Obama Conspiracy Theories

This is something that’s been bugging me for some time.

I remember seeing (but can’t find now) a comment attributed to an Obama campaign staffer that said the campaign had obtained several birth certificates for Senator Obama in 2007. When the issue began to be raised seriously about where Obama was born, the campaign posted the famous scan of the 2007 Certification of Live Birth.

When questions were raised about where McCain was born, a McCain campaign staffer showed McCain’s birth certificate to Michael Dobbs of the Washington Post.

The fact that two presidential campaigns had birth certificates for their candidates at the ready suggests to me that the campaigns thought they needed them. Why is that? The most likely answer is that they did need them, but if so, what for?

Crank image analysis seem to be a recurring theme in the Obama Conspiracy Theories world, and the Post & Email blog touts another one in its article: Original Certificate of Live Birth from Hawaii is different from Obama’s COLB by Sharon Rondeau.

Since the basic premise, that Obama’s COLB is a fake, is false the analysis cannot be true, and if not true flawed, and if flawed likely to be hard for a logical person to follow. Let us, nevertheless, take a stab at it.

The Post & Email claims to have an authentic Hawaiian birth certificate for someone born in 1981. That’s not an implausible claim. However, they use some slight of hand to try to make something appear odd. First the certificate they show appears to have features of the 2010 revision which is known to be different from what was issued in 2007 when the President’s was printed.

The P&E says the President’s certificate says “Certification of Live Birth” and their says “Certificate of Live Birth.” That’s exactly what one would expect to see since Hawaii changed the wording between 2007 and 2010, as proven by numerous examples of “Certifications” and press accounts. Their other differences are:

• More information about parents. Since this second certificate is from a different form revision, and multiple examples of certificates just like Obama’s exist, the difference (assuming the P&E certificate is true) means nothing. However, we have an example of a hot-off-the press Hawaiian COLB that does not have the extra fields the P&E shows on their example. This at least calls into question the authenticity P&E version, although there are scenarios where it might be true.
• Visible certificate number. This is totally silly. Obama’s certificate as shown by FactCheck.org has a certificate number too.
• Onaka’s stamp: Same as on Obama’s.
• Raised seal visible from both sides. Same as Obama’s although his is fainter.
• No bleed through. Must have less ink.

They cite Hawaiian law about late certificates, but fail to mention the other provision in the law that requires such certificated to be marked as such:

§338-16  Procedure concerning late and altered birth certificates. (a)  Birth certificates registered one year or more after the date of birth, and certificates which have been altered after being filed with the department of health, shall contain the date of the late filing and the date of the alteration and be marked distinctly “late” or “altered”.

Then the conspiracy theory kicks in, what they call “Passportgate” but that’s another story for another time.

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Birthers have been vocal critics of Hawaii’s so-called “short form” Certification of Live Birth–that it was not a birth certificate but only a “certification”. Well, Hawaii has changed its tune. Birthers win. The computer generated “Certification of Live Birth” is gone. Now Hawaii issues a computer generated Certificate of Live Birth!

I think they also have changed the paper so that it shows folds more easily. Still has that pesky “Date Filed” though.

Obama COLB (click for full-size)

So I was at the birth certificate factory today and I went over to one of the old timers, and I said to him, “you remember about 15 years ago you were talking to me about sticking a birth certificate into one of those numbering machines?” He said, “sure I remember; that was New Jersey”.

He told me that the hospitals in New Jersey entered information into a computer system (this was something that ran on a PC under MS-DOS) and that computer system would dial-up the state computer system and transfer the record using a modem. The hard-copy paperwork went to the local registrar (if memory serves me right this is a county official) who checked them and sent them to the state. Once the state was finished they would stick the paper certificate into a slot in a desktop numbering machine, and then type the certificate number into the computer system with the electronic record.

All this time Deep Birther was there, and Grandma (I haven’t mentioned Grandma before).  What ensued was a lively discussion about how every state is different in their process. Grandma told me that in South Dakota, even though they have an all electronic system, they still have the computer number certificates in electronic batches that may include births for multiple days. I ask what order the certificates were numbered in, and the reply was that it wasn’t in any particular order within the batch as best she recalled. (more…)