Monday, July 30, 2012

Hocus Pocus

I've always wondered why black Americans descended from slaves support Obama; they have absolutely NOTHING in common with him. With a tight election right around the corner, a few intrepid genealogists have combed through musty courthouses to plug this gaping hole in the only way they COULD plug it...they tied his mother to slaves.  And not just any ol' slave either. No way. Not for The One.

Wave a magic wand, make a wild  guess here and there, close your eyes, mumble the letters "DNA", and presto! Obama is the grandson of John Punch! Cool, huh?


Here are the supporting documents at Ancestry.com.


14 comments:

  1. I've been reading the documentation. The entire premise that Obama is related to John Punch rests on two suppositions:

    1. That the black slave John Punch mated with a white woman sometime before 1637.

    2. That said slave John Punch was the sire of the next guy on the tree: John Bunch.

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  2. If you think THAT'S a stretch, there's more:

    John Bunch l, the son of a black slave and a white woman, is presumed to have ALSO mated/married a white woman, since his descendants freely intermarried with whites.

    John Bunch l was a planter, owned land, and borrowed money.

    I am incredulous that this man, the son of a slave, lived such a genteel life in 17th century Virginia.

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    Replies
    1. lr, I think there were in fact mixed race people in those days who were free men. So, "it could be".

      IMO the appropriate riposte is yeah, Barack Obama is descended from slaves... just like a lot of other white people!

      :D

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    2. Yes, of course it "could be". And of course there were mixed race folks in those days. Some of them may have even prospered.

      However, I would think that a white woman bearing the child of a black slave would have been an unusual occurrence. For that child to financially succeed, and himself to marry a white woman, further strains the story. However, there are many strange stories in our history; perhaps this is one of them.

      Then again...

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    3. "However" is the word of the day. :D

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  3. I'd say it's little more than an attempt to give Obama some 'Plantation' Cred.

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    Replies
    1. Well, it might explain Stanley Ann's jungle fever, eh?

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  4. Hee hee snort snort. This guy should have is own late night show.

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  5. Totally off topic (hee-hee, THAT never happens here!) have you guys seen the brouhaha between Geller, Spencer, IOTW, and Zip? Yikes. Tomatoes are flying everywhere!

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  6. Actually, the slave status of offspring of black/white coitus, whether freeman, indentured servant, or slave per se (which John Punch was not ... that is a latter day presumption) was not clearly defined in 1640. The principle issue of the day, 1662, was the spawn of Negro women by white men, not vice versa as this "ancestry" purportedly details. It wasn't until 1750 that Virginia legislated that slaves were real property. HERE is a time line summary.

    The main problem, in my view, is exemplified by this quote from this article ...

    ...the research left open a question: Was John Punch, the slave, a Bunch ancestor? Because records have been destroyed, there is no definitive proof.

    In short, we're really dealing with guesswork, informed somewhat, but none-the-less, guesswork.

    The real question is this: What earthly difference does this purported finding serve?

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  7. Guess I was too obtuse .... let's try again.

    This "ancestry" study does nothing but make the case that Obama has NO slave status in his background. Period.

    So, again, what is the point?

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  8. I agree with you aridog. Have you noticed that this whole Ancestry.com bombshell sank like a rock? Even the left wants nothing to do with its stinkiness.

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