Talk:Barack Obama citizenship conspiracy theories

Conflicting statements

In this article it states, " Barack Obama was born on August 4, 1961, at Kapi'olani Medical Center for Women & Children in Honolulu, Hawaii."

But on the President's official Wikipedia page it states, "Obama was born August 4, 1961, at Kapi'olani Maternity & Gynecological Hospital in Honolulu, Hawaii."

- Which one is it? Someone please look into this and confirm the President's place of birth. TonyO13 (talk) 20:29, 2 January 2011 (UTC) TonyO13

The place of birth is confirmed. You are pointing out a minor difference in the name used for that place. It is quite common for things to have minor renames over a fifty year period, and Kapi'olani Medical Center for Women & Children is the current name. See, for example, here for info. Johnuniq (talk) 23:51, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Johnny, thanks for the clarification. I have updated both articles to make this clear. -- Brangifer (talk) 02:52, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

This pages name is conflicting. Its not a conspiracy theory, its simply a controversy.

Hawaii governor

I tried to insert the following into the lead, but it keeps crashing my computer (that's part of the conspiracy I guess): "Hawaii's Democratic governor would like to release more information about Obama's birth, to dispel the rumors.<ref>"[http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jVvzGsSMmbEAZ6p1vr1hcwPPmnTw?docId=4a74dffeeb6d474cb26411721149ba61 Hawaii's governor wants to reveal Obama birth info]", Associated Press (2010-12-28): "Democratic Gov. Neil Abercrombie wants to find a way to release more information about President Barack Obama's Hawaii birth and dispel conspiracy theories that he was born elsewhere."</ref>

Would someone please put that in the lead? Thanks.166.137.137.43 (talk) 18:44, 8 January 2011 (UTC)

I noticed that assertions in the Neil Abacrombie section went well beyond what the cited source[1] supported.

• The cited article didn't mention any "strong feelings" on Abacrombie's part; it did say that he is "... voicing the frustration of many Hawaiians ...". The publisher's article headline writer juiced that up by saying that Abercrombie is "is determined to torpedo the conspiracy theory", but that's not what the article says. I've shored up this article assertion a bit by adding a cite of this source, which quotes Abercrombie as saying, "Now that I'm governor, I'm going to do something about that".
• The article asserted that at the time of Barack Obama Jr.'s birth Abercrombie was Barack Obama Sr's teaching assistant at the University of Hawaii. The previously cited supporting source and the one I've added both support Abercrombie having been a TA at the UofH, but neither mentions his having been BO Sr's TA. The Barack Obama, Sr. article says that BO Sr. graduated in June 1962 and left shortly thereafter. Abercrombie may or may not have been BO Sr's TA, but, as that is not verifiable from the cited sources, I've removed that assertion from the article.

Wtmitchell (talk) (earlier Boracay Bill) 23:23, 12 January 2011 (UTC)

The reference states that "As a teaching assistant, he met and befriended Obama's father". This means that it was Abercrombie's work as a TA that brought about the friendship with BO Sr. So either they were co-TA's, or Abercrombie was BO Sr.'s TA. Since BO Sr. was an undergrad at Hawaii U, the possibility that they were co-TA's is out. The way the sentence currently reads:

he knew Barack Obama's parents, Barack Obama, Sr. and Ann Dunham, at the time of Barack Obama Jr.'s birth as he was a teaching assistant at the University of Hawaii

makes no sense, as being TA does not mean he knew BO Sr. Victor Victoria (talk) 14:11, 13 January 2011 (UTC)

This section on Abercrombie makes very little sense in view of the facts recited in the rest of the article. The premise of this article is that the proof of Obama's birth in Hawaii is incontestable, birthers are crazy and that there's no need to see the contemporaneous 1961 long form. Yet all Abercrombie says is (and I quote) is that "It was actually written I am told, this is what our investigation is showing, it actually exists in the archives, written down." Huh? This article has posited (using biased sources like Salon) that there are good reasons not to release the long form (it wouldn't satisfy birthers anyway, timing would look bad), but Abercrombie appears to be conceding that the long form doesn't even exist. There's just some notation about the birth "written down" somewhere. This, despite former Governor Lingle's former claim to have seen that contemporaneous document, Obama's claim in Dreams to have possessed it, and the Hawaii DOH's (inconsistent) statements that they maintained the certificate (or "vital records") in accordance with state procedures. So I would recommend either deleting this section about Abercrombie to avoid these inconsistencies, or changing his quote to affirmatively say that he examined the 1961 Certificate of Live Birth just like Lingle did. It might be inaccurate, but this article is riddled with such inaccuracies. — Preceding unsigned comment added by TruthfulPerson (talk • contribs) 15:39, 20 January 2011 (UTC)

Merger request

A month ago I discovered that a person named Orly was being mentioned on cable news... according to the article on Wiki the only reason Orly is notable is the birther movement. Her realty world is not notable. Like Joe Werzilbacker's plumbing activity is not notable. As such her notability has not separate existence outside the birther movement. Thus outside of editorial., linguistic and grammatical aspects, Orly should be merged with Birther articles. 132.216.55.26 (talk) 17:05, 13 January 2011 (UTC)

No. According to her entry, "She also promotes a number of other allegations both related and unrelated to Obama, and has initiated a number of lawsuits on behalf of the "birther" movement." One of her issues is to delete her entry. Bearian (talk) 18:40, 13 January 2011 (UTC)

Weak No. Although I tend to agree with your points, Taitz basically has become the face of the birther movement. Also, she ran in the Republican primary in 2010 to become a candidate for California's Secretary of State (she lost, badly), and she's stated her intention to run in 2012 to become a U.S. Senator(!). --Weazie (talk) 18:57, 13 January 2011 (UTC)

No. Not suitable for merging with this article for many reasons. Ridiculous woman that she is, her own article should stand. 21st CENTURY GREENSTUFF 19:09, 13 January 2011 (UTC)

Oppose This article is too long already. --JaGa^talk 20:28, 13 January 2011 (UTC)

Oppose Although she is notable because of the birther movement, she is very notable, and meets the WP:N criteria to have her own article. Victor Victoria (talk) 13:12, 14 January 2011 (UTC)

Support unless someone can show she's also a notable dentist. If this article is too long to merge, it should be cut. 24.177.123.74 (talk) 06:19, 24 January 2011 (UTC)

With no consensus to merge after several weeks, I am removing the tag. Joefromrandb (talk) 06:54, 28 January 2011 (UTC)

Material regarding liberal commentators

I've got a few issues with the attempts to add statements that several liberal commentators have called on Obama to release his birth certificate. Beyond the obvious (he already has, so to avoid this we have to get into the whole long form / short form thing), there are some reliable secondary sourcing problems, and also undue weight and POV implications of selectively mentioning what a few liberal commentators are saying. The birther conspiracy theory has overwhelmingly been promoted by conservative pundits, commentators, politicians, etc. When the odd liberal urges Obama to produce something, these pundits have jumped on it as evidence that even the liberals have a bone to pick over this. That's the wrong implication - the liberals seem to be urging this in order to put the conspiracy theory to rest, not out of concern that it might be true. Further, without some reliable sourcing on the topic it's not clear that the statements of a few liberal pundits in their arenas of punditry (op ed pieces, political TV shows) represent any significant shift in the position of liberal pundits, or that what the liberal pundits have to say is terribly relevant to the subject of the conspiracy theory. Inside-the-beltway (or inside the chatterbox) minute by minute coverage of the goings on among TV pundits is not all that germane. The ABC piece is the only neutral, third party reliable source proposed on this, and it mentions only a single person, Chris Matthews, as jumping into the fray, and only there in passing as a single point in a much longer piece. I think all of this could arguably be enough to support a statement that there were a few liberals among all of the commentators saying what Obama ought to do, but only in the proper context and, given the sourcing, not as a full subheading in the piece or done in a way that appears to give undue attention to the statements of a few, or their importance to the overall issue. A neutral way to present this, if important enough at all, would be to report what the sources sayd regarding why certain liberals made these statements, what being liberal had to do with it, and its relevance to the overall conspiracy theory.

I hope we can see what other editors here think, and perhaps wait a few days to see if anything more comes of this stuff, before considering further whether this should be included or expanded. - Wikidemon (talk) 00:31, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

The material is well-sourced to ABC, WaPo, WSJ, and MSNBC. Those are reliable sources by any stretch. If you think there's already a suitable heading somewhere then put it there. I didn't see one.

Some of the conservatives who are presently mentioned (or slimed) in this article have given the exact same rationale as Matthews, Corn, and Page: that the docs should be released to confirm Obama is right. Attributing nefarious motives to those conservatives but not to the liberals would be a severe POV problem, as would be omitting the liberals from this article.Anythingyouwant (talk) 00:40, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

The WSJ piece is anything but reliable. It's an opinion piece (the column "Fear of a White Planet"), giving a blow by blow account of some lowbrow jocular political banter on Chris Matthews' show. All of my comments above apply: POV slant, undue influence, no reliable sourcing as to the significance, characterization, or the importance of punditry or of these pundits being liberals. Further, the way it was put gave the reader the mistaken impression that liberals were coming around on the issue, when in fact it was just a few people on a single TV show, not coming around but talking about why the theory can't be put to bed. There is no Washington Post source - it's a blog roundup, quoting a self-published blog word for word. The MSNBC source is a primary source - a transcript of the punditry show where these comments were made. Any attempt to derive broader meaning of what was said there is original analysis. And as I said the ABC piece[2] is not a significant mention - it's two paragraphis in the middle of a three (web) page article on a broader topic. Mining that piece for a heading about Chris Matthews gives Matthews' opinion greatly undue weight here. Wikipedia isn't built on what these talking heads say to each other on shows devoted to political sparring. If third party reliable sources say the political sparring on these particular shows is significant, we can cover it as such. - Wikidemon (talk) 00:59, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

I don't have the time or interest to get deeply involved in this article. It seems to have been a battleground for those wishing to ridicule "birthers" and the birthers themselves. But I will say this: if you compare the WSJ piece to a lot of the sources in this article, it seems quite neutral. Looking at the lead alone, footnotes 8 (Weigel),11 (Kay), and 14 (Koppelman) look pretty opinionated to me. And note that I used in-text attribution for the WSJ piece (unlike the treatment of footnotes 8, 11, and 14) as is commonly done for other opinion sources later in this article, but you removed the in-text attribution. The WaPo piece is not purely a primary source; it says "Matthews, among others, thinks that Obama could end the controversy by simply requesting the document himself." The MSNBC source is a transcript of Hardball, which is essentially an extended quote of Chris Matthews; even if it's a primary source, it's an appropriate one. And of course the ABC piece is a simple news piece, and the reason I honed in on the Matthews stuff is because the rest is already pretty much covered in this Wikipedia article.

Anyway, rather than become a bigger target for relentless charges of POV, quote-mining, and all the rest, which I think would be more aptly hurled at much of the existing text in this article, I'll not reply further. I'm not betting that Chris Matthews' request for the birth documentation will be mentioned for long in this article.Anythingyouwant (talk) 01:42, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

• This is absurd. NONE of those "liberal commentators" are urging the release of the 'original document' for any birther reasons, but were making fun of the birthers. The section is absurd and trying to make it seems as if it was something it was not. There is no need to'ridicule birthers', they do that all on their own by the absurd conspiracy theories they subscribe to. Dave Dial (talk) 02:19, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

"Birth Certificate"

As I understand it, no "birth certificate" has ever been produced: rather, it was a "certification of live birth," which is not the same thing. Yet this article repeatedly, erroneously, refers to it as a "birth certificate." Has this been discussed before? Can someone point me to the reasoning behind the language use in the article? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.137.113.43 (talk) 20:19, 24 January 2011 (UTC)

Ad nauseam. Links to the archives of this talk page, and a search function,can be found at the topof this page. Fat&Happy (talk) 00:23, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

'Certification of Live Birth' Not Birth Certificate

I'd like to point out that the graphic 'Certification of Live Birth' has the incorrect descriptor below it. In the description, which I have tried to edit several times, it incorrectly identifies the 'Certification of Live Birth' as a "Birth Certificate", which it is not. Please look at the title of the document.

I'm not a major contributor to the Wikipedia, I'm not anti-Obama or a birther, but I do like the information on the Wikipedia to be as accurate as possible. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Dandspach (talk • contribs) 17:36, 27 January 2011 (UTC)

Asked and answered - see above. - Wikidemon (talk) 17:41, 27 January 2011 (UTC)

Would it be helpful to have something about this in the FAQ?Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 11:46, 28 January 2011 (UTC)

It might. It probably wouldn't deter the true believers from making the claims, but it would be easier for editors to point to in response. I would say it would be something like pointing to the Factcheck link describing it as Obama's birth certificate, and the law descriptions(which would be in the archive somewhere, at least some of which from discussions I've had here). Dave Dial (talk) 14:36, 28 January 2011 (UTC)