Re: Birth certificates You're the one missing the point. There is ZERO reason to doubt the authenticity and validity of the provided document. Hell, there are even newspaper reports of Obama's birth -- are those part of the conspiracy too? To give one bit of credence to the "birthers" or to their objections is to push reasonable skepticism well into the abyss of unhinged stupidity. And, yes, I do question their motives. They can't say he's not really an American and shouldn't be president because he's black so they do this instead. Maybe it's not conscious on their part (or not always, anyway), but if Obama were white this idiotic conspiracy theory never would have taken off.
Re: Birth certificates I'm sticking to what I said and seconding Knave's post above. Tough luck if you don't like my characterization of you. You seem to think you're playing Devil's Advocate but you're not really you're just stumbling onto the wrong side of the line of a discussion that's split over facts and nonsense.
Re: Birth certificates I would honestly just show them my passport. Date of birth and place of birth. If they have a problem with the validity of it, they can take it up with the US Department of State. I'm no forgery expert, but it seems like it would be far harder to create a fake passport than a fake birth certificate. I just don't understand why all the nutjobs don't just go here and knock themselves out: http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/w2w.htm
Re: Birth certificates Why? Personally, I think they should tell all the conspiracy assholes to go screw themselves.
Birth certificates No. numbnuts. If someone wants to view & handle an original document, they should go to where the original is kept (Hawaii), not to someplace else (Chicago) to view and handle a certified copy of the original.
Birth certificates Well, you're still wrong. First, the document itself clearly states "This copy serves as prima facie evidence of the fact of birth in any court proceeding". Prima facie evidence can be challenged or refuted. That does not mean that the challenge has merit or will succeed in refuting the evidence. Second, you correctly describe it as a "provided document". It is not an original birth certificate; it's a certified copy of information on file in Hawaii. You've already forgotten the debate about McCain's birth? Well, you're still an asshole, then.
Re: Birth certificates He's right in that you still miss the point. It can be challenged just as an original could be. So bring the evidence you challenge it on. And if you really think the McCain debate would reach these proportions or have commentators and even congresspeople avoiding straight answers in order to satisfy a whacko base 6 months into his administration you're either naive or stupid.
Re: Birth certificates Surely some FOIA requests have been filed? This all seems to boil down to some of the usual shit--some whackos froke, the initial response could have been better, whackos remain whackos, further response won't be made because it acknowledges the whackos, whackos remain whackos. Now we're in that Catch 22 of either giving a more complete response and thus providing some legitimacy, or ignoring the whackos at the risk of them finding a big collective whacked out voice. In the meantime real shit is happening.
Re: Birth certificates Prima facie means that you should take it as exactly what it says it is unless you have a reason to doubt it. And there is no such reason, except for people that can't accept that a guy with "Hussein" as his middle name is President and reach for straws. There really is ZERO reason to doubt the authenticity and validity of the provided document.
Re: Birth certificates Like spejic notes, you do not know what you are talking about. That "debate" lasted about a day and was roundly treated as a joke from all corners. You're sitting here giving credence to a bunch of loons that make 9/11 Truthers look rational. Again: There is ZERO reason to doubt the authenticity and validity of the provided document.
Re: Birth certificates No, the initial response could not have been better. What is the proper way to reply to a request for a birth certificate? Request one from the state. That's what we have from the Obama camp. Anticipating a conspiracy theory and doing something above and beyond what is required of every US citizen would not be a "better" response. It would provide no additional evidence and would only move the whackos to the next stage of their conspiracy theory. I mean these are people who believe a foreign citizen could get a certificate indicating they were born in Hawaii. EDIT: To elaborate on this - if they were to do something outside of the normal and say "ok well we think we can end the conspiracy theories once and for all by going to the archive in Hawaii and showing you the original from which the state gathers its data for the normal birth certificate" and indeed they did that (not sure how... you want cameras to go there? independent factcheckers to be with them? make it a Capone's vault type-show? or just provide a photo of it?) conspiracy theorists would immediately be suspicious of why the Obama camp chose to do so rather than do what any American would when asked for their birth certificate and find a reason (I'm not going to list any of the millions of stupid things people could claim if they wanted to - remember they're not rational) to doubt what they saw.
Re: Birth certificates Maybe it would move them to the next stage. Maybe moving them to the next stage would make them seem just that much crazier. I don't think it even really matters if he wasn't born on U.S. soil. Still, if there was a granite document, it's better than the sandstone one. Obama wasn't a normal U.S. citizen, he was Presidential candidate. Now, we can either acknowledge this pseudo dilemma and laugh at the whackos, or we can be shrill ladies protesting too much.
Re: Birth certificates First of all: it does matter where he was born AND we know where he was born. Second, no the "granite" document is not better than the sandstone one. The document he provided is good enough as stated by spejic. Third, there is no pseudo dilemma to acknowledge. Again, the parallel I draw is creationism. There is no debate over whether creationism is sound science or not. There is no debate or dilemma over whether Obama is a natural-born citizen or not. Laugh at the crazies yes and beat the idiots who try to say "well maybe it's reasonable to answer their question" because they're dangerous too.
Birth certificates It's not a photocopy. It's a document attesting that a staffer has viewed the original document and is certifying that the information had been accurately copied. Anyone challenging the authenticity of the certification should be able to view the original. You're naive if you think that every certified copy introduced in court is authentic or accurate. I've worked within the system long enough to know that anything can be fabricated. I'm not saying that happened in this case, just that it has happened in others. I've seen fabricated official documents, as well as inaccurate and altered ones. In NJ, the fraud in Hudson County is notorious. http://www.nj.gov/lps/dcj/releases/2003/passport0925.htm http://www.newjersey.gov/lps/newsreleases04/pr20041221b.html http://www.retailindustrynetwork.com/NovitalsinHudson.htm http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5946145/
Re: Birth certificates Funny thing is under the "Birther Bill" the document Obama provided would be perfectly sufficient. When you request a copy of your birth certificate from Hawaii, the form Obama presented is the form you get.
Re: Birth certificates True, if I believed "every certified copy introduced in court is authentic or accurate" I'd be naive, but I don't believe that. Produce the evidence that would prompt a court to look into this particular birth certificate being false. If you can't then you disagree with the birthers. The problem though isn't whether you agree or disagree with them and the fact that they can't provide any counter-evidence, the problem is your inability to treat the insistence on seeing what they want to see as anything more than irrational and deserving only of being summarily dismissed.
Birth certificates Google: Results 1 - 10 of about 6,690,000 for "McCain birth controversy". Google: Results 1 - 10 of about 12,700,000 for "Obama birth controversy". Google: Results 1 - 10 of about 10,700 for "Ombak asshole". (I did not fabricate the third one!) Fine. But are people entitled under FOIA to examine the original at the source? Perhaps not, in Hawaii. http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2008/jun/27/obamas-birth-certificate-part-ii/ "Hawaii birth certificates aren't public record."
Re: Birth certificates You fail at demonstrating a controversy comparable to the Obama birther nonsense. Heck I'll bet some of those links (on both results) are to this thread. You've managed to do two searches that tell us nothing.
Birth certificates 2 to 1 They are. You have managed to make many posts that tell us nothing. I stand by my third Google search.
Re: Birth certificates 2 to 1 what? Google searches. If you can't see why that means nothing you're being stupid and if you know that without any kind of evaluation of what those hits are it means nothing but posted it anyways, you're being dishonest.
Re: Birth certificates Herein lies the problem, doesn't it? If you treat them with a little bit of respect, they'll think that means they're on to something. If you tell them to go screw themselves they'll think that means they're on to something.
Re: Birth certificates I dunno that "joke" is the right word. I mean, it's an interesting and undecided question about what qualifies as "natural born", and there's some legal ambiguity due to some changing laws concerning citizenship rules and the timing/location of McCain's birth. As an academic question it's mildly interesting and unresolved, but I also thing it's fairly obvious that if challenged in court the court should find in favor of McCain; there is no doubt that he's a citizen, and little doubt that he fits the intended definition of the class "natural born". I take "natural born" to mean "citizen at birth", as opposed to "naturalized". Those are, after all, the only two definitions of citizenship we have, and eligibility for the Presidency is AFAIK the only distinction between them. IOW, it's the lack of clarity over the indented legal definition of "natural born" combined with the unusual status of Panama and poorly-written US Law at the time of McCain's birth that is of interest. There was never a doubt in my mind (nor that of just about anybody else talking about this) that McCain was eligible to be President. (I'd like to note that Democratic Senators - including Obama - introduced and passed a non-binding resolution expressing the sense of the Senate that McCain was "natural born". I don't think any Republicans returned the favor.) Birthers, OTOH... there's no doubt at all that Obama is a citizen. He was born in a US State, to a US Citizen. The facts are very clear on this. There's zero question that he's "natural born"; I have a hard time figuring out how someone qualified for citizenship both via jus sanguinis and jus soli would fail to fit even the most restrictive definition of "natural born". I also find it incredibly ironic that these folks are probably a large overlap (based on the blogs this stuff shows up on, like Atlas Shrugged) with the folks railing against Anchor Babies and wanting to amend the constitution to make naturalized citizens eligible for the Presidency. It's all very nonsensical.