WHAT IS A NATURAL BORN U.S. CITIZEN?

I think a way should be found to litigate what "natural born American" means.  You couldn't do it for Papa Romney who was born in Mexico because he didn't get the Republican nomination.  You have to have "standing" i.e. you have to be injured. Because he didn't win the nomination, no one was injured. Democrats decided not to try McCain who was born in the Panama Canal zone, but he was born in a U.S. military hospital on an American military base to two American parents; however he didn't win the presidency either so it was mute.  At any rate, I would accept McCain as a natural born American.  Goldwater was born in Arizona, but before it became a state, his credentials are suspect also, but he didn't win the presidency either so Democrats had no "standing."   If anyone was injured in these three cases it was the candidates Republican opponents in the nomination process but none have tried to take out a lawsuit over it.

Obama was born in the U.S. to an American mother and an immigrant father* (He is a natural born citizen on two counts and many Republicans (including Trump) refuse to recognize him as a legitimate American born.  Snopes has an interesting discussion as to whether Obma is a legitimate president. The minimum qualifications for the presidency of the United States specified in Article II of the Constitution are few and seemingly straightforward: In order to be President, a person must be a natural-born citizen of the United States, must be at least thirty-five years old, and must have been a resident of the United States for fourteen years.**  Mitt Romney may have claimed he was injured by Obama's victory, but he too didn't take out a suit.  At any rate, I doubt he would have won.
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A few facets of this claim [of being a natural born American] immediately jump out as being far-fetched: first, that a sitting U.S. Senator who has already spent a good deal of time and money securing his party's nomination for the presidency would suddenly be discovered as ineligible due to an obscure provision of U.S. law; and second, that U.S. law would essentially penalize someone who would otherwise qualify for natural-born citizenship status simply because his mother was too young. The fact is, the qualifications listed in the example quoted above are moot because they refer to someone who was born outside the United States. Since Barack Obama was born in Hawaii, they do not apply to him.

The Fourteenth Amendment states that "all persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States." Since Hawaii is part of the United States, even if Barack Obama's parents were both non-U.S. citizens who hadn't even set foot in the country until just before he was born, he'd still qualify as a natural-born citizen.

Some have claimed that Barack Obama's Hawaiian birthplace doesn't qualify him as a natural-born citizen because Hawaii was not yet a state when he was born. This claim is wrong: Hawaii was admitted as the 50th state almost two years before Barack Obama's birth there (21 August 1959 for statehood vs. 4 August 1961 for Obama's birthdate).

But Cruz was born in Canada to one American parent (mother) and even carried a Canadian passport and he didn't renounce his Canadian citizenship until he decided to run for president.*  I certainly hope he doesn't win because he scares the H@LL out of me, but his case is questionable.  Constitutional law Prof. Laurence Tribe of Harvard said that as a student, Cruz was an "originalist" who said that the constitution should be interpreted as it was originally intended.***

Here are some other possibilities.  Consider this one, suppose you are born in the U.S. to legal immigrants or even better suppose you are born in the U.S. to illegals.  Technically you are a natural-born American even if your parents are not citizens (see above quote).  Can you imagine Republicans on that one?  Or suppose you are born by C-section.  Is that "natural born?"

I think we ought to get this thing out of the way for good.  It is fine with me if the Supreme Court says born anywhere in the U.S. and/or born to an American citizen.

NOTE ADDED 01-16-2016: Houston attorney Newton Schwartz, who said he isn’t connected to any campaign, filed the lawsuit Thursday in U.S. District Court in Texas. The court is being asked to settle whether Cruz, a Republican senator from Texas, meets the “natural born citizen” requirement in the Constitution. (http://www.marketwatch.com/story/lawsuit-filed-over-whether-ted-cruz-is-a-natural-born-citizen-2016-01-15)

* Until 1934 if your mother was American but the father wasn't, you were not considered a natural born American citizen and had to be naturalized.  In 1934 a law was passed making you a citizen not needing naturalization if it is you mother is an American citizen and your father isn't. So it is only since 1934 that you are considered an American citizen with either parent being an American citizen.
** http://www.snopes.com/politics/obama/citizen.asp
***https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2016/01/11/professor-laurence-tribe-questions-whether-ted-cruz-is-a-natural-born-citizen/

SUPPORTING FISCAL CONSERVATISM

In case there are those that read my previous post (http://stopcontinentaldrift.blogspot.com/2014/04/three-republicans-who-wont-get.html) that may have gotten the opinion that I hate conservatives, I do not hate conservatives and I do support a policy, for example, of balancing the Federal budget over a business cycle (but not annually).  I point out, however, that having a positive cash flow in our government is something we rarely have done.  No Republican has done even this loose balancing since Eisenhower (who had it twice), not Nixon, not Ford, not Reagan, not H.W. Bush, and not H.W. Bush.

In fact I was a Republican up until Barry Goldwater.  After he got the nomination I said to my fellow Republicans at a meeting that now we should all pull together and not just beat up on Rockefeller.  Someone replied that if I was such a Rocky lover, why didn't I become a Democrat?  So I did and have to admit that Democrats have more fun.  Later I was to break from the Democratic Party because I agreed with President Ford's pardoning of Nixon.  The Democrats were setting up to worry the Nixon issue to death, just like Republicans are doing with Benghazi now, and not do any work.

I think that Republicans putting the 1964 Civil Rights Act over the top was their finest hour.  The Act was much broader than just applying to Blacks but included sex, race, and religion as well as color.  Through the leadership of Republican Everett Dirkson, in the end 27 Republican Senators voted for the Senate version of the bill and only 6 against it.  Also 138 Republican Representatives voted for the House version and 34 against whereas 96 Democrats voted against it (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Rights_Act_of_1964).  Can you imagine that happening today when a comprehensive immigration bill cannot even come to the House floor?

The same might be said for the Voting Rights Act of 1965 when 30 Republican Senators voted for it and only 2 against, 112 Republican Representatives voted for the bill and 24 against (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voting_Rights_Act_of_1965).

Of course these bills were in the days when the Solid South was in the Democratic Party and before the Southern Strategy when they switched to the Republican Party.  I consider Dirkson who shepherded both bills through the Senate to be a hero, though he was a supporter of Joe McCarthy and the Vietnam War..  Dirkson is also famous for saying, "A billion dollars here, a billion dollars there and pretty soon you are talking about real money." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Everett_Dirksen)