Wednesday, July 7, 2010

We never understood the damn thing ourselves, sir


Right before the 4th of July holiday, the President made what could only be described as a bizarre speech regarding illegal immigration and border enforcement. Before we link you to the ultimate destination, let's review a portion of the 14th amendment of the Constitution as it pertains directly to qualifications for citizenship:

Section 1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.


Now, let's bounce that against what the President had to say last week with respect to citizenship:

“Being an American is not a matter of blood or birth, it’s a matter of faith,” President Obama declared at a speech he gave on immigration.


If someone other than Obama had said this, we might reason that it was an inartful way of describing that possessing the "American spirit" is not merely a matter of where one was born or that American exceptionalism takes a "belief" that is not automatically bestowed upon one because he was born within our nation's borders.

Since Obama does not believe in American exceptionalism nor does he even know what it means we're left with the distinct impression that this was his way of blowing off all that dense legalese of the 14th amendment in order for this particular constitutional scholar to qualify American citizenship however the hell he wants.

Hello, Amnesty!

Our blog-buddy, Harrison has an excellent wrap-up of the rest of the President's speech, here.

2 comments:

SarahB said...

going out with our update today

Harrison said...

Thanks for the link as always!