(no subject)
So I watched yesterday's episode of Rachel Maddow and I'm beginning to think I need to stop paying attention to political news altogether just in avoidance of things that will skyrocket my blood pressure. She did a segment covering the idiotic "birther bill" in Arizona, and I'd heard of this, but the prior coverage I'd read of it/heard of it had just stated it required presidential candidates to provide their birth certificates. Which is redundant and silly legislation; presidential candidates already provide plenty of proof of citizenship in order to run on the federal level, and there's really no reason to have to submit their records to individual states except to add an unnecessary layer of bureaucracy, so even on its face, the bill is a facetious waste of the time and money of the Arizona taxpayer and, if anything, an unconstitutional restriction on the political freedoms of American citizens to run for office.
But here's the part where it just gets ridiculous, and the part that I wasn't aware of before -- I checked out the bill itself after I watched Rachel's segment, since the text of it is available online from the Arizona legislature. They do, indeed, require a long form birth certificate in order to accept a presidential nominee in this bill. They amended the bill to include a proviso so that if you can't provide your birth certificate, you can supplement it with two out of the following in the list of documentation:
'(a) AN EARLY BAPTISMAL OR CIRCUMCISION CERTIFICATE.
(b) A HOSPITAL BIRTH RECORD.
(c) A POSTPARTUM MEDICAL RECORD FOR THE MOTHER OR CHILD THAT IS SIGNED BY THE DOCTOR OR MIDWIFE OR PERSON WHO DELIVERED OR EXAMINED THE CHILD AFTER BIRTH.
(d) AN EARLY CENSUS RECORD.'
So, okay. Leaving aside for the moment the fact that the fact that not having access to a long form birth certificate shouldn't disqualify you as a citizen and in fact doesn't, and leaving aside for the moment that a state does not have the power to disqualify presidential candidates for a federal election due to a little thing called the Supremacy Clause, and leaving aside the fact that the Full Faith and Due Credit clause requires states to recognize documents from other states the same way that they would be recognized in their own state such that no state can decide that another state's birth certificates aren't good enough for them, and leaving aside the fact that they didn't realize until after the bill was already presented that there should be some form of alternative proof of natural born citizenship, this bill requires not just one but two of the above, so this requires basically--
In order to be a natural born citizen, you have to either be of a form of the Christian religion that baptizes, or male, or both, since women don't have access to circumcision records and many faiths (or non-faiths, as the case may be) do not baptize babies or keep baptismal records. Or, you have to be born in a hospital, so home births and people who are born not in hospitals or people whose hospitals have lost or failed to keep accurate records.
Okay.
Of course, you can circumvent all of those pathways if you have the long form birth certificate.
But you don't have the long form birth certificate if you were born in Arizona.
Arizona does not issue long form birth certificates and it hasn't since 1989. Source through Lexis is Arizona Vital Records. This is fine for the current generation, since 1990 onward is too young to run for president and will be for a while yet. But the fact that this law is so phenomenally short-sighted that it renders citizens of Arizona ineligible to run for the presidency in future generations is the proof in the pudding of just how completely idiotic this bill is.
You don't have to be a crazy liberal like me to think that this bill is stupid. It was vetoed by Jan Brewer, a woman with whom I rarely agree, on the grounds of its total ridiculousness, but they've got the votes to override the veto if they decide to court the tea party to the extent that they will do that.
It's not that I'm surprised that the Arizona legislature is doing phenomenally idiotic things, exactly. But I do find it surprising that a state legislature would attempt to launch a political assault on a sitting president like this. His birth certificate isn't long form, so it isn't good enough for the Arizona legislature. Like the birth certificates of all children born in Arizona starting in 1990.
There is not much content on this journal lately, and most of it is about how my job search has sucked and will continue to suck. But seriously. This is too ridiculous for me not to comment. They don't even issue long form birth certificates and they brought this to the governor's desk.
This is like the long-form RL version of "SOMEONE IS WRONG ON THE INTERNET."
But here's the part where it just gets ridiculous, and the part that I wasn't aware of before -- I checked out the bill itself after I watched Rachel's segment, since the text of it is available online from the Arizona legislature. They do, indeed, require a long form birth certificate in order to accept a presidential nominee in this bill. They amended the bill to include a proviso so that if you can't provide your birth certificate, you can supplement it with two out of the following in the list of documentation:
'(a) AN EARLY BAPTISMAL OR CIRCUMCISION CERTIFICATE.
(b) A HOSPITAL BIRTH RECORD.
(c) A POSTPARTUM MEDICAL RECORD FOR THE MOTHER OR CHILD THAT IS SIGNED BY THE DOCTOR OR MIDWIFE OR PERSON WHO DELIVERED OR EXAMINED THE CHILD AFTER BIRTH.
(d) AN EARLY CENSUS RECORD.'
So, okay. Leaving aside for the moment the fact that the fact that not having access to a long form birth certificate shouldn't disqualify you as a citizen and in fact doesn't, and leaving aside for the moment that a state does not have the power to disqualify presidential candidates for a federal election due to a little thing called the Supremacy Clause, and leaving aside the fact that the Full Faith and Due Credit clause requires states to recognize documents from other states the same way that they would be recognized in their own state such that no state can decide that another state's birth certificates aren't good enough for them, and leaving aside the fact that they didn't realize until after the bill was already presented that there should be some form of alternative proof of natural born citizenship, this bill requires not just one but two of the above, so this requires basically--
In order to be a natural born citizen, you have to either be of a form of the Christian religion that baptizes, or male, or both, since women don't have access to circumcision records and many faiths (or non-faiths, as the case may be) do not baptize babies or keep baptismal records. Or, you have to be born in a hospital, so home births and people who are born not in hospitals or people whose hospitals have lost or failed to keep accurate records.
Okay.
Of course, you can circumvent all of those pathways if you have the long form birth certificate.
But you don't have the long form birth certificate if you were born in Arizona.
Arizona does not issue long form birth certificates and it hasn't since 1989. Source through Lexis is Arizona Vital Records. This is fine for the current generation, since 1990 onward is too young to run for president and will be for a while yet. But the fact that this law is so phenomenally short-sighted that it renders citizens of Arizona ineligible to run for the presidency in future generations is the proof in the pudding of just how completely idiotic this bill is.
You don't have to be a crazy liberal like me to think that this bill is stupid. It was vetoed by Jan Brewer, a woman with whom I rarely agree, on the grounds of its total ridiculousness, but they've got the votes to override the veto if they decide to court the tea party to the extent that they will do that.
It's not that I'm surprised that the Arizona legislature is doing phenomenally idiotic things, exactly. But I do find it surprising that a state legislature would attempt to launch a political assault on a sitting president like this. His birth certificate isn't long form, so it isn't good enough for the Arizona legislature. Like the birth certificates of all children born in Arizona starting in 1990.
There is not much content on this journal lately, and most of it is about how my job search has sucked and will continue to suck. But seriously. This is too ridiculous for me not to comment. They don't even issue long form birth certificates and they brought this to the governor's desk.
This is like the long-form RL version of "SOMEONE IS WRONG ON THE INTERNET."