<p>“Now it is good fodder for the likes of Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity…”</p>
<p>I wouldn’t know, I don’t listen to them, but some of the speculation has been belly-laughingly funny.</p>
<p>Edit: I don’t mean serious speculation, I mean people actively being silly because they know there’s nothing to this. Lots of that going on. There may be some people taking it seriously, but I haven’t seen that in weeks – since Hillary stopped being a viable candidate.</p>
<p>Sounds like there must be something embarrassing, like Kerry’s refusal to release records that ended up showing he had a lower GPA at Yale than did Bush.</p>
<p>I hadn’t heard anything about this until I saw this thread. I avoid political blogs, as I get my fill of so-called political experts on tv. I googled a bit and found some pretty amazing ‘stuff’, including claims that GOP ‘people’ have been sent to Mombasa to see what they can dig up on the claims that he was actually born there. It all seems so ridiculous. </p>
<p>I’m curious. Is it common/normal/usual for Presidential candidates to release their birth certificate?</p>
<p>Maybe his birth certificate has a space for “religion,” and maybe it says “Islam.” I think that would be utterly meaningless, but a bunch of idiots would make a big deal out of it.</p>
<p>Just put it out there. Get it over with.</p>
<p>I cannot imagine why the campaign would prefer to have all this negative speculation, instead of just dropping this trivial piece of paper on the pile: If trivial, trivial.</p>
<p>This matter IS trivial but it does create perceptions that will exceed their natural boundaries if it is not addressed. No stonewalling. Openness is the key.</p>
<p>i didn’t hear about this either until I just logged on here. If it’s the law that one must be born a U.S. citizen to be POTUS, then I’m confused as to what is so ridiculous about the idea that his eligibility must be verified? He’s not exactly applying for a job at Dairy Queen here, is he?</p>
<p>Why would he not release his birth certificate? Since being a natural born citizen is required to take office - I see nothing wrong with him proving it.</p>
<p>Hunt - you may be on to something. Perhaps it does have his father’s religion on it. weird.</p>
<p>One explanation suggested that his father’s race was listed as “Arabic” on his birth certificate instead of “black” because that is how it was done at the time.</p>
<p>I have no idea if that is true. Does it really matter? I guess to some, Arabic would be an indication that he does indeed have terrorist blood. Yup, sheer nonsense. But at least it gives the bloggers something to blog about.</p>
<p>I don’t go on the political blogs either. Curiosity got the better of me and I just conducted a 30 second Google, and found that tidbit! :o</p>
<p>Post #27 sent me to check my kids’ birth certificates (from MA). There is no space for stating parents’ religion. Do different states require different information on birth certificates?</p>
<p>Post #28: But why would a Kenyan list himself as “Arabic”? “Black” makes more sense for an African.</p>
<p>It was suggested that Arabic was entered as father’s “race”, not his religion.</p>
<p>Like I said, the source was from a blog ! It was one of the speculations offered. 
</p>
<p>Back in the day - they used to put a lot more info on the birth cert. I believe that my original says my mother was R.Catholic and my father was Protestant. This was California.
I don’t think any of my kids’ birth certs list anything about religion. or race.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>This was true of our third child, born to 2 US citizens living in Canada. We had to get a very important document called US Consular Report of Citizen Born Abroad, so that when he got older he could get his U.S. Passport and the Social Security Card, needed as points to get his drivers’ license. That US consular document is as important as the birth certificate whenever he needs to get a critical US document. Somehow my H knew (because others told him) that it would be crucial someday, so he went to process it while I was still in the hospital. It was a bureaucratic web, hard to get, and moving from place to place it hasn’t been easy to keep all these documents in order. If he hadn’t gotten this consular document, our S still would have been a U.S. Citizen Born Overseas…just much harder to prove it. </p>
<p>I always thought S couldn’t run for president because he was born outside the country. Y’all are missing a great opportunity, here :)</p>
<p>S can’t run for president. “I know my son, and he’s no Obama,” but he’ll be voting for him when he casts his first vote, ever. </p>
<p>The very topic of “Where’s the Birth Certificate” just embarrasses Obama. A man of humble origins doesn’t wave around his birth background. If there’s no father’s signature on it since the Dad was in Kenya at the time of birth, again, an embarrassment. All irrelevant.</p>
<p>If there is anything (a big if), I think it more likely that the birth certificate would show that his parents weren’t married, because they couldn’t be as the father was already married. I don’t see that as a big deal and think that most people know that, anyway.</p>
<p>No religion on our birth certificates either. No space for race either. These documents are issued by the state. I can’t imagine there would be a listing for religion if one were born in the U.S., since there would seem to be issues of separation of church and state there. His mother was an early sixties flower child, to put it kindly. He was left in Hawaii to be raised by his grandparents while she completed her education in other parts of the world. If he was born in Hawaii, what in the world would be the problem with releasing the document.</p>
<p>Obama was born in 1961. I suspect that many states still had religion and race lines on their birth certificates then. I’ll have to see if I can find mine from a few years before that to see.
The possibility that it may say “Arabic” for race reminds me of a bit from the humor series “Red State Update” on Youtube, in which two good ol’ boys discuss politics:</p>
<p>Dunlap: “Jackie, some people say Obama’s not really black.”
Jackie: “What, are they blind?”</p>
<p>Looked it up. Most plausible problem is that IF he was born outside of the U.S., his mother, the natural born citizen, may technically not have been one since the law at that time required that the natural born citizen must reside in the U.S. for ten years, FIVE of them after the age of 16. She gave birth to BO at age 18. (@ NYTimes)</p>
<p>* Senator Obama’s actual first name is Barry.*
And his mom’s name was Stanley.
[Barack</a> Obama: Walking between worlds](<a href=“http://www.cbc.ca/world/story/2008/06/04/f-obama-biography.html]Barack”>Barack Obama: Walking between worlds | CBC News)</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I just can’t stop thinking of the Brady Bunch when I hear that name.</p>
<p>I am about the same age as Obama (+/- a few years).</p>
<p>I just looked at my own birth certificate. It does ask for father’s (and mother’s) 'color or race". Also includes father’s age, birthplace, and occupation.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>That actually isn’t true. She resumed her education at the Univ. of Hawaii (she had dropped out after one semester when she married) when her son was a toddler. Her parents assisted with childcare at the time.</p>
<p>I checked my b/c (I’m considerably older than Senator Obama) and all that’s on it is my name, date and location of birth, father’s name, and mother’s maiden name. Interesting how each state seems to be so different in what they require.</p>