Where’s the evidence?
Despite Mike Zullo’s representations, citing Verna K. Lee, of a highly precise and error free operation of the Hawaii Health Bureau’s Vital Statistics division in 1961, when it suited his purposes in interpreting a race code on the President’s long form birth certificate, Zullo at the same time asserted that registration procedures were lax and that persons got birth certificates that shouldn’t have.
Larry Klayman in his recent petition to have Obama deported makes similar statements asserting the lax version of Hawaii Health Bureau operations, following in the footsteps of Mike Zullo, who stated in his “Alabama affidavit”:
…due to a loop holes in the state of Hawaii’s vital statistics reporting laws, there was the distinct evidence suggesting that Hawaii’s statutes appeared to be in conflict with federal immigration law and posed an independent threat to the national security of the United States.
Zullo later specifies what this loop hole is, citing HRS § 338-17.8 “Certificates for children born out of State” of which Zullo writes:
By statutory provision Hawaii has granted upon itself the unique power to confer citizenship to children not born in the United States, and to children not born to United States citizen parents, but to children actually born on foreign soil.
Zullo is lying. Nothing in HRS § 338-17.8 confers citizenship, and indeed no birth certificate of any kind by any state “confers” citizenship. A birth certificate is proof of the facts of birth, where, when and to whom. One need but look at any Hawaiian birth certificate to see that (1) it states where the birth occurred and (2) it says nothing about citizenship. Zullo also fails to disclose that HRS § 338-17.8 didn’t even exist when Barack Obama was born (it was passed in 1982).
Zullo goes on to assert lax procedures by citing statutes, which do not contain detailed procedures. What he does not show is the administrative procedures, regulations and policies in effect.
Klayman puts the story together in his petition, saying:
One of the main reasons that this entire topic is controversial and difficult is that Hawaii became a State on August 21, 1959, and as a very new State in the 1960’s was extremely lax in creating birth certificates for those not born in Hawaii or anywhere else in the United States of America. Hawaii not only had to work out procedure to operate as a new State but also had a culture of openness and relationship to nations throughout the Pacific Rim – recall that Kenya is a coastal nation along the Pacific Ocean / Indian Ocean – which allowed very loose concepts of Hawaii citizenship and immigration.
As a result, Hawaii routinely and by standard legal procedure issued birth certificates for children who were not born in Hawaii or anywhere in the United States. Furthermore, Hawaii allowed birth certificate to be issued based on the unverified claims of one or both parents – anyone signing for them (such as a grandparent).
People assume that the existence of a birth certificate from Hawaii proves a birth in Hawaii, when Hawaii law at the time is explicit that a parent could lawfully request a birth certificate from Hawaii for a child born in a foreign country.
Searching over a several year period, various researchers have found repeated listings of birth to Japanese parents as being reported in the newspapers as Hawaiian births, even though the child was found to be born in Japan. In 1961, Hawaii Department of Health appears to have used local area offices outside Honolulu as reporting centers in which parents and other family members could present children born to the family as Hawaiian births, without submitting any proof that the child was actually born in Hawaii.
The problem is a so exacerbated by the more limited scope of medical care and government at the time. As a result, births outside of a hospital were not rare.
For the most part, Klayman is lying. The first lie is the suggestion that Hawaii had to scramble to put together vital records procedures when it became a state in 1959. In fact, Hawaii had been a US Territory since 1898, and the statutes for vital records in effect when President Obama was born in 1961 dated to 1955 (revised in 1959).
Klayman descends to the silly when he cites Kenya as a country of the “Pacific Rim” (see Pacific Rim map below). It may be that Klayman does not know where the Pacific Ocean is.
Next, Klayman says: “Hawaii law at the time is explicit that a parent could lawfully request a birth certificate from Hawaii for a child born in a foreign country.” The statute for issuing out of state births was passed in 1982, not “at the time” when Barack Obama was born.
Klayman rambles on about registration procedures when a child is born, not attended by a doctor, while dishonestly failing to mention that Barack Obama was born in a Honolulu hospital with a birth certificate signed by a doctor. Klayman fails to provide any regulations or administrative procedure documentation whatever to back up his claim of lax requirements. He doesn’t know what the requirements were and just assumes there weren’t any.
Klayman mentions alleged Japanese children listed among births in Hawaiian newspapers. He cites “various researchers” studying “a several year period.” He doesn’t name the researchers, he doesn’t specify the period, and he doesn’t cite a single birth. In fact, to my knowledge, no birther has ever provided a specific instance, and no reason has been given to believe any of it. Klayman got it from Zullo, and Zullo, as we know, gets his facts from birther web sites.
One almost gets the impression that Klayman thinks Hawaii in 1961 was some kind of third world country with “limited scope of medical care,” and goes on to suggest that births outside of a hospital “were not rare.” Where did he get that notion? If Klayman had actually bothered to do minimal research he could have found that, according to the Vital Statistics of the Unites States for 1961, in the United States as a whole, 97 out of every 100 births were delivered in Hospitals (p. 1-13) and according to 1961 VSUS statistics for Hawaii, there were 17,578 births, of which 17,516 were in a hospital and attended by a physician, or more than 99 out of 100! Hawaii had a higher percentage of hospital births than the rest of the country. Indeed only 0.35% of Hawaiian births were not in a hospital attended by a physician! And this is what Klayman says is “not rare.” The guy is a first-class idiot.
If indeed vital records procedures in Hawaii were so lax, and all manner of abuses were prevalent, why is it that Klayman and his entire birther tribe have not been able to cite one single instance of vital records fraud in the history of the State of Hawaii, and only one example from the Territory of Hawaii, 110 years ago!
It’s a vicious circle. Zullo cribs from birther web sites. Klayman cribs from Zullo. The birthers then cite Zullo and Klayman as authorities.
Maybe he meant to say that Hawaii and Kenya have close relations because they both grow excellent coffee.
And don’t forget who discovered coffee – Arabs; you know what that means! And the President has been seen drinking coffee! According to the Boston Globe, the White House even placed orders with Kona Rainforest Farm in Hawaii!!
ETA: Now we know why President Obama’s birth certificate was printed on coffee mugs.
Uruguay is a coastal nation along the Pacific Rim/Atlantic Ocean. Kazakhstan is a coastal nation along the Pacific Rim/Caspian Sea. Chicago is a coastal city on the Pacific Rim/Lake Michigan. Okay, that was fun, but that’s enough.
Page 12, first paragraph of the petition – Lying Larry writes that Obama’s short form has to be a forgery because they did not have laser printers back in the 60’s.
I’ve seen that argument over the last few years from some who don’t grasp the concept that a person can actually request a COLB if they need one and the COLB is then printed and given to or sent to the person making such request. They don’t run back into the filing cabinets to pull out the old dusty one to make a copy.
It’s the same with death certificates. You really have to be a special moron to think the way a birther thinks.
I debunked that almost 6 years ago!
http://www.obamaconspiracy.org/2008/12/not_born_in_hawaii/
That’s extra-special moron, but yeah!
I have a couple of decades on the President, but when I needed a copy of my Texas birth certificate, I marched down to my county courthouse, where I was issued a laser printed document that was in terms of the information shown quite similar to Mr. Obama’s. I suppose that because I was born 18 1/2 years before Mr. Obama, and I was issued an instant printout of my birth records in a different county than the one where I was born, mine must be a more obvious forgery than the President’s!
Lasers weren’t even invented until 1960, J.D., you are an obvious forgery.
A few months ago, I was arguing with a guy who claimed that the birthers had shown that it was possible for someone born elsewhere to have their birth registered as having taken place in Hawaii. I pointed out that there had been no proven cases of birth certificate fraud since Hawaii became a state. He latched on to the “since Hawaii became a state” phrase and said that he found it hard to believe that the state would have suddenly tightened things up in the two years since it became a state.
I guess I should have chosen my words more carefully, but I still don’t think that’s a legitimate debate tactic, to look for a hole in my choice of words.
I revised my argument to point out that there was only one before Hawaii became a state and asked him to show me the proof of rampant birth certificate fraud.
At that time, he changed the subject to Obama’s school records.
But folks, be very, very careful in the words you use when arguing about these things.
While I appreciate your story, and have similar ones of my own, the fact of the matter is that you can’t win an argument with a birther no matter how precise your language and how persuasive your evidence. If birthers thought rationally, they wouldn’t be birthers.
Point well-taken .
Doc, you have a copy of the Posse’s “Question of Eligibility” e-book, right? There’s a passage in there where Zullo/Corsi claim that Hawaii was known to have issued many birth certificates to foreign-born children. Of course, absolutely no evidence is provided of this claim, nor any source cited.
Do you think you can find that quote? It might be worth adding to the post above.
When discussing this subject, it’s important to choose one’s words carefully. Remember what Janice Okubo said — “If you were born in Bali, for example, you could get a certificate from the state of Hawaii saying you were born in Bali. You could not get a certificate saying you were born in Honolulu.”
No Obot has ever produced a Hawaii birth certificate issued under the 1982 law which has a country other than Hawaii shown as the birth country. Additionally the Obots have never produced a single Hawaii birth certificate issued under the 1982 law which is in anyway different from the standard Hawaii long-form birth certificate.
Well, if the certificate issued under the 1982 law is just like the regular birth certificate, then it has the place of birth on it. Duh.
Henry says “No Obot has ever produced a Hawaii birth certificate issued under the 1982 law.” No birther has either, but I point you back to the Hawaii Department of Health’s statement that “If you were born in Bali, for example, you could get a certificate from the state of Hawaii saying you were born in Bali.” (Thanks to Arthur B. for remembering that.)
Back in the box.
The birfer version of “self-evident truths” LOL
Another “thought” from Jack Osborne related to this article … a real beauty that never fails to crack me up. He posted over at Amazon recently:
Oh poor jack I cribbed his line last week for my signature on fogbow along with the reply:
“…perception is just perception and does not require thinking…”
Perception
noun
1.
the act or faculty of perceiving, or apprehending by means of the senses or of the mind; cognition; understanding.
Reading about the supposedly close relationship between Hawaii and (Pacific Rim!!) Kenya, I could only speculate that Hawaii and Kenya had to be about as far apart on the globe as can be. Assuming there must be a Web page for such things, I Googled, “What is on the exact opposite side of the Earth?” Well, this must be a popular search, because I only had to type the first five words for auto-fill to complete that phrase.
Turns out the exact opposite side of the Earth from Honolulu is (close to) the Central Kalahari Game Reserve, in Botswana (separated from Kenya by Zambia and Tanzania). But imagine if the exact opposite side had been Mombasa! Oh, the tales birthers would have made up about THAT little (obviously-not-a-) coincidence!
No birther has ever produced a Hawaii birth certificate issued in the last 100 years which says that a person was born in Hawaii when that person actually was born somewhere else.
I’ll do you one better, no birther has produced any evidence in 6 years that the President was born anywhere but Hawaii.