Friday, May 28, 2010

quiet about the delorean

presenting "what natural-born citizenship really means", from afterbirther's excellent and soon-to-be-famous ongoing contemporary history series "great moments in birtherism":

jefferson: ok, i think i got this. i changed "45 years" to "35". it now reads:
"neither shall any person be eligible for that office who shall not have attained to the age of 35 years and been 14 years a resident within the united states."
how's that sound?
washington: oh yeah, i like that much better. after all, it's 1787, most of us are dead before we ever get to be forty-five.
jefferson: great. so, let's see: we've taken care of the age thing; we've written in the grandfather clause so that old benny franklin doesn't feel all left out; the residency thing is handled. so what are we missing?
washington: well, there's still that whole citizenship thing.
jefferson: oh yeah, that thing that john jay was running on about. what's his problem, again?
washington: well, he seems to have this wild hair about a usurper becoming commander-in-chief one day. i'm not quite sure i get the whole issue. i think it has something to do with kenya.
jefferson: ok, well, how about something like this: "no person except a native-born citizen can be born president."
washington: close ... but not quite. john really likes the term "natural-born" instead of "native-born".
jefferson: "natural-born"? what the hell does that mean?
washington: well, de vattel says —
jefferson: no! no! be very quiet about de vattel. nobody's supposed to know about the delorean!
washington: hey, you're preaching to the choir! but if we don't use the delorean, we're stuck with english common law! and you know how well that's been working out ...
jefferson: but if we start using common law terms in ways that won't be invented for another ten years, then we're gonna need a glossary.
washington: that's a bad idea too. after all, jay had his heart set on being on the supreme court. if we make a glossary, they'll have nothing to do.
jefferson: but why de vattel? i mean, on issues of citizenship, the man's a fucking idiot!
washington: i thought you liked the frogs ... ?
jefferson: now, george, be nice — you know i'm a dual citizen of france!
washington: i know. i just like to rub it in.
jefferson: and after all, de vattel is not even really french. he's swiss, for god's sake! who pays any attention to the swiss? they're not even big enough to have their own language!
washington: so, ok, we have to make john jay happy. after all, he's like a bazillionth-degree templar in the illuminati and if we piss him off, it's back to virginia for both of us!
jefferson: wait — i have an idea ... bear with me: what if we used jay's "natural-born citizen" but don't use english common law or de vattel's definition ... ?
washington: go on. i'm listening ...
jefferson: ... what if we use it to mean somebody who was born naturally, as opposed to cloned?
washington: cloned?
jefferson: yeah, cloned. i was tooling around in the delorean. it's gonna be huge!
washington: ok ... i like it. so john jay gets his phrase; we don't have to worry about either de vattel or english common law; no glossary so the supreme court has something to do. i think we've got article ii covered. awesome!
jefferson: now we can go tackle that amendment that abigail adams has been so bitchy about.
washington: which one is that, again?
jefferson: the second amendment. the one about giving first ladies the right to wear sleeveless dresses.
washington: oh yeah. grab some sunscreen. i'll go load the flux capacitor into the delorean and then meet you in the garage ...

No comments:

Post a Comment