Hey, "birthers," get a fucking clue (and a copy of the Constitution)

Okay, I'm fucking sick of those goddamn sorry losers who don't understand basic constitutional law. Or English for that matter. Obama overwhelmingly won the election. No doubt about it. For the first time since 2000, we had a presidential election that was completely without dispute. The majority of the American public definitively spoke. I dealt with the Constitutional and electoral travesty that was Bush/Cheney for eight years. I felt I actually had more of a complaint about whether he was a legitimate president, but I still shut the fuck up about that and moved on to complaining about more substantive issues once the Supreme Court appointed him. But these "birther" idiots, the ones complaining that Obama isn't a natural born citizen and isn't the legitmate president, are just beyond my scope of understanding. Sure, there will always be the fringe conspiracy nutjobs out there, but the fact that the birthers are actually getting any press attention whatsoever is disconcerting to me. I mean, doesn't anyone fucking check snopes anymore?

My theory is that in truth, they're racist to their core. Obama has an African father and that's really what they have a problem with. But who cares? Because his white mother from Kansas was undeniably a citizen, so that makes him a natural born citizen. And there's also the fact that he was BORN IN A U.S. STATE. And that his fucking birth certificate is PUBLISHED FOR ALL TO SEE.

But for that sake of this insane argument, let's pretend that he wasn't born in Hawaii, or that Hawaii wasn't actually a state when he was born (both not true). Is he still a citizen? Yes.

First, the text of the Constitution:

No person except a natural born citizen, or a citizen of the United States, at the time of the adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the office of President; neither shall any person be eligible to that office who shall not have attained to the age of thirty five years, and been fourteen Years a resident within the United States.

What is a "natural born citizen"? The plain text doesn't say, "person born IN THE UNITED STATES." There might be some debate among the dogmatic plain texters, but no worries, U.S. law clears this up:

Title 8 of the U.S. Code fills in those gaps. Section 1401 defines the following as people who are "citizens of the United States at birth:"

• Anyone born inside the United States
  
• Any Indian or Eskimo born in the United States, provided being a citizen of the U.S. does not impair the person's status as a citizen of the tribe
• Any one born outside the United States, both of whose parents are citizens of the U.S., as long as one parent has lived in the U.S.
• Any one born outside the United States, if one parent is a citizen and lived in the U.S. for at least one year and the other parent is a U.S. national
• Any one born in a U.S. possession, if one parent is a citizen and lived in the U.S. for at least one year
• Any one found in the U.S. under the age of five, whose parentage cannot be determined, as long as proof of non-citizenship is not provided by age 21
• Any one born outside the United States, if one parent is an alien and as long as the other parent is a citizen of the U.S. who lived in the U.S. for at least five years (with military and diplomatic service included in this time)
• A final, historical condition: a person born before 5/24/1934 of an alien father and a U.S. citizen mother who has lived in the U.S.

(This nicely simplified list can be found here.)

So, even if we want to argue that Obama was born somewhere else, his mom was a citizen, SO HE'S A CITIZEN. Just what the fuck are we debating? Is this really happening? Did I really just see an blurb on CNN.com where the White House press secretary addressed this nonsense? MEDIA: STOP PAYING ATTENTION TO THESE FOOLS!!

I'm just so frustrated by this, mostly because some fools are actually spending money on things like billboards along I-35 in Texas on this bullshit. THERE ARE PEOPLE STARVING TO DEATH IN THIS WORLD. Can't you fucking loser asshole ingrates find a better way to spend your time?