The main goal of politicians is to get re-elected. The main way to do that is to protect and consolidate wealth. Everything else is ancillary to that goal for both parties. It’s why Bernie is an independent and AOC ought to be.
Can she become president, born in Thailand?
The Democratic strategy of ignoring competitive races, standing for nothing, and moving to the Right has been a failure. Systematically defunding and purging Progressives had the Party circling the drain until Trump came along. Concentrating on a few high visibility national elections while ignoring State and local politics has been suicidal.
The Party needs to include something besides “whatever the Republicans were doing ten years ago but with a folksy speech” and neoliberal orthodoxy (“We will make things shittier a little more slowly and promise that we will think of tiny cosmetic improvements twenty years from now”) if it wants to survive.
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Nobody seemed to have a problem when it was John McCain or Ted Cruz running
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Could John McCain, being born in Panama?
The debate on that one boiled down to what the law (Congressional, not Constitutional) was at the time. Duckworth, being the child of a US citizen serving overseas at the time and married to her mother (not sure if a naturalized citizen at the time) would be under the law in 1968.
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Wiki is not clear on her father’s actual occupation when she was born, says he worked with the UN and “international companies” . McCain and Cruz did of course generate mixed opinions on eligibility with their clearly different situations ( to Duckworth and each other ).
Her father was a US citizen, so she was born a US citizen, regardless of where she was born
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I love how AOC thanks Yoho at the end - for providing such a shining example of duplicity and assholery. Thanks him for being the useful idiot he never intended.
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I dug deeper, and he was working as a civilian at the time. Also, her mother was not at the time naturalized (later it caused trouble getting her mother into the USA.) However, the law in 1968 was that one parent was sufficient if the parent was working for the US government or any of several government related agencies. Her father was working for the UN on refugee settlement, and although the precise details aren’t given where I looked she was apparently admitted to the USA with her father when he returned while her mother was stuck in limbo, so apparently the INS thought she was already a citizen.
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AOC has far more influence with the progressive wing of the Democratic Party than Sanders ever did. She’s playing the long game. He’s just been in the game a long time.
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Not by your definition of honor. Mine either, but it underscores something I’ve been thinking about a lot, which is how to coexist with others who have a diametrically opposed moral center to your own.
I think it involves very strong borders.
There are lots of differing ideas I can co-exist with. Genocide as a matter of public policy is not one of them. There is no co-existing with that, even if I’m not the target, because that means ANY of us can become the target.
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I agree. The question is what to do about it.
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Maybe we stick with retiring them for now. Hopefully to a small room with bars. We can change that in the future though, I’m ok with that.
Be consistent about shutting out such talk as if it’s a legitimate position to hold. It’s inherently aimed at least ethnic cleansing. Speak up each and every time we see such things trying to be pushed into the public sphere. Push for accurate historical education beginning in K-12. Push for education that does more than train people for work, but actually educates them.
There are many things we can do to push back against this kind of thing. Assuming it’s entirely acceptable discourse is not one of them.
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People born abroad to US Citizens are statutorily naturalized at birth.
And this is not just pedantry since that makes the eligibility question a real and long debated one.
The Natural-Born Citizen Clause and Presidential Eligibility: An Approach for Resolving Two Hundred Years of Uncertainty Spoiler: They don’t really resolve it.
The distinction pops up in other odd places too.
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Double spoiler: few people seriously dispute the eligibility of white Republican dudes born abroad to American parents when they decide to run for President (i.e. John McCain & Ted Cruz). It only becomes an issue when it’s a non-white Democrat, because how can we trust those people?
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True enough. But you know Republicans will send a Duckworth presidency to the courts, and you know who has been filling all those lifetime judicial appointments.
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It sure would be interesting to hear Republicans in the Senate try to explain why they passed a resolution declaring John McCain a Natural-Born Citizen but Tammy Duckworth doesn’t count.
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I look forward to the 2040 AOC Prez, Katie Porter VP ticket…
