Politicos’ heads filled with way too many cockamamie ideas for own good

Birthright citizen revocation as legitimate …

Learning of President Donald Trump’s desire to repeal the concept of birthright citizenship for certain kinds of people he thinks are undeserving is a completely stupid idea.

It’s something that goes so contrary to the concepts of the U.S. Constitution whose ideals the president is supposed to be upholding (remember that oath of office?). If anything, the fact that Trump could conceive of such an idea is merely the ultimate evidence that he’s unfit to hold elective office.

… as 3rd presidential term for Obama

BUT IT IS far from the only absurd idea I have heard when it comes to people who think they’re having intelligent discussion about our government operations.

Just the other night, I happened to be a part of a dinner-type conversation with people who came up with an idea for picking the next president. One that I’m sharing solely because I know the very concept will grossly offend the sensibilities of those individuals who think Trump has a good idea with regards to birthright citizenship.

These people would like to see one-time Vice President Joe Biden (who is in Illinois Wednesday for a pair of appearances on behalf of congressional candidates whose election would undermine the president’s political strength) run for president with Obama as a running-mate, then resign upon victory!

BIDEN: Scheming to be president-elect only?

I can already envision the veins bursting in the heads of all the people to whom Obama was everything that could ever be wrong with this country (because he wasn’t exactly like them). I also want to tell all of those people to relax – it can’t happen!

It took just a few minutes for me to look up the law to see that anybody ineligible to be elected president (as Obama is because he’s already maxed out at two, four-year terms) is also ineligible to ascend to the presidency.

BASICALLY, I SUPPOSE Obama could be elected V-P (although I can’t envision why he’d want to be), but he would then be skipped over. The House Speaker would become next in line of succession to be president.

BOLSONARO: Trump's new political idol?

In short, it’s political gibberish. Pure nonsense. Just like the ideas that Trump is now putting out there about birthright citizenship, which is the concept that anybody actually born in within the boundaries of the United States or its territories is a U.S. citizen – regardless of what circumstances brought them here or their parents’ life stories.

Of course, in the mindsets of followers of this Age of Trump we’re now in, it’s the legal loophole that allows a batch of filthy Mexicans to sneak into this country, give birth to kids and have those children be able to claim U.S. citizenship and all its benefits – both for themselves and, by extension, for their parents.

That’s an overly-complex conspiracy theory if you think about it. You probably have way too much free time on your hands if you believe there’s any significant truth to it.

BESIDES, THE IDEA of birthright citizenship has its backing in the U.S. Constitution. Which means Trump could theoretically sign off on an amendment if he could go through the years-long process of getting Congress, then a majority of state legislatures to back it.

Not just the law, would Michelle allow it?

He certainly can’t merely draft an executive order, sign it, then have it be so. Unless he’s envious of Jair Bolsonero, the newly-elected president of Brazil – whom many think is a right-wing tyrant who will take his country in a dangerous direction. The same one that, I suspect, Trump would like to do with the U.S.A.

There are those who think Trump’s real motivation is to stir up a debate in coming days so as to motivate his ideologically-inclined voters to turn out on Election Day, and that the idea could go on the back-burner come Nov. 7.

But even if that’s true, it is scary to think people in positions of power could be vacuous-enough to believe something so absurd is possible. In short, the 2020 election cycle can’t come soon enough!

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Some political issues like ERA just won’t die, even after they’re long dead

When it comes to conservative political people in Illinois, they long have thought of their ability to kill off the Equal Rights Amendment as one of their major accomplishments.

A past image for an antique amendment

And it seems they’re not about to give up that “victory,” no matter how ridiculous they make themselves look in the process.

FOR THOSE OF you so young that you don’t have a clue about anything that came before your time, the Equal Rights Amendment was an effort that tried to put in the Constitution to protect women from discrimination.

It failed back in 1982 when enough state Legislatures failed to ratify the amendment. The Illinois Legislature was among those that failed to act, and some say it was Illinois’ failure to approve that inspired other holdouts to stubbornly act out as well.

But there are some legal scholars who have argued that the 1982 deadline for ratification is not as rock solid as political people always presumed it was. Which is what caused the Illinois Senate this week to take a vote this week.

The Democratic majority that now controls the Illinois Senate voted to approve, and the Illinois House of Representatives likely will take a vote in coming weeks. Even though it is likely the 1982 deadline remains in place, and the action becomes one of pure symbolism.

MEANING IT’S NOT likely to make a difference. We’re not likely to get the Equal Rights Amendment as a part of the Constitution any time in the near future.

Will we get future protest marches like this?

But that’s not stopping the ideologue-inclined from getting all bent out of shape.

Officials with the political action committees of the Federation for Right to Life, Illinois Citizens for Life, Lake County Life, Illinois – Stop ERA, Illinois Family Action and the Concerned Christian Americans signed off on a letter informing legislators that they’ll lose out on the endorsements and possible money that the activist groups might otherwise provide to them as they seek re-election come Nov. 6.

They’re going to make the demise of the Equal Rights Amendment – which is what the late Phyllis Schlafly used to gain her national reputation – their big issue.

Schlafly 'made her bones' on Illinois ERA failure

I KNOW SOME people are shocked to think that anybody in these days would vote against the Equal Rights Amendment. Although considering that ERA opposition always had a tinge of nonsense attached to it, nothing should be shocking.

How nonsensical?

I remember back when the issue was alive for real, opponents would toss out the argument that the Equal Rights Amendment would mean separate restrooms would no longer be acceptable for men and women and that women could face conscription into the military.

You can’t really use those arguments anymore because we have unisex bathrooms and women are a part of the modern military.

NOW, THE ARGUMENT being used is that equal rights for all would undermine local laws that restrict abortion access. Which means that ERA opponents must be the knuckleheaded-types who want to talk of criminal punishment for women when the day comes they can overturn the 1973 Supreme Court ruling that upheld abortion rights for women.

What is humorous about this is that the actual Equal Rights Amendment merely says, “Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied, or abridged, by the United States or by any state on account of sex.” That’s all!

The past's offensive image has largely come true

Where anyone ever read anything about unisex bathrooms into that is beyond me. Just as I don’t see anything in there about abortion – unless you really think it proper to harass pregnant women.

But like I wrote, the death of the ERA is a political victory the “right” can claim. And they’re not going to let any smart-alecked dames even think about taking it away – that’s the pathetic way some of us still think in this Age of Trump.

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Trump’s just a bully best dealt with by ignoring his rhetorical nonsense

There are times when I think the best way to deal with the trash talk that emanates from the mouth of President Donald J. Trump is to ignore it.
 

A favorite spot for tourists to pose these days

He’s a bully and a dullard and is one who seems to relish being the center of attention.

WHICH IS WHY I wonder how much it would hurt him emotionally if we paid little attention to him – treated him for the triviality he truly is, rather than regarding much of anything he says as significant.

I think that would be the cruelest blow we could dish out to this egomaniac whom 46 percent of the electorate chose to be our nation’s leader.

I’m having these thoughts leading into Independence Day; the date upon which we celebrate the creation of our nation and the ideals of social justice for all that it supposedly stands for.

It is one upon which I can’t help but feel a little bit of shame over the pathetically-partisan nature our society has taken a turn to. We’re in an era in which some people are determined to turn back the advances we have made in our society toward achieving the American ideal – and those who voted for Trump did so largely because they think he supports their vision.

THAT IS WHY it shouldn’t be a surprise to learn of polls showing that Trump’s support levels remain ridiculously high amongst those people who voted for him.

Many are the kind of people who find themselves intimidated by people who actually understand government and its procedures and find Trump’s simple-mindedness easier to comprehend.

Particularly if it repeats to them over and over that everything wrong is somebody else’s fault!

Which is why I can’t help but chuckle at the recent outburst caused by Trump using some doctored video from the days of old when he tried boosting his public persona by becoming a character in professional wrestling.

ONLY NOW, INSTEAD of taking down a real wrestler, the video shows that wrestler being representative of CNN – the national news network that gets demonized by people who don’t want a dose of reality in their reports but want to be reassured that everything wrong is somebody else’s fault!

There are those people who are concerned that Trump has crossed over a line and is trying to incite violence against reporter-type people. As though he’s nothing more than one of those third-world tyrants who likes to criminalize people who dare to speak out against him.

Personally, I think that’s giving Trump way too much credit!

While it always is possible that some irrational sort is capable of taking anything out of context and turning it into a gross over-reaction, we also can’t go too far in terms of trying to limit this kind of stupid talk. People do, after all, have a right to be wrong.

IT SAYS SO in the Constitution – that document we’re supposedly celebrating Tuesday that says we have a right to free expression of our ideals. No matter how trivial or ridiculous those ideals may be.

In the case of Trump, personally I don’t think he has much in the way of a political philosophy. It wouldn’t shock me if his presidency winds up being a collection of contradictions, along with many trivial outbursts. Personally, I do believe that the political structure created by our Founding Fathers is capable of withstanding the nastiness we’re going to endure during this Age of Trump.

Which is why as a reporter-type person myself, I actually think the best way to respond to Trump’s doctored image of a body-slam of CNN is to come up with an alternate reality follow-up.

Perhaps one in which a symbolic American people puts Trump over its knee and gives him a spanking worthy of an insolent and bratty child!

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EXTRA: Rauner sending a historic msg w/ slavery amendment proclamation?

Gov. Bruce Rauner issued his own proclamation Tuesday, praising a legislative action of 150 years ago. It has me wondering if our new governor is sending a subtle message about how quickly he’d like the current legislature to respond to his own actions.

The action in question is the approval by the state Senate in early February 1865 of the 13^th amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

THAT AMENDMENT WAS approved by the U.S. Senate on Jan. 31, 1865, and Illinois became the first legislature in the nation to give its support. By December of that year, enough states had ratified the amendment to allow it to take effect.

Which means Illinois just gave a knee-jerk reaction to supporting the desires of then-President Abraham Lincoln. No pesky debate or rhetoric. Just pure support!

Not that giving such quick support to the 13^th amendment was a bad thing. That amendment was the first of three measures (the 14^th and 15^th as well) that, in effect, brought an end to the concept of slavery in this country. Racial discrimination and segregation lasted for another century.

But being ahead of the pack on that issue surely doesn’t shame us in any way.

As Rauner wrote, “today we remember all of the sacrifices made by so many to create equality for all. We, as the great state of Illinois, must continue to lead the country to achieve freedom, liberty and justice for all.”

LET’S JUST HOPE it’s only my political paranoia at work here in suspecting that the current governor expects equally-quick reactions to his own proposals. Let’s hope that serious thought is put into the many changes that Rauner is bound to try to make – both in his State of the State address on Wednesday and during the next four years.

One aspect does amuse me; the historic illiteracy of many people in our society today.

Be honest! How many of you would have to look up to see which amendment the 13^th is, and probably think of it as being the basis of the storyline in the late 2012 film “Lincoln,” which gave us a semi-fictionalized account of the political brawl in January 1865 to persuade enough political people to put aside their racial hang-ups and do away with slavery – rather than anything that really happened in life like that other film that portrayed "Honest Abe" as a silver axe-wielding vampire slayer!

Although my own memories of the film (which gave actor Daniel Day-Lewis his “Best Actor” Oscar) are more humorous in noting how many of the “lobbying” tactics to persuade congressmen to vote to abolish slavery would now be regarded as out-and-out bribery that would draw the attention of a U.S. attorney.

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