Posted on 03/01/2009 8:22:44 AM PST by STARWISE
Bill Clinton had the Vince Foster "murder." George W. Bush had 9/11 Truth. And the new administration has brought with it a new culture of conspiracy: The Birthers.
Out of the gaze of the mainstream and even the conservative media is a flourishing culture of advocates, theorists and lawyers, all devoted to proving that Barack Obama isn't eligible to be president of the United States.
Viewed as irrelevant by the White House, and as embarrassing by much of the Republican Party, the subculture still thrives from the conservative website WorldNetDaily, which claims that some 300,000 people have signed a petition demanding more information on Obama's birth, to Cullman, Alabama, where Sen. Richard Shelby took a question on the subject at a town hall meeting last week.
Their confinement to the fringe hasn't cooled the passion of believers; the obscure New York preacher James Manning turned up at a National Press Club session in December to declare the president "the most notorious criminal in the history not just of America, but of this entire planet."
(Excerpt) Read more at politico.com ...
I have read the whole thing. My daughter and son-in-law, graduates of one of the top regional law schools, regularly ask me my opinion on Constitutional topics, because I know it better than they do. My son-in-law asked me just today about the issue of giving DC a single vote in the House of Representatives, although he already had his own opinion on that one. :)
Article II, Section 4.
The President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors
So is being ineligible per Art. II section 1 a "high crime" or a High Misdemeanor, since it's certainly not Treason (as defined in Art. III Sec. 3) or bribery?
Can a person not eligible actually *be* President, regardless of any certified count (and that's all it was, the candidate was not being certified, just the votes of the electors) or ceremony. The President is not anointed by the ceremony, the Constitution provides, (amendment XX section 1, which modified Amendment XII) that he/she takes office at noon on January 20th, and states that the oath must be taken *before* entering into that office(Art. II sec 1)?
If an ineligible person cannot be President, then how can he/she be removed by Congress from an office they didn't legally hold? None of that is settled law. The Constitution just does not contemplate the situation of an ineligible person assuming the office of President and so provides no remedy other than the general judicial power.
Isn’t amazing how well informed some posters
here (I won’t call them FReepers) are about
all the Obama minutiae that they can just
call up ... in a flash?
And there’s no doubts, no hint of patriot pride
for our blessed America, no love of country and
concern for the integrity of our government ...
just spewing out dry minutiae and countering
every question raised with robotic answers.
They seem well coached or spouting talking
points. It seems very programmed and canned to
me.
I’m about convinced that the One’s payroll
for operatives is expansive ... very expansive.
I proved you completely wrong on that point.
See up thread.
Incorrect assumption. The "pertinent officials" do not have access to birth records under Hawaii law, absent a court order that is. And they have stated as much. They have verfied that such a certificate exists, but have also explicitly said they have not seen it. Thus they would not have been aware of that information, if (1) it is indeed a fact and (2) the fact is reflected on the original Certificate of Birth, which it conceivably might not be.
What you're saying basically amounts to the fact that he is eligible since all the states and everyone with authority to question and act on it considers him to be.
I consider them to be so. Started by former WashPost
reporters, interviewed all the time by the cables.
Wait, are you saying they are mainstream = in tank for the occupant or mainstream = unbiased? moderate?
Straw man argument. None of those officials (although I only count 3, including the governor) said they had seen the certificate, they said they had seen that the state has a certificate.
You have to properly parse what they stated.
Therefore, I as Director of Health for the State of Hawaii, along with the Registrar of Vital Statistics who has statutory authority to oversee and maintain these type of vital records, have personally seen and verified that the Hawaii State Department of Health has Sen. Obama’s original birth certificate on record in accordance with state policies and procedures.
Thus they saw and verfied that such certificate is on file, they did not say they saw the certificate or what was on it.
They aren't supposed to look at it any more than anyone else, except as required to fill a valid request for that information. However, unless a copy is specifically requested, no one needs to see the original, as the information comes from a database, as you have said, so all they see is the abstract, assuming printing, folding and stuffing in an envelope isn't also automated, which it very well could be.
The only person to have seen the actual certificate would have been the person who abstracted the information from it into the computer database. That was likely a decade or more, likely more, ago.
There is a Constitutional requirement that has not been reduced to legislation, just yet.
I believe that the STATES hold the primary responsibility here. After all, the entire Electoral College system is part of our Federalist system. The 10th Amendment, even, would seem to grant the power to the States, to enforce the Natural Born Citizen clause, as nowhere else in the Constitution is the enforcement of this right clear, accept maybe in the Impeachment clause, or in the clause stating the process for the Electors to present their votes to Congress. I believe it would be hard for Congress to act to deny any electoral votes, to any candidate, without a challenge at the State level, in the Courts or through their State officials.
We need State laws on this matter. States control elections. States determine Presidential race procedure and the method for awarding their Electoral College votes.
States WILL address this issue. Maybe only a handful at first, but it will be addressed.
And, when a State REQUIRES such documentation, it will be hard for Obama or anyone else to explain why he or she is NOT on the ballot, in that State.
Under Hawaii law, and absent a court order, that is indeed the case.
Lamestream = biased.
~~~~
The author, Ben Smith
http://www.politico.com/reporters/BenSmith.html
~~~
What would you say about an arrogant twirp who
speaks about Presidents Ronald Reagan and George W.
Bush in this manner?
###
“I was born in 1976, the week Jimmy Carter was elected. Four years later, my mother let me come into the voting booth with her. I pulled the lever on the prehistoric voting machine to send Carter back to the White House. Instead, Reagan won in a landslide, which was confusing for a four-year old, since my family knew no one who admitted to voting for him.
My British peers were Thatcher’s children; we didn’t have a word for it, but I grew up under Reagan.
That demonic image of the president on the local walls, which must have surfaced during his second term, could have been inspired by any of a dozen issues, or all of them.
Reagan had cut taxes on the rich, and cut some spending on the poor and the cities. He had been talking tough about the Soviet Union, for which many in “Moscow on the Hudson” had a measure of sympathy.
He supported right-wing dictators in Latin America, when we supported left-wing dictators. He talked about God more than Jewish secularists were comfortable with. Later in his term, he ignored the burgeoning AIDS epidemic. And a neighborhood of intellectuals considered him a moron.
*snip*
Amid the Reagan eulogies, though, it’s too easy for liberals to forget their contempt for what we saw as unfair cuts and his simplistic anti-Communism.
Indeed, the uniform, seething hatred for Bush returns me immediately to my 1980s childhood. Of course Bush has sent out the troops; but who doubts that Reagan would have lashed out if the country was attacked?”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2004/jun/09/usa.theobserver
###
I’m glad I went searching for some background on him and found that. I didn’t like him before; now, I can comfortably despise him and be on alert for his next missives.
The one that I've seen had neither the clerk's "signature" rubber stamp marking nor evidence of a raised crimp seal. It may indeed be a "true and correct" printout of what the Hawaiian Vital Records office has in its computer system, but it's not authentic proof of that. If you've seen another image with the certification marks, please provide the source.
Ooops .. missed this sterling chunk of spew:
###
“Now New York has turned its ire on another president, another idiot and cowboy. On the West Side, the locals are assuring themselves that George W. Bush is the worst yet, the worst ever.
When it came to militarism, Reagan talked tough, but Grenada was his only hot war; Bush has soldiers scattered across the Muslim world. And in matters of style, Reagan, at least through the gauze of time, was sort of lovable. “Liberals would look at Reagan and say ‘Damn, I wish we had someone that charming,’” a local Democrat, Eric Schneiderman, told me.”
Ben Smith
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2004/jun/09/usa.theobserver
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Liberalism = a documented mental disorder
No, I'm saying that they have not, and cannot, verify that the information on it is the same as the information on the Certification image released by the Obama campaign.
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