Wednesday, November 19, 2008

Obama Claim is Circulating

Below is part of an interseting email I received. What do you think?

Former Deputy Attorney General Philip Berg filed a lawsuit addressing the citizenship status of Barack Obama before the Democratic National Convention and copied Democratic Chairman Howard Dean. It should have alerted them that there was a possible problem before they selected their nominee. But that problem was ignored. Other lawsuits filed before Nov. 4 were also ignored, placing us in what could be a constitutional crisis.
The good news is the real election hasn't taken place yet. The Electoral College doesn't meet until Dec. 15. That gives us less than a month to find the answers to the looming questions regarding whether Barack Obama meets the constitutional requirements for the office of president.
The courts don't seem to be in any hurry to take up their responsibility as guardians of the Constitution, so now Congress must step in. You see, members of Congress are sworn to uphold the Constitution, and when they vote in January to confirm (or reject) the vote of the Electoral College, they can't very well do that unless they know for certain that the basic constitutional requirements for office have been met.
An ad running this week in the Washington Times Weekly asks three questions America needs to know: "Was Barack Obama really born in Kenya?" "Is he really a citizen of Indonesia?" And, "Does the Constitution still matter?"
As I wrote about last week, there are many reasons to doubt whether Barack Obama meets the requirements for the office of president. First, there's that pesky tape from Sarah Obama, Barack's grandmother, where she says, "I was in the delivery room in (Mombosa) Kenya when he was born Aug. 4, 1961." Secondly, there's the matter of U.S. law. If only one parent was an American citizen, as in Obama's case, the law at the time of Obama's birth required one parent to have been an American citizen for at least 10 years – five of which had to have happened after the age of 14. Since Obama's mother was only 18 at the time of Obama's birth, he would not qualify as an American citizen if his grandmother is right about him being born abroad.
Thirdly, there's no original birth certificate – just a "certification of live birth" posted on a website experts say is forged and altered. Fourthly, there's the issue of Indonesian citizenship, which is a prerequisite to attending school there. Add to that the fact that Obama's stepfather, Lolo Soetoro, is listed as his father on his Indonesian school records. If he had U.S. citizenship, according to Indonesian law, he would have lost it when he attended school there or if he was adopted by his stepfather as his records indicate.
As the ad proclaims, "The Constitution matters" and is still worth defending. All we are asking is that Congress takes their oath to defend it seriously. If Obama can prove he meets the basic but essential constitutional requirements, fine, he'll serve legally. But if he cannot provide simple proof, then he cannot. We're not asking for the world here, just the original birth certificate that each of us delivers when getting a passport, driver's license or Social Security card. If we can't tell the clerk at the post office to check out the digital photo of a certificate posted online, neither should the guy running for president. Members of Congress: If you have taken an oath to defend the Constitution, now's the time to keep it.