Posted on 01/06/2016 8:20:35 PM PST by Isara
The only thing funnier than Donald Trump’s birther claims about Ted Cruz is the media’s demand that Cruz take them seriously.
Trump’s suggestion that Cruz’s birth potentially presents a “precarious” situation for the GOP should Cruz become the nominee is silly. And a silly attack deserves a silly response, which Cruz delivered in the form of a tweet of the Fonz from “Happy Days” jumping the shark.
However, Trump has every reason to have the word “precarious” on the brain
“Precarious” means “dangerously likely to fall or collapse.” That doesn’t describe the circumstances of Cruz’s birth; it describes Trump’s inflated position that is “dangerously likely to fall or collapse” as soon as the primaries begin next month.
Trump, who doesn’t hesitate to attack anyone, hasn’t figured out how to successfully attack Cruz who is his biggest threat, according to the polls that Trump depends on as the lifeblood of his campaign.
Last month, Trump attempted hitting Cruz from the left by criticizing him for opposing ethanol subsidies and calling him a “maniac” for failing to make enough friends in Washington. That backfired as the conservative base of the party defended Cruz on both counts. So now Trump is toying with the idea of going full birther against Cruz; a ploy Trump used to great media effect against Barack Obama in the 2008 election.
Trump, after all, was the biggest, most-well known Obama birther in the world. He takes credit for forcing Obama to finally produce a birth certificate. (Something Cruz has already done, by the way. Cruz gave it to the Dallas Morning News in 2013.)
Crazy birther claims got a crazy amount of media attention in the 2008 election, and Trump, the unabashed maestro of media controversies, is all too happy for a repeat.
Why let the truth get in the way of a tried and tested conspiracy theory?
Although, to his credit, this time around Trump isn’t going all in. (Yet.)
Trump is suggesting, very loudly, that this is something other people may be concerned about. Those other people, however, aren’t putting their names in public. Except for known kook Alan Grayson and Trump-defender Ann Coulter, who in 2013 said Cruz WAS eligible to be President.
If anyone is interested in the legal merits of Cruz’s citizenship, President Obama’s Acting Solicitor General Neil Katyal and President Bush’s Solicitor General Paul Clement co-authored a piece in March 2015 for the Harvard Law Review titled “The Meaning of Natural Born Citizen.”
In it, they wrote:
Senator Ted Cruz, was born in a Canadian hospital to a U.S. citizen mother. Despite the happenstance of a birth across the border, there is no question that Senator Cruz has been a citizen from birth and is thus a “natural born Citizen” within the meaning of the Constitution. Indeed, because his father had also been resident in the United States, Senator Cruz would have been a “natural born Citizen” even under the Naturalization Act of 1790.
There you have it. Top lawyers for both the Obama and Bush administrations say there is “no question” about it.
In fact, Trump seemed to agree with these top lawyers when he was asked about Cruz’s citizenship at a rally Trump and Cruz appeared at together last September. “I hear it was checked out by every attorney and every which way and I understand Ted is in fine shape,” Trump said.
Odd, huh? Both Trump and Trump-supporter Coulter once believed Cruz was eligible and now they don’t think he is.
What changed? Is Trump getting different legal advice today? From Ann Coulter, perhaps?
No. The only thing that’s changed is Cruz’s position in the polls as the calendar approaches the GOP primaries.
Trump is still searching for a way to knock Cruz off his game. Unfortunately for Trump, and all the campaign reporters hanging on his every word, Cruz is too smart to take the bait.
There are much more important things going on in the world besides Trump’s latest outburst. How about North Korea’s newfound nuclear capabilities? ISIS? The growing Saudi-Iranian hostilities? The stock market declining? President Obama’s latest gun grab? The frightening list goes on and on.
It’s refreshing to see that someone running for president has higher priorities than taking out Donald Trump.
In all my years here, not once has Jim expressed an interest in playing Twister.
Learn somethin’ new everyday.
Best we settle the issue now. Trump is doing us a huge favor by forcing the issue early.
This issue is a non-starter because Cruz’s love and passion for our country is unquestionable. He clings to his Bible, gun, and Fitbit 24/7.
You are correct. Trump is preempting and exposing what would be a very likely ‘RAT tactic if Cruz is the nominee.
Who cares? It’ll be this or they’ll call him a domestic terrorist wife beater.
Perhaps but I do not see the answer as inappropriate.
In deed, it may help Cruz to get this out of the way. I don’t see animosity in either Trump’s response to the question or in video linked by Cruz
And all the other GOP candidates can bring up Cruz’s eligibility problems until they’re blue in the face, but no one will listen to them. So Trump is the best person to bring it up right now, even if it raises the temperature a bit between their respective supporters.
Oh my, this is really really good. I see that Jim is placed to the right.
There is no other place Jim SHOULD be placed! :)
Link? Source? If you have it handy.
Carpenter is biased, having worked for Cruz. But Trump was very effectivr with Wolf Blitzer in outlining how Hillary would likely come after Ted if he were to be the nominee, and SNARK is not going to cut it.
Trump’s kooky conspiracy theory comes after he said obama’s tears were genuine reaction.
Trump, sympathetic to obama while spreading lies about Cruz.
How will that make America great
Had Cruz been born in 1933 under the identical birth circumstances that he was born into in 1970, than he would not even have been a US citizen. The Cable Act, passed in 1934, allowed a US citizen woman, married to a foreign national and who gives birth in a foreign country, to transmit US citizenship onto the newborn child for the first time.
Article II, Section I clause 5, was ratified in 1791 with the rest of the constitution, long before the Cable Act.. Article I has not been modified by any subsequent amendment. Accordingly, the original intent and meaning of Article II stands absent any such constitutional amendment.
The purpose of Article II, Section I clause 5 was to prevent undue foreign influence on the office of the presidency, PARTICULARLY thru a father owing allegiance to a foreign sovereignty. The framers took their definition for NBC from Emmerich De Vattel’s Law of Nations, the 212th paragraph of which was quoted in it’s entirety in the 1814 Venus Merchantman decision. The Law of Nations is referred to in Article I of the constitution. That definition referred to an NBC as being born of two citizen parents and born on the soil of the nation. That definition was cited in the 1868 case of Minor vs Hapersett, and Wong Kim Ark vs US. De Vattel has been cited and accepted in dozens of SCOTUS and federal lower court rulings.
The authors of the 14th amendment, Senators Howard Jacob and Rep. Bingham also defined an NBC in similar terms.
Obama is the very embodiment and personification of the REASON that the framers put those protections into the constitution. By ignoring it, we have opened ourselves to the anti American and unconstitutional tyranny that Obama poses to our constitutional republic.
Ted Cruz is head and shoulders the best candidate in the race. He is a patriot who loves this country and it’s people. He is intellectually and philosophically superior to ANYONE else in the race. As much as I admire him, He CANNOT be considered a natural born citizen, as he is a citizen by statute. He was born with THREE countries (The US, Canada, and Cuba thru his father) having a legitimate claim on his allegiance from birth, whether he wanted it or not. I believe in the constitution and the rule of law, NOT in the cult of personality.
If I were you, I’d go to a padded room and take some much needed rest.
Trump doesn’t bother me.
People selling themselves as something they are not, does.
With Trump, what you see is what you get.
You’ve just defined trump.
Don’t worry Cruz will really make America great again with Conservative foundation.
I'm sure the press is going to let that happen. Watch the next week of news coverage. Cruz is trying to get Iowa locked down and this will be the story for a while. Then we will have the debates and this will be something to try and provoke responses.
Did it ever occur to you that Trump dismissed it initially, but has come to the realization that this issue has legs & is a threat?
Your friends don’t tell you what they think you want to hear. Your friends tell you the truth.
The issue is not the country of birth as much as were Cruz’s parents American citizens when he was born in Canada? No, his father was a Cuban refugee (as are both of Rubio’s parents, so he isn’t eligible either). McCain was born in Panama, but both his parents were American citizens with his dad stationed in Panama. Our diplomats have babies in other countries, and their children would still be considered “natural born.” Did Cruz’s parents get him Canadian citizenship at his birth (that would be on his official Canadian birth certificate)? If Cruz is really a “rule of law” kind of guy, he needs to lead the way to lay this to rest one way or the other.
Now we know why the GOPers didn’t make an issue about Obama’s eligibility documentation.
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