The state gun (Colt’s "peacemaker made famous in many western movies) was voted in as part of the AZ legislature’s answer to the wounding of Gabby Giffords and the killings and woundings of 13 others in that Safeway Supermarket parking lot. It shows the empathy of the cretins who inhabit my state’s capitol up in Phoenix.
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What everybody missed from eight years of Birther lawsuits, numbering in excess of 140, is the fact that every case was dismissed from every court due to a lack of standing. The SCOTUS refused to hear a single case and no court in the land declared Obama to be eligible.
That’s because, like the meaning of “high crimes and misdemeanors”, the actual meaning of “natural born citizen” is NOT a legal question.
It is a political question.
The beginning point in the process to determine the political answer is the political party process of vetting nominees. Any nominee who survives that process to win their party’s nomination then gets vetted by the electorate as a whole. If they win the general election, the next step in the vetting process is the electoral college, though many are bound by law to vote for the candidate they were chosen for.
If somebody goes through this entire political process and actually wins at least 270 electoral votes, the final step in the process is the Committee of the Whole meeting to read the votes of the electoral college. All it takes here is one member of the House and one member of the Senate to call into question the eligibility of the candidate receiving 270 or more electoral votes in writing and presented to the Vice President of the United States, who presides over this joint session of Congress.
The joint session is then dismissed to the separate houses where debate ensues and a vote is taken. If at least 218 members of the House decide the candidate is not eligible, and 51 Senators vote likewise in the meeting in the Senate, then the candidate is not eligible and the election falls to the House of Representatives to determine the winner of the election from the top two remaining candidates. Each state delegation gets a single vote and 26 votes elect the president.
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Shouldn’t whether Cruz’ Mother had renounced her US citizenship in favor of Canadian citizenship at the time of his birth be the real question here? She was registered to vote in Canada? What were the rules?
His mother’s status as US citizen or Canadian citizen at the time of his birth seems critical to the issue. That is something I would like to see clarified.
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Republicans are SUCH idiots who know NOTHING about how their own Govt works. They’ve never read the Constitutions passed the 2nd Amendment.
It will take a few years to even convene a Convention, and if they did, they all dont understand something very crucial…,
that once you convene a Constitutional Convention…ANYTHING and EVERYTHING in the Constitution is up for grabs and revision or addition…like the 2nd Amendment…Citizens United…Gerrymandered districts…abortion without restrictions, etc
Funny that Cons think a Constitutional Convention would only be for THEM and THEIR ideas.!!!
Um…NOPE. Guess again and be careful waht you wish for Righties!
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As we have learned from certain sage-like Constitutional scholars the courts, like the SCOTUS, are NOT the last word on Constitutional issues (except, of course, when a Rethuglican says they are).
And Squash. Don’t forget Squash.
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His mother’s status is really important. If she wasn’t a citizen at the time he was born, then Cruz is an illegal alien.
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Good god, man.
Get a grip. And a sense of humor.
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What a trivial reason for a convention.
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Actually, I think he’s 100% correct in this. So did a number of top level legal scholars in 2008 when the bullcrap of Obama’s status was “in issue” (like, not really). So also say not just some but to my understanding a plurality of American constitutional law professors, lecturers and generally-accepted experts. At least the plurality position, and maybe even the majority view, is that the issue reduces to a case of mixed fact & legal context, IOW it’s to be treated much like a purely “political question”, which the courts mostly tend to duck from in deference to the checks and balances otherwise present in the Constitution.
In this case, the poster that you’ve responded to has, in my view, at least started in the right place, being the Electoral College.
We’re having fun with this.
Understand now?
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For Michael Bay’s next film there will be a reenactment of Cruz’s birth under fire in Benghazi
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Ah, hahahahahahha! Good luck with that! They couldn’t manage it for arnold, thank heavens, and they won’t manage it for rafael, jr.!
Better keep our frying pans nearby.
They finally realized Ahnold would be one more contestant in a presidential contest when all the time each of them were looking in the mirror at the next president.
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I have a 7-lb cast iron skillet, will that do the job?
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Of course! Why didn’t we think of that? Why didn’t some brave, thoughtful, logical Democrat propose a Constitutional convention to declare black men born in Kenya with one supposedly white American parent a “natural born citizen.” Totally would have save us a lot of grief.
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This just in – the transcript from the Constitooshunal Cunvenshun:
.
.
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Crowd: We’ve found an unnaturally born citizen! An unnaturally born citizen! Bar him! Bar him!
My good people, there are ways of telling if he is an unnaturally born citizen. Tell me, what do you do with an unnaturally born citizen?
Crowd: You bar him from running for President! Bar him! Bar him!
Yes, and what else do you bar from running for President?
Crowd: Doorknobs! Bones! Soup spoons! Wood!
Very good, yes, wood! Now, does wood float in water?
Crowd: Yes!
And what else floats in water?
Crowd: Bread! Apples! Very small rocks!
From the back of the crowd, King Donald of the Roulette Table calls out: A duck!
Exactly. So, logically… (pauses, allows the Socratic method to come to fruition)
Delegate: If Ted Cruz…weighs the same as a duck…then he’s like wood…
And therefore?
Delegate: An unnaturally born citizen!
Crowd: An unnaturally born citizen! An unnaturally born citizen! Bar him! Bar him!
We shall use my largest scales!
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My biggest point in the diatribe about how this is not a legal question but is a political question, we are seeing the initial vetting phase of the political question playing out before our eyes. In my not so humble opinion the answer, according to Republican primary voters and caucus goers is going to be a resoundingly loud NO, Ted Cruz is NOT ELIGIBLE. Of course this political decision will have no sway over any potential future political question about eligibility under the natural born citizen clause.
It’s all playing out precisely how the founders intended.
It was the same with the glorification of the A.R. 15 after the Sandyhook children were massacred.