Exclusive: Kumbe Barack Obama na George W. Bush Ni ndugu.

Back in Sept. 2007, several major media outlets broke the story that Dick Cheney and Barack Obamaare distantly related.

Lynne Cheney, Dick Cheney's wife, said on Oct. 16, 2007 on MSNBC that she was doing research Blue Skies, No Fences, her new book, and discovered the link between Barack Obama and her husband when researching genealogy records.

Meanwhile, the New York Post, reported that Obama is also the 10th cousin once removed of President George W. Bush! Sensational political scandal at its finest!

Well, not really.

Does this, in any way whatsoever, affect Barack Obama's credibility or his fitness to be the Democratic Party nominee for President of the United States? Of course it doesn't.

Is it an interesting tidbit of news among all this heavy-handed political reporting? Oh yeah!

A favorite game among the Hollywood glitterati and their groupies is "6 degrees of Kevin Bacon." The rules are to take any film actor, examine who they have worked with in each film, who that person has worked with in other films, and how many films it takes before one of those people has worked with Kevin Bacon.

The point is, if you go back far enough, just about any two people living in the United States are probably related. The Chicago Sun-Times article says that Barack Obama and Dick Cheney are ninth cousins once removed, but according to Geneology.com's logic for determining kinship relationships, they are eight cousins once removed.

This is because Dick Cheney and Barack Obama's common ancestors are reported by the Sun-Times and the New York Post to be Mareen and Susannah Duvall, who emigrated from France in the 17th century, the two publications said.

According to Genealogy.com, when determining what to title the relationship between cousins, it is always the older individual who is considered first in their relationship to the common ancestor.

So, if the Duvalls are Dick Cheney's great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandparents, and Barack Obama's great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandparents, then Barack Obama and Dick Cheney would be eighth cousins once removed, because there is eight generations between Dick Cheney and the common ancestor, and one generation between Dick Cheney and Barack Obama.

The line of logic for the relationship between Barack Obama and George W. Bush is the same. The Post reports that Obama and George W. Bush both share common ancestors in Samuel Hinckley and Sarah Soole.

Barack Obama, Dick Cheney, George W. Bush--and also the president's father, Former President George H. W. Bush--all relatives! The fact that the major media even took time on our TV screens to report on this story is kind of silly, but it is an interesting bit of news nonetheless!