.gov/law/info/info_609.html), and I quote

Birth Abroad Out-of-Wedlock to a U.S. Citizen Mother: A child born abroad out-of-wedlock to a U.S. citizen mother may acquire U.S. citizenship under Section 301(g) INA, as made applicable by Section 309(c) INA if the mother was a U.S. citizen at the time of the child’s birth, and if the mother had previously been physically present in the United States or one of its outlying possessions for a continuous period of one year.

Obama’s parents were not legally married because his father was still married in Kenya. US law doesn’t recognize marriages where one of the people are already married, whether their marriage occurred in the US or abroad.

And regarding you F point, the one you think trumps all the others. Can you please point me to the law witch defines “natural-born citizen” as someone who doesn’t have dual citizenship? I understand you point, and others, about the framers not wanted someone with British citizenship becoming President (they had just one independence from Britain, for crying out loud) but they never discussed, nor has the law defined “natural-born” as not including dual citizenship. Without evidence, I believe your point is moot.

By: Grace Nearing

Grace Nearing — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 00:55:53 +0000

Anyone running for the presidency has placed himself in the arena of a public, rather than a private citizen. A candidate is, for all practical purposes, giving up his privacy rights, and making his or her entire life open to scrutiny by the public and the press. Their personal records should and must be part of this.

So every record from a candiate’s birth (or what, age 18 or 21?) — medical records, military records, sealed legal records, tax records, phone records, school records, magazine subscriptions, DVD rentals, book purchases, etc, etc — immediately becomes open to the public the moment a candidate files papers in the first state? And would this be limited to just the candidate but the candidate’s spouse and adult children? The candidate’s parents and grandparents and the spouse’s parents and grandparents?

By: unspun

unspun — Sun, 07 Dec 2008 22:53:55 +0000

Thank you for this excellent commentary.

And for an article covering the Donofrio “natural born Citizen” challenge see this link. It includes background, rationale, constitutional context, and case law:

http://investigatingobama.blogspot.com/2008/12/donofrio-dual-citizenship-natural-born.html

By: Mickey G

Mickey G — Sun, 07 Dec 2008 17:33:57 +0000

The question of birth on American soil is actually the most difficult for the apologists to kill off. Under laws in effect Obama is not even a citizen today if he was born in Kenya, in fact he could then be classed as an illegal alien subject to possible deportation. The other issues are easier for the apologists to deal with because he would have been a naturalized citizen and we are really dealing with technicalities.

Regarding the potential for civil war, remember the original civil war was fought over state’s rights not slavery as the uninformed and government educated seem to think. A documented illegal candidate sworn in via a perjured president would probably drive the other 46% into a frenzy.

By: chucka83

chucka83 — Sun, 07 Dec 2008 16:37:42 +0000

Although I do not see this issue leading to a civil war, as most of Obama’s supporters could care less if he is in fact a citizen. The fact that he was registered as a dual citizen with the UK seems to already disqualify him from being a natural born citizen. I am happy though that this issue is starting to gain some momentum and support. The “Honolulu Advertiser” has a birth announcement in it for Obama, supposedly found on microfilm and posted on the wikileaks website.

http://wikileaks.org/wiki/Obama_1961_birth_announcement_from_Honolulu_Advertiser

By: “That Bleeping Birth Certificate” by Steven D. Laib « Rosettasister’s Weblog

Sun, 07 Dec 2008 14:56:34 +0000

[...] http://www.intellectualconservative.com/2008/12/06/that-bleeping-birth-certificate/ [...]