Free Republic

So what are you saying? That anyone who posts here who hasn't been registered since 1996 is a troll? Or that there is some prescribed waiting period between the time one registers and the time that they post something? If so, how long is the waiting period?

k

It wasn't folded twice. And it wasn't folded on any significant diagonal. And the fold in the photos is perfectly consistent with the fold in the scan.

Photo 2 makes it appear that the fold was made on an diagonal. But that's simply because the angle of the page above the fold on the "DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH" side was more extreme than the angle above the fold on the "STATE OF HAWAII" side.

Take a look at photo 5 and you'll see that the distance from the fold to the top inside edge of the border does not vary in any significant way.

But sticking to photo 2 for the moment, pull it up, make it full size, and then scroll to get to where the fold meets up with the left side of the border.

As you can see, the fold there is located just above the pair of horizontal (or vertical with respect to the photo itself but I'm going to reference them as they would appear with the document right reading) bars, and right at the ends of the pair of vertical bars above them.

Then scroll down, following the fold until you get to the point where it meets up with the right side of the border.

As you can see, it's moved further above the horizontal pairs to the point that nearly half of the vertical pair above them is now below the fold.

Now pull up the Kos or FactCheck scanned images and you will find the exact same thing.

k

But it is.

It's not quite as visible as it is in the scan (and even the scan needs to be enhanced to bring it out further) because you have quite different lighting and other conditions between this photograph and the original scan.

But some of it is still visible even without enhancement in the photograph. See that bluish smudge just above the "ma" of "prima"? That's the top of the "D" in the "Ph.D" of the signature stamp. You can also see it in image 6.

Here's an animated GIF which uses an enhanced section of the original scan (the only enhancement was a change in color levels) which is overlaid with the date and signature stamps cropped from the 2008 Michele COLB, showing how the elements of the bleed match up with the signature stamp.

stamp.gif

k

I've yet to see any credible evidence that it was faked the first time.

I will say however that in spite of my being critical of the so-called "analysis" showing it to be fake, I have had one lingering question about the Obama COLB. And that was the border pattern. It was unlike any of the two other border patterns that were known to exist.

And I must thank Polarik for finally putting that one nagging question I had to rest. He did so by way of the first image he shows in his post. In that image, he shows another COLB which has the same border pattern as the Obama COLB.

And speaking of that image, I would like to address what Polarik claims it reveals.

To wit:

Furthermore, the two vertical borders on each side of the FactCheck COLB image were not drawn as long, parallel rectangles, but as divergent ones! When comparing them to real 2007 borders, the border on the left side went from being narrow at the base to being wider at the top. Conversely, the border on the left side went from being wider at the base to being narrower at the top. These disparities show up when the FactCheck COLB is made semi-transparent and laid on top of a genuine 2007 COLB image (as shown below).

I assume he meant left side and right side instead of left side and left side. However in any case, this is absolutely incorrect. The two vertical sides of the border in the FactCheck image are not divergent.

They only appear at first glance to be divergent due to the underlying border of the "new 2007 COLB" being skewed counterclockwise. The width of the border in the FactCheck image is the same at the bottom as it is at the top. There is no divergence.

So now the question is whether this image was produced due to laziness or incompetence, or was it done in order to intentionally mislead readers into believing something about the FactCheck border which simply wasn't true?

Given what Polarik had said on my blog back around mid-August regarding deskewing borders before comparing them, the latter would seem to be the case here.

Please remember to deskew them counter-clockwise...

You didn’t deskew the borders.

So why didn't Polarik deskew the borders in this instance? It seems rather obvious that he didn't do this because it would have shown a much better match between the FactCheck image and the "new 2007 COLB" than he wanted to portray to readers here.

And finally I'll note once again that Polarik still hasn't offered an explanation as to why he claimed that the date stamp is never placed above the signature stamp on any existing COLBs when he knew this wasn't true.

Do any of you reading this actually care whether or not what Polarik claims is true? Or do you unquestioningly accept that it is true because it's something you want to be true?

As I said previously, I'm neither a Democrat nor will I be voting for Obama. But if you're going to make a case against Obama, or anyone else for that matter, it should be based on fact, and not lies, misrepresentations or fabrications. Otherwise, you'll find yourself showing up at a gunfight without so much as a pea shooter.

k

Ok, fine. Now that you've got that out of your system, what do you have to say about photos themselves? I mean, the photographs are what they are regardless of the date in the camera.

k

Ok. Who? What reporter(s)?

You are voting for Obama - aren't you?

No. Why would you make such an assumption?

Obama better not be caught lying about his birth because it has the potential to take all the Dems down a notch or two running in elections, for your Dem party's sake.

My party's sake? Um, no. I have no party affiliation. I think political parties (at least the Democratic and Republican parties) are rather like labor unions. They once served a useful purpose, but anymore, they only serve themselves to the detriment of those they're claiming to represent.

So that's two erroneous assumptions on your part so far.

Care to try for three? ;)

k

But before I reply to Polarik's latest posts, I'd like to ask him to explain to those reading this why he claimed that the date stamp is never placed right above the signature stamp on any existing COLBs when he knew this was not true.

He completely ignored this issue in his subsequent posts, and if he expects to be taken seriously, I think it's deserving of an answer.

k

I'm still not quite convinced.

I recently wrote two posts that have yet to be posted. Maybe moderation's just running a bit slow on a Saturday night. But if they don't show up I'm not going to spend a bunch of time responding to your latest posts if they're likely to just end up in the bit bucket.

k

I don't know that it is. How exactly do you go about establishing the odds for such a thing? Bottom line, you can't really say with any certainty one way or the other.

k

Oh please. Dispense with the melodrama.

And what's this "your side" stuff? It has absolutely nothing to do with any "sides." It's called "politics." And no campaign would jump into action and respond every time someone on some blog hatched some theory or other.

An honest person would let reporter pools inspect the document(s) in question, and not use biased websites like Annenberg.org "FactCheck" and the DailyKos.

And what unbiased reporter(s) have shown up at Obama's Chicago campaign headquarters (where the certificate is supposedly kept) and asked to inspect the document(s) in question but have been refused or otherwise turned away?

Are you aware of any? I'm not.

You say that Obama's campaign shouldn't publish scans and photos of the certificate on biased websites, but yet they're expected to address those who are unabashedly biased against him and post on similarly biased websites?

What's up with that?

k

That just tells you what the camera's internal date/time was set to, not necessarily when the photos were taken.

k

Essentially, yes.

Huh? No need to end a controversy before it starts.

As Polarik's post here (and posts by others elsewhere) amply prove, down at the blog level, controversies never end. They just keep getting recycled.

That's Back@ss thinking.

I disagree.

As I said, at the blog level, controversies never end. And as long as they stay down at the blog level, no one else to speak of knows anything about them, so in the larger scheme of things, they're not a problem for the campaign.

However if the campaign did anything to address these blog level controversies, in doing so, they couldn't help but to draw wider attention to them. And why would they want to do that? That would indeed be some "back@ss" thinking.

So no, from a campaign standpoint, the prudent thing to do would be to ignore the blog level stuff, and only shoot at the odd one or two that might rise up from the underbrush, as happened with Corsi's claims on Fox News.

k

Why would you comment on the absence of a signature block when just yesterday you said this over on TexasDarlin :

Remember the signature stamp that was barely visible, even under heavy image enhancement? Remember how this amorphous blob was located way off to the left side of the COLB?

First, the "amorphous blob" wasn't "located way off to the left side of the COLB." It was located in the middle, just as is shown in the photos. It was located way off to the left side in the PD COLB. But again, it was located in the middle in the Kos COLB.

Second, you also said this:

Well, now it’s clear as day, right smack dab in the middle with the date stamp riding directly above it. Not only are date stamps never placed right above the signature block on any existing COLBs was on the forged COLB.

I want those reading this to pay particular attention here. Polarik is saying that date stamps are never placed right above the signature block on any existing COLBs.

Now take a look at this:

micheleback.jpg

This is a scan of the back side of the "Michele COLB" which was issued in June 2008. And as you can see, the date stamp is clearly placed above the signature stamp.

What's the significance of this? It's that Polarik had previously posted this image on his blog. And in fact it's still there in his PhotoBucket album:

SKMBT_C45008071713500.jpg

So I ask those of you reading this. Why would Polarik claim that the date stamps are never placed right above the signature block on any existing COLB when he knows that this is not true?

k

What's fraudulent about the Kos/PD overlay is that it does not reflect the reality. In order to get the borders and text of the Kos and PD images to perfectly overlay each other as you have shown, the aspect ratio of one or the other image needs to be altered, i.e. the height and width need to be changed by a disproportionate amount (squeezed or stretched) in order to "force" the two to overlay perfectly.

The reality is that when one or the other image is simply scaled, i.e. maintaining the aspect ratio and not resorting to any squeezing or stretching, and the widths of the borders are matched at the tops of each border, the border of the PD image is taller than the border of the Kos image, and the horizontal alignment of the text gets progressively worse as you go down below "CHILD'S NAME."

obamapdoverlay.jpg

That's the reality. The only way reproduce what Polarik misrepresents as the reality is to either squeeze the PD image or stretch the Kos image vertically to force them to perfectly overlay.

Also, the laundry list of differences between the scanned image and the FactCheck photos are is full of factual errors. I'll address some of those in subsequent posts if this post is allowed.

k

A handful of people on a handful of blogs didn't make it a controversy for the Obama campaign. No need to draw attention to something that no one else to speak of knew anything about.

The only reason they did this now is because of Corsi's having made mention of it in an interview on Fox News, which made it mainstream. If it hadn't been for that, it would have continued to not be any sort of controversy for the Obama campaign.

And just for the record, the document in the scan is the very same document shown in the photos. Right down to the creases in the top fold.

k