I do have a life outside of PPRuNe, mowing the lawn, for example. Flying for the next two days for another one. BTW, I have been to about 50 countries in my line of work and I have only once heard an anti-American attitude. It came from a Canadian, which considering the nationality of one of the pilots and the manufacturer, is more than a little ironic. I have taken the most valuable possessions of families-their children- and flown them half across the world and never an "attitude". You make statements about Americans and foreign attitudes about us wholly based on tourists who might be on their first trip outside of North America. Just about every country's tourists are seen a bad light-how about them Brits, Russians, Germans, etc, etc.
The election? While, I think the outcome will be close, closer than some polls are indicating-it will be Obama with a larger majority in Congress. The headwind is too strong against McCain. McCain was probably the only Republican candidate that could come close this year. It will be a battle royal in Congress to pass much of his program-which is decidedly anti-business, anti-growth and will stall any recovery from the present recession. I don't see jobs going anywhere soon; the budget will be deep in deficit reducing any room to maneuver toward expanded government programs. A good thing, too. Foreign policy will be a continuation of the present-Obama will keep troops in Iraq, a showdown with Iran is a likely possibility, opening to Cuba might happen, Europeans will love him right up to the point he starts acting like an American and he will. They want leadership from an American president, not platitudes. Look at the history of Clinton and Yugoslavia. First, it was no US forces, consultation with the EU, soon, it became US troops in, then two aerial wars, that the Euros couldn't do, that brought us where we are now-mired!
The empty promises of "hope" and "change" are just that-his program is pure Democrat platform harking back to George McGovern.
If you haven't figured it out yet, Obama is NOT my choice.
I know they are around here someplace, my marbles...
You try a ten days in a box in the Sahara Desert with far too little to do and see how whacky you get, okay?
Nothing wrong with my spine, I think. El Grifo is on the record as suggesting that there is much to praise in Cuba and in Fidel's governance, if memory serves. Or do I have him mixed up with someone else? Where he is from, well, it is all Greek to me! Europe, somewhere? Don't know, don't care... I try to take everyone as I find them.
Well, maybe not pikeys, can't stand pikeys but we don't get a lot of them coming around. That said there were a couple here just the other day telling us they could tarmac the runway cheap, that they had been up in Bordj Omar Driss doing a job and had some material left over...
In the colonies we harvest conspiracy theories by the tonne, GOLF_BRAVO_ZULU, and there may some credibility in your question. It's an old truthhood that governments think they exist to solve problems, and therefore they have to create problems to justify their existance.
But I truly believe the subprime fiasco is the result of social engineering by past Congresses who were not astute enough to realize the unintended consequences of their do-gooder actions.
There was a change in U.S. law after McCain was born in Panama. Nowadays it is so that children born abroad to at least one parent who is an American citizen are also "natural born" citizens themselves. Under present law it makes no difference where in the world you are born, you come into the world as a U.S. citizen if one of your parents is an American.
The law at the time of his birth was different. You had the right to citizenship but you had to be "naturalized". This means that you were NOT "natural born"! You came into the world without U.S. citizenship if you were born outside the U.S.A and then later got it by naturalization.
There's some argument about the exact meaning of "natural born" but it may be that McCain does not meet this test.
Obama, well... I could well imagine something happening such as sorting out the papers to get him into school in Indonesia by coming up with something showing that he had given up his American citizenship and become a citizen of Indonesia. His step-father would have sorted that one out for him, I assume.
I wonder if he had his own U.S.passport and if it was cancelled? This is something you would need to do to show renunciation of your U.S. citizenship to the Indonesian authorities.
As a child he may have traveled on his mother's U.S. passport and not had one of his own but our children had U.S. passports as infants. (Getting their signatures was the tricky part!)
On the other hand, if he were born in Kenya, given that his mother was an American citizen, that is of no import. Too, why should it matter which hospital in Hawaii? Is that hinting it is a cover-up for being born in Kenya? Why bother?
It will be interesting to see what comes out of this court case.
Last edited by chuks : 11th October 2008 at 22:33.
Actually, BHO is hiding the birth certificate as having one would disprove his virgin birth! Would shore up his vote with conservative Catholics, though.
While I think Cuba is bit of a sideshow, if BHO loses FL (don't tell GTF), I think he could open up Cuba fairly quickly. He won't beholding to the Florida vote, the time is ripe (has been for 20 years), would be a benefit for both countries and Fidel is a spent force, no matter what anyone says. Could be a real crowdpleaser, too-no long flights to Jamaica or the Caribbean anymore.
I've done research into the claim that Obama is not a natural born citizen. I really believe that he is. The one unchanging fact is that his mother was a natural born citizen. Therefor, where Obama was born is immaterial as his mother was a natural US Citizen.
However, the Indonesian issue I have not heard about before. I believe that there must be documentation of his mother denouncing her citizenship and adopting the citizenship of another country before Obama would lose his citizenship. In the video there is no proof or even any claims that she ever did denounce her US citizenship.
Now, let us assume that indeed she did denounce her US citizenship and adopt another country's citizenship. As Obama was a minor child at the time when this may, or may not have occurred, he has every right, after reaching majority, to request that his natural citizenship be reinstated. Primary reason for Obama having the right to do so was because he was a minor child, under the care and supervision of is legal, natural mother. In other words he had no legal, by US law, choice to not become a citizen of a foreign state if his mother chose to do so, his permission was not required or needed.
If his stepfather lied about Obama's nationality to have admitted to a school it is the stepfather who committed fraud, not Obama.
Perhaps there is an obscure legal technicality that does strip Obama of his natural citizenship. I for one will not waste my time trying to find it. If such a technicality does exist, I believe it is an erroneous technicality that should be overturned or just abolished.
There are many more reasons why Obama should not be President than this, in my humble opinion.
isn't it all a bit academic who steals the election, at the end of the day whether its the democrats or the republicans america will continue to tramp over the world forcing there own definition of "freedom" down the throats of any third world country who has a thimbleful of oil or an aversion to McDonalds definition of "food"
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Remember this motto to live by: "Life should NOT be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in an attractive and well preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, chocolate in one hand, vodka in the other, body thoroughly used up, totally worn out and screaming "WOO HOO that wuz great!"
While you Southern racists, naves, fools and assorted nutters were electing segregationists, we New Englanders were giving the nation men like Silent Cal, a real believer in limited Federal government. Had it not been for Hoover, the engineer and FDR, the rich patrician traitor to his class; Cal would be better liked today.
As a minor Obama would not have been able to renounce his U.S. citizenship himself because he couldn't execute a binding contract until he reached the age of maturity, probably 18 or 21 years of age. Could his mother do that for him as his guardian?
Even if he did renounce his citizenship in some binding way, well, he had first been "natural born".
Would renouncing it but then later resuming it leave you still a natural born citizen, in that you were A: "natural born" and B: a citizen, as two separate things, both valid?
This could be lots of fun when you think of how things work in the Third World. I had all sorts of stuff offered to me, including a graduate university degree! It might be that any papers relating to this matter from Indonesia would be regarded as just paper.
Wasn't it Coolidge who asked, when presented with a proposal to expand the Army Air Corps, why they couldn't just buy one airplane and let the pilots take turns flying it?
There were all kinds of stories about him. One had him being presented with a an axe, I think it was. The presenter went on at length about how this oak axe handle symbolised Coolidge's strength and blah-blah-blah. When he handed it over Coolidge looked at it and simply said, "Ash..."
isn't it all a bit academic who steals the election, at the end of the day whether its the democrats or the republicans america will continue to tramp over the world forcing there own definition of "freedom" down the throats of any third world country who has a thimbleful of oil or an aversion to McDonalds definition of "food"
Thank you for your thoughtful, well researched, insightful, comment on the matter of the next President of the United States.
Now as you seem to have the expertise to define and interpret the entire US Legal Code by stating, "who steals the election", despite the ruling of the lower state courts and the United States Supreme Court, I am quite confident that you, in your expert legal knowledge of US Law, can answer the issue in regards to the matter of if Obama is in fact a natural citizen.
Your post is even more impressive in the fact that you were not only able to sum up the United States in that one short run on sentence, but the fact you were able to do so without using a single capital letter, except the misspelling of McDonald's restaurant chain.
Speaking of food products. I see you claim to be from Scotland. Now with that taken into consideration, how anybody that comes from a country that invented and actually eats haggis can actually criticize food from any other nation deifies the imagination.
Hell, GTF has a leftist, Euro political viewpoint and he is proud to have never the left the good ole USA, except Canada as a child.
Don't look now, GF, but you're making his point for him. On such a minor and trivial point -- one where you can't possibly score any points -- you can't help but exaggerate. I'm not "proud" that I haven't been overseas. I just haven't been.
Hopefully the wife and I will get to go one day. (I've got my passport and everything -- unlike some I could mention.) But not to worry, I'm sure we won't be visiting all the deprived places of the world so I'll never be able to match your worldly wisdom.
(I've got my passport and everything -- unlike some I could mention.)
Hum, just out of curiosity just to whom are you referring to, may I inquire?
I have had held a current passport for over 52 years, just so you will know.
Now, if you are talking about "everything", the last time I stood naked (not a pretty sight I grant you) in front of a mirror I still had "everything".
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