And where were you born again ...

[Top Gun]

Blacks Law Dictionary (9th Edition) defines 'Natural Born Citizen' as "A person born within the jurisdiction of a national government".

"IF" I interpret this correct. according to the legal definition, you are required to be born on U.S. soil to be considered a Natural Born citizen

your Lineage does not make you a Natural born citizen

But by the legal definition, a child born of a United States citizen is also a United States citizen by default. They're within that legal jurisdiction of the US government from the moment they were born. The true legal counterpart to "natural-born" is "naturalized," an individual who was the citizen of another country by birth but later became a United States citizen. Obama wouldn't fit into that category no matter where he was born. (There are apparently some restrictions on citizenship by parentage, but as far as I can tell, Obama's mother more than qualified.) The phrase "natural-born citizen" by itself doesn't even specify if it's restricted to jus soli (born on US soil) or includes jus sanguinis (born to US parents) as well, so looking at the literal text doesn't tell us much.

Again, this is all moot, since the guy was born in Hawaii regardless.

[Nightshade]

Looked at the PDF.

For some strange reason, they decided to add a green pattern behind the copy of the certificate after it was scanned.

Meh. They should have just scanned it and released it BW... So what?

[CUDA]

.

[Will Robinson]

Looked at the PDF.

For some strange reason, they decided to add a green pattern behind the copy of the certificate after it was scanned.

Meh. They should have just scanned it and released it BW... So what?

If this is true it is odd. It has numerous layers: watch
If it is just some normal result of the process they should have locked the layers or whatever you call it in Photoshop because obviously seeing the different parts all on their own layer will incite conspiracy worse than not being able to find it at all. I think someone is purposely tweaking someone here but not sure who is doing it to who...

[Ferno]

Looked at the PDF.

For some strange reason, they decided to add a green pattern behind the copy of the certificate after it was scanned.

Meh. They should have just scanned it and released it BW... So what?

[Jeff250]

OMG! The "K" in "Kenya" that was printed over the form border is in a different vector object than the rest of the text! His father must have been born in Enya!

It's just shitty OCR, people...

[Duper]

KB, my back yard when I was 6 watching the sun come up on my tricycle.

[Nightshade]

Looked at the PDF.

For some strange reason, they decided to add a green pattern behind the copy of the certificate after it was scanned.

Meh. They should have just scanned it and released it BW... So what?

Erm, I was commenting on the fact that whoever put the certificate copy together decided to put it on some kind of green pattern that wasn't necessary.

That Ferno believes in alien masters is completely up to him.

[Foil]

It's just **** OCR, people...

Exactly why I think it was a huge mistake for Obama to release it.

The birther movement is very like conspiracy-theory; pushers latch onto anything they can find, whether it really makes sense or not.

[woodchip]

So it seems Trump is the real winner here as he can now claim to be the only person to force Obama to show his real (?) birth certificate.
What I find almost amusing is Obama talking about putting the birther distraction behind him so he can get on with the important things like the economy. To show he means business, Obama then flits off to do a important Oprah show and afterwards flies to New York City for a fund raiser. I'm impressed how focused on America's problems our President is.

[Jeff250]

Exactly why I think it was a huge mistake for Obama to release it.

The birther movement is very like conspiracy-theory; pushers latch onto anything they can find, whether it really makes sense or not.

The problem was that the birther movement was becoming a little too mainstream. By releasing his birth certificate, it re-marginalizes the movement, which serves a political advantage to Obama. The birthers are back to only being the type of people who never would have voted for Obama anyways and back to casting Obama in a sympathetic light to independents who generally recognize their nutjobbery.

[Top Gun]

So it seems Trump is the real winner here as he can now claim to be the only person to force Obama to show his real (?) birth certificate.

The only thing Trump can claim is having the worst "hair" in America.

[Will Robinson]

So it seems Trump is the real winner here as he can now claim to be the only person to force Obama to show his real (?) birth certificate.

The only thing Trump can claim is having the worst "hair" in America.

I think Woodchip has a valid point. Trump pushed the issue instead of making self serving calculations on how pushing it could hurt him (see: Palin). It may be that it was going to build to the tipping point without his help, we don't really know but regardless of how much Trump actually caused it to happen, the perception is Trump stood in front of america and said 'Mr. President you are not above scrutiny so answer the damn question!' and the President appears to have responded to Trumps lead. That's a win for Trumpp and a concession for Obama.

Perception is key in american politics because so many voters respond to the theatrics instead of understanding the mechanics of the issues.
So Trump gets to claim credit for taking the lead and for showing no fear for his own political survival when he called out the President. The likely net result is he picked up additional support for doing so. He really had nothing to lose politically as long as he was bold enough to claim credit instead of trying to change the subject when the certificate was released.
and, yea, his hair is the silliest comb over ever. Saturday Night Live should have some fun with that, the whole cast is probably making donations to the Trump for President fund as we speak!

[Jeff250]

It's not like all Donald Trump did was ask questions. He suggested ridiculous claims that naturally turned out to be false. He may have loaded them down with weasel words like "my investigation team told me that..." but using weasel words doesn't score him any political points with me either. He also led an investigation team that was either incompetent or an entire fabrication. (Obama's birth certificate has an order of magnitude more evidence for its existence than Trump's investigation team.)

[Top Gun]

All Trump has done over the past month or two is spout mindless inanities and ridiculous "promises" about what he'd do if hell froze over and he managed to become president. While he did make the issue somewhat more visible, it's not like he created it himself, and all that visibility really did is make him look like more of a drooling idiot to most people. It may have been enough to push Obama over the edge into finally releasing the document, but I'm sure he'd thought about it on multiple occasions beforehand. Trump's already crowing like a bloated rooster about it; there's no need to feed his ego any more by assigning him legitimate credit.

Also, I love The Onion.

[Spidey]

If they actually used OCR for this document, it was a huge mistake. The only practical reasons for converting to a vector & text is to edit the document, be able to search or reduce file size. (they could have done that for in house use only)

I don’t give a damn if Obama was born on Pluto, I think the document should have been scanned as a raster (bitmap), then released to the public.

I mean like…give people a reason to suspect something…why don’t you.

(I won’t download that thing, because there are too many nasty tricks you can play with a PDF, so I will just take Jeff‘s word for it)

[Will Robinson]

All Trump has done over the past month or two is spout mindless inanities and ridiculous "promises" about what he'd do if hell froze over and he managed to become president. ....

It's not like all Donald Trump did was ask questions. He suggested ridiculous claims that naturally turned out to be false. He may have loaded them down with weasel words like "my investigation team told me that..." but using weasel words doesn't score him any political points with me either.

Lol! A bit skewed both of you but, at he same time there is certainly plenty of substance to support your perspectives but the thing that made me laugh out loud after reading it is I realized from your assessments it looks like he's absolutely perfect for the job if you compare him to the last three guys to get elected!!

The one area where he excels is he is driven to triumph in the deal...any deal he makes he only wants to win. He doesn't give a ratts ass about a party or anyones feelings or what people say about him. He doesn't compromise to guild his path for an inevitable career change. He's always in it to win it and if he was doing that in hammering out a budget between R's and D's, or trade policy with allies and enemies....whatever it was... he wouldn't be nearly as willing to accept defeat as any politician that is likely to hold the office instead of him. They all are more than willing to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory for the sake of self preservation. I don't think Trump can find relief in being a cog for someone else's wheel in any endeavor he chooses he seems to need to win on his terms or die trying. He's Favre like and we've had enough cheerleaders throwing the ball so I'd take him with all that he doesn't do right because just like with Bret Favre it would be fun to watch him fight his heart out purely for the glory of winning outright instead of calculated safe bull★■◆● that has brought us to so many limp finishes.

[flip]

Lol, I think Trump and Obama are golfing buddies. Trump's the heckler and Obama's the showman

[Bet51987]

.

[flip]

Lol, yeah, Trump's stupid, What a dumbass.

[woodchip]

Lol, yeah, Trump's stupid, What a dumbass.

Since his net worth is 7 billion, I wish I was as stupid as he is.

[flip]

Lol, I love it. Makes me believe it even more now. I say some off the wall ★■◆●, then Bee comes in and confirms it. Cmon, Bee, do you really think one of the richest and business savvy people in the world, wouldn't have checked his facts before he went on the attack? No, I don't think Trump is a dumbass at all.

[Nightshade]

No, I don't think Trump is a dumbass at all.

No he isn't- nor is he really running for president. He's out to get himself publicity for some other thing he's gonna sell or use for his own business.

Trump hasn't been a serious candidate, nor will he ever be- even if he does 'run.'

[Bet51987]

.

[flip]

Uhm,no. That's not what I said or implied at all. I'll give you a second chance though, if you want to backup and regroup.

[Bet51987]

.

[Jeff250]

Bet, I believe that Flip is suggesting that Trump and Obama are working together and that Trump is intentionally throwing the game for Obama. I don't think I believe it yet, but it's probably the most plausible conspiracy theory thrown around so far in this thread.

If they actually used OCR for this document, it was a huge mistake. The only practical reasons for converting to a vector & text is to edit the document, be able to search or reduce file size. (they could have done that for in house use only)

I think people are reading too much conniving into this. I'm imagining some guy in Hawaii just using the same machine that he always uses to scan these in (or just using whatever *.pdf he already had on file) and then sending that to the White House. I think that putting any more effort into it than that would have been the mistake.

Lol! A bit skewed both of you but, at he same time there is certainly plenty of substance to support your perspectives but the thing that made me laugh out loud after reading it is I realized from your assessments it looks like he's absolutely perfect for the job if you compare him to the last three guys to get elected!!

If you think my assessment is skewed, you're welcome to clarify, but upon rereading it, I like it even more than when I originally posted it! One of the differences that strikes me about this issue versus other political issues (and the respective politicians) is that this issue is so black and white. The birth certificate either exists or it doesn't. He campaigned on it's nonexistence, but he was wrong--it *does* exist. Most politicians gamble in a grey area. Maybe that's one reason why this seems extra silly.

[Jeff250]

Also, for reference, if people want to perform their own analysis on the *.pdf, here's all I did:

I dragged and dropped the *.pdf into Inkscape (a free and open source tool). Then I repeatedly right clicked on the grouped vector object that was imported and hit "ungroup" until it split into six or so different vector objects.

[flip]

Bet, I believe that Flip is suggesting that Trump and Obama are working together and that Trump is intentionally throwing the game for Obama.

Yes. I'm not saying I'm totally convinced myself, but it does seem an epic foolish and stupid move from an otherwise pretty smart individual.
Trump can do just like King David and run butt ass naked down the street, and at the end of the day he's still King. Arrogant SOB .

[Will Robinson]

Jeff you pointed at Trump making false claims...I think it is skewed to portray Trumps empty words as something of a departure from what Obama would say or has said. I drew the analogy that Trump was exhibiting a similar trait shared by Obama, Bush and Clinton. They said lots of stuff that didn't pan out to be true. I just thought it was funny that you took something that Obama does very often and used it as a reason Trump isn't in the same league as Obama.

Trump said enough is enough, cough it up and Obama coughed it up. It looks like Obama blinked. He most likely didn't care what Trump was saying other than it was getting traction with voters. As of a few days ago only 35% of america believed Obama was born here! That is serious stuff for a guy who is already in campaign mode. So it doesn't matter one bit how silly Trump looks to someone like Bee or TC etc it only matters to Trump how it looks to those other 65% who thought that maybe there was something to the story. they all know that if Obama had the certificate he was belligerently refusing to show it. To those people it looks like Trump called him out and the President surrendered. That is not a win for Obama...

Bee can call it a win for Obama because she thinks it made Trump look foolish but she already thought that! Obama hasn't won anything from her she was already on his side! She wasn't going to abandon her guy but there are lots of people who have abandoned him and lots of other people who are just as dogmatic about opposing Obama as Bee is about supporting him and that group is who Trump was performing for.
I don't think Obama won many new supporters, if any at all, off of this situation but Trump certainly has. Expect it to continue, as long as Trump is on offense and Obama is reacting to him Trump is winning. Trump is playing the angered adult scolding the impudent teenager in public. Obama needs to move away quickly and quietly...lets see if the media will let him, they want to help him but they love the drama so they may end up giving Trump the spotlight he needs to continue the assault.

I imagine there will be more about the birth certificate to come, like 'who had it' and 'who was just saying it was lost' etc. as well as the latest 'lets see your school records and written work' lol imagine the papers he wrote! You know there is some sweet anti capitalism anti-american stuff in there locked away deep in the basement of a Harvard library.

The notion that this episode helps Obama is way off in my opinion. It didn't hurt him with the loyalists but they can't get him re-elected. He needs to energize a lot of people who he has let down and flat out lied to. I don't think trading blows with Trump is going to get him that kind of fire because now Obama owns this mess, economy, war, war, unemployment, etc. all the things we were supposed to hope for change on have stagnated and festered under his watch.
I predict as we get near the election he starts losing in the polls and gets frustrated and plays the race card a little too hard and that will be the straw that breaks the undecided/independent voters back.
He better hope for a Trump/Palin ticket to energize the left but it looks like Trump is just playing Picador for someone rational and calm to come to everyones rescue at the right time.

[Top Gun]

Lol, yeah, Trump's stupid, What a dumbass.

Since his net worth is 7 billion, I wish I was as stupid as he is.

How many times has Trump declared bankruptcy, again? And he says he's perfectly qualified to improve America's financial status?

[Will Robinson]

Lol, yeah, Trump's stupid, What a dumbass.

Since his net worth is 7 billion, I wish I was as stupid as he is.

How many times has Trump declared bankruptcy, again? And he says he's perfectly qualified to improve America's financial status?

How does that scenario differ from the way our current President and Congress are running finances?!? Lol!
besides, Trump came from bankruptcy to net worth of 7 billion! We need that kind of transition right now! At least he has shown he can pull it back up again unlike anyone else who has ever been in power...

[Jeff250]

Jeff you pointed at Trump making false claims...I think it is skewed to portray Trumps empty words as something of a departure from what Obama would say or has said.

My intent was never to take that position, but I actually am sympathetic toward it. When I mentioned Obama, my intention was to point out the irony that Obama's birth certificate has a lot more evidence for its existence than Trump's dubious investigative team. But I am resistant to this "it's a wash" mentality. For one thing, I don't think you would find "but Republicans do it too" a very convincing comeback whenever you catch Obama in a lie. But also, I really am struggling to recall when any of our former three presidents' primary campaign was to take such an obviously false stance, even in foresight, on such a purely factual issue and then build it up with such a web of lies. Knowing you, you probably will be able to recall such instances. But still, I think it's fair to call Trump out on these lies without having to give a list of every other instance where previous politicians have done it too.

As of a few days ago only 35% of america believed Obama was born here! That is serious stuff for a guy who is already in campaign mode. So it doesn't matter one bit how silly Trump looks to someone like Bee or TC etc it only matters to Trump how it looks to those other 65% who thought that maybe there was something to the story.

The USA Today/Gallup poll I found says that 38% of Americans "definitely" believe Obama was born here versus 8% of Americans that "definitely" believe Obama was born elsewhere, so your analysis seems backwards. I think that this is going to help Obama with independents more than it is going to hurt.

In any case, speculating what most people will think is difficult, since it's so hard to get inside of their simple minds. I'm more interested in how these events have changed *your* support for him as a presidential candidate, not how you think this will change others' support. Has your opinion of his ability to be President of the United States really improved in light of these events?

[Will Robinson]

I don't think you should consider this event as the bulk of what Trump is campaigning on. He isn't even running for sure and he has talked a lot about other issues but the media isn't going to highlight the things he says that hurt Obama when they can focus on feeding the 'he's a nutcase' scenario.And it hasn't changed my opinion of him, he's being who he always was... my support for him is primarily based on a desire to see the two parties self destruct. I don't think he'll run but there is no one with R or D that I'll vote for anyway.
I don't think his abilities to be an executive, which are pretty well established, are compromised by his playing the game he's playing and it is no different than the games the others play.

[Tunnelcat]

You know,Trump and the birther issue has got to be the stupidest, biggest waste of time I've ever seen a bunch of bored people suck into as a reason to decry a president. It's a distraction suckers! This country has more important problems that need addressing and this one isn't it! If Obama's doing things wrong, HE WILL GET VOTED OUT! That's the way it works in this country.

[Bet51987]

.

[flip]

No, what will happen, is that by the time the election is in full swing, so many stupid ass questions will have already been asked that nobody will bother asking real ones. Not a real big accomplishment actually by the looks of it .

Edit: Oh yeah, and Obama is gonna shine like a new penny.

[Jeff250]

my support for him is primarily based on a desire to see the two parties self destruct. I don't think he'll run but there is no one with R or D that I'll vote for anyway.
I don't think his abilities to be an executive, which are pretty well established, are compromised by his playing the game he's playing and it is no different than the games the others play.

I share your enthusiasm for the destruction of the two parties. But like you said, his games are no different. When I say I want an independent candidate, this is not what I have in mind.