Obama Birth Country Still Raising Questions

News Chief ^ | June 10, 2009 | David Scrimshaw

[Non-Sequitur]

That is PRECISELY what the “natural born citizen” clause in the Constitution is all about.

The Constitution mentions only two forms of citizenship - natural born and naturalized. If you're not one then your the other, and per the 14th Amendment, relevant Supreme Court, and applicable U.S. law people born in this country are natural born citizens regardless of the nationality of their parents in most cases.

To be a “natural born” citizen, one must be born in the United States and have a US Citizen father.

That may be your opinion and your interpretation of the founder's intent. But it is not supported by the Constitution, the law, or the courts. So long as he was born in the U.S. Obama, as well as people like McCain and Jindal, meet the Constitutional eligibility for the presidency.

[stylecouncilor]

ping

[BP2]

Why would he have traveled nearly 10,000 miles to Pakistan in 1981? Summer vacation?

Who footed the bill? Was it a Grant from the University of National Friendship (Patrice Lumumba University) ? I understand they had one hell of a Exchange Program, and Institute of Distant Learning, at one time...

Even IF it was possible to get in and out of Pakistan ...
Wouldn't it have been nonetheless difficult for a “Christian” American (ie, a non-Muslim) to have traveled to Pakistan during that time frame in Cold War history, especially on an American passport? Remember, just 2 years earlier, a mob in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad, burned the US Embassy to the ground and killed a Marine on the rooftop. The Iranian Ayatollah Khomeini wasn't exactly spreading the love for Americans in Pakistan. And YES -- Obama's religion would have been a very relevant question asked by Pakistani "Customs" officials each time he flew into town.

Those are pretty big questions. Here's another:

If Obama was in Pakistan as part of some college correspondence program (as some of us suspect), what the hell brand of Poli Sci was he studying at Occidental College and Columbia University?

Not IF, but WHEN we confirm the answer to the last question, yes, it will be quite an inconvenient truth for Obama ...

No wonder he doesn't want his college records to be publicly known. And no wonder he's in a hurry...

[kabar]

Why would he have traveled nearly 10,000 miles to Pakistan in 1981? Summer vacation?

As a freshman, he quickly became friends with Mohammed Hasan Chandoo and Wahid Hamid, two wealthy Pakistanis. There were others, Thummalapally recalls: a French student and both black and white Americans, including Jon K. Mitchell, who later played bass for country-swing band Asleep at the Wheel (Mitchell remembers that Obama wore puka-shell necklaces all the time, though they were not in style, and that "we let it slide because he spent a lot of time growing up in Hawaii."

"In 1981, Obama transferred from Occidental to Columbia. In between, he traveled to Pakistan — a trip that enhanced his foreign policy qualifications, he maintained in a private speech at a San Francisco fundraiser last month. Obama spent "about three weeks" in Pakistan, traveling with Hamid and staying in Karachi with Chandoo's family, said Bill Burton, Obama's press secretary."

"He was clearly shocked by the economic disparity he saw in Pakistan. He couldn't get over the sight of rural peasants bowing to the wealthy landowners they worked for as they passed," says Margot Mifflin, who makes a brief appearance in Obama's memoir."

When Obama arrived in New York, he already knew Siddiqi — a friend of Chandoo's and Hamid's from Karachi who had visited Los Angeles. Looking back, Siddiqi acknowledges that he and Obama were an odd couple. Siddiqi would mock Obama's idealism — he just wanted to make a lot of money and buy things, while Obama wanted to help the poor.

Wouldn't it have been nonetheless difficult for a “Christian” American (ie, a non-Muslim) to have traveled to Pakistan during that time frame in Cold War history, especially on an American passport? Remember, just 2 years earlier, a mob in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad, burned the US Embassy to the ground and killed a Marine on the rooftop. The Iranian Ayatollah Khomeini wasn't exactly spreading the love for Americans in Pakistan.

No, there were plenty of Americans living there. I travelled there on multiple occasions to negotiate with the Pakistani goverment in Islamabad to reimburse us for the costs of rebuilding our embassy and housing that were destroyed in the fire. I also visited Karachi and Lahore to meet with our consulate officials.

Once you get into the country, you don't have to present your passport very often, except to check into hotels. Obama was with his Pakistani roommate and stayed with his family. It would be difficult to visibly detect whether Obama was an American or a Christian.

[ga medic]

I don’t know what you are talking about with the Iranian Pakistan comments. I travelled to Pakistan in Jan 1982 and there was no problem at all being an American Christian. There were 120 visas, and it was very inexpensive to travel around the country. It was also much safer than you describe.

[iowamark]

No. It is not possible. Pakistan was on the U.S. State Department's "no-travel" list in 1981

Obviously false. This kind of casual dishonesty is why the Birthers are not taken seriously.

[IrishPennant]

Let’s not forget the connection between Turbo Tax Timmy’s dad and Obozo’s mom through the Ford Foundation.

[kabar]

I am not forgetting it. I think Obama is an angry person who believes that his father and mother abandoned him. I don't believe that Obama was very close to his mother who was more interested in pursuing her own interests. Obama exhibits some of the traits of a sociopath. Profile of the Sociopath

[IrishPennant]

Uh-oh...I read too much of that page. Starting to wonder about myself now. But that's fine - I'll self medicate with adult beverages tonight.

BTW, thanks for the link - it seems spot on Obumbo.

[John Valentine]

Nope. You have it wrong. Time to break out the books, my friend.

The category “Natural Born” is not, repeat NOT, synonymous with “native born” as you seem to think. It is a category of Citizenship that has little significance for most of us as it is a really an issue only for a single office in the United States: the Presidency.

The only way you can reach the conclusion you do in your final paragraph is to take the Constitution as a “living, breathing, document, infinitely malleable, subject to our current definitions of words, whatever we choose them to mean” the way our liberal friends do. If that’s you, you are no conservative. The Constitution says what is says, and it means what the Founders intended it to mean, nothing more and nothing less. That stands in the face of years of wrongly decided cases, and emphatically stands in the face of unconstitutional legislation and executive acts.

BTW, McCain’s natural born citizenship is on a bit more solid ground than Obamas, because McCain’s father was indeed a US citizen, as Obama’s was not, but its still a bit shaky to to the extraterritoriality of the birth.

[usmcobra]

The Constitution mentions only two forms of citizenship - natural born and naturalized. If you're not one then your the other, and per the 14th Amendment, relevant Supreme Court, and applicable U.S. law people born in this country are natural born citizens regardless of the nationality of their parents in most cases.

There is just one problem with this statement, Obama has never claimed to be a Natural Born Citizen, He claims to be a Native Born Citizen..

As a constitutional lawyer and former president of the Harvard Law Review, I think we can safely assume that Obama knows the difference and yet still uses the term that applies to that third class of citizens you say does not exist because it isn't written in the Constitution.

Apparently Obama believes it exists because he claims to be one.

[BP2]

Very true. I'm sure the Ford Foundation financed the expedition.

Barack Obama And Ahmadiyya

Ahmmadiyya USA with Barack Obama (circa 2005). Missionary in charge USA, Mr. Daud Hanif Sahib and Naib Amir Mr. Zinda M. Bajwa Sahib & Public Relations in charge.

http://www.rabwah.net/ahmmadiyya-usa-with-barack-obama/

One has to wonder if Obama joined the Ahmadiyya Movement while there, and continued in silence when he came back to the US. The total US membership of the Ahmadiyya Movement is 10,000 of which 45 percent are Black Americans, and 55 percent are Pakistanis/Indians. The Ahmadis have branches in more than 40 American cities, and their numbers are growing.

Islam in the African-American experience (Google Books)

Here's the Chicago office (approx 300 members in the mid-1990s, 50 of which were Black Americans)

and six New York offices (Columbia Univ)

and two Los Angeles offices (Occidental College)

[Non-Sequitur]

There is just one problem with this statement, Obama has never claimed to be a Natural Born Citizen, He claims to be a Native Born Citizen.

He can claim to be a rainbow citizen for all the difference it makes. Native born, natural born, citizen at birth, citizen by birth, all mean the same thing. What matters is that he is not a naturalized citizen.

As a constitutional lawyer and former president of the Harvard Law Review, I think we can safely assume that Obama knows the difference and yet still uses the term that applies to that third class of citizens you say does not exist because it isn't written in the Constitution.

The where does the Constitution or the law define that third class of citizenship you say does exist?

[Non-Sequitur]

The only way you can reach the conclusion you do in your final paragraph is to take the Constitution as a “living, breathing, document, infinitely malleable, subject to our current definitions of words, whatever we choose them to mean” the way our liberal friends do.

The true defintition of a living, breathing Constitution is one where meaning is found when there is nothing in the document to support it. So then the question becomes where in the Constitution is that third class of citizenship mentioned or defined, or even implied? If the Constitution is not living and breathing then it has to be in there somehwere, so that a reasonable conclusion can be reached that that was the founder's intent. So point it out to us. Or tell us where in the law it is to be found or what Supreme Court decisions identified it and laid out the difference between the various forms of citizenship.

BTW, McCain’s natural born citizenship is on a bit more solid ground than Obamas, because McCain’s father was indeed a US citizen, as Obama’s was not, but its still a bit shaky to to the extraterritoriality of the birth.

By your definition - born of two U.S. parents on U.S. soil - then McCain's eligibility isn't even shaky. By your definition he isn't qualified, period. Nor would Bobby Jindal be.

[John Valentine]

That’s not MY definiton: it’s the Founder’s. Sorry.

[Non-Sequitur]

That’s not MY definiton: it’s the Founder’s. Sorry.

Then where in the Constitution is it?

[mojitojoe]

As a freshman, he quickly became friends with Mohammed Hasan Chandoo and Wahid Hamid, two wealthy Pakistanis. There were others, Thummalapally recalls: a French student and both black and white Americans, including Jon K. Mitchell, who later played bass for country-swing band Asleep at the Wheel (Mitchell remembers that Obama wore puka-shell necklaces all the time, though they were not in style, and that “we let it slide because he spent a lot of time growing up in Hawaii.”
___________________
Odd that he said.... “ HE SPENT A LOT OF TIME GROWING UP IN HAWAII” instead of saying he was from Hawaii or that he was born in Hawaii.

[mojitojoe]

When Obama arrived in New York, he already knew Siddiqi — a friend of Chandoo’s and Hamid’s from Karachi who had visited Los Angeles. Looking back, Siddiqi acknowledges that he and Obama were an odd couple. Siddiqi would mock Obama’s idealism — he just wanted to make a lot of money and buy things, while Obama wanted to help the poor.
________________
MY BULLSH*T meter just broke, this one was off the charts.

[mojitojoe]

23 minutes before you found a birth thread to try to defend your Messiah. Hangover AGAIN? A little late today, but better than last time. How many times a day do you type BIRTH and CIVIL WAR into the search box here on FR? Be honest.

[Non-Sequitur]

Hangover AGAIN?

Something you don't seem to have a problem with since your mojito consumption appears to be 24x7. Based on your posts.

Be honest.

Honestly? None, there's no need to. The Birther posts are pretty much continuous and I often get pinged to the rebellion posts via freepmail.