I got the story from a link someone sent me to WorldNetDaily. It seems to me that Mike Zullo, who as far as I know is the Cold Case Posse, has gotten away with so much crazy stuff so far, that he’s ready to make up just about anything. Zullo appeared on the Mark Gillar radio show (Gillar produced the Cold Case Posse videos, so this is one birther interviewing another). WND reports the exchange:
Gillar described the process in the 1960s: Foreign nationals, primarily from Japan, would fly to Hawaii and buy a birth registration for their son or daughter, not with the goal of one day having them become president, but to obtain the benefits of being a U.S. citizen.
Zullo said that when he was in Hawaii last month following up on leads, he talked to older locals who “informed us about a syndicate operation, a Mafia operation if you will, being run in the early infancy of the state of Hawaii where birth certificates were being sold to Japanese refugees on a black market basis.”
While vital records fraud exists, I have never been able to uncover (and I have tried) a news report of such a thing since statehood in Hawaii. This story bears all the marks of a fake: specifically the lack of any specifics, reliance on anonymous authority, no published sources, and no way to verify anything.
In a delicious piece of irony, the WND web page containing the story was blocked by the commercial security program, Norton Internet Security, that correctly identified the story as “fraudulent.”
I cannot say that Zullo’s story is not true; however, I can say with certainty that nothing has been presented to cause any one to believe the story. Zullo is not a credible reporter of fact, evidenced by the bogus initial presentations he made of junk analysis of the Obama Long Form certificate (now doubly verified by the State of Hawaii) and the failure of the Cold Case Posse to name the “person of interest” or to bring any case against anyone. It’s all political theater and advertising for WorldNetDaily.
“Even if we lose, we win, because political theater is one of our objectives.”
– Birther Mantra
Hey, doc, thanks for the link to a story I had only heard rumors of. I see there’s not much to it …. and if taken at face value, WND is asserting that Hawaiian BCs from the “early statehood” period (when exactly did that period end….?) are worthless as proof of citizenship. Awesome. Hawaiians everywhere must be thrilled!
There has long been a Japanese presence on Hawaii, easy to see how such an urban legend go going. But what’s the point really? These parents went to Hawaii just long enough to get a BC, then went back to Japan? Or that they stayed in Hawaii?
Next and even more obvious, Obama is not Japanese. WND’s next step to to make the insinuation blatant? Tie this back into their Kenyan birth meme? “If the Japanese can do it, anyone can! Hawaii was the world’s US citizenship factory!”
And thus, another story was uncritically accepted as true, and written into the Birther Gospel.
I do remember debate way back when (late 60’s early 70’s maybe?) about Guamians going to Hawai’i ‘because they could’. This may well have been the genesis of the Hawai’ian Native Lands process, because it was the native Hawai’ians that were objecting to it the most.
At the very worst, it was an anchor baby scenario when those legal Guamian immigrants had children, not a racket fraudulently buying birth certificates for foreign born children.
I don’t have any sources to link either.
I should point out that I believe the Guamians that were immigrating to Hawai’i were of Japanese ancestry, not of native Guamian ancestry.
(also I think Guam has changed its name but I can’t remember what it is now).
Oh, I don’t think so … have seen it referred to as the Island of Guam …. beyond that, it’s Guam Guam Guam …..
http://www.guam.gov/
Oh Lord, what will the birthers think of next?? A black market for HI birth certificates! A question, please. Why HI? Why not some other state? Could it be because President Obama was born there?
One has to wonder just what drugs these people are on. Where are the facts? Where is the evidence to give this piece of sh*t merit?
This is just as unbelievable as the Kenyan BC story. No one is going to give it even the slightest consideration, except of course other birthers.
Wouldn’t it be just delish if Romney is on the stage with Trump and The Donald starts talking about the Obama’s purchasing a blackmarket BC for their son?
LOL!!!! The look on his face would be priceless. HAHAHAHAHA!!!!
Probably because Hawaii is the closest to Japan.
The story doesn’t make sense. (Quelle surprise!) Why would a birth certificate racket occur in the early years of statehood? People born in Hawaii have been US citizens since it was a US territory. If there was going to be some sort of “mafia operation”, it didn’t have to wait for statehood.
It just warms my heart that Zullo is working on this at the behest of the MARICOPA COUNTY SHERIFF and, hopefully, after this fiasco gets enough attention, we can finally bring evidence here in MARICOPA COUNTY, ARIZONA (note, that doesn’t read as Hawaii) to get rid of the seditious jerk!
Keep it up Zullo, your work is going to be very helpful to us one day.
What’s the over/under on Arpaio seizing ballots in Maricopa County in November over this nonsense?
I guarantee that John believes it.
I have personal experience that this Zullo story is false, I was at University of Hawaii in the 60’s,the language I studied was Japanese, I had many Japanese friends including my future wife. The only thing visiting Japanese did illegally was buy guns tru locals. Zullo is a lying sack of brown stuff.
It wasn’t in the WND story but in the Gillar interview Zullo says that the mole in the Hawaii DOH tells them that Team Obama has obtained paper and ink from the 1960s so they can crreate a paper BC. I kid you not.
Why does that require a ‘mole’ (Moleman Mike?) in Hawaii? I know, I know, why question, it’s nuttery.
I say there’s an Ouija board and weekly séances in the WND scriptwriting room.
Wikipedia: Guam – Proposed Name Change
Guamians (?) were granted U.S. citizenship shortly after the war when Guam was made an unincorporated territory of the United States.
Looks like they’re still refering to it as Guam: http://www.guam.gov/
He has nothing to do with ballots in Maricopa County.
Re: “I cannot say that Zullo’s story is not true”
Sure you can. Any time some kooks keep repeating specific claims like they “know about hundreds of thousands of foreigners who were given U.S. citizenship by the state of Hawaii” but they can never name even one such person, they are quite clearly lying.
Like I said, I’m hazy on the memory and I don’t have sources. Maybe it was Okinawans. Whatever, my memory is not one of a black market in birth certificates.
And yes, the Guam name change is only a proposal, that’s why the Wiki article I quoted describes it as a proposal. When I mentioned it originally, I hadn’t looked it up, your query prompted me to do so, and what I found is that the ex-Governor is attempting to get it up as a matter of local pride. I have no problem with that. I understand that it hasn’t happened, and that the main opposition is to to the cost changing all the signs and tourism promotions, which can of course be done in stages to reduce the impact, but it is their decision.
This story is false on its premise.
Just because one obtains a birth certificate, doesn’t mean their birth is registered.
The certificate comes from the state, not the other way around.
One can’t present to the state a birth certificate and have a child added to the registrar.
This is as stupid as thinking if you forged a fake drivers license, you could go to the DMV and have them add you to their records.
Indeedy. In fact, whenever you ask a birther if he can name anyone who ever got an incorrect BC from Hawaii, the answer is, with a 100% guarantee, “Sun Yat Sen”. Their memes thrive on generalizing anecdotic incidents.
When has that stopped “Sheriff Joke” from overstepping his authority?
(partial sarcasm alert)
That’s a good point to make. I had assumed that the tale included a false registration (bribed hospital worker or something).
A recent case of major vital records fraud in New Jersey involved a local registrar inserting false paperwork into the legitimate work flow.
“I can say with certainty that nothing has been presented to cause any one to believe the story.”
Sure something has. In order for a birther to believe something, it simply has to support their beliefs. Thus, since the story was presented, that alone is enough to make birthers believe it.
Now, had you said that nothing has been presented to cause any logical, rational, intelligent, honest or sane person to believe the story, you would have been correct.
Even if the story WERE true (which it in all likelihood is not) — how in the world would that have any relation to Obama? Where’s the Japanese mafia connection to his family? How would they even know that such a mafia ring existed? Which of them would make contact with such a mafia? How would the INS who was investigating Obama Sr. at that time not notice any such connection?
I think it’s safe to say that we would know from reputable sources if there were evidence of fraud in Hawaii’s birth records. There are examples of fraud being uncovered in birth records, such as in a couple of counties of northern New Jersey and births registered by certain midwives in Texas and California. The result of this is that the State Department has standard practices where birth certificates from the relevant areas could be affected, such as insisting on New Jersey certificates generated from the state rather than county archives, seeking long-form certifictes for births in parts of Texas and California (and asking for additional documentation where the attending midwife was someone known to have committed fraud in other cases). The State Department does not, as far as I am aware, have a standard policy or practice of questioning the facts stated on Hawaii birth certificates filed within the statutorily required period; this strongly suggests that the federal government has long believed that birth registration during Hawaii’s statehood has been quite reliable.
I’ve never heard of the State Dept ever having an issue with Hawaii territorial birth certificates either. There were many children of US military personnel born in Hawaii, and it would have been a disaster had their birth records have been questioned.
California’s issues with their abstract form were several. It wasn’t a secure document, and there were counterfeiting “kits” out there. I haven’t really seen one, but it’s my understanding that it didn’t even include an embossed seal like the current California birth certificate.
I think that the implication here, and in much of what is said about the Hawaii Department of Health, is that Hawaiians are of inferior moral character. It’s an essentially racist viewpoint.
Well, that makes sense… unfortunately. I’ve had US mainland tourists approach me, looking quite nervous, and asking if I speak English. I always say “No” and walk away.
Hawaii statehood was delayed because of a rape trial (not guilty, followed by a murder trial) in the 1930’s that “showed” how uncivilized we are here. Clarence Darrow represented the murderers, who were just defending a white (haole) woman’s honor, donjaknow. Clearly guilty and found as such, their sentence was commuted to a pleasant hour with the governor in his office.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massie_Trial (Pls pardon the wiki link, but it is accurate.)
Just FYI, Doc – Hawaiians are Hawaiians. The rest of us are residents of Hawaii.
Interesting. Thanks.
And shaking my head at the visiting buffoons. Before walking away, I might have answered, “Better than you.”
My wife used to have New Mexicans ask her “That’s a great accent, where are you from?”, and she would, of course, answer: “Australia”.
They would then ask her where she learned to speak English so well.