Donofrio alleges Obama birth records amended!
Leo. C. Donofrio
Leo. C. Donofrio
Flash!
Leo Donofrio has made a stunning claim on his blog in a new article: Pending Litigation: Hawaii Confirms That Obama’s Vital Records Have Been Amended.
One has to translate that headline from “birther speak” to normal usage. “Pending Litigation” means “we haven’t filed a lawsuit” and “Confirms” means “we say so, but we won’t tell you why or how”.
Hawaiian law requires that certificates that have been amended be distinctly marked “altered”, and Obama’s Certification of Live Birth clearly is not marked “altered”. This fact justifies a high degree of skepticism on Donofrio’s claim. Of course the word “Amended” in birther speak might mean something totally different from the normal usage.
Donofrio says:
I will issue a full statement and press release on behalf of TerriK via this blog in the days ahead. This statement will include a complete history of correspondence between TerriK and Hawaii state officials in the Office of Information Practices (OIP) and the Department of Health (DoH). (more…)
A Certification is not a Certificate….
…but it’s just as good.
I’ve written on this topic before. Part of the problem with the language is that it is used imprecisely and terms with technically different meanings are used interchangeably. States are not fully consistent with the titles they put on their documents. I’ve done some research in consultation with professionals in the field, and want to give you, the reader, some guidance on using the terms correctly:
- Birth certificate. This is an original document generated in most cases by a hospital, but possibly by others when a birth happens outside a hospital and not on the way to a hospital (if mother and newborn arrive in a taxi where the baby is born, the hospital completes the certificate). Different jurisdictions have their own procedures for the creation of certificates for those born outside a hospital. (There are variations on the theme when the birth is registered later — delayed birth certificates, or in the case of a foreign-born adoption.) Certificates contain one important attribute, the signature of the person attesting to the event. The most common type of certificate is the Certificate of Live Birth for the timely registration of children born alive.Nowadays many births are reported electronically by hospital systems (as a stream of data), and there is no paper birth certificate. In this case, the birth certificate is the electronic data and the signature is electronic.
- Certified Copy. Unless you work in a hospital or a vital records agency, chances are that you have never seen a real Birth Certificate. What you got from the State is a certified copy. A certified copy is a photocopy or digital image copy of the birth certificate. I will be signed by someone attesting that it is a true copy, and it should also be sealed (either in multiple colors or impressed) by the agency issuing it. Of course, with a paperless electronic system, there are no certified copies.
- Certification of Birth. Modern vital records systems carry computer databases of birth registration information. Some may retain images of old records while newer records may never have had an electronic image. The Barack Obama Certification of Live Birth is an example of one of these.
Certified Copies and Certifications of Birth carry certain basic information, including the child’s name, date and time of birth, location of birth (city, state, county), the State File Number, Sex and the date the record was filed with the vital records agency. Some may contain more. The important thing is that from a legal perspective a Certified Copy carries equal weight as a Certification of Birth, and both are fully valid for obtaining a passport, joining the military, registering with Social Security, and getting a drivers license, and until the lunatics run the asylum, proving that you’re eligible to be President of the United States.
The Long Form – reconstructed
Over the months, bits and pieces of evidence have come forward that provide at a partial view of what President Obama’s original birth certificate must look like.
Starting with the COLB released by Barack Obama himself, we add the recently confirmed Mother’s Usual Address from the newspaper birth announcement, the certificate number from FactCheck.org photographs, the name of the hospital from the President himself in a letter to the hospital on the occasion of their centennial celebration, and some formatting hints from the Nordyke Twin’s certificate.
I took a birth certificate from 1963 and reconstructed a Barack Obama birth certificate with the most accurate content I could. I did not attempt to make a forgery: the fonts don’t match exactly and the security paper background is obviously cut and pasted. But if and when a long form is published, this is the content we should expect to see. The only thing I guessed about was the age of Obama’s father: I put 24, but it could have been 25. If anyone has his date of birth documented, please tell me (and tell the Wikipedia!).
I may kick myself for this but here it is:
Reconstructed birth certificate, click to enlarge
Exhibits:
- “Nordyke” long form 1961 (copy printed and sealed in 1966)
- Obama COLB 1961 (printed and sealed in 2007)
- “Edith” long form 1962
- “Alan” long form 1963
Yet another Kenyan birth certificate
This one is on YouTube. I think the videographer intends the viewer to interpret this sideways video as having been shot in Africa (hence the black extras), and one gets the impression that the speaker has obtained a birth certificate locally.
The video is too shaky and the resolution too poor to do much “analysis” of the document on the screen. Some might be able to freeze frame the image and record some details to see if it is consistent with a real document. The main point to keep in mind is that without any supporting evidence, a video on the Internet is nothing but a video on the Internet. However, it is entertaining, and I thought well done (for a fake).
A much enhanced version of the video is available at AboveTopSecret.com.
Kenyan Official confirms: it’s all “baseless claims”
In a report on August 3, 2009, The Washington Independent quoted a Kenyan Embassy official:
Jon Chessoni, a first secretary at the Kenyan Embassy in Washington, can’t understand why his office gets so many baseless questions about whether Barack Obama was born in Kenya.
“It’s madness,” said Chessoni on Monday. “His father, in 1961, would not even have been in Kenya. When this matter first came up, the Kenyan government did its research and confirmed that these are all baseless claims.”…
Chessoni didn’t understand what Taitz was talking about or what her discovery (the gift of an “anonymous source” who’s “afraid for his life”) was supposed to prove. He showed the image [fake Kenyan birth certificate] to other embassy employees, who rolled their eyes….
A stake through its heart
When the fake Kenyan birth certificate surfaced a week ago, it looked odd. Within hours, problems surfaced, the most humorous was the certificate number 47,044 (Obama was 47 years old and the 44th president). Then when the real birth certificate from South Australia from which the fake one was modeled came to light, the jig was officially up.
One is reminded of the 1970 made for TV movie “The Monster that Would not Die” as the birthers turned on the innocent Australian bystander, declaring that it was his certificate that was the fake.
Many problems with the Kenyan “certificate” have come to light; however, in the literal minded world of the birthers, one looks for that one image, that one memorable blow, that will finally drive a stake through the heart of this hoax. I hope I have found it.
7 shillings 6 pence
The fake document was dated 1964. In the upper left corner of the certificate is the cost charged for the document, 7 shillings 6 pence. But what was the actual Kenyan currency in 1964, and if I were to tell you, what would be a memorable way to drive the point home? And the answer came to me, so obvious to an erstwhile stamp collector like myself!
1964 Kenyan Stamp, Scott Standard Postage Stamp Catalog Number 16
It is this Republic of Kenya postage stamp issued in 1964 valued at 30 CENTS! That’s right. Kenya has the decimal currency system. (Scott’s catalogs are available at most any public library for you to easily verify for yourself.)
Let me take another couple of hammer blows into the heart of the fake birth certificate. One might wonder if perhaps an old form was used or somehow the 1961 price was on the form. No joy in Birfistan. Since the 1920’s it was always pounds, shillings and cents, as shown by this stamp from the 1950’s and later shillings and cents.
Kenya Postage, 1950's
There have been so many frustrating episodes where the Obama denialists have found some way to cover their eyes, and cover their ears, and uncover their mouths to say the most outrageous things. But what I have learned from long experience is that there are points where the belief system finally breaks. There are proofs that simply cannot be wriggled out of. This is one.
The fake Kenyan certificates says pence, and there warn’t no damned pence in Kenya, not ever. Now get mad at the people who lied to you.
Kenyan birth certificate proven fake – no doubt
In a remarkable piece of detective work, Koyaan over at Politijab.com has posted definitive proof that the Kenyan birth certificate was forged using an Australian birth certificate image on the Internet as the base document. ge. Read the Politijab article for details.
Click for larger view
Click for larger version
