I like Windflier's post as well. What burns my chaps is the FR posters who would then accuse wf of 'betrayal', 'treason' and being an 'apostate' of the Constitution for not agreeing with their interpretation of it.
C Edmund said it best when he said the intransigent ones who didn't understand that the framers were most concerned about someone holding the office that was under foreign influence (ideas, and worse), that those that did not understand that fact were niggling (racist?) pharisees. In my mind, and on that basis, the entire democrat party and some of our RINOs are unfit for the office
Thank you.
People need to stop and think about what the Framers were trying to accomplish with the NBC clause.
They were attempting to screen out and disallow any person with divided loyalties from assuming the office of President. The simplest way to do that, was to restrict the office to those citizens who were naturally attached to the country through the circumstance of their birth. It makes perfect sense that such people's first allegiance would be to our country, and to our people.
I said earlier that it would have been a stroke of genius for the Framers to attach an addendum to the Constitution which explained their reasoning for every Article, Section, and Clause. That act could have saved our country centuries of argument over the Constitution's true meaning, and would probably even have prevented the country from drifting so far from our founding principles.
Unfortunately, they assumed that the plain language of the day was sufficient for any person to grasp what sort of government they'd created. In hindsight, we see that it is not.
In the case of the eligibility requirements for the office of President, what's paramount is the individual's loyalty to our country and the Constitution. If that question can be answered in the affirmative for someone seeking the office, then the Framers' intent is satisfied. I believe that's the case with Ted Cruz, who I have no doubt, the Framers would unanimously approve of.