Birther Card Played Too Soon

The White House released President Barack Obama’s original “Certificate of Live Birth” from Hawaii amid persistent questions about his citizenship.

The long-form birth certificate, which the White House requested, says Mr. Obama was born at 7:24 p.m. on Aug. 4, 1961, in Honolulu. The White House said Hawaii doesn’t generally release long-form birth certificates but did so at the president’s request.

The administration previously released a less detailed version of Mr. Obama’s birth certificate.

White House Communications Director Dan Pfeiffer said the decision to release the document came because “the president was struck by how this was crowding out the debate” on the budget.” He added that “it became an issue that transcended” the Internet and conspiracy theorists and had moved into the mainstream.

“The president decided to do this…because this was a sideshow that’s distracting from” significant issues, Mr. Pfeiffer said.

Mr. Obama has just demonstrated, again, that he and his team are terrible politicians. This ends what could have been played for two more years, allowing the GOP to tear itself apart. The fringe on the right has been eating this up for three years now. It's an incredible waste of the GOP resources and anyone who even talks about it looks like an absolute nut case, or at least, are painted as nut case fringe by the main stream. What was a non-issue for most of the actual Purple States of America, has been smoked out and played out. Everyone folds.

Sure not everyone, "it's a forgery, it's a fake, what took you so long..." can already be heard echoing. But why would they play this card now? It's a bad move, politically. Perhaps they felt that two years was all it was worth. Maybe it was the growing threat of the Trump card?

Eh.

Can we finally start talking about real issues? How about that laser guided sight on Jobs? How about the three wars we're engaged in?

How about that wedding I keep hearing about?

Caption the Party Crashers

"Security didn't give you any trouble either, right? Hell, I didn't even have to show them my birth certificate. They just let me right in."

Birther Rebuffs Army and Bama: Updates and New Developments

Retired general, lieutenant colonel join reservist’s lawsuit over Obama's birth status
By Lily Gordon

A controversial suit brought by a U.S. Army reservist (see our previous story here at Blasphemes: Birther Rebuffs Army and Bama) has been joined by a retired Army two-star general and an active reserve Air Force lieutenant colonel.

Maj. Stefan Frederick Cook filed the suit July 8 in federal court asking for conscientious objector status and a preliminary injunction based upon his belief that President Barack Obama is not a natural-born citizen of the United States and is therefore ineligible to serve as president of the United States and commander-in-chief of the U.S. Armed Forces.

However, before the issue got to court, Cook’s orders to deploy to Afghanistan were revoked. Lt. Col. Maria Quon, a public affairs officer with the U.S. Army Human Resources Command-St. Louis, said Tuesday that Cook was no longer expected to report Wednesday to MacDill Air Force Base in Florida for mobilization to active duty. Cook, who claims he is now the victim of retaliation due to his suit, received his mobilization orders to report for active duty at MacDill on Wednesday. From there, he was to go to Fort Benning on Saturday for deployment to Afghanistan.

Cook is an Individual Mobilization Augmentee. This means he’s a reserve soldier assigned to an active component unit consisting of active duty soldiers instead of a reserve unit, which is composed entirely of reserve soldiers. He is assigned to the U.S. Army Element of U.S. Southern Command.

As you'll remember, Cook filed a request in federal court seeking a temporary restraining order and status as a conscientious objector represented by California attorney Orly Taitz - who is also a 'birther'.

The government, in its response to the suit, claims that Cook’s suit is “moot” in that he already has been told he doesn’t have to go to Afghanistan, so the relief he is seeking has been granted.

“The Commanding General of SOCCENT (U.S. Special Operations Central Command) has determined that he does not want the services of Major Cook, and has revoked his deployment orders,” the response states.

In a pleading revised after the revocation of Cook’s orders, Taitz argues that the application for preliminary injunction is not moot and that retired Maj. Gen. Carol Dean Childers and active U.S. Air Force reservist Lt. Col. David Earl Graeff have joined the suit “because it is a matter of unparalleled public interest and importance and because it is clearly a matter arising from issues of a recurring nature that will escape review unless the Court exercises its discretionary jurisdiction.”

Cook’s resubmitted Application for Preliminary Injunction is meant to encompass the possibility of Cook receiving future orders for deployment as well as to address and prevent “negative collateral consequences such as retaliation against Major Stefan Frederick Cook ...”

As to the retaliation issue, the revised suit states Cook lost his job at Simtech Inc., a corporation that does Department of Defense contracting in the field of information technology/systems integration, because of the suit. It also states that Cook has been subjected to “gossip” from people who believed Cook was “manipulating his deployment orders to create a platform for political purposes.”

Taitz, who has challenged the legitimacy of Obama’s presidency in other courts, filed the original suit with the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Georgia. Two similar suits have previously been thrown out of federal court.

In the filing, Cook states he “would be acting in violation of international law by engaging in military actions outside the United States under this President’s command. … simultaneously subjecting himself to possible prosecution as a war criminal by the faithful execution of these duties.”

A hearing to discuss Cook’s requests is scheduled to take place in federal court.

More updates to follow, as very few other people are following this story.

Birther Rebuffs Army and Bama

The Army has revoked the Afghanistan deployment orders for Army reservist Maj. Stefan Frederick Cook, the plaintiff in a lawsuit arguing that President Obama has no authority to send him to war because, he believes, Obama is not a “natural-born citizen” and thus not eligible to be president. Cook’s lawyer, leading “birther” Orly Taitz, said the Army’s move is proof that Obama was not born in Hawaii. Whoa. Really?

If the military isn’t backing Obama’s legitimacy as commander-in-chief, then all the sudden this is a real issue, right? If Obama wants to quash this growing controversy, all he has to do is release his “true ‘long-form’ birth certificate,” as Cook requested. Against all possible logic, Cook has a point... It would be illegal for him to follow an 'illegitimate' president’s orders.

However, since it is a "volunteer" army - and Stefan volunteered - he's likely AWOL now. But why would anyone want to pursue this in a court martial? the Army probably just doesn't want to deal with the politics of the "birther" crowd, or worse. It doesn't make Obama look clean to let Stefan out... but doesn't want to keep this thing in the news or talk about it. And if he does, then it's to make the right wing look even more desperate and nutty than usual.

Or, perhaps Stefan has found the solution to the age old Army problem of the Catch 22? The solution? He turned it around on his superiors.

Natural Born?

I called this three days ago:

Republican Senator says: Eligibility is up to the voters
Republican Martinez implies constitutional requirement for presidency can be bypassed (link)

A U.S. senator has suggested that voters have made Barack Obama eligible to occupy the Oval Office, whether or not he meets the constitutional mandate of being a "natural born" citizen.

The comments from Sen. Mel Martinez, R-Fla., came in an e-mail sent to a constituent shortly after the election which seems to go against the "Birther's" complaints -- and more troubling sets the stage for EXACTLY what I said three days ago:

Schwarzenegger 2012

The Presinator

The Birthers

In a country where 34% if Americans believe in UFOs and 24% believes in witches, and 9/11 was an inside job... there is a large pile of folks, let's call them "birthers," who still don't believe that Obama was born in the United States. If it were true, it would invalidate his Presidency, since Natural Citizenship is one of only three actual requirements to be the Chief Executive.

What's the problem with a couple right wing fringe nuts ruining the remaining threads of the Republican Party? 

The conservative talk show host Michael Medved recently referred to the movement's leaders as "crazy, nutburger, demagogue, money-hungry, exploitative, irresponsible, filthy conservative imposters" who are "the worst enemy of the conservative movement." 

"It makes us look weird. It makes us look crazy. It makes us look demented. It makes us look sick, troubled, and not suitable for civilized company," he mourned

For the most part, it's just funny. For a larger part, this claim and subsequent belief in someone lying about their birth is a natural and usual tactic by the opposing party since the birth of the country.

Chester A. Arthur (1829–1886), 21st president of the United States, was rumored to have been born in Canada. He was born to a U.S. citizen mother and a father from Ireland, who was eventually naturalized as a U.S. citizen. Arthur was sworn in as president when President Garfield died after being shot. 

George Romney (1907–1995), who ran for the Republican party nomination in 1968, was born in Mexico to U.S. parents. Romney’s grandfather had emigrated to Mexico in 1886 with his three wives and children after Utah outlawed polygamy. Romney's monogamous parents retained their U.S. citizenship and returned to the United States with him in 1912. Romney never received Mexican citizenship, because the country's nationality laws had been restricted against American settlers.

Barry Goldwater (1909–1998) was born in Phoenix, in what was then the Arizona Territory of the United States. During his presidential campaign in 1964, there was a minor controversy over Goldwater's having been born in Arizona when it was not yet a state.

Lowell Weicker (born 1931), the former Connecticut Senator, Representative, and Governor, entered the race for the Republican party nomination of 1980 but dropped out before voting in the primaries began. He was born in Paris, France to parents who were U.S. citizens. 

Róger Calero (born 1969) was born in Nicaragua and ran as the Socialist Worker's Party presidential candidate in 2004 and 2008. In 2008, Calero appeared on the ballot in Delaware, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York and Vermont.

....aaaaaannnndddd..... John McCain (born 1936), who ran for the Republican party nomination in 2000 and was the Republican nominee in 2008, was born in Colón, Panama, in the Panama Canal Zone of two U.S. parents, who were at the time serving at the Coco Solo Naval Air Station.

The worst thing that can happen from the Birthers? Well, first the restriction will be relaxed, in the odd chance their movement gains any further traction. What then? President Arnold Schwarzenegger. And the horrible vision of Idiocracy will be complete.