Soccer Dad

Looks like they fixed it!

While you are "crossing out" the Obama citizenship question I suggest you (a) Google "natural born citizen" which is the question regarding Obama. Not if he is a citizen but if he is a natural born citizen. Then I suggest that you read the 14th Amendment to the Constitution. Then I suggest you check the rather strange Hawaiian laws regarding the birth certificates they issued after Hawaii became a state. Without questioning that Obama is in fact a citizen, since his father was never a US Citizen, under the accepted definitions of Natural Born Citizen, he does not qualify. I have nothing against Obama but I have a lot against the Constitution being bent, tweaked and trashed.

Hotair--a right wing blog that has continuously rebutted the claim that Obama was not born in the US--has a post featuring a copy from the archives of the Honolulu Advertiser in a print copy from August
1961, featuring an item announcing Obama's birth.

Check it out

Hotair--a right wing blog that has continuously rebutted the claim that
Obama was not born in the US--has a post featuring a copy from the
archives of the Honolulu Advertiser in a print copy from August
1961, featuring an item announcing Obama's birth.

Check it out

Elie,

You really shouldn't try to play with dangerous things like laws. You might hurt yourself.

Ever since 1898, when the US Supreme Court decided you had to be born here to be a natural born citizen, and that wsa all that was required, (United States v. Wong Kim Ark, 169 U.S. 649 (1898)) what you say is "the accepted definitions [sic]" is just wrong. So please, stop bending, tweaking and trashing the Constitution. It's important to the rest of us.

Don.

If we all focus on self improvement, we'll have a lot less time to criticize others.

I humbly suggest that you may be overreacting a bit, and in doing so are losing focus on the issues which really concern the future of our Country.

Natalie,

Since you didn't say to whom you were directing your comment, I suppose you meant all of us. Point taken.

But as for the Constitution, well, to paraphrase one of my fave conservatives, passion in the defense of the Constitution is no vice.

Now. As for the "ineffective oath of office" nonissue, the Twentieth Amendment is the authority for succession.

And, BTW, if you (Daled) were right, Bush would still be president. Now, do you really want that? Let's go get him and sober him up!!!

Anyway, the Twentieth says that succession takes place, without anything more, at noon on the twentieth of January. The Oath is merely an oath. It is the act of affirming loyalty to the Constitution, nothing more. And there's no requirement anywhere in the law for a bible.

I suppose he could have made some unconstitutional appointments during that time, and nobody would have anything to say about it, since he hadn't sworn to uphold it.

Call the papers. Call the Washington Times. Call Rush! Call 911, Hillary Clinton is about to ruin our country, big time!

You know what this means? This means that Sen. John McCain has won the election, and that we won't have to bother with dealing with that nasty ol' recession that sits close off our coasts at this very minute!

SAAaaaayyyyy. Maybe he WASN'T born in the United States, after all.

And, BTW, if you (Daled) were right, Bush would still be president. Now, do you really want that? Let's go get him and sober him up!!!

On the contrary, I find Obama's unilateral actions in the Middle East very sobering, thank you.

Daled,

"On the contrary, I find Obama's unilateral actions in the Middle East very sobering, thank you."

Not to mention long, long overdue. BTW, how do you make those cool italics? Can't find it on this site.

It's too easy, and too tempting, to say that "Arabs caused 9/11, so let's blame them all."

There are just too many of them to ignore. Too many to nuke. And it wasn't every Arab, or I'd agree with you. Most people in the Mideast just hope when they get home, they get laid, like we do.

There is just no identifiable downside you can point out, from telling Muslims we wish them no harm.

If you really wanted to punish those responsible for 9/11, you'd go out and get an electric car, powered (ultimately) by good old American coal. And contribute to the well-deserved bankrupting of Saudi Arabia.

But you don't want that. You want to show dislike, hatred and contempt for people you know nothing about. It's so easy, and so lazy. Just like turning on your TV. Like eating fast food instead of cooking. No effort required at all. Just pay McDonald's, or Jack, several times what the food is worth, and they'll trot it out.

But a newly-elected American president agreeing to be interviewed by Al Jazeera? Somehow this is a negative that will in some way hurt the U.S.?

As I said, if you can show me the harm, everyone will be educated. But I doubt you can.

Rather than make up what it is that I think, maybe you should actually look at the link I provided and see why I find so sobering--and unsettling about Obama's actions in the Middle East. All you need do is read the article and you will know what I am talking about.

But you don't want that. You want to show dislike, hatred and contempt for people you know nothing about. It's so easy, and so lazy. Just like turning on your TV. Like eating fast food instead of cooking. No effort required at all. Just pay McDonald's, or Jack, several times what the food is worth, and they'll trot it out.

Daled,

I didn't think you were serious with that link. Sorry. And BTW, you haven't tipped me with the italic hint.

The link is, on the one hand, to the New York Post. OK, if someone believes it's a newspaper, I'll concede that for the sake of argument.

But even if one believes the NYP is a newspaper, what you cited me to is an editorial. Do you really get your facts from editorials?

That is NOT news reporting. It is editorializing, and it surprises me that you would cite it for some factual source. Editorials, whether Washington Times' or Washington Post's, are not news reports, and this wasn't, either.

They surely can offer their opinion, that is fine with me, just as when you do. But you certainly won't find me trying to enlighten you as to facts by telling you to go read Thom Hartmann.

You are being told what they want you to think. And what I said about you and McDonald's? Well, I can't really do any better for you than that.

Find a source that is trustworthy to write news stories, believe no more than a third, and cite me to that and we'll have something to talk about. But editorials? They believe what they want to believe, and I believe what I want to believe. It's a discussion of opinion, and no more.

I thought you had something serious to say.

It's too easy, and too tempting, to say that "Arabs caused 9/11, so let's blame them all."
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Because they are part of the culture which breeds it. They don't speak out against it and instead blame America and Israel for the pathologies within their own culture and societies.

I'm sick and tired of the notion that we must listen to and respect the muslims. What about what muslims must do in terms of human rights and respecting non-muslims?

Sorry, I thought you would notice that it is not an editorial. I assumed you might be familiar with the name of Amir Taheri.

In any case, whether The New York Post is a newspaper or an aardvark is irrelevant. And considering how the media has gone ga-ga over Obama makes your distinction editorials and news reports somewhat arbitrary.

Anyway, if you don't feel like it, that's fine, but this stuff about finding "a source that is trustworthy to write news stories" is just empty rhetoric and is just as subjective as the editorials you disdain.

Laura,

There's a lot that I agree with in your post. "Part of the culture which breeds it" is pretty weak, though. I don't believe this is the core of your views on the topic.

But what else you say seems OK to me. It's just, as I said earlier, what do you do, nuke them?

Much of what is accepted in the Muslim world as directed practice of the religion is actually tribal brutality and tribal bigotry. (Female circumcision and isolation of the sexes after puberty come to mind) It is accepted because the population of Muslims and the population of tribal types is often coterminous.

I am a foreign policy pragmatist. I just see swinging our genitalia around, knocking down trees, is not going to work for us. It hasn't worked since April 2003, and won't work now.

But we CAN enter into negotiations; into efforts like Bush's very fine PETVAR program; into personal relationships; and see what that does for us.

I don't think we can give up on diplomacy just yet.

Daled,

Some of what Taheri says is factual, most is opinion. So what's there to cite? His opinion? As I said, I don't cite Thom Hartmann's opinion, and don't want to hear Laura Ingalls cited to me. They think what they think.

We can read them, but not try to use them for factual matter, seems to me.

Now. What you say about "gaga" about Obama is probably defensible, but it will be short-lived. If you can't admit that he is seen as the only hope to get out of the financial mess we are in now, you can't admit much. Neither of us knows whether he will succeed or not. But who else? The governor of California?

The press isn't too trustworthy, I agree. They completely abdicated their duty, so well carried out by the Washington Post in the Watergate era, to be critical of government. But, again, they're the only press we got.

They're better than nothing. I'm not sure what you mean by, "if you don't feel like it."

I doubt you're my type. :-0

If you can't admit that he is seen as the only
hope to get out of the financial mess we are in now, you can't admit much.

No one argues that Obama is seen as the only hope--but that does not mean that he is.

I admit that freely.

Daled,

So what is? Is there one? You dance not so well, but you sure do dance. You said the "press [is] gaga about Obama", but when I said "he is seen" it offended you. YOU were the one who raised the issue of the press's notions about the new administration. Sure, he may not succeed, but we don't know that. You don't know that.

Pulling facts out of you is like pulling teeth, I gotta say. Will you contribute what you have, instead of me having to endlessly ask you questions you ignore?

What WILL work, if Obama is not, in fact, the only hope. Or, if you think he can't do it, then what IS the only hope? Or is there more than one? Who are they? Where are they?

This discussion has been about my facts and your opinions, so far. I don't want to discuss your opinions. If you are unwilling to discuss the facts, which apparently you are, we need not continue wasting electrons.

Come to think of it, you originally raised a question of legality and expressed an opinion. You supported that opinion by citing someone else, who also had an opinion, Whelan. Neither of you bothered to actually look it up. I looked it up, you were uncomfortable because your opinion was contrary to the clear facts.

So you changed the discussion to another opinion you have. And cited another opinion, by Taheri.

The world is a place where we have to make our decisions based on the facts we are pretty sure are true, not on the opinions of someone who writes his opinions for a newspaper.

Evidently, I'm talking to someone who thinks you can cite another's opinion to support an argument. No wonder you have trouble distinguishing between editorials and news reporting.

You continue to concoct straw men.

You write, "when I said 'he is seen' [as the one hope to save the economy] it offended you"

Nonsense. My point is that to say that the President of the US is seen as the one hope to save the economy is so obvious that saying so is pointless.

Of course, that is nothing compared to your other mindreading exercise:

"You want to show dislike, hatred and contempt for people you know nothing about. It's so easy, and so lazy."

Talk about lazy--how lazy is it to build straw men out of thin air so that you can then conduct an ad hominen attack.

Of course, the beauty of all this is that the original post is about hoaxes about Obama--in other words, for the beginning I agree they are baseless. When someone questioned Obama's citizenship, I linked to proof of his citizenship from Michelle Obama's HotAir site.

Now if you want to have an entirely different discussion, that's fine. But you'll have to make clear just what it is you are arguing about.

And do it without the personal attacks.

"Much of what is accepted in the Muslim world as directed practice of the religion is actually tribal brutality and tribal bigotry. (Female circumcision and isolation of the sexes after puberty come to mind) It is accepted because the population of Muslims and the population of tribal types is often coterminous".
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It IS the direct practice of the religion since these practices you mention transcend cultures and borders and takes hold wherever islam dominates. You've been listening to PC propaganda.

You're wasting my time. You don't know anything about what you're talking about.

Sorry I ever started talking to you, hoping we could have a discussion. I was mistaken. You don't discuss, you throw out opinion, expecting that others will mistake it for fact.

Have the last word, if you want. I'm through.

Laura,

Oops, thought this was posted by Daled. Sounded like him.

The notion that practices are often found where a religion is practiced, therefore are a part of the religion, is nonsense.

For instance: tooth brushing is universal in the U.S. (well, except in West Virginia maybe), but nobody thinks it's demanded by Christianity. Certainly, nobody was brushing their teeth in Christian Europe in the Sixteenth Century.

Don't forget, Islam is a VERY recently-developed religion, only about 7-800 years old. The practices that were in place when it developed were established and pretty immovable. The evidence that they are persistent is that they persist, hundreds of years later. The Old Testament forbids eating pork, even for Christians (I know, there were no Christians in Old Testament times. But the OT is still part of the Bible). Yet we do. The doctrine did NOT persist.

As for "listening to PC propaganda," a person only needs to know facts. You don't need opinion. And the idea that female circumcision is part of Islam, is clearly false. It is not commanded by the Koran, nor in any of the writings accepted by Muslims everywhere.

It is clear you accuse me of knowing what I know, because I "listen to ...propaganda". You say this, because you think opinions are facts. You should think of dealing with facts. This is exactly how the Bush administration got into trouble. Here's a fact:

"In Islamic texts, [female genital cutting] is referred to as khafḍ (Arabic: خفض‎)[46] or khifaḍ[47] (Arabic: خِفَض‎). Female genital cutting predates Islam.[45]In Saudi Arabia, in the area known as the Hijaz, where Islam originated, FGC was already being practiced during the lifetime of Muhammad. Female genital cutting is not commanded by the Qur'an[48] and is not practiced by the majority of Muslims."

and,

"The consensus of Muslim scholars shows that circumcision is for men".

Wikipedia.

This is absolutely opposite to "violence against unbelievers," which is clearly in the Koran. And is part of the religion.

So. If someone says something that does not seem to condemn Islam, to you it's propaganda even if it's true. But my last paragraph, which I know to be true, would be acceptable to you because it DOES condemn Islam.

Like Daled, you need to deal with facts. Just putting out opinion just makes you look a little powerless. But I admire your spunk.

Don't forget, Islam is a VERY recently-developed religion, only about 7-800 years old

Actually, it was founded in 622, which means it was 'developed' almost twice that amount--1387 years ago.

And while I'm feeling 'spunky', let's take a look at the rest of that paragraph:

The practices that were in place when it developed were established and pretty immovable. The evidence that they are persistent is that they persist, hundreds of years later. The Old Testament forbids eating pork, even for Christians (I know, there were no Christians in Old Testament times. But the OT is still part of the Bible). Yet we do. The doctrine did NOT persist.

The fallacy here is that the Torah is for Christians. The fact that Christians have incorporated the Tanakh and have then selectively rejected parts of it obviously has absolutely no bearing whatsoever on the Tanakh itself.

The test of whether something is 'persistent' is measured by those for whom it was intended and have originally accepted it.

What Christians do with the Tanakh in this case is completely irrelevant.

The Joint Chiefs of Staff HAVE AN ABSOLUTE CONSTITUTIONAL DUTY to stand behind Guantanamo Military Judge James Pohl UNTIL OBAMA OVERCOMES �RES IPSA LOQUITUR� BY SUPPLYING HIS LONG FORM BIRTH CERTIFICATE AND PROVING HIS ELIGIBILITY TO BE PRESIDENT UNDER ARTICLE 2 OF THE US CONSTITUTION.