The meaning of Abercrombie’s tacit admission that he hasn’t found the birth certificate

Bruce B. writes:

A question on this entry: what contents of a birth certificate could be damaging to a person in an advanced liberal society? What could a birth certificate reveal other than the fact that his father isn’t who we think?

LA replies:

We know for a self-evident fact that Obama has been concealing his birth certificate. Therefore we know that there is something about the circumstances of his birth which, advanced liberal society or not, he himself regards as so damaging that he feels he must conceal it. He may have been born out of wedlock, which is highly likely, given that Barack Sr. was married to a Kenyan woman when he met Stanley Ann. Even if advanced liberal society claimed not to care about that, Obama may care very much about it. Or he may be the son of a man other than Barack Obama Sr. Given that he has constructed his entire identity around his “dreams from his father,” if it turned out that Obama Sr. was not his father, Obama Jr.’s entire life would be revealed as a fraud.

Or it may be that Obama was legitimate and the son of Obama Sr., but was not born in Hawaii, which would also reveal his life story as a lie. Or perhaps his parents were married but he was not born in the U.S., which would mean that he was not a natural born citizen and thus not qualified to be U.S. President, as has been discussed in detail here.

Whatever the truth is, this much is now at least provisionally demonstrated as true: that the birth certificate is not there. Either it has been destroyed, meaning that Obama had it destroyed in order to cover up the truth about himself, or it never existed, at least in Hawaii. Either way, it is now established, not as a fantasy in the bigoted brains of birthers, but as something close to a certainty, that the circumstances of Obama’s birth are unknown. We do not know the truth about Obama’s birth. But we do know something. We know that we do not know the truth about his birth. And such knowledge of not knowing is itself a form of truth. It is indeed the primary truth that the birthers have been insisting on all along; and now, given Gov. Abercrombie’s apparent inability to find the birth certificate of Barack Obama in the official records of the state of which he, Abercrombie, is the governor, it is a truth that can no longer be denied.

Abercrombie’s failure to find the birth certificate is even more spectacular and damaging to Obama and his defenders, given that in October 2008, Chiyome Fukino, the Director of the Hawaii Department of Health, formally stated that she had “seen and verified that the Hawai’i State Department of Health has Sen. Obama’s original birth certificate on record in accordance with state policies and procedures.” See, at the above linked entry, my discussion of this patently misleading statement.

- end of initial entry -

January 20

Tyrrell L. writes:

Is it possible that the scandalous element of Obama’s birth certificate is something as mundane as the date? Maybe he’s a little older or younger than he claims, and is embarrassed to come clean. As long as you’re exploring all possibilities, I thought I’d throw it out there.

p.s. Absolutely love VFR.

James N. writes:

Regardless of the location of his birth, if his real father was the British subject from Kenya, then I am convinced that Barack Hussein Obama Jr. could not be a natural-born citizen, since by statute and the Law of Nations he had dual citizenship at birth.

I am also convinced, however, that since “natural born citizen” is not defined in Article II and has never been litigated to a conclusion, it is impossible to displace him using this argument. Most Americans are unfamiliar with the issue, and most would regard an attempt to disqualify him now (using the dual nationality argument) as post-hoc reasoning. His most passionate supporters would have some justification in feeling abused if their champion were brought down in this way.

And, that being the case, even a Court with so expansive a view of its powers as the U.S. Supreme Court would (rightly) be most reluctant to enter the lists in such a cause.

If, however, it could be proved that he was born outside of the U.S., that would be a different matter. Most Americans, rightly or wrongly, understand “NBC” to mean “born a native,” or, even more simply, “born here.” Were it proven otherwise, and were conspiracy to conceal the facts revealed, he would be toast—and rightly so.

LA replies:

I think it is a distraction, and very premature, and undermining of the birther cause, to discuss Obama’s possible removal from office. The point is getting at the truth. Further, it is highly unlikely that, even if it were determined that he was not a natural born citizen, he would ever be removed over this issue. There is no precedent or procedure for doing it, and it would take something like a civil war to do it. But he would be permanently tarred by it, and by his cover-up of the facts, and certainly, even if the truth is not discovered, the Congress will pass a law setting up procedures for determining the natural born citizen status of future presidential candidates.

However, I must add that I think it is highly unlikely that we will ever get at the truth of Obama’s birth, other than the truth that we don’t know the truth, and that there has been a massive cover-up of the truth.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at January 19, 2011 07:12 PM | Send