Posted on 12/05/2008 3:36:25 PM PST by ckilmer
There’s something to what you say. But part of that is making very, very sure that they take the case only if it meets every jot and tittle of their standards for taking cases.
They probably desperately want to get their hands on the constitutional issue, but desperately want to avoid becoming politicized.
You said — “My pastor has said a few times that he can’t find America mentioned or even alluded to anywhere in the Scriptures. It could be (and this is pure speculation) that America is destroyed or so weakened/marginalized that we don’t figure anywhere in the End Times. And...it could be the Zero is the one God has set aside to accomplish this.”
Well..., I’ve heard this frequently at Prophecy Conferences and other pastors speaking about it. However, it’s a very, very weak argument.
The fact that a country is not mentioned directly is supposed to mean that they are not there or do not exist or have been destroyed. Well, if that’s the case, then we can say that about half the nations in the world are probably going to be destroyed, just like America, at these end-times events (with that logic).
A more likely scenario is that the focus is on Israel and its immediate and prime enemies — which happen to be the Muslim nations. And it could very well be that the U.S. simply does not take any significant part in the process of what will happen at that time, because the “policies” of the U.S. will have probably changed, leaving Israel pretty much on its own.
However, there is an indication that the U.S. is there, along with a confederation of nations who asks the following...
Sheba, Dedan, the merchants of Tarshish, and all their young lions will say to you, ‘Have you come to take plunder? Have you gathered your army to take booty, to carry away silver and gold, to take away livestock and goods, to take great plunder?’ “ ‘
This is in Ezekiel 38:13, and may be an indication of the U.S. and other countries...
I don’t think the U.S. has disappeared or is not active in the community of nations, just like they are now. It may simply be that the policy of the U.S. will have changed by then and the U.S. is not as involved in the peace process (not as “hands on” as it is trying to be now).
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There is a guy named Walid Shoebat (who has been all over the news and was a Muslim terrorist, now a Christian), who has a view on Biblical prophecy from the standpoint of how it seems from a Middle East perspective and that from Arabs and Jews (according to what the Bible says). He seems to be of the opinion that this is untrue about the U.S. (what these other pastors say) and that it indicates a lack of knowledge of the Middle East to say that.
You should look him up and see what he has to say about that.
This is all about "legalistic" because what constitutes a "natural born citizen" is a legal question. And it doesn't matter if the answer (whatever it is) "sounds silly" to some. If it "sounds silly" to enough people, then they can go to Congress and amend the Constitution or get other "anti-silly relief." But the Constitution established (without defining) a standard and that standard must, somehow, be upheld.
As for your example above, that is nowhere near what is at issue here. IF--which is what the present case is about, it's about IF the candidates were natural born citizens---but IF a person was, in fact, a natural born citizen, lived in Iran all his life, came here and ran for prez, that is not a question of eligibility. (Because, in your example, we are assuming the person is without question a "natural born citizen.")
That person would indeed be eligible to run and any concern about his loyalty to this nation would have to be expressed at the ballot box.
Just because someone is a "natural born citizen" doesn't mean people have to vote for him.
But if someone is not a "natural born citizen," he is not eligible to serve even if people do vote for him.
Good thing the burden of proof is on the applicant.
Too bad there’s apparently no way, yet, to make the applicant prove anything beyond a prima facie case.
>The Constitution was written for an honest, intelligent and moral people.
This is true, and how can a people be moral and honest without a proper humility before the Almighty and All-Powerful Ruler of the Universe. {Let us remember that He hates “crooked balances” and “the shedding of innocent blood”.}
>It only protects the minority if the majority agree to follow it.
This is true, however, let us also remember that Independence and Liberty were won at the barrel of a gun, by the grace of God.
It is not unreasonable to think that one day, perhaps soon, America will have to be won back, once again, by the barrel of a gun.
Will they go shopping for the right case? The are aware that several cases are progressing in their direction, might they look at each to see which one best fits the need to clarify the Constitution. I cannot see them ignoring the issue, I can envision them researching, discussing and presenting a combined finding that will be historical sound.
How they handle these cases will go a long way in calming the country.
If this is not settled before Obama is sworn in. And he's found not to be a natural born citizen after his inauguration. He will become the illegitimate president and any acts and laws signed by him would be invalid. It appears to me that any lawsuit filed that went against laws Obama signed into "law" would be found illegal.
Therefore Congress would have no choice but to impeach him. They could get nothing done.
You said — “I don’t know whether or when Ann went to Kenya.”
Well, at this point, you have to take the parties at their word. You see, she said she married him. And guess what — he couldn’t be married in the United States, because that’s bigamy. That would end up throwing the Kenyan father of Obama in jail, in the U.S. He was married already.
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Obama Sr. was married at the age of eighteen in a tribal ceremony to Kezia, with whom he had four children.
[from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barack_Obama_Sr. ]
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“The couple married on February 2, 1961; they separated when Obama was two years old and divorced in 1964.”
[ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barack_Obama ]
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So..., he could be married again in Kenya, since that was allowed, and it would give him more status, too.
Then you put with that, the fact that the grandmother says she was there when Obama was born in Kenya and you have even more testimonial evidence.
And furthermore, it was probably the plans of Ann to come back to the U.S. and have Obama born there. But, when the airlines wouldn’t allow her to fly back in her advanced state of pregnancy, she was stuck in Kenya and gave birth to Obama there.
That fouled up the plans for Ann to have her son as an American citizen and so she immediately got back to Hawaii to set up the pretense that Obama was born there and placed the ad in the paper. She was only thinking about him being an American citizen and the advantages of that.
I don’t see them shopping for a case, exactly. And so far, if accurate, the vibes coming out of the staff offices has demonstrated something like contempt-—IOW, no, “wowzer, if only the ‘right’ case showed up” vibe at all.
(Caveat here: each “side” of the Court potentially could want the issue because they think it would fall a certain way. And that’s okay because the point here is to get the law settled, to the extent the SCOTUS can do that (some of the repsonsibility may lie on Congress to flesh out the standard), and indicate what procedures, if any, should be in place here.)
Like you, I think several of the Justices would, just as Constitution geeks, want to provide a nice summary of the issues and law even if they don’t disturb Obama’s eligibility. However, again, I am sure they are unsure of how the country will react if they act or don’t act and, while that won’t be the determining factor, it’s got to be of some influence.
I think one thing they could do in Donofrio is send it back to NJ (sorry if I’m repeating myself to you; I’m losing track of exactly who I’ve posted to and on what) and order the lower court to interpret the statutory responsibility of the SOS and find facts as to whether she fulfilled it.
In the course of that, Donofrio could be building a more extensive factual and legal record to go up on appeal (assuming the case went against him).
Could be. Lock and load and wait and see. :)
P.S. Also if the SCOTUS remanded the case for further action below, at that point, amicus briefs on all kinds of issues related to the case would start pouring in from all over the nation.
Where, allegedly, were these two married and is there record of their marriage?
They probably desperately want to get their hands on the constitutional issue, but desperately want to avoid becoming politicized.
I don’t think he would be impeached. I would reason it out like this: if a sitting president were found to be ineligible to serve, then he would be legally “unavailable” or “incompetent” to serve and our laws on succession of the presidency would kick in and be followed. Same as if he died in office.
As to any acts that the now-known-to-be-ineligible President did, there would probably be ways to fix that that were satisfactory. For example, the first thing the new president could do, simply for the sake of continuity and calm, is ratify every official act done by the former president-—so that laws signed by that prez were still laws, as if they had been signed by the new prez and so on.
What I am saying is I think we would find a way.
Would hope that Vieira would lead the Amicus pack.
BTW do you have your brief ready to submit?
Not only that, but considering their “ripeness” doctrine and so on, I would think that even in relatively clear cases of ineligibility, the SCOTUS might not get involved until after that candidate wins. And, if that was how they viewed “ripeness,” then I don’t know if they would say the matter was ripe when he won the election or when he was elected by the Electorol College.
IOW, the Court will not want to be doing this for every joe who runs for prez. It only gets really serious if the guy wins, either the nomination of a major party or the election or the Electoral College vote.
Regardless, the point is that right now they have a guy with potentially considerable questions about his eligibility and he WON. If I were them, I’d be looking for some *legitimate* (not activist) way to grab these facts and get it addressed.
You said — “Where, allegedly, were these two married and is there record of their marriage?”
That’s a good question... LOL...
If they were married in the U.S., the father of our Barack Obama is a bigamist and committed a crime by marrying Obama’s mother. The only way he could have married her legally, was in Kenya.
Now, as to that documentation, I’ll let someone else dig that out. It’s sufficient for me to know that he would be a bigamist in the U.S. if he got married here...
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Furthermore, he wasn’t divorced from his first wife, if you follow the record (at least, as it’s given to the public).
See this page on Wikipedia — “Family of Barack Obama”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Family_of_Barack_Obama
Look down at the family tree that they’ve got diagrammed. Also, note that Barack Obama’s step mother is still alive. Someone could be asking her questions, too — unless someone has paid her off for some silence.
There are some good rabbit trails to go down, I would say....
Don’t tempt me!
I would love to send one.
This is the 18-lane interchange of rabbit holes, my FRiend.
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