Soldier from Greeley won't go to Afghanistan until Obama produces birth certificate

[HBARleatherneck]

http://www.greeleytribune.com/article/20100402/NEWS/100409965/1051&ParentProfile=1001

A Greeley native and U.S. Army official has vowed to disobey orders to deploy to Afghanistan until President Barack Obama produces proof he was born in the United States.

Lt. Col. Terry Lakin, who was born in Greeley and graduated from University High School, is asking Obama on an Internet video posted this week to furnish a birth certificate.

“For the first time in all my years of service to our great nation, and at great peril to my career and future, I am choosing to disobey what I believe are illegal orders, including an order to deploy to Afghanistan for my second tour of duty there,” Lakin says in the video.

He later adds, “President Obama, I ask you to respect and uphold the Constitution. Be transparent, and show your honesty and integrity. Release your original signed birth certificate, if you have one, thus proving your birth on American soil, and thus assure the American people you are lawfully eligible to hold the office of the presidency and serve as commander in chief of the armed forces.”

He does not accuse Obama of illegally obtaining office in the video.

Lakin is in his 18th year of active uniform service, according to the video.

Lakin's father, Frank Lakin of Greeley, said he didn't know enough about the situation to comment Thursday afternoon, but he did say his son's video wasn't representative of the family.

“This does not reflect the opinions or the attitude of the family by any means,” Frank Lakin said. “We're Obama supporters.”

A Web site dedicated to Lakin's cause, http://safeguardourconstitution.com (http://safeguardourconstitution.com/), is collecting donations to contribute to Lakin's defense fund. The site claims it must raise $50,000 in the next 10 days.

Margaret Hemenway, who has been handling media relations for the Web site, said Terry Lakin is the highest-ranking active duty officer to publicly challenge Obama's natural born citizenship.

Hemenway said Lakin researched the subject before coming to her with the idea to create the video. She then had him talk to a lawyer, who attempted to derail the plan. Lakin persevered, however, and filmed the video.

Lakin is waiting to see what course of action the Army will take with him, Hemenway said.

“If they court-martial him, it will be huge,” she said. “They will risk making a martyr of him.”

According to the Web site, Lakin serves as chief of primary care and is a flight surgeon for the Pentagon's DiLorenzo TRICARE Health Clinic. He has been awarded with the Army Flight Surgeon Badge, Combat Medical Badge, the Bronze Star, the Meritorious Service Medal, the Army Commendation Medal with two Oak Leaf Clusters, the Army Achievement Medal with one Oak Leaf Clusters, the National Defense Service Medal with Bronze Service Star, the Armed Forces Expedition Medal, the Army Reserve Component Achievement Medal, the Army Service Ribbon, the Overseas Service Ribbon sixth award and the NATO service medal

[Birddog1911]

I predict that it will not end well for him.

[SA Friday]

Although I understand him completely and empathize with his cause, I am sorry to see him destroy 18 years of honorable service. They will not be disuaded from courts martial simply because of some press. They will definately charge him for disobeying a lawful order, and the defense that it's unlawful won't last 2 seconds in any court. Furthermore, I suspect they will also charge him with acts unbecoming (Can't use your military status for politics) for the video, and maybe throw in dereliction of duty to boot.

He won't plead either. He wants the press. One of two results, jury nullification (which they'll boot him afterward, it's administrative) or guilty and he will get a un-nice ride in a short bus to Kansas.

[HBARleatherneck]

i think the last officer that pulled this kind of stunt, just got his orders dropped. i would bet the military will just cancel his deployment. but he can figure on a bad fit-rep. no promotions, and or maybe early discharge. 2 years left to retirement. why? nobody likes the kenyan, I get that, but dont throw away your career and at this point, retirement funds.

[Bailey Guns]

I applaud his standing firm on his convictions but I'm with Friday. There's no way this is going to solve the birth certificate issue.

I'm guessing they're hoping they'll be able to compel the gov't to produce the document as some sort of evidence or under some discovery rule. I don't see that happening.

But I don't see him doing any/much jail time either.

[SA Friday]

I applaud his standing firm on his convictions but I'm with Friday. There's no way this is going to solve the birth certificate issue.

I'm guessing they're hoping they'll be able to compel the gov't to produce the document as some sort of evidence or under some discovery rule. I don't see that happening.

But I don't see him doing any/much jail time either.
Neither do I. 6 Months. BUT... All Officers serve their time at Leavenworth.

[Marlin]

The story of Don Quixote comes to mind..

[sniper7]

i like what he is doing but dont see it ending well

[Hoser]

i would bet the military will just cancel his deployment.

Nope.

[theGinsue]

I predict that it will not end well for him.

I fully agree. The Army has only to prove that he failed to obey an order or regulation. At which point the Lt.Col will question/debate the legality of the order. There is no way the legality will be substantiated - and the presiding officers of the courts martial will surely blow past the challenge and white wash it as an "assumed" because Obama hold the office of President of the United States thus making him Commander-in-Chief.

I wonder if this guy has ever been to Kansas because he's fixin' to be sent to Leavenworth!

[theGinsue]

i would bet the military will just cancel his deployment.

Not these days. They HAVE to nip this in the bud and make a clear example out of him or LOTS more will follow the Lt.Col's example.

[theGinsue]

Although I understand him completely and empathize with his cause, I am sorry to see him destroy 18 years of honorable service. They will not be disuaded from courts martial simply because of some press. They will definately charge him for disobeying a lawful order, and the defense that it's unlawful won't last 2 seconds in any court. Furthermore, I suspect they will also charge him with acts unbecoming (Can't use your military status for politics) for the video, and maybe throw in dereliction of duty to boot.

He won't plead either. He wants the press. One of two results, jury nullification (which they'll boot him afterward, it's administrative) or guilty and he will get a un-nice ride in a short bus to Kansas.

I've gotta quit working my way through the threads from the bottom up. I just spent all that time typing the same essence of what you had already typed.

[HBARleatherneck]

he isnt the first officer to do this. and they made the other ones just go away. normally this would be punished under the UCMJ post haste. but since it involves O, they have been reluctant to prosecute for fear of more people doing it. from what i have read( i realize i dont know everything), they have cancelled deployment orders, but there hasnt been much done as far as icarceration. just like nobody does real time for desertion now. its political now.

[Troublco]

Yeah, his position description just became EXAMPLE. And they'll do it up right just to make sure everyone knows their place.

[KevDen2005]

Although I understand him completely and empathize with his cause, I am sorry to see him destroy 18 years of honorable service. They will not be disuaded from courts martial simply because of some press. They will definately charge him for disobeying a lawful order, and the defense that it's unlawful won't last 2 seconds in any court. Furthermore, I suspect they will also charge him with acts unbecoming (Can't use your military status for politics) for the video, and maybe throw in dereliction of duty to boot.

He won't plead either. He wants the press. One of two results, jury nullification (which they'll boot him afterward, it's administrative) or guilty and he will get a un-nice ride in a short bus to Kansas.


+1

I don't like my boss either, but you can't always just throw away your career. Sometimes you can stick it out until the right time, and I would say he should have held out a couple more years until he could retire.

[sniper7]

Not these days. They HAVE to nip this in the bud and make a clear example out of him or LOTS more will follow the Lt.Col's example.


yeah i am sure there are plenty of other soldiers out there that would love to stay home until the CIC proves he is legal to hold the office.

[sniper7]

I've gotta quit working my way through the threads from the bottom up. I just spent all that time typing the same essence of what you had already typed.


you know you just like to post whore and respond to every comment![ROFL1]

[sniper7]

+1

I don't like my boss either, but you can't always just throw away your career. Sometimes you can stick it out until the right time, and I would say he should have held out a couple more years until he could retire.


I am very surprised he did this with 18 years in. after 20 I could understand and then when they forced him out he still keeps the retirement. hopefully that isn't tripped away from him


who knows maybe obama will invite him to the white house and personally show him the birth certificate...[Swim]

[theGinsue]

yeah i am sure there are plenty of other soldiers out there that would love to stay home until the CIC proves he is legal to hold the office.

I know a few where I work, but they aren't going to throw their careers away for it.

[theGinsue]

you know you just like to post whore and respond to every comment![ROFL1]


Who? Me?

Never!

[theGinsue]

I am very surprised he did this with 18 years in. after 20 I could understand and then when they forced him out he still keeps the retirement. hopefully that isn't tripped away from him


who knows maybe obama will invite him to the white house and personally show him the birth certificate...[Swim]
He'll invite him, offer him a beer, have him pulled over driving away from the White House and charges with DUI - at which point he'll lose his career and get villianized.

[sniper7]

He'll invite him, offer him a beer, have him pulled over driving away from the White House and charges with DUI - at which point he'll lose his career and get villianized.


more than likely, or have everyone say he harassed the wookie that happens to live there.

[HBARleatherneck]

nothing matters anymore as far as a birth certificate goes. he is in one of the worlds most powerful positions. he could have the doctor who was supposed to have signed it, dug up, reanimated, and force him to lie for him. he could have a perfect document made. so i doubt, unless he admits it, that the truth will ever be known. so the moral of the story is, suck it up for 2 more years LTCOL

[theGinsue]

nothing matters anymore as far as a birth certificate goes. he is in one of the worlds most powerful positions. he could have the doctor who was supposed to have signed it, dug up, reanimated, and force him to lie for him. he could have a perfect document made. so i doubt, unless he admits it, that the truth will ever be known. so the moral of the story is, suck it up for 2 more years LTCOL

Yup. If he ever did come up with a birth certificate now I know *I* wouldn't believe it was valid (yes, I'm a "birther").

[ronaldrwl]

Yea, I'm thinking the samething. B.O. probably already has a perfect forgery ready to go.

BUT, someday, somebody will be the first. I remember standing at the corner of Lexington and Concord and thinking how it must have been. They were all loyal British Subjects at the time but a few decided to risk it all. Makes you think.
.

[theGinsue]

Yea, I'm thinking the samething. B.O. probably already has a perfect forgery ready to go.

BUT, someday, somebody will be the first. I remember standing at the corner of Lexington and Concord and thinking how it must have been. They were all loyal British Subjects at the time but a few decided to risk it all. Makes you think.
.
I stood there too. I pictured the battle. I pictured the man who drug himself up onto his front porch just across the street from the Lexington Common (aka Lexingtonm Battle Green) and died there at his wife's feet.

I lived a few hundred yards from where Paul Revere was captured by the British on that night when he was making the rounds to report the British were on their way.

I stood on the far side of the Concord River at the Old North Bridge - the site of "the shot heard round the world". I saw in my minds eye the pitched battle between patriots who wanted little more for themselves than to be free men and the soldiers of the oppressive government that refused to treat these colonists as subjects but chose instad to treat them as possessions.



http://www.ushistory.org/Declaration/document/images/w.gifhen in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

[sniper7]

Yup. If he ever did come up with a birth certificate now I know *I* wouldn't believe it was valid (yes, I'm a "birther").


probably why he doesn't because people will say that one is false also. first impressions are the greatest and now that there is doubt there will always be doubt.

I am a "birther" as well. i don't think he is legit to hold the office.

[Marlin]

The thing of it is, If one has at least one parent that is a U.S. citizen at the time of birth, it is automatic that one is a U.S. citizen. The only thing that could questioned is if He held dual citizenship as a youth and, which "path" he took at 21.

[theGinsue]

The thing of it is, If one has at least one parent that is a U.S. citizen at the time of birth, it is automatic that one is a U.S. citizen. The only thing that could questioned is if He held dual citizenship as a youth and, which "path" he took at 21.
The word is that his mother denounced her U.S. citizenship prior to his birth.

[Marlin]

Yeah,, I've heard that... That would be one I would need to look up.. However,, Not sure if I really care enough to do it..

[theGinsue]

In the end it won't matter - the guy is 1/4 of the way thru his term in office. While he can still do a heck of a lot more damage to the nation, we'll never get him out of office early so the effort used to work towards that end would be wasted.

[Hoosier]

(yes, I'm a "birther")

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