Wed, October 31, 2007

What do I do between the Annual TiVo Gauntlet of New Fall Programming and the Annual onebee Oscar Pool? Mostly I nap. Some self-defeating behavior in the areas of romance or creative expression, followed by the appropriate amount of self-loathing, but generally sub-par TV and high-quality naps. Occasionally, my mind will fixate on some obscure and meaningless topic. Case in point:

Two Reasons the U.S. Will Never Have a Foreign-Born President:

(Unless, in the distant future, America is overthrown by a foreign power. Then, all bets are off. On the plus side: looting!)

The first reason operates on more of a gut-check level. If our president were allowed to be born elsewhere, what would prevent someone from simultaneously being the President of the United States and also the leader of some other country? Think about that for a minute! (I have. Time's up!) Nothing in particular says that this would have to be a bad thing, but somehow it doesn't sit right. It seems like the sort of conflict of interest that's more likely to hurt us than help us.

In the ten minutes I could devote to Googling this issue before I was overdue for another nap, I found a list of three developed countries that have at some point allowed foreign-born leaders: Germany, India, and Israel. Apparently, Golda Meir was born in Russia and grew up in America before running Israel. (So... sleepy...) Maybe we should try this out by having our president run for office in one of these countries first. Of course it isn't likely to work, but if there's no specific prohibition on the books, anything is possible, right? We all remember what Sherlock Holmes said about things that are possible: they happen.

At any rate, one person running America and Germany simultaneously strikes me as a great plot for either a Tom Clancy novel or a Leslie Nielsen movie.

Point Two: An amendment to our Constitution requires exactly the sort of unanimity that will prevent this restriction from ever being repealed.

Think about it: the first five or ten years after the Constitution was written, you could've mounted a campaign to change the part requiring the president to be a natural born citizen, based entirely on an intellectual argument. The country was young and its rules were new. But today, any challenge to this clause is going to be catalyzed by a foreign-born citizen with his or her eyes on the presidency. Like, for example, the "Amend for Arnold" movement. I'm not for it or against it, but the point is, nobody is making the argument that we should revise the Constitution because it's a good idea. They're proposing the revision because Arnold might want to run for president.

And that's a fine idea, but I think it guarantees its own failure. An amendment must pass a 2/3 vote in the House and Senate, then be ratified by 3/4 of the states. If a hypothetical candidate (but let's say Arnold for argument's sake) were to have that kind of support, the opposition party (Democrats) would be insane not to throw up every possible roadblock to that amendment. If someone can win 3/4 of the states, he's basically running unopposed. Regardless of where a given Democrat stands on the issue of naturalization and the presidency, I can't imagine a political scene in the foreseeable future where he'd be willing to hand over the White House for a minimum of four years. Political suicide!

(Ooh... Political Suicide. There's a title for your Tom Clancy book.)

So, not that you asked, but that's what I think about that exceedingly non-pressing issue! You can discuss amongst yourselves. (Or not. I'm going back to sleep.)

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