Yes Cisco. I absolutely LOVE this state, have lived here 50 years. The legislature continues to spew out ridiculous bills while ignoring the fires burning at our feet.
Keep in mind I was adding on to Steve MB’s response to Little Nemo. I/we took Lil’ N’s contention as saying that there could be little problem with the law since it would have to establish concrete, unassailable and non-manipulable criteria for establishing citizenship.
Steve’s initial response was that by vesting the decision solely in the SoS–making the SoS the decider–then that would fulfill Nemo’s challenge. I was merely adding on to/tightening it by noting that it would be possible to not only prevent the question from being appealed to the judiciary, but also that the only avenue of appeal would be to a similarly political office.
By “political question” I’m referring to one that is outside the court’s general purview because the question of fact-finding (not the law itself, but the outcome of the SOS’s determination) is reserved to the SoS and the Governor. Note that this is different from challenging the constitutionality of the law—it’s whether or not the court can pass on the SoS’s determination if “fact” (i.e., whether or not citizenship has been established).
That’s pretty much why I think this is an evil proposal. It would not be too hard to write it in such a way as to make ballot qualification a hotly contested political issue.
If Arizona can dictate what rules it has on what it takes to be a presidential candidate legal, then Hawaii can makes its own rules as to who it considers to be a Hawaii born citizen and resident.
Posted, again.
http://www.cracked.com/blog/history-texbook-from-the-future-holy-shit/
Dude, I’ve seen that picture. The shadows make it clear that the picture is a total fake. Just like the moon landing.
-Joe
-Joe
The only reason to propose this stupid law is if Arizona intends to deny candidates that everyone else would accept. If they didn’t expect/intend to deny Obama’s citizenship, they wouldn’t be proposing the law.
It’s just like abortion, of course. All of the Hard-R GOPers in AZ can point to what they did to fix the problem with the Kenyan in the White House.
Nothing will actually come from it - it’s just a bunch of noise to show that they’re real Americans, real patriots, not socialists.
-Joe
The concept, though, goes back much further. I had in mind a passage from the novel Catch-22 in which the commanding officer gets it in his head that it’s a good idea to make the men under his command sign loyalty oaths, then weekly loyalty oaths, then daily, and eventually each officer has to sign an oath and sing the national anthem before getting breakfast. The practice is finally broken when blunt officer flatly refuses to play along, yelling instead “Give me eat!”
The point being that once an empty gestures is tolerated in the name of trying to prove a negative, there’s no reason to keep from piling them on for the same reason. If the goal is make really, really really sure that a person running for president is not ineligible, then there’s no limit to number of pointless tests one can demand, once everyone agree to the first one.
You win the right to win the next sentence - the one where I said any proposal has to have a reasonable chance of surviving a constitutionality test. Your idea fails - no court is going to rule that a public official has the authority to make arbitrary decisions on who is eligible to run for President.
As I said in another thread, this guy probably isn’t irrational. He wants to get out of his military obligation. He’s probably figuring if he makes himself a conservative poster child, the Obama administration will give him a quiet discharge rather than lock him up. Then he can do the right wing talkshow circuit and write a book that will make him a million dollars or so.
As I said above, the most likely motive for this proposal is to get Obama’s supporters up in arms over this and make it look like Obama has something to hide.
In view of the fact that this is not yet the law in the State of Arizona, I’d be interested in knowing what is the current process by which candidates’ names are selected for inclusion on the ballot.
I did a little research, and discovered that the bill under discussion here is HB 2441, and that it amends Section 16-507, Arizona Revised Statutes.
I also found out that the current version of Section 16-507, Arizona Revised Statutes states, in toto:
This doesn’t have word one to say about how names were selected for inclusion on the ballot in, say, 2008.
Anyone have an idea where I might find information on the process, as it was exercised in 2008?
From kaylasdad’s link, here’s the relevant section of the proposal:
What’s so sinister about that? It’s 2012. The Barack Obama and Mitt Romney campaigns both submit thier candidate’s name to the Arizona Secretary of State’s office. They both submit a copy of the documentation that they are natural born citizens and are over thirty five. Maybe some cable bills to prove residency.
The Secretary of State has to show reasonable cause to dispute these documents. If you think “I don’t like this guy” is going to suffice, think again. If you think “I don’t like the way this state designed its birth certificates” is going to hold up as a reasonable cause, think again.
Like I’ve been saying all along: Barack Obama is an American citizen. He will have no problem passing a citizenship test.
Stop acting like this is something he needs to worry about.
The only thing sinister is the implication that they’ve been careless and slipshod in how they’ve been formulating their ballots for ninety-six years.
Somebody ought to demand an investigation of that! :rolleyes:
If Obama were an educated Ivy League type, certainly he would have no problem passing a literacy test to the satisfaction of the local county board of elections clerk?
It’s not about worrying, about humoring the crazy for…what was the purpose of this again? And how do you the people jerking off over this next to their rebel flag feel about the frivolous lawsuits that are raising our health care costs by like a bajillion percent*?
-Joe
*Figured arrived at randomly, dependent on the right wing arguments that all health care cost issues can be resolved through tort reform.
“Please translate your birth certificate into Chinese. This will prove that you are familiar with it and that it is not a fake.”
“This is one nigger that won’t be running for President in Arizona this year.”
Good luck on devising a literacy test that Palin can pass and Obama will fail.
Which is still my point. Can anyone explain why Obama will be more burdened by this than his Republican opponent will be?
According to the text of the bill, the pass/fail decision appears to be left up to the discretion of the SoS.
Where I see this backfiring, though, is when the Arizona Secretary of State accepts President Obama’s documentation as valid in 2012, and places him on the ballot.
At which time, the Birthers move to prosecute the SoS for accepting fraudulent documentation in violation of the law.
Technically that is correct, but I’ve never voted for an elector by name, and I’d be very surprised if anyone here has.
Yes, but how do we know that his mother and father’s birth certificate isn’t faked? Hmm? Or that Admiral McCain was really the father? Hmm? How do we know that a Nigerian wasn’t really John McCain’s father? Or that the hospital didn’t swap babies accidentially, or intentionally with a communist mother? Hmm? How do we know that his parents were loyal US citizens? They might have been spies!! Hmmm?
I now extend a handshake and a laurel to our new n…President.
Hey, watch the language! … Oh, good thing we’re in the Pit.
Sad but all too true. (I hope I’m not accused of racism, but I thought it was nuts to pick a black candidate if the idea was uniting the country.)
Even without a legal mandate to do so, there’s nothing stopping 50 Secretaries from taking out an ad in U.S.A. Today to advocate sane discourse. Or for 535 Congressmen to pass a unanimous resolution that Obama is the legal President and, regardless of political differences, they deplore the pollution of political discourse with rank gibberish.
I can’t recall Democrats ever rallying around such poisonous lies, but if they did I’d be ashamed to be a Democrat. That the RW/GOP/Teapotters embrace the bile-drenched fumes from the mouths of their most stupid supporters leads rationalists to ask “Have you no shame?” There are RW people in this very forum! Do you agree with the tactic of embracing even the most obviously false vile nonsense? Your theory being, I guess, that the gullible and stupid are your natural voter base?
From The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn:
And bless 'em if they tried, but it won’t make any difference. The birthers might lose some of their less insane membership, but the dedicated hard-core types would remain and and the media, eager to publicize anything interesting, unusual or weird (on the basis that mundane, commonplace and banal make for lousy headlines) will continue to give them press.