RETURN OF THE BIRTHERS

AFTER FIRST OBSERVING the notorious "birther" movement back in July, 2008, long before many in the nation had tuned into the election, even before the financial crisis finally broke, which I anticipated atop the formidable shoulders of others here and here and here, there is finally a break in the courts for the "eligibilty to serve" suit to get heard.

In what could prove to be a turning point in the legal challenges to Barack Obama’s eligibility to be president, a federal judge in California, also a former US Marine, has scheduled a hearing on the merits of a federal court case raising those questions.

While there have been dozens of legal challenges to Obama’s status as a “natural born citizen,” many of have summarily dismissed while others still languish in the lower courts.

The US Constitution, Article 2, Section 1, states, “No Person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the Office of President.”

Some of the lawsuits question whether he was actually born in Hawaii, as he insists. If he was born out of the country, Obama’s American mother, the suits contend, was too young at the time of his birth to confer American citizenship to her son under the law at the time.

Other challenges have focused on Obama’s citizenship through his father, a Kenyan subject to the jurisdiction of the United Kingdom at the time of his birth, thus making him a dual citizen. The cases contend the framers of the Constitution excluded dual citizens from qualifying as natural born.

Complicating the situation is candidate and President Obama’s decision to spend sums estimated from the hundreds of thousands of dollars to several millions to avoid releasing a state birth certificate that would put to rest all of the questions.

It has been concluded that the “Certification of Live Birth” posted online and widely touted as “Obama’s birth certificate” does not in ANY way prove he was born in Hawaii, since the same “short-form” document is easily obtainable for children not born in Hawaii. The true “long-form” birth certificate—which includes information such as the name of the birth hospital and attending physician—is the only document that can prove Obama was born in Hawaii, but to date he has not permitted its release for public or press scrutiny.

Congressional hearings were held to determine whether Sen. John McCain was constitutionally eligible to be president as a “natural born citizen,” although, defying both official protocol and common logic, no controlling legal authority ever sought to verify Obama’s claim to a Hawaiian birth.

The birthers are considered fringe folks, crazed radicals, racists, and inconsequential, but here's a look at the latest fring controverst, this time on the left. First, let's go to Big Hollywood.

And now, let's take a peek at the firestorm created by a White House spokesman who said the "Internet Left fringe needs to grow up, and take off their pajamas so that this administration can get on with more important issues" here's that link. Or something like that. Here's another take.

THE AMERICAN CITIZEN

THEODORE ROOSEVELT'S IDEAS on immigration, immigrants, and on being an effective American in 1907 were once considered sane, profitable, and good for both the country and the people. Some of us still think it is a brilliant sketch of American inspiration, and are astonished that some people have the audacity to disagree:

"In the first place, we should insist that if the immigrant who comes here in good faith becomes an American and assimilates himself to us, he shall be treated on an exact equality with everyone else, for it is an outrage to discriminate against any such man because of creed, or birthplace, or origin. But this is predicated upon the person's becoming in every facet an American, and nothing but an American...There can be no divided allegiance here. Any man who says he is an American, but something else also, isn't an American at all. We have room for but one flag, the American flag... We have room for but one language here, and that is the English language.. and we have room for but one sole loyalty and that is a loyalty to the American people."

—Theodore Roosevelt, 1907

Every American citizen needs to read this!

AFRICAN PRESS INTERNATIONAL

MICHELLE OBAMA APPARENTLY IS ANGRY AGAIN. In a rather frightening but revealing article, the African Press International has claimed that it received a telephone call from the would-be First Lady who proceeded to drop a few bombs, including a few choice words on Obama's citizenship controversy, the so-called racist blogosphere, some unspecified evil people, Louis Farrakhan's premature support, and the API's conspiracy against supporting her husband his elevation for the office he seeks (or more to the point, is entitled to hold).

Be sure to read the comment section, as well. If this API organization is legitimate and if this report is truthful, it is not an illusion to think that the chips may fall in the streets and neighborhoods of America before things get better. Perhaps it's time to turn one's focus to particle physics.

Couple this with Jesse Jackson's recent comments in France, reported by the New York Post as strongly anti-semitic and anti-Israel (which Jesse "Hymietown" Jackson damn well knows sunk his own campaign for the White House), then we seem to have a growing discontent and a thickening plot within the African American community to sabotage the Obama candidacy.

But then, so much has gone unnoticed or covered up with regards to the Obama campaign, why should these latest two wrinkles sully the spotless cloth that is Barack Obama?

TEDDY ROOSEVELT HAD IT RIGHT

Teddy Roosevelt in Egypt
Despite almost certain risk of being tagged a filthy racist pig and anything else the heavy hearted, high-minded so-called globalist, uh I mean, anti-globalist, uh fiddlesticks, the uh, let's call 'em the "which is it" crowd, can fathom in their ragged pursuit of raging chaos they prefer to call peace in their lifetime—when it comes to immigration and those immigrants who refuse to assimilate into America, TR said it best:

"In the first place, we should insist that if the immigrant who comes here in good faith becomes an American and assimilates himself to us, he shall be treated on an exact equality with everyone else, for it is an outrage to discriminate against any such man because of creed, or birthplace, or origin. But this is predicated upon the person's becoming in every facet an American, and nothing but an American...There can be no divided allegiance here. Any man who says he is an American, but something else also, isn't an American at all. We have room for but one flag, the American flag ... We have room for but one language here, and that is the English language ... and we have room for but one sole loyalty and that is a loyalty to the American people."

Theodore Roosevelt—from a letter he wrote to the president of the American Defense Society on January 3, 1919 three days prior to his death.

To clarify these points I am working offline on an essay which seeks to identify and apotheosize The True American. Of course, this process must begin with Thomas Paine. And I don't mean the monolithic American, but simply the true American. Stay tuned.

TWO KINDS OF PEOPLE

Photograph by Darrel V. Willis

Originally published on November 5, 1996

You have a point to a certain extent when you mock my statement that "there are two kinds of people in the word—those who vote and those who don’t vote." For even those you suggest that voting is a hoax, seem to miss my original point.

I struggle with the question of citizenship, more specifically—voting or not voting. Many people suggest that voting is a cruel hoax, postulating with wimper and whine, that there is only one party, one slate, one candidate, and that’s the fascist corporate dog. Is this for real? Perhaps I am just a silly pawn participating in a sick process that allows the slave to choose his own master. Maybe I can't see the forest for the trees and am wasting precious brain cells worrying about this issue or that. I don't know. Do I betray myself as an artist and an individualist by convincing myself that citizenship, the right to vote, the right to serve on a jury is important? Socrates didn't think so. But then, Nietzsche thought Socrates destroyed the aesthetic of Greek tragedy, of philosophy.

I am happy that I got up and went out to vote. I am happy that I took the time to read several perspectives on the issues, coming to my own conclusions, however petty they may seem on the worldstage at any given point of social struggle, and I don't have any regrets about voting for one of the big parties in spite how I believe the party system in this country is designed to keep new parties from arising. They make it so cost prohibitive, the only rebel we get to see rising from the dust is yet another rich little weasel dusting himself off with the people’s rag.

I also think it’s a shame that more people don't see their right to vote as important. Imagine, if more people did, we might actually see some change. Whether that would be for the better is up for debate, but a true democracy would be one where every eligible citizen adequately informed rises to the challenge and casts a vote. The original idea was that the American citizenry should have a non-violent revolution every election.Of course this idea is naive, and superficial, bugt it is the spirit from which we embrace our heritage. That's what we should strive for instead of sitting on lazy, uppity haunches pretending that we're staging some big protest by not voting. I know a lot of people who don't vote and they don't vote because they simply don't give a rats ass not from some higher level of protest.

I spit on the so-called "independents" determined not to be sheep by not voting. They are allowing their voices to be silent and are not doing anything subversive or meaningful by not voting.

Vote. It's free. You can go to the booth and vote for absolutely anyone you want. You can write in a candidate. That would be much more effective than sitting on a couch with a beer and a ciggy pretending to protest with apathy. There isn't enough revolution happening right now. We perhaps need some voting booth agitation to get our juices flowing. Isn’t that spirit still available to us?

But I digress.