Another Elephant in the Living Room
The Founding Fathers had some very specific reasons for creating the Electoral College. Aside from their insistence that the president and vice president be elected by the states... not by the people and not by the state legislatures... their primary concern was that a foreign power might one day attempt to achieve through corruption and political intrigue, that which they could not achieve on the battlefield.
As Alexander Hamilton wrote in Federalist Paper No. 68, "These most deadly adversaries of republican government (cabal, intrigue, etc.)” might come from many quarters, "but chiefly from the desire in foreign powers to gain an improper ascendant in our councils. How could they better gratify this than by raising a creature of their own to the chief magistracy of the Union?”
The idea of a foreign power purchasing the allegiance of an American president had never been a major concern – until 1996, that is, when Bill Clinton, Al Gore, and the DNC accepted hundreds of thousands of dollars from agents of the Peoples Republic of China. Those illegal receipts were not disclosed until well after Clinton and Gore were reelected. Would some Democratic electors have withheld their votes, had they known? Perhaps not, but we’ll never know.
Then, in 2004, Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry refused to authorize the release of some 100 pages of his military records. It is known that Kerry enlisted in the Naval Reserve on February 18, 1966 for a six year commitment, expiring on February 17, 1972. He returned from Vietnam and was released from active duty on March 1, 1970.
After assuming leadership of the Vietnam Veterans Against the War, he traveled to Paris in May 1970... just two months after being discharged... where he met with North Vietnamese and Viet Cong negotiators. He was given a copy of the Communists’ 7-point peace plan and in July 1971, seven months before the end of his Navy commitment, he led demonstrations in Washington demanding that the Nixon Administration accept the Communist peace plan, exactly as written.
Although he was released from active duty in March 1970, Kerry did not receive an honorable discharge until February 1978, six years after his commitment expired, and only then under an Executive Order, EO 4483, signed by the President of the United States, Jimmy Carter.
It raises a number of troubling questions. For example, what kind of discharge did Kerry receive in February 1972, twenty-one months after giving aid and comfort to the enemy in Paris? Why was his honorable discharge not granted until six years later? And what is in those 100 pages of military records that, to this day, he refuses to let us see?
Could it be that, in 1971 or ’72, Kerry was booted out of the Navy with a dishonorable or a less-than-honorable discharge? If so, and if Kerry had eked out a victory in Ohio and a true patriot in the Pentagon had leaked his discharge papers, how would Democratic electors have responded? Would those who were veterans of World War II, Korea, and Vietnam cast their electoral votes for a man who had earned a less-than-honorable discharge? We’ll never know.
And now we have Barack Hussein Obama, the most liberal and the least qualified man ever to seek the office of President of the United States... a man who is the subject of a lawsuit filed in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania on August 21, 2008. The suit asks the court: a) to declare Obama ineligible to run for the office of President of the United States, b) to temporarily and permanently enjoin Obama from running for President of the United States, and c) to temporarily and permanently enjoin the Democratic National Committee from nominating Barack Obama as the Democratic nominee.
The plaintiff in this case, 08-cv-04083, is not a conservative or a Republican. The plaintiff is Democratic attorney Philip J. Berg, a former deputy attorney general of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania; former Democratic chairman of Montgomery County, PA, a large Philadelphia suburban county; and a former Democratic gubernatorial and U.S. Senate candidate.
Among other charges, Berg contends that Obama is not a "natural born” citizen; that he was born, most likely, in Kenya; that two separate hospitals in Honolulu have been given as Obama’s place of birth; that a GOP research team located a birth certificate for Obama at a maternity hospital in Mombasa, Kenya, then a British colony; that a Canadian birth certificate for Barack Hussein Obama, dated August 23, 1961, has been located; that, in or about 1967, after his mother married Indonesian Lolo Soetoro, his stepfather established his official nationality by registering him as an Indonesian Muslim; that upon his return to Hawaii, at age ten, Obama failed to reapply for U.S. citizenship; and that Obama perjured himself when filing an application for admission to the Illinois bar, writing "none” in the space provided for "Full former name(s).”
Since Barack Obama and the Democratic National Committee, co-defendants, have not responded fully to the allegations, it is impossible to know the truth of any of Berg’s allegations. However, according to Rule 36(a)(3) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, "A matter is admitted unless, within 30 days after being served, the party to whom the request is directed serves on the requesting party a written answer or objection addressed to the matter and signed by the party or its attorney.”
Neither Barack Obama nor the DNC responded to Berg’s allegations by the October 15 deadline, a tacit admission that the allegations contained in his complaint are, in fact, true. By rule, Obama is not a natural born citizen and is not eligible to serve as President of the United States.
However, given that liberals and Democrats have never been "sticklers” for the Rule of Law, or for troubling provisions of the U.S. Constitution... it being a "living” document and subject only to what they’d like it to say on any given day... can we count on Democratic electors to do their patriotic duty when the Electoral College meets on December 15? And if 270 or more electors should proceed to elect Obama to the presidency, with the tacit admission that he is not a natural born citizen hanging over his head, the American people will be faced with a constitutional crisis unmatched in the annals of democratic self-government. How will they react? Although Republicans view the Berg lawsuit with intense interest, it is, after all, a fight among Democrats. But for Democrats and their friends in the drive-by media it is another "elephant in the living room” that they wish would just go away quietly. But that’s not likely to happen because the judge, R. Barclay, Surrick, is not free to simply ignore the Rules of Civil Procedure. It will be fascinating to watch the drama unfold in the weeks ahead. |
