TBD on Ning
Birthers release forged Kenyan birth certificate for Obama
From Salon.com by Alex Koppelman
To hear the Birthers tell it, their Holy Grail has been found: Over the weekend, de facto movement leader Orly Taitz released a photo of what is supposedly a certified copy of a Kenyan birth certificate for President Obama, which shows that he was born in Mombasa, Kenya, and not in Hawaii.
The movement is, naturally, all abuzz. But even people who might normally be inclined to support it, like the founder of conservative forum FreeRepublic.com and the Birthers' favorite self-proclaimed document expert, who declared Obama's Hawaiian certification of live birth a forgery, are calling foul. The document is just another in an increasingly long line of fakes intended to prove Obama wasn't born in the U.S.
How do we know?
First of all, Obama was born in Hawaii. He has released a copy of his actual birth certificate -- the same kind of copy anyone requesting their birth certificate from the state would get -- and it has repeatedly been authenticated by Hawaii officials. They've also said that they've checked the original record in their files, and that Obama was born in Hawaii. Those records are supported by two newspaper announcements from the time of the president's birth -- and those announcements weren't submitted by the family, but taken from hospital records.
The Birthers won't care about that, of course -- they haven't yet.
But there are major, glaring flaws in this latest forgery, which is supposedly a copy produced in February of 1964 by the government of the Republic of Kenya (Obama was born in 1961, but the Birthers believe this particular document was related to his parents' divorce).
The biggest? Kenya gained its independence from the United Kingdom in December of 1963, but was known as the Dominion of Kenya until December of 1964 -- 10 months after this copy was allegedly made -- when it became a republic and changed its name.
There are some other basic issues with the document, including the age it gives for Obama's father, who's listed as 26. But Barack Obama Sr. was born in 1936, making him 24 or 25 at the time of his son's birth and 27 or 28 at the time the copy is dated.
The Washington Independent's David Weigel makes another good point about the location of birth given, saying Mombasa just doesn't fit a basic Occam's Razor test and is instead part of the conspiracy theories about Obama's religion:
The image is part of the extremely ill-informed conspiracy theory that Obama was born in Mombasa -- conveniently, one of the more Muslim parts of the country.
This has always been a red flag for conspiracy theorists, so it deserves some explanation. Barack Obama Sr. was born and educated in Nyanza Province, in southwestern Kenya, on Lake Victoria. This is the area where Obama’s family lived and continues to live; Sarah Obama, the step-grandmother of the president, lives in Nyang’oma Kogelo, a small town in the province. But Mombasa is a city on the Indian Ocean, a thousand miles to the east. It didn’t even have an international airport until 1979. And the city wasn’t even part of Kenya when the future president was born. Mombasa was a part of Zanzibar until December 12, 1963, when it became part of the newly independent Kenya.
The new forgery? Why, it claims that the president was born in Coast General Hospital in Mombasa.
Taitz also filed the document in court as part of the case in which she's representing Alan Keyes. (Two plaintiffs, including Keyes' running mate, have just dropped off the case, citing "irreconcilable differences with counsel," not the first time Taitz's eccentric legal strategies have led to disillusionment.)
Even by Taitz's standards, the motion that accompanies the document is bizarre and incoherent. Among other things, she asks that Hillary Clinton, as secretary of state, write to Kenya and to the U.K. and ask for their files, and says that discovery in the case should be expedited because "hearsay evidence exists that an individual involved in the examination of passport files at the United States Department of State relating to and involving certain 2008 Presidential candidates may have been killed in relation to such inquiry."
As always, Taitz started with a small morsel of the truth there and then spun way off from reality. In the filing, she writes, "Lt. Querl Harris was one of the suspects in passport tampering scandal. Washington post [sic] has announced that he was cooperating with the FBI and shortly thereafter he was found dead, shot in the head, sitting in his parked car."
It was actually a man named Quarles Harris, not "Querl," and it was the Washington Times, not the Washington Post. And Harris was indeed under investigation relating to passports at the State Department -- but it had nothing to do with the people who looked at Obama's passport records, among others. According to the Times, Harris was cooperating after he was stopped and "found in possession of 21 credit cards and eight printouts of State Department passport applications." He allegedly told authorities that he was part of a fraud ring that applied for credit cards using information obtained from the applications. But he's shown up on at least one "Obama Body Count" (shades of the Clintons) so it's natural that a conspiracist like Taitz would know something about his case and see it as evidence for her own cause.
Update: Two British professors who specialize in African history have e-mailed Salon to point out another apparent error in the purportedly Kenyan document. The certificate's header reads Coast Province -- but according to the professors, at the time the document is dated, what are now known as provinces were called regions.
Writes Dan Branch, an assistant professor of African history at the University of Warwick:
It seems highly implausible and certainly a hoax. I have not seen any documents from this period in early 1964 that uses the heading of Republic of Kenya -- unsurprisingly given Kenya was not a Republic until December 1964. Moreover, the label of 'Region' was being used in early 1964 instead of 'Province.' While some of the old colonial forms may have still been in circulation, which would have used 'Coast Province,' these would have been headed as 'Colony & Protectorate of Kenya.'
As for his qualifications to judge the document and the header on it, Branch e-mails, "I''ve been working in the Kenyan archives on late-colonial and post-colonial history for the past eight years."
To hear the Birthers tell it, their Holy Grail has been found: Over the weekend, de facto movement leader Orly Taitz released a photo of what is supposedly a certified copy of a Kenyan birth certificate for President Obama, which shows that he was born in Mombasa, Kenya, and not in Hawaii.
The movement is, naturally, all abuzz. But even people who might normally be inclined to support it, like the founder of conservative forum FreeRepublic.com and the Birthers' favorite self-proclaimed document expert, who declared Obama's Hawaiian certification of live birth a forgery, are calling foul. The document is just another in an increasingly long line of fakes intended to prove Obama wasn't born in the U.S.
How do we know?
First of all, Obama was born in Hawaii. He has released a copy of his actual birth certificate -- the same kind of copy anyone requesting their birth certificate from the state would get -- and it has repeatedly been authenticated by Hawaii officials. They've also said that they've checked the original record in their files, and that Obama was born in Hawaii. Those records are supported by two newspaper announcements from the time of the president's birth -- and those announcements weren't submitted by the family, but taken from hospital records.
The Birthers won't care about that, of course -- they haven't yet.
But there are major, glaring flaws in this latest forgery, which is supposedly a copy produced in February of 1964 by the government of the Republic of Kenya (Obama was born in 1961, but the Birthers believe this particular document was related to his parents' divorce).
The biggest? Kenya gained its independence from the United Kingdom in December of 1963, but was known as the Dominion of Kenya until December of 1964 -- 10 months after this copy was allegedly made -- when it became a republic and changed its name.
There are some other basic issues with the document, including the age it gives for Obama's father, who's listed as 26. But Barack Obama Sr. was born in 1936, making him 24 or 25 at the time of his son's birth and 27 or 28 at the time the copy is dated.
The Washington Independent's David Weigel makes another good point about the location of birth given, saying Mombasa just doesn't fit a basic Occam's Razor test and is instead part of the conspiracy theories about Obama's religion:
The image is part of the extremely ill-informed conspiracy theory that Obama was born in Mombasa -- conveniently, one of the more Muslim parts of the country.
This has always been a red flag for conspiracy theorists, so it deserves some explanation. Barack Obama Sr. was born and educated in Nyanza Province, in southwestern Kenya, on Lake Victoria. This is the area where Obama’s family lived and continues to live; Sarah Obama, the step-grandmother of the president, lives in Nyang’oma Kogelo, a small town in the province. But Mombasa is a city on the Indian Ocean, a thousand miles to the east. It didn’t even have an international airport until 1979. And the city wasn’t even part of Kenya when the future president was born. Mombasa was a part of Zanzibar until December 12, 1963, when it became part of the newly independent Kenya.
The new forgery? Why, it claims that the president was born in Coast General Hospital in Mombasa.
Taitz also filed the document in court as part of the case in which she's representing Alan Keyes. (Two plaintiffs, including Keyes' running mate, have just dropped off the case, citing "irreconcilable differences with counsel," not the first time Taitz's eccentric legal strategies have led to disillusionment.)
Even by Taitz's standards, the motion that accompanies the document is bizarre and incoherent. Among other things, she asks that Hillary Clinton, as secretary of state, write to Kenya and to the U.K. and ask for their files, and says that discovery in the case should be expedited because "hearsay evidence exists that an individual involved in the examination of passport files at the United States Department of State relating to and involving certain 2008 Presidential candidates may have been killed in relation to such inquiry."
As always, Taitz started with a small morsel of the truth there and then spun way off from reality. In the filing, she writes, "Lt. Querl Harris was one of the suspects in passport tampering scandal. Washington post [sic] has announced that he was cooperating with the FBI and shortly thereafter he was found dead, shot in the head, sitting in his parked car."
It was actually a man named Quarles Harris, not "Querl," and it was the Washington Times, not the Washington Post. And Harris was indeed under investigation relating to passports at the State Department -- but it had nothing to do with the people who looked at Obama's passport records, among others. According to the Times, Harris was cooperating after he was stopped and "found in possession of 21 credit cards and eight printouts of State Department passport applications." He allegedly told authorities that he was part of a fraud ring that applied for credit cards using information obtained from the applications. But he's shown up on at least one "Obama Body Count" (shades of the Clintons) so it's natural that a conspiracist like Taitz would know something about his case and see it as evidence for her own cause.
Update: Two British professors who specialize in African history have e-mailed Salon to point out another apparent error in the purportedly Kenyan document. The certificate's header reads Coast Province -- but according to the professors, at the time the document is dated, what are now known as provinces were called regions.
Writes Dan Branch, an assistant professor of African history at the University of Warwick:
It seems highly implausible and certainly a hoax. I have not seen any documents from this period in early 1964 that uses the heading of Republic of Kenya -- unsurprisingly given Kenya was not a Republic until December 1964. Moreover, the label of 'Region' was being used in early 1964 instead of 'Province.' While some of the old colonial forms may have still been in circulation, which would have used 'Coast Province,' these would have been headed as 'Colony & Protectorate of Kenya.'
As for his qualifications to judge the document and the header on it, Branch e-mails, "I''ve been working in the Kenyan archives on late-colonial and post-colonial history for the past eight years."
Tags: Birth Certificate, Kenya, Obama
Views: 86
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Mark F on
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Is this the same 'real' birth certificate someone else '"found" last year? lol.
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Permalink Reply by Boothby171 on
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No, this is an entirely new forgery someone "found" over the weekend. I think it had fallen in between the entirely NEW Beethoven string Quartet and the brand NEW Picasso painting....
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Permalink Reply by Just-a-Writer on
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Are you insinuating that my painting isn't a real Picasso?? How dare you!!
*Yes, honey, it's a pretty picture, now go wash the paint of off your hands, hurry." -
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Permalink Reply by Madhatterat60 on
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I saw this last night...what a hoot! What a howl. I swear the only thing it does is show who belongs to the DUMB AS A SACK OF HAMMERS Club.
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Permalink Reply by no1toolmkr on
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WASHINGTON – California attorney Orly Taitz, who has filed a number of lawsuits demanding proof of Barack Obama's eligibility to serve as president, has released a copy of what purports to be a Kenyan certification of birth and has filed a new motion in U.S. District Court for its authentication.
This document purports to be a Kenyan certification of birth for Barack Obama, allegedly born in Mombasa, Kenya, in 1961
The document lists Obama's parents as Barack Hussein Obama and Stanley Ann Obama, formerly Stanley Ann Dunham, the birth date as Aug. 4, 1961, and the hospital of birth as Coast General Hospital in Mombasa, Kenya.
Document enlarged to show detail alleges Barack Obama was born at Coast General Hospital in Mombasa on Aug. 4, 1961
No doctor is listed. But the alleged certificate bears the signature of the deputy registrar of Coast Province, Joshua Simon Oduya. It was allegedly issued as a certified copy of the original in February 1964.
WND was able to obtain other birth certificates from Kenya for purposes of comparison, and the form of the documents appear to be identical.
An enlarged view of the bottom of the document
Last week, a counterfeit document purporting to be Obama's Kenyan birth certificate made the rounds of the Internet, but was quickly determined to be fraudulent. The new document released by Taitz bears none of the obvious traits of a hoax.
One of the issues Taitz must deal with will be the authentication of the document. Critics immediately jumped on the Feb. 17, 1964, date for the document, explaining that the "republic" of Kenya wasn't assembled until in December of that year.
Media Matters wrote, "Sorry, WorldNetDaily: Kenya wasn't a republic until Dec. 1964."
But Kenya's official independence was in 1963, and any number of labels could have been applied to government documents during that time period.
At Ameriborn Constitution News, the researcher noted that the independence process for the nation actually started taking as early as 1957, when there were the first direct elections for Africans to the Legislative Council.
"Kenya became an Independent Republic, December 12, 1963, which gives more [credibility] that this is a true document," the website stated.
The 1963 independence is corroborated by several other information sources, including the online African History.
Even the People Daily news agency cited, on Dec. 12, 2005, the "42nd independence anniversary" in Nairobi. "The country gained independence from Britain on Dec. 12, 1963," the report said.
An online copy of the Kenya Constitution, "adopted in 1963, amended in 1999," states: "CHAPTER I - THE REPUBLIC OF KENYA, Article 1, Kenya is a sovereign Republic. Article 1A, The Republic of Kenya shall be a multiparty democratic state…"
It was in November 1964 when the region voluntarily became a one-party state, according to an online source.
The region including Mombasa originally was dealt with as a separate independence movement, but it almost immediately became part of Kenya when the sultan of Zanzibar ceded the "coastal strip" to Kenya, according to sources.
Taitz told WND that the document came from an anonymous source who doesn't want his name known because "he's afraid for his life."
Taitz's motion, filed yesterday in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California, requests the purported evidence of Obama's birth – both the alleged birth certificate and foreign records not yet obtained – be preserved from destruction, asks for permission to legally request documents from Kenya and seeks a subpoena for deposition from Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
"I filed the motion with the court asking for expedited discovery, which would allow me to start subpoenas and depositions even before Obama and the government responds," Taitz told WND. "I am asking the judge to give me the power to subpoena the documents from the Kenyan embassy and to require a deposition from Hillary Clinton so they will be forced to authenticate [the birth certificate].
"I'm forcing the issue, where Obama will have to respond," she said.
"Before, they said, 'You don't have anything backing your claims,'" Taitz explained. "Now I have something. In fact, I have posted on the Internet more than Obama has. My birth certificate actually has signatures."
Join the petition campaign to demand President Obama resolve the question by revealing his long-form, hospital-generated birth certificate!
Taitz's most celebrated case involved a military officer, Maj. Stefan Cook, whose order to deploy to Afghanistan was revoked when he challenged Obama's eligibility to hold office. That case has now been refiled in federal court in Florida, raising the specter of a class-action claim among members of the military that their orders aren't valid because of questions surrounding Obama's constitutional eligibility.
Taitz told WND she plans to file additional paperwork with the Florida court tomorrow, adding the alleged Kenyan birth certificate to Maj. Cook's case.
The suit seeks damages and a declaratory judgment. Named as defendants are Simtech, Cook's former civilian employer, and several officials, including Col. Louis B. Wingate and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates.
WND previously reported a judge in Georgia dismissed Cook's case when the government suddenly revoked his orders to report to Fort Benning for deployment to Afghanistan.
WND reported when the case originally was filed that Cook's concern was that without proof that there is a legitimate commander in chief, the entire U.S. Army becomes "merely a corps of chattel slaves under the illegitimate control of a private citizen."
Cook told WND: "As an officer in the armed forces of the United States, it is [my] duty to gain clarification on any order we may believe illegal. With that said, if President Obama is found not to be a 'natural-born citizen,' he is not eligible to be commander in chief."
The new complaint says it seeks Cook's reinstatement with his civilian employer, Simtech Inc., as well as protection from the Department of Defense and president "from further retaliation for plaintiff's challenge to the president's constitutional authority."
See the movie Obama does not want you to see: Own the DVD that probes this unprecedented presidential eligibility mystery!
WND has reported on dozens of legal challenges to Obama's status as a "natural born citizen." The Constitution, Article 2, Section 1, states, "No Person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the Office of President."
Some of the lawsuits question whether he was actually born in Hawaii, as he insists. If he was born out of the country, Obama's American mother, the suits contend, was too young at the time of his birth to confer American citizenship to her son under the law at the time.
Other challenges have focused on Obama's citizenship through his father, a Kenyan subject to the jurisdiction of the United Kingdom at the time of his birth, thus making him a dual citizen. The cases contend the framers of the Constitution excluded dual citizens from qualifying as natural born.
Complicating the situation is Obama's decision to spend sums estimated in the hundreds of thousands of dollars to avoid releasing a state birth certificate that would put to rest all of the questions.
at least the Kenyan birth certificate has a seal, some aging and genuinely looks authentic.
Even if its proved that he was born in Africa I don't expect he will be impeached.
however I bet he become a lame duck president. unable to effect any meaningful legislation.
effectively stopping the Marxist take over of the federal government. -
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I have one here too....only MINE has ALL the right information and dates. I took time to look up things...Important Things....like when KENYA actually became a nation. And when it's capital ACTUALLY became part of that nation. And WHEN the birth ACTUALLY took place....all the right dates and times and tricky stuff like that.
OH...and I got it wet and put it in the oven to bake some age into it as well.
And it's just as useful as toilet paper as the one you have posted. -
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I wonder when those who so question the authenticity of his birth from so many sources...sorta like you Tool...are going to drop the facade and deal with the fact you can't stand to see a black man ... an INTELLIGENT black man...perhaps smarter than you are...as President.
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My eldest daughter was born in Michigan (we live in IL now) and we always have problems with her birth certificate. The reason being, Michigan birth certificates look like receipts. They don't look anything like any other birth certificate I've ever seen.
I hope she doesn't want to run for president some day, if I have to ride the asses in the IL school systems to take it, she'll never get it past the birthers. -
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but this is so much fun.
you know the birther thing....
it lends itself all too handily, I know its the internet you can find a post of anything you want to say whatever you want. and the truth is sometimes so hard to come up with, or not so hard sometimes.
I've seen a lot, Obama's the anti Christ, second Hitler, the last american president, you name it.
its all fun and games at times. however his persistent attack on the American Constitution is no joke.
the cap and trade bill, Health care reform, stimulus bill, driving the American people so deep into debt it would enslave us for generations, thats very much true. and on that alone is enough to muster every ounce of strength we can to stop him.
compared to that I don't care if he's African born or American. He continues to destroy our Constitution and everything this nation stands for. We must do everything we can to stop him...
besides whats the matter with him providing the American people his long form birth certificate. Any red blooded American could do that...
except apparently Barack Husein Obama.... -
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your too kind....
and as far as BHO. I think he's getting a failing grade from the American people....
and EVERY right granted by the constitution has been violated.
the government can take your property, your money, your guns, right to a trial. all of them have been trampled upon they can even silence your right to free speech....
we do not have one freedom or liberty left that has not been compromised..
It is time we start making our legislators obey our constitution.. it would be a first in a very long time.... -
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Don't hold your breath on that "failing grade" bit. According to the latest reports, The Stimulus is working.
"...the government can take your property, your money, your guns, right to a trial. all of them have been trampled upon they can even silence your right to free speech..."
WERE YOU ASLEEP FOR THE FIRST 8 YEARS OF THIS DECADE?? Jethro already gutted the Bill of Rights. Or have you forgotten he called The Constitution "just a goddamned piece of paper!"? -
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Permalink Reply by Westerly_2 on
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yeah, jacquin, every time I check the business page, lately, the green stock arrows are mostly pointing up. In our area - N. Cali - housing prices have increaed 11% over the last month and up 20% from the same time last year.
Jobs are slower, but Kohls is opening 4 new stores by September, hiring at least 600.
Could be better. I like infastructure-building myself. But it surely has not grown worse.So far, the slide has stoppeed, held, and is starting to inch up slowly.
I guess this is a problem for people hoping for a "Waterloo." -
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