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Politics | 11/03/2008 11:50 am

Attention Conspiracy Theorists: Obama Birth Certificate Verified

By The Staff at wowOwow.com
© AP

Some right-wing talk-show hosts and commentators have been trying to get the mainstream media to pick up on the story that perhaps Barack Obama wasn’t really born in the U.S., but in his father’s country of Kenya, and therefore can’t be president.

Some even said Obama’s recent trip to Hawaii to visit his ill grandmother had something to do with him trying to clean up some scent of a scandal surrounding his birth records. But AOL’s Political Machine notes today that even though Obama’s campaign long ago released copies of his birth certificate to the media to quiet that noise, it wasn’t enough. So on Friday, the Director of Hawaii’s Department of Health, Dr. Chimoye Fukino, "finally got tired of listening to ridiculous chorus coming from McCain/Palin supporters and he went to personally inspect the original birth certificate."

Hawaii state law does not allow someone’s birth certificate to be released to anyone outside of the family, so Fukino and the registrar of vital statistics, Alvin Onaka, said they personally verified that the health department holds Obama’s original birth certificate.

"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," Fukino said.

Fukino said that no state official, including Gov. Linda Lingle, ever instructed that Obama’s certificate be handled differently from any other.

Earlier Friday, a southwest Ohio judge rejected a challenge to Obama’s citizenship. Judges in Seattle and Philadelphia recently dismissed similar suits, AP reports

37 Reader Comments (so far…) Sign In or Register to comment

JoanBrown
That’s what I say to. It is beyond me who would vote for McCain. Actually, my husband voted for McCain and when I asked him why he said and I quote, “I’m a middle aged white conservative and that’s what we do. I’ve voted republician all my life and I’m not going to change now.” That’s why he’s in the guest bedroom!!
By JoanBrown on 11/03/2008 3:22 pm
MaryNSBFlorida
Joan, I can identify. My husbands traditionally cancels my vote. This year is an exception… he’s joinimg me in supporting Obama/Biden 2008 See… there’s hope and it appears they can be retrained.
By MaryNSBFlorida on 11/03/2008 7:46 pm
JoanBrown
From your mouth to God’s ears!
By JoanBrown on 11/04/2008 9:04 am
MsDee1
Whew. I was sooo worried. heheheheh.
By MsDee1 on 11/03/2008 1:00 pm
JenniferDooley
To use Jeannot’s saying…”Only One More Sleep”. So I have yet to see a post about a forum tomorrow night. How do we spread the word around and just pick a post to work off of, like the Election Night Party Post? Say Eight O’clock Eastern until the last survivor…
By JenniferDooley on 11/03/2008 2:30 pm
rockyrocky
Don’t worry, Jen. We’ll all find each other one way or another … I know I’ll be bursting (my poor blood pressure).
By rockyrocky on 11/03/2008 4:50 pm
KyMcQueen
At least Obama was born a US Citizen from the start. Hawaii became a state in 1959. Obama was born in 1961. John McCain technically isn’t a American Citizen…He is a Panamanian citizen! But since the Panama Canal Zone was controlled by the US from 1903-1979. In 1953, Congress passed legislation to specify the status of Americans born in the Canal Zone—Title 8, Section 1403 of the United States Code grants citizenship to those born in the Canal Zone with at least one parent who is a United States citizen. I think this Law was passed just for him…LOL!
By KyMcQueen on 11/03/2008 2:43 pm
KathrineGluvna
Ky, according to the link that Patty E posted, the lesgislation that Congress passed, does not even apply to McCain. The town, Colon, where he was born was not in the Canal Zone. How can he run? I’m so confused!!!!
By KathrineGluvna on 11/03/2008 3:03 pm
PattyE
Katherine—-just back to my desk, and have not looked up the specific legislateion—-BUT—I think it is in the link I posted…..AND re: McCain and his eligibility: Several months back, about the time he got the nomination, there was a special vote re: McCains’ eligibilty, in congress…they actually voted to allow him to run for President , as KY mentioned….and voted that he was to be deemed a ‘citizen by birth’. This was done under the radar, barely mentioned in the media—-but I have ‘alerts’ set up, so that when certain people or thing ‘happen’ in Congress—an email is zipped over to my mailbox. I wondered why that had to be done and then when the birth certificate issue came up for Obama, I understood. It is in reality, McCain who was born outside the boundaries of America—not Obama—but the game of projection and deflection turned the focus on Obama to keep the focus AWAY from McCain. If I have an extra minute or two—I will post the exact legislation link for the ‘approval’ of McCain as ‘qualified’ to be POTUS.
By PattyE on 11/03/2008 4:14 pm
TeeZee
Let’s hope the ratings for those right wing outlets finally start waning now that we begin to uncover the truth.
By TeeZee on 11/03/2008 3:07 pm
JoanBrown
Yeah, I saw the clip with that guy saying Obama’s birth certificate was fake. Who was that guy anyway? Someone from PA I think. I never gave it much thought, after all Obama is not the liar or the cheat running in this election.
By JoanBrown on 11/03/2008 3:17 pm
PattyE
NEWS | OPINIONS | SPORTS | ARTS & LIVING | Discussions | Photos & Video | City Guide | CLASSIFIEDS | JOBS | CARS | REAL ESTATE McCain’s Birth Abroad Stirs Legal Debate His Eligibility for Presidency Is Questioned By Michael Dobbs Washington Post Staff Writer Friday, May 2, 2008; A06 The Senate has unanimously declared John McCain a natural-born citizen, eligible to be president of the United States. That is the good news for the presumptive Republican nominee, who was born nearly 72 years ago in a military hospital in the Panama Canal Zone, then under U.S. jurisdiction. The bad news is that the nonbinding Senate resolution passed Wednesday night is simply an opinion that has little bearing on an arcane constitutional debate that has preoccupied legal scholars for many weeks. Article II of the Constitution states that “no person except a natural born citizen … shall be eligible to the office of president.” The problem is that the Founding Fathers never defined exactly what they meant by “natural born citizen,” and the matter has never been fully tested in court. At least three pending cases are challenging McCain’s right to be sworn in as president. Jurists on both sides of the political divide, consulted by the McCain campaign, insist that the issue is clear-cut. They argue that McCain is a natural-born citizen because the United States held sovereignty over the Panama Canal Zone at the time of his birth, on Aug. 29, 1936; because he was born on a U.S. military base; and because his parents were U.S. citizens. But Sarah H. Duggin, an associate law professor at Catholic University who has studied the “natural born” issue in detail, said the question is “not so simple.” While she said McCain would probably prevail in a determined legal challenge to his eligibility to be president, she added that the matter can be fully resolved only by a constitutional amendment or a Supreme Court decision. “The Constitution is ambiguous,” Duggin said. “The McCain side has some really good arguments, but ultimately there has never been any real resolution of this issue. Congress cannot legislatively change the meaning of the Constitution.” Senators sympathetic to McCain’s position, including Democrats Claire McCaskill (Mo.) and Patrick J. Leahy (Vt.), dropped an earlier attempt to quell the eligibility controversy with legislation. McCaskill acknowledged in an interview that there is “no way” to completely resolve the question short of a constitutional amendment, a cumbersome process which could not be concluded before November. She described the nonbinding resolution, which she sponsored, as “the quickest, clearest and most efficient” way for the Senate to send a message to the courts that McCain has the right to be president. One person who disagrees with that premise is New Hampshire resident Fred Hollander, who has filed a suit in U.S. District Court claiming that the Republican candidate is “not a natural born citizen.” In an attempt to prove his argument, the 49-year-old computer programmer filed a subpoena last month seeking McCain’s birth certificate. The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees citizenship services, declined to hand over copies of the document, saying the subpoena was improperly served. In his autobiography, “Faith of My Fathers,” McCain writes that he was born “in the Canal Zone” at the U.S. Naval Air Station in Coco Solo, which was under the command of his grandfather, John S. McCain Sr. The senator’s father, John S. McCain Jr., was an executive officer on a submarine, also based in Coco Solo. His mother, Roberta McCain, now 96, has vivid memories of lying in bed listening to raucous celebrations of her son’s birth from the nearby officers’ club. The birth was announced two days later in the English-language Panamanian American newspaper. A senior official of the McCain campaign showed a reporter a copy of the senator’s birth certificate issued by Canal Zone health authorities, recording his birth in the Coco Solo “family hospital.” Curiously enough, there is no record of McCain’s birth in the Panama Canal Zone Health Department’s bound birth registers, which are publicly available at the National Archives in College Park. A search of the “Child Born Abroad” records of the U.S. consular service for August 1936 included many U.S. citizens born in the Canal Zone but did not turn up any mention of John McCain. Possible discrepancies in the bureaucratic paperwork are of little concern to Laurence Tribe, a Harvard law professor who looked into the case at the McCain campaign’s request. Tribe examined the issue along with Theodore B. Olson, his onetime nemesis in the 2000 Supreme Court case Bush v. Gore. Tribe said it would be “astonishing if the recordkeeping practices of Canal Zone [officials] could have any bearing on eligibility for the U.S. presidency.” The key constitutional issue is whether the Canal Zone was part of the United States at the time of McCain’s birth. In a memorandum, Tribe and Olson cite a 1986 Supreme Court ruling stating that the United States “exercised sovereignty” over the 10-mile-wide area between 1904 and 1979, when it was handed back to the Panamanians. Hollander and others challenging McCain’s eligibility argue that the zone was never part of the United States. Duggin, the constitutional law scholar, said the sovereignty question is “more complex” than Olson and Tribe concede. People born in some U.S. territories, such as American Samoa, are not recognized as citizens of the United States. According to a State Department manual, U.S. military installations abroad cannot be considered “part of the United States” and “A child born on the premises of such a facility is not subject to the jurisdiction of the United States and does not acquire U.S. citizenship by reason of birth.” Tribe said the manual is an “opinion” with no legal status. There are few precedents for someone born outside the 50 states running for president, let alone becoming president. The best example the McCain camp has been able to come up with is Vice President Charles Curtis, who served under President Herbert Hoover and was born in the territory of Kansas in 1860, a year before it became a state. The 12th Amendment requires that vice presidents possess the same qualifications as presidents. Several prominent politicians have run for the presidency without having been born in the United States, including Barry Goldwater, who was born in the territory of Arizona in 1909, three years before it became a state. Mitt Romney’s father, George Romney, ran in 1968, even though he was born in Mexico. Since neither Goldwater nor Romney won the presidency, the “natural born” clause was never tested. Duggin believes that Hollander and the other plaintiffs are likely to have a hard time establishing their own eligibility, or legal standing, to challenge McCain. She said it will be difficult for them to demonstrate that they have been “disenfranchised” because of the mere presence on the ballot of a candidate with debatable constitutional qualifications. But she said the matter should be sorted out before the election, rather than afterward: “Imagine what would happen if the courts were to overturn an election simply based on eligibility. It would be a disaster. After what happened in 2000, people would completely lose faith in the electoral process.” © 2008 The Washington Post Company
By PattyE on 11/03/2008 5:23 pm
KyMcQueen
Someone tell the Panamanian American that he isn’t a U.S citizens…lol.
By KyMcQueen on 11/03/2008 7:00 pm
CandisMalone
You would think these things would have been worked out before they start their run in the primaries - why hasn’t a policy for this been in place - is this the first election the candidates birth certificates / birth place - has been in question?
By CandisMalone on 11/03/2008 11:06 pm