Obama's Late October Surprise

Auntie Zeituni: Barack Obama's life associations and extended family tree are so diversified it's tough to know who's on first. He's often joked he has distant cousins of the likes of Dick Cheney and Brad Pitt. Now comes his aunt who is his late father's half sister. She is Zeituni Onyango, an illegal immigrant. She's been one since 2004 living in a South Boston public housing complex. It's rather fascinating that the first reaction statement from the Obama camp is that Barack believes her immigration status should be handled like any other illegal immigrant. As a secondary thought, the campaign said Obama was unaware of her immigration status. Right. Same as Obama's earliest utterances he was unaware of his former pastor's inflammatory un-American diatribes from the pulpit Obama attended for 20 years. Neither pass the smell test. This latest revelation just days before the U.S. is poised to elect its first black president comes out of nowhere. The Associated Press which broke the story nationally, said it could not determine weather the leak came from the Bush administration or Republican opposition operatives. The story established the following facts:

• An immigration judge ordered her deportation four years ago denying her plea for asylum from her native Kenya which at the time was in civil war.
• Obama first met Auntie Zeituni as a young adult when he visited Kenya to meet his father who abandoned him as a baby.
• Onyango visited Obama and his family in Chicago on a tourist visa nine years ago. The two met on several occasions, including in 2006 when she joined the Obamas during his swearing in ceremony as newly elected U.S. Senator.
• The campaign said she called Obama two years ago, telling him she was living in Boston. They did not visit. Since that time, she mailed him campaign checks of $5, the last one Sept. 19. She has contributed $260 over the course of the campaign, according to federal election officials.
• It was unclear how Onyanga received public housing during a time she was under a deportation order.

What this disclosure means politically remains to be seen. It's reminiscent of news George Bush was arrested on drunken driving charges years earlier but not made public until four days before his election in 2000. It cost Bush thousands of votes from evangelical supporters. But there is a huge difference here. Bush committed the offense. Obama is a bystander. Its been that scenario throughout Obama's campaign. He's been charged and convicted in public opinion over his relationships with unsavory characters -- the Rezko's, Wrights, Ayers and Palestinian movers and shakers. All were guilt by association. Nothing he did was wrong or illegal, merely suspicious in the minds of the accusers. We've already experienced one Teflon president in Ronald Reagan. Are we about to see deja vu all over again with Barack Obama? One final thought. There's a video circulating the Internet whose author claims Obama does not have a valid birth certificate from either of the two hospitals in which he may have been born in Honolulu. The author, an attorney, believes Obama may have been born in Kenya and thus constitutionally unqualified for president. He claims a copy of the birth certificate on Obama's website appears fraudulent. He's filed the claim in federal court. Seems to me this is a case of the opposition entering the bizarre. For one, even a lowly copy kid on the Honolulu newspapers could locate the birth certificate at the county courthouse. He must have one. Otherwise, how would he be awarded a passport to travel to Kenya and most recently his tour of the Middle East, Germany, France and England? The United States is remarkable how it can peacefully transfer the reigns of power at the highest level of government. It is also remarkable to what extent those in power stoop to hang on to that power.