Dr. Conspiracy
Readers may have noticed a Learn more link at the bottom of some articles of late. This feature goes along with a small change in this blog’s direction. Originally, Obama Conspiracy Theories was created as a “debunking” site and I went through the popular misinformation about Barack Obama, looked up the facts, and made logical arguments against what was wrong. It’s approaching two years out and while some new twist comes along occasionally, the serious debunking is long over.
I’ve begun to think of the blog becoming more of an educational site. It isn’t, nor will it ever become, encyclopedic. It is after all just one guy’s blog. But since it is my blog, I talk about what interests me, and if it interests you, you may want to know more, and so the increased emphasis on the reader’s options to get more information. I know my readers can use search engines as well as I do, but I can do some filtering and pick a few quality follow-up articles on the topics I write about.
I would be remiss if I did not mention the many fine comments left by the online community here that also provider the reader with opportunities to Learn more.
Interesting and thank you.
A great initiative!
Regarding Dr. Kate’s ridiculous “Usurperthon”, attended by about 10 people, the following comment was interesting…She usually doesn’t have dissenting opinions but I guess this one made it through…
“Thomas Brown
Thursday, September 9, 2010, at 9:38 am
Wow. Usurpathon. How do you expect to garner any respect or credibility when you use the word “usurp”? Have you never studied history or opened a dictionary?
Our President was elected by the long-established American electoral process, not appointed by the Supreme Court like Bush in 2000. He is a natural-born American citizen, in the view of the Board of Electors in all 50 States, Congress, and every Court Judge whose time has been wasted by frivolous lawsuits about his citizenship. There is exactly as much documentation of his birth as there is on any Senator, Judge, or FBI agent alive, but you persist in walling yourselves up in Birther Fantasyland.
President Obama is closer to a common American than anyone elected to the office in over a century. He has had only one wife, is untainted by any scandal, and when elected owned one house. He is, in John McCain’s words, a “good family man,” and you treat him like dirt.
When Bush lied us into Iraq you said “criticizing the President during a war is un-American and endangers our troops.”
So what does that make you, today?
Most fact-based criticism of the President is basically that he hasn’t cleaned up the mess left behind by decades of housing, banking, and industrial de-regulation, and the deficits guaranteed by the tax cuts for the wealthy and shameless deficit spending by Bush. And the rest is based on nothing but lies. Lies so outlandish they make you sound mentally challenged.
Even George W. Bush, in his dignified refusal to carp at the sitting President, has shown more class than the tea-bag-wearing patriots-in-name-only who are hopping mad about paying the lowest tax rates in 60 years and terrified by some weird Mulsim/Socialist Takeover Conspiracy any fifth-grader could identify as preposterous nonsense.
Really. Get a grip. Otherwise you risk looking like that wild-haired filthy street bum in rags you see in movies holding a sign saying “You’re All Doomed!”
http://drkatesview.wordpress.com/2010/09/06/the-usurpathon-begins/#comment-11316
From Media Matters….
WorldNetDaily’s factually deficient “eligibility primer”
September 09, 2010 11:47 am ET by Terry Krepel
The birther obsessives at WorldNetDaily have issued a new downloadable “Obama eligibility primer” (you have to give up your email address to WND to receive a copy) that it hyperbolically claims “could sink Obama’s presidency.” In fact, the report is yet another rehashing of many of the factually dubious claims WND has been making since it latched onto the birther issue two years ago.
WND repeats the discredited claim that “On Oct. 16, 2008, Obama’s step-grandmother, Sarah Obama, famously claimed in a telephone interview with an American religious leader she had been present at Obama’s birth at a hospital in Mombasa. Sarah Obama speaks Luo, not English.” WND goes on to claim that “Other Luo speakers who have listened to the tape, however, including a member of the Kenyan government, say she insisted twice that she had been present at his birth in Kenya.” This is an apparent reference to a WND article by Jerome Corsi citing anonymous “members of Sarah Hussein Obama’s Luo tribe” making that claim. Corsi is not exactly a reliable source, having pushed his own birther conspiracies, so anything he has to say on the issue is suspect.
Noting that in 1981 “Obama traveled to Pakistan during a period when it was difficult for U.S. citizens to enter that country,” WND claims that “Obama would have needed a passport to travel to Pakistan, and apparently the passport he used was not American.” But since The New York Times and the State Department were offering advice at the time on how Americans could obtain the proper papers for entry into Pakistan, it likely was not as “difficult” as WND suggests.
WND goes on to suggest that Obama, while a student at Occidental College, “received scholarship funds set aside for foreign students.” As Snopes.com details, this idea is based on a hoax.
WND also highlights how “[c]omputer graphics expert Dr. Ron Polarik (an assumed name) contends the COLB is not a record of Obama’s birth at all, but an outright forgery” — never mind that FactCheck.org points out that it has “seen, touched, examined and photographed” the certificate, concluding that “[c]laims that the document lacks a raised seal or a signature are false.”
WND even goes so far to promote the idea that because “[n]umerous African newspapers have described him as Kenyan-born” and “[h]is wife, Michelle Obama, has twice implied publicly that he is a native of Kenya,” it’s sufficient reason to question where Obama was born. WND tries to immediately downplay this, calling such statements “probably the least compelling reasons to doubt Obama’s eligibility,” but then insists “they have become prominent parts of the Obama eligibility lore.” Indeed, WND has endeavored to make that so — nearly six pages of its 32-page pamphlet are devoted to recounting these statements.
WND has long desperately promoted any claim, no matter how specious or discredited, to promote the idea that Obama is not a real American. The most notorious example of this is the “Kenyan birth certificate” WND promoted without bothering to verify its authenticity first, before finally conceding the certificate was “probably not authentic.”
A real “eligibility primer” would have included all relevant facts, including the exculpatory ones — but the full truth is something WND has shown little interest in reporting.
http://mediamatters.org/blog/201009090020
Really, as many as 10? That’s the biggest estimate I’ve seen so far. Where does that come from?
“telephone interview with an American religious leader she had been present at Obama’s birth”
A self appointed bishop. Harumph.
I was giving her the benefit of the doubt…I did see a picture over at OFGS that showed about 3 people gathered….What I find most interesting about Dr Kate is that she was born in Mexico and does not meet the definition of a “natural born citizen”….I guess that is why she has such an issue with the President…The fact that he could be President and she can’t….
All of the birthers are self appointed at something….The so called self appointed “grand juries”, the self appointed “Private Attorney general of the US” (Cody Robert Judy), the self appointed Constitutional expert Orly, and the self appointed forgery expert Dr. Ron Polarik. The entier movement is filled with people with delusions of grandeur….
And all of them are shouting “Why don’t you take me seriously?” and “Look at Meeeeeeeeeee!”.
not only self grandeur but so many of them are just creepy when you look into them- the self appointed Bishop is just one of them.
WorldNetDaily’s Factually Deficient “Eligibility Primer”
Topic: WorldNetDaily
The birther obsessives at WorldNetDaily have issued a new downloadable “Obama eligibility primer” (you have to give up your email address to WND to receive a copy) that it hyperbolically claims “could sink Obama’s presidency.” In fact, the report is yet another rehashing of many of the factually dubious claims WND has been making since it latched onto the birther issue two years ago.
WND repeats the discredited claim that “On Oct. 16, 2008, Obama’s step-grandmother, Sarah Obama, famously claimed in a telephone interview with an American religious leader she had been present at Obama’s birth at a hospital in Mombasa. Sarah Obama speaks Luo, not English.” WND goes on to claim that “Other Luo speakers who have listened to the tape, however, including a member of the Kenyan government, say she insisted twice that she had been present at his birth in Kenya.” This is an apparent reference to a WND article by Jerome Corsi citing anonymous “members of Sarah Hussein Obama’s Luo tribe” making that claim. Corsi is not exactly a reliable source, having pushed his own birther conspiracies, so anything he has to say on the issue is suspect.
Noting that in 1981 “Obama traveled to Pakistan during a period when it was difficult for U.S. citizens to enter that country,” WND claims that “Obama would have needed a passport to travel to Pakistan, and apparently the passport he used was not American.” But since The New York Times and the State Department were offering advice at the time on how Americans could obtain the proper papers for entry into Pakistan, it likely was not as “difficult” as WND suggests.
WND goes on to suggest that Obama, while a student at Occidental College, “received scholarship funds set aside for foreign students.” As Snopes.com details, this idea is based on a hoax.
WND also highlights how “[c]omputer graphics expert Dr. Ron Polarik (an assumed name) contends the COLB is not a record of Obama’s birth at all, but an outright forgery” — never mind that FactCheck.org points out that it has “seen, touched, examined and photographed” the certificate, concluding that “[c]laims that the document lacks a raised seal or a signature are false.”
WND even goes so far to promote the idea that because “[n]umerous African newspapers have described him as Kenyan-born” and “[h]is wife, Michelle Obama, has twice implied publicly that he is a native of Kenya,” it’s sufficient reason to question where Obama was born. WND tries to immediately downplay this, calling such statements “probably the least compelling reasons to doubt Obama’s eligibility,” but then insists “they have become prominent parts of the Obama eligibility lore.” Indeed, WND has endeavored to make that so — nearly six pages of its 32-page pamphlet are devoted to recounting these statements.
WND has long desperately promoted any claim, no matter how specious or discredited, to promote the idea that Obama is not a real American. The most notorious example of this is the “Kenyan birth certificate” WND promoted without bothering to verify its authenticity first, before finally conceding the certificate was “probably not authentic.”
A real “eligibility primer” would have included all relevant facts, including the exculpatory ones — but the full truth is something WND has shown little interest in reporting.
http://conwebwatch.tripod.com/blog/index.blog?entry_id=2058076
The birthers take Obama derangement to an entirely new level of crazy….
Bombshell: Barack Obama conclusively outed as CIA creation….
“Far from being the mere son of a goat herder’ (as he deceptively paraded during and even before his candidacy), strong evidence has emerged that President Barack Obama is the product of the intelligence community. Investigative reporter and former NSA employee Wayne Madsen has put together an extensive three-part (and growing) series with conclusive proof and documentation that Barack Obama Sr., Stanley Ann Dunham, Lolo Soetoro and President Barack Obama himself all hold deep ties to the CIA and larger intelligence community. And that’s just the beginning.”
http://www.oilforimmigration.org/facts/?p=7232#comments
On Free Republic I’ve seen people argue for the CIA theory on one hand and yet they still consider Obama an anti-American traitor on the other. Eventually the disconnect will give them a stroke and twitchy hands.
That’s as oxymoronic as Marxist Muslim.
Or a Marxist Nazi.
WND is just mining for email address. It is more designed for people who want a document to suggest that they really aren’t disillusioned. The documents doesn’t seem to be the creation of WND.
A first time visitor to this site, I am quite amused at some of the bizarre theories. However, I seriously believe that most here are missing the boat. Regardless of which conspiracy you choose to “debunk”, nobody cares anymore. He is our President, and therein lies the problem.
Eligibility is one thing, but ability is what really matters. Whether eligible or not, Obama has proven himself completely incapable of performing the duties of the office he ran for. His halo has faded away and, for all the hooplah, Obama is now seen in the light of day as just another in a long list of crooked, lying politicians.
The people don’t care any more if he’s from Hawaii, Kenya, or Timbuktu. We just want him to go away, and to take his Chicago circus with him.
Just curious, could you cite some examples of your theory? Because it seems like a lot of this country’s problems stem from 2 wars that the last administration started, tax breaks that we could not afford, and bailouts of AIG and other banks in 2008. Not to mention the serious invasion of privacy that the last administration engaged in. So if this administration is worse, I would love to see some examples…
More Obama derangement….
http://www.forbes.com/forbes/2010/0927/politics-socialism-capitalism-private-enterprises-obama-business-problem_print.html
“Incredibly, the U.S. is being ruled according to the dreams of a Luo tribesman of the 1950s. This philandering, inebriated African socialist, who raged against the world for denying him the realization of his anticolonial ambitions, is now setting the nation’s agenda through the reincarnation of his dreams in his son. The son makes it happen, but he candidly admits he is only living out his father’s dream. The invisible father provides the inspiration, and the son dutifully gets the job done. America today is governed by a ghost.”
Better a son honoring a father with a dream, than a son pathetically trying to gain his father’s respect.
So you’re another alleged “non-birther” who claims to speak for “the people”?
Obama job approval, Gallup Poll taken 9/9/10-9/11/10:
Approve: 46%
Disapprove: 46%
http://www.gallup.com/poll/113980/Gallup-Daily-Obama-Job-Approval.aspx
So I suppose that the 46% who approve of the job he is doing just don’t count.
And please feel free to provide evidence for your claim that Obama is a “crooked, lying” politician. Some concrete examples would be appreciated.
And if someone really wants to, they can compare President Obama’s approval ratings with those of other presidents. Obama’s 46% is better than Ronnie Raygun, Jimmy Carter, and even Bill Clinton had at the same time in their presidencies.
http://www.gallup.com/poll/politics.aspx?CSTS=pollnav&to=POLL-Politics-News
And that’s even true at the Wall Street Journal
http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/documents/info-presapp0605-31.html
I wish the folks who make up and promote these “bizarre theories” would take your message to heart and get on with their lives. Until that happens, I’ll be here.
As for your dissatisfaction with Obama’s job performance, you know when the next election is.
Irate Nate- i have no objection to your opinions about the Presidents performance- meaning you are expressing a political opinion about how well he is doing his job- and I think citizens should do just that. I disagree with you, but thats fine.
I dislike the characterization of him being crooked because I have seen no evidence of that. “Crooked” “Chicago” “Marxist”, Muslim”- are all labels intended to make the President into some caracature and inspire rather mindless fear, rather than an honest discussion of his administration.
Well said. I fully agree. These people can dislike him or his policies all they want. They just need to grow up and leave the childish slanderous name calling out of it. Its all about these folks being too immature to disagree with someone or something without having to resort to needing to attempt to dehumanize and smear them to express their views.
It looks like Lucas Smith and his buddy Jim Byrne had a falling out…..Byrne published an aritlce on the Post and Fail site which questioned Smith and his fake Kenyan BC. The Post and Fail scrubbed it. What is more amazing is how many birthers still support Smith, a convicted forger and his so called evidence. It just shows us that Obama derangement is a serious condition….
From the OFGS website….
“A former friend and co-Birther of Smith’s, with whom he has been battling all summer, named Jim Byrne, wrote an op ed piece on September 10: “Kenya Birth Certificate a Forgery? DR. “HELTAN” MAGANGA FINALLY WEIGHS IN!” This followed on a recent interview at the Post & Email with the convicted forger. Byrne is challenging Smith to document his February, 2009, stay in Mombasa, when Smith claims to have bribed a hospital guard to obtain President Obama’s birth certificate, the FKBC2.
Dr. Heltan Maganga is Chief Administrator of Coast Province General Hospital in Mombasa, Kenya. Byrne is claiming–(remember what I always say, Birthers lie like the dickens, so you never know)–that he emailed Dr. Maganga and asked three questions:
1. Were you the Chief Administrator (or acting Chief Administrator) of CPGH on Feb. 19th 2009?
2. Do the stamp and signature that appear in the attached document appear to be your stamp and signature?
3. Is the attached CPGH birth certificate representative of what a birth certificate issued by CPGH in 1961 would look like?
According to Byrne, Dr. Maganga responded: “The answers to all your questions is a resounding NO.”
http://ohforgoodnesssake.com/?p=12333
And the original Post and Fail article is below….
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:KX_FKuuLaVMJ:www.thepostemail.com/2010/09/10/kenya-birth-certificate-a-forgery/+%22Kenyan+Birth+Certificate+a+Forgery%3F&cd=6&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&client=firefox-a
More comedy from the Post and Fail, this time crazy Lucas Smith supporter David LaRocque….The following excerpt says it all…You really can’t make this stuff up….They are now changing what the Constitution says…
“So I informed him that the Constitution requires that the person elected to the office of president must have been a resident in the United States for fourteen years, and that he must be a “natural born Citizen.”
Then I asked this bright young Bilbray volunteer if he knew what is meant by the term “natural born Citizen” in the U.S. Constitution? He stated that it means that the president must have been born in the U.S. He could think of no other requirement. When I informed him that the eligibility clause in Article II also requires that both parents of the person elected to the office of president must have been U.S. citizens at his or her birth, he quickly nodded agreement.
Then I asked him how Barack Obama could be a legitimate president if he was a dual citizen at birth. His response was that no one else he had encountered had brought these things up.”
http://www.thepostemail.com/2010/09/13/a-strange-coincidence/
And in the comments, the usual bunch of simple minded birthers…
Mick says:
Tuesday, September 14, 2010 at 6:08 AM
Your young campaigner obviously lied when he said he had never heard of obama’s eligibility problem, as he stated all of the talking points (except the Birth advertisement in the Hi. newspaper). I have been educating my kids about this, and it is apparent that the knowledge was lost in public schools. Their primer on the Presidential election states that the requirement of POTUS is “a US Citizen that was born in the US”, and their teachers have tried to correct my kids correct definition by saying “oh no, if you were born in the US you are eligible”.
Citizen Concerned says:
Tuesday, September 14, 2010 at 10:05 AM
According to an unnamed HI state agency, a “natural born citizen” is anyone who was born in the U.S. irregardless of either parent’s citizenship status.
That is the most uneducated and stupid response ever. They are in effect stating that even anchor babies are natural born citizens.
Osama Bin Laden or someone of his ilk inpregnates a woman and sends her to the States to have the baby. The young lad eventually moves to the Middle East for his primary/secondary education and indoctrination. As a young adult, he returns to the U.S. to attend a prestigious Ivy League school and majors in political science and then attends law school. He immediately starts seeking to secure a political position at the local or state level, then works his way up the political ladder, and eventually runs for President and wins the election. He then proceeds to destroy the U.S. from within.
According to the SoH, the above scenario is perfectly acceptable since the President is after all a “natural born citizen.”
Unbelievable.
vharlow says:
Monday, September 13, 2010 at 9:28 PM
As a grandparent homeschooling, I can report that the good Christian curriculum we used last year had this wrong. I emailed them, and they did not respond. So I tweeted, which is pretty public, and they said they would look into it. The requirement is “natural born citizen” and they had it “native born.” I checked another older history book, and the regular text which students never read had the correct wording, but the edge margin notes said “native born” again.
Text books are critical. I’ve also found entirely too many references to how evil we were in westward expansion…. No mention of the natives attacking settlers… We cover these things and discuss them very carefully. Also, if the population of blacks is 10-15 percent why do they get 30-40 percent of the history stories in these more recent textbooks? There are now more hispanics resident in the country than blacks, and after a bit, we will be getting what…half hispanic history? From all the central American countries and Mexico? Sheesh. This incessant inclusiveness is driving me nuts.
Next they will feel obliged to include all the separate groups…. No wonder kids only read the margins….
But the best had to be when one of the Post and Fail sheep point out that Article 2 does not mention parental status, look at Rondeau’s response….
whats_up says:
Monday, September 13, 2010 at 6:10 PM
Article II doesn’t say anything about the status of parents? Where are you getting this info?
——————-
Mrs. Rondeau replies: No, but the Vattel definition, which is believed to be that which was incorporated into the U.S. Constitution in Article II, Section 1, clause 5, mentions that the parents have to be citizens of the country at the time their child is born in order for that child to be considered a “natural born Citizen.” This would eliminate any potential foreign influence or allegiance in that child.
and
whats_up says:
Tuesday, September 14, 2010 at 9:25 AM
Mrs. Rondeau, thanks for the reply. However, if we are arguing law, shouldn’t we use the law? Since it is not spelled out in US Code or the Constitution, how good of an argument is it? Just a thought.
—————–
Mrs. Rondeau replies: The fact is that the U.S. Supreme Court has never conclusively ruled on the meaning of “natural born Citizen.” There is Vattel, and there are those who say that as long as the person is born on U.S. soil, he or she is “natural born.” But as others have mentioned, why would the Framers of the Constitution have put in the additional words “natural born”? They must have an extra meaning beyond that of “Citizen.” That might be why Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas joked with Rep. Jose Serrano several months ago, saying, “We’re evading that issue.”
And then of course they refer the writer to the following Constitutional scholar…
David F LaRocque says:
Monday, September 13, 2010 at 9:15 PM
You need to read the extensive writings on this subject by Constitutional scholar and attorney Mario Apuzzo at:
http://puzo1.blogspot.com/2009/09/natural-born-citizen-clause-requires.html
“The Natural Born Citizen Clause of Our U.S. Constitution Requires that Both of the Child’s Parents Be U.S. Citizens At the Time of Birth
…The meaning of a “natural born Citizen” as expressed by Vattel, including that both parents of the child must be citizens at the time of the child’s birth in order to make the child a “natural born Citizen,” was carried forward in American history following the Founding. ”
That’s RIGHT, “natural born” does have an extra meaning beyond that of “Citizen.” You see, not all “citizens” are born on U.S. soil. Those who are are “natural born”.
See?
But Doc, you are using a technique that the birthers are unfamilar with. It is known in this country as “common sense”….Rondeau is a perfect example of someone that sees a conspiracy behind every corner….It is no different than the birthers stating that the Constitution actually says that a “natural born citizen” is one born to 2 citizen parents”…
Constitutional scholar????? These folks wouldn’t know a Constitutional law scholar if it bit them on the the backside. Any guesses on the number published law journal articles on the subject of the Constitution by Mr. Apuzzo?
Yeah I almost threw up in my mouth reading that. Apuzzo is constitutional scholar like I’m the last king of scotland. Apuzzo is a joke I think even he knows it and its why he avoids this place like the plague.
I know…I know….How about zero or none? Or the same amount as Orly, Leo, and Jensen combined….