I'm confused: is he for us girly-men, or against us?
he's said he has no problem with same-sex marriage. by the standards of American politics in general, that puts him very solidly on the left on the LGBT rights issue, and by the standards of his own party, he's waaaaay over to the left.
in general, he's had positive things to say about the issue and has resisted a lot of pressure from his party to take a more anti-gay stand. on this issue, he's not only not the bad guy, he's actually more-or-less one of the good guys.
This is odd to me. Have we become so short-sighted that we'd change the qualifications for President so quickly, just for one cool action hero politician?
honestly, he's not the only reason we'd do it. on the most crass level, the governor of Michigan is a popular "electable" Democrat who happens to have been born in Canada. currently, the maple syrup running through her veins makes her ineligible for Our Highest Office, but a lot of Democrats would like to change that.
and, well...
I've found it strange that a country that was founded by immigrants, and espouses an ideal that posits that immigrants can arrive, settle, get a job, start a business, and raise a prosperous family, thereby living the "American Dream," would have a law prohibiting an immigrant from being its leader.
exactly. dare i say it, but i see it as an issue of principle. i think that amending the Constitution to allow immigrants to run for President, rather than short-sightedly hiding behind a requirement i've never believed in in the first place in order to keep a popular Republican off the ballot for a few election cycles, is taking the long-term view.
I assume they'll have to replace the "American born" item with some requirement about years of residence, but even Darling Arnold doesn't have many.
he's got 21 years under his belt.
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i think it's also telling that a lot of Democrats assume he would win if he ran. i think he would win... if he could get the party's nomination, and i honestly don't know whether he could. you have to win over the evangelicals to win the Republican primaries, and a pro-stem cell research candidate who's OK with gay marriage and has a history of group sex and so on and so forth is not going to do that. however, moderate Republicans would support him pretty strongly, and he would have the aura of electability. his candidacy would probably tear the party apart and split the already-tense relationship between the evangelicals and the rest of the Republicans wide open. |
