Mitt Romney's father was born in Mexico. So how could he run for president?

This isn't meant as an expose or attack of any kind. It's just something I was thinking about during all the Romney biopics at the Republican Nation Convention (and CNN's Romney Revealed!) Mitt's father George Romney was a popular governor of Michigan and was briefly the front-runner for the Republican nomination for President when he ran in 1968. (He dropped out after a series of gaffes.) But George Romney was born in Chihuahua at a Mormon colony there. So how could he have qualified to be president if he was born in Mexico? 

When John McCain was running for president in 2008, congress quickly passed some sort of an exception allowing people born on U.S. military stations abroad to qualify for president. (McCain was born in Panama.) But that was in 2008, and a Mormon polygamous colony is hardly the same deal. Did anyone ever ask to see Romney's birth certificate? 

I'm just wondering because this seems to not make sense.

UPDATE: I just found this on Wikipedia: 

Questions were occasionally asked about Romney's eligibility to run for President due to his birth in Mexico, given the ambiguity in the United States Constitution over the phrase "natural-born citizen". His Mormon paternal grandfather and his three wives had fled to Mexico in 1886, but none of them ever relinquished U.S. citizenship. Romney's parents chose U.S. citizenship for their children, including George.The family fled Mexico and came to the United States in 1912 during the Mexican Revolution. By February 1967, some newspapers were questioning Romney's eligibility given his Mexican birth. In May 1967, the Democratic chair of the House Judiciary Committee, Emanuel Celler, said he had "serious doubts" about whether Romney was eligible, but had no plans to formally challenge the matter. Another member of Congress made a case against Romney the following month. In response, the New York Law Journal published an article by a senior attorney at Sullivan & Cromwell arguing that Romney was, in fact, eligible. The Congressional Research Service also came down on Romney's side, as did most other constitutional experts at the time. During the campaign, Romney was generally considered a viable and legal candidate for United States president. He departed the race before the matter could be more definitively resolved, although the preponderance of opinion since then has been that he was eligible.

That's pretty interesting that, 45 years ago, someone who was known to be born in Mexico - and four years ago, someone who was known to be born in Panama - was generally considered eligible to run for President. Or that the interpretation of "natural-born citizen" has changed over the years. Perhaps it's time to revisit how much sense that vague and xenophobic qualification makes in the 21st century, especially when it's only uses are to prevent qualified people from being president, and to fuel a racist conspiracy theory against a sitting president.

Foo Fighters - Keepin' It Clean - Lyrics & Chords - Special Friends Around the Campfire, actual campfire edition

This amazing Gay-Truckers-showering song, "Keep it Clean" or "Keepin' it Clean," plays in the background of the opening of the Foo Fighter's music video to "Hot Buns" (2011). This summer, they famously rolled up on a flat bed truck in Kansas City & sang it to the Westboro Baptist Church "God hates fags" protesters, which might have been one of the best moments in American history.

The Manna Tease were camping in Berlin-Ichthyosaur State Park in the Great Basin desert last weekend, & sang it around the campfire - it's a bit shaky, we were doing it fresh from memory & after a bit of afternoon bourbon, but here goes:

And for your convenience, here are the lyrics & chords we use:

C G C C7 

Keep It clean, my mama said keep It clean (2x) 

F  

Driving all night, got a hankering for something 

C A7 

Think I'm In the mood for some hot-man muffins 

D7 G Gaug 

Mmmm, Sounds so fine, yes indeed

Keep It Clean, my Daddy said keep it clean (2x) 

Ain't looking for a fight, ain't looking for trouble 

Howdy Mr Right have you met Mister Bubble 

Hey, put 'er there, ain't she sweet. 

F 

Rubbin' and a lovin' and a scrubbin' and a truckin' 

C A7 

Maybe if we're lucky just a little bear huggin' 

D7   G7 C F C 

Know what I mean, Keep it clean 

Rubbin' and a lovin' and a scrubbin' and a truckin' 

Maybe if we're lucky just a little bear huggin' 

Know what I mean, Keep it clean

Note: We added the augmented chord for spice, it's not mandatory.
The Foo Fighters sing it in G, which is very low, but here's approx. their chords if you wish:

G D7 G 

G D7 G G7 

C 

G E7 

A7 D7

Please "like" / follow the Manna Tease on facebooks!

Zucchini Fries with Chris Daly

Last night, after the ballet, I finally stopped by the Buck Tavern. Former supervisor Chris Daly just signed a twenty-two-month lease to run it. Daly’s dive is fantastic, you must stop by the next time you’re in San Francisco. Two dollars gets you a massive basket of fries, the private alcove in the back has red vinyl seats, and there’s one pinball machine (Mars Attacks, two bucks for five games).

2000-10 is considered the “Daly Decade” by many in SF for his boisterous voice and sometimes isolated vote on the Board of Supervisors; last month, when the board’s president David Chiu cast his vote for Ed Lee to become interim mayor instead of a more leftwing candidate, Daly told him on the record, “I will haunt you. It’s on like Donkey Kong.” Chiu and Lee are progressive enough, they’re just fine, but that’s the kind of politician Daly was, a windbaggy force his Tenderloin constituents were lucky to have, the kind of city council member that worked hard to make SF different from the Panera-laden, interstate-covered, free-parking BIG SADNESSES that make up the American urban landscape.

So I thought is was cool when I went to order the first round, because he is now the bartender, server of zucchini fries, and régaler of my table. A loud, slurring white guy at the counter ruined my geek-out moment, “You could be making… a hundred bucks an hour as a consultant, man, but you’re serving us beer instead.”

San Francisco has become more moderate. We’re still banning phone books and plastic bags, but the last election resulted in an ordinance that bans sitting on sidewalks and ushered in a couple of pro-business centrists to the Board of Supervisors. And, if I may: The three-story building next to mine installed a car garage, removed street trees, and converted a triplex into a single-family home over the course of eighteen loud months of construction. This new "house" is ten feet away from the frackin' J-train station, for frack's sake, why did they need to install a frackin' garage?

Excursus. I don’t think escapism should carry a negative connotation. People who think they are meaningfully and willingly connecting with the world probably engage in the same kind of narrative invention that escapists rely on in order to survive. Maybe Daly’s dive represents a geographical contraction of that strange and wonderful space which the city, in his mind and for good reason, no longer stands for. Once upon a time you could ditch Chemlawns, entitled drivers, and Baptist proselytizers for a city where landlords must provide compost collection, medical marijuana dispensaries sell vegan pastries, and topless dancers are unionized. You still can, but if all that feels threatened, then open a bar you can always escape to.

In any case I know that S. Sandrigon would love it at the Buck Tavern. Apparently during the State of the Union they hosted a drinking game and political discussion. See you there soon, editor-in-chief!

Tonight's State of the Union Drinking Game

Official Itwaslost 2011 State of the Union Drinking Game:

Every time the President says something that makes you thirsty, drink a big gulp of Scottish beer. Go!

Goodby Michael Steele. Welcome Reince Priebus

The Huffington Post put together a nice farewell to the head bibble Michael Steele, departing RNC chief, to replaced by Reince Priebus, whose name I have nothing to say about (except that it has an 'e-i' followed by an 'i-e'.)

Socks with Sandals goes all the way to the top

At Jon Stewart's Rally to Restore Sanity last October, there was a man with a sign saying "Socks with Sandals" which I posted here. This is a cause I chauvinistically support. A picture was floating around the Huffington Post that showed George W Bush on vacation when he was president (it was in response to "should the President dress like this?" bullshit about Obama's casual wear in Hawai'i.) Look closely, I believe our movement has a new messiah. He's not only wearing crocks with socks, but the socks have the presidential seal on them!

I hereby Spearhead the Initiative to Introduce a Special Department of Socks with Sandals as a Special Sub-Department of the Department of Fashion (with Grainne's approval of course.)

HAPPY NEW YEAR YA'ALL!
soooo.....this brings fashion illustration of the every third day to a close, at least for the time being. I've put 'em all into a scribd book (link below) for perusal.... the department of fashion will be bringing in 2011 with a series of fashion illustrations of dictators, monarchs, and other political figures, beginning with Salou Djibo, president of Niger. Slainte!




G.F Marlier; Fashion Illustrations 2010

Jesus Christ is a Liberal Democrat

"Jesus Christ is a Big Fat Man" has not yet hit the singles charts, but Colbert last night took on the age-old dichotomy of Christ's beliefs vs. Christ's followers' beliefs. (The anti-Socialist Christians clearly haven't read the beginning of Acts, where the apostles set up a hippie commune. Nor, for that matter, basically anything Christ said in red.)

The Colbert Report	Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
Jesus Is a Liberal Democrat
www.colbertnation.com
Colbert Report Full Episodes Political Humor & Satire Blog March to Keep Fear Alive

List: 141.5 ways to spend $141.5 Million of Meg Whitman's Money

Good morning! This list will keep growing until it reaches 141.5. Meg Whitman just wasted $141.5 Million of her own money to lose by twelve percentage points in the California gubernatorial race to Jerry Brown. I'm open to suggestions on other ways to spend her money. (We're estimating pricing from Amazon & google, &, of course, eBay.)

1) Buy a copy of Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventure's in Wonderland ($5.95 for the CreatSpace edition) for 23.8 Million 9-year-olds (which is probably more 9-year-olds than there are in the whole country).

2) Better yet, buy the cool Robert Sabudo Pop-up version of AAiW ($19.13) for 7.4 Million 9 year olds.

3) Smoke it.

4) Buy 141.5 million lottery tickets (which may give you slightly better odds of getting your money back than of beating Jerry Brown.)

5) Amazon sells a set of 7 fake mustaches for $2.99, which is $0.43 a mustache. THAT'S ENOUGH FAKE MUSTACHES FOR EVERY RESIDENT OF THE USA!

6) A decent Bachelor Party stripper goes for around $200. You can buy strippers for 707,500 Bachelor Parties!

7) Cut out the Benjamin Franklins from 1.415 Million $100 bills, & make an epic collage

across AT&T Park.

8) Looks like a basic civil war re-enactment shirt gos for around $17.99, $5.65 for a good hat, but you need $150 for some sort of replica rifle. That will outfit 814,904 soldiers. The First Battle of Bull Run had less than 70,000; The Second Battle of Bull R

un had about 100,000 soldiers. You see what I'm getting at, you could properly bankroll the re-enactment of a dozen or so major Civil War Battles.

9) Attach a bidet ($50) to 2.83 Million toilets, greatly increasing the cleanline

ss of buttholes in the East Bay Area.

10) I found 20 acres of foreclosed land for sale for $17,663 in San Bernardino County. If you could buy 8,011 acres together, that's enough to succeed & be governor of your own little state. (You may need the soldiers from #8 to accomplish this.)

11) Buy a tractor (7 grand) for every resident of Orinda, California (with three thousand tractors left over.)

12) Buy an iPad ($552) for almost everyone in Sacramento, California.

13) Build the new Berkeley Art Museum ($95 million) with $46.5 Million leftover t

o buy half of a Jasper Johns painting (buy the good half, of course.)

14) Smoke it.

15) A bottle of absinthe from St George's in Alameda goes for $59.99 at its cheapest. You could buy a bottle for almost everyone in Nevada.

16) A dildo is about $7.95, which would outfit every

woman and girl in Connecticut with a shiny new dildo.

17) Sly & the Family Stone's album "A Whole New Thing" can be found used for $3.83, which would greatly improve the morale of every resident in California.

18) A fake rubber rat is $4.95, which is just what everyone in K

ansas could use.

19) A Uniflame WAD820SP 34in Wide Outdoor Fireplace with Slate Mantel with Copper Accents ($154) for everyone in San Francisco.

20) Pay back MF Global, "the world's largest broker of exchange-traded futures and options," the $141.5 Million it lost from unauthorized wheat trading in 2008.

21) Okay, I think I'm getting this right: The width of a penny is 1.4mm. So 141.5 billion pennies stacked would be 10,107 kilometers or 6,280 miles, which is the

distance from Scottsbluff, Nebraska, to Rapid City, South Dakota.

22) To fund a new

Johnny Appleseed project, an Apple Grow-A-Tree kit is $3.5o. That's 40.4 Million freaking apple trees!

23) Or alternately for a Christine O'Donnell project, there are 300 deadly nightshade (atropa belladonna) seeds in a $5 pack. In the unlikely event that all of them sprouted, that would be 8.5 billion plants. With the right potion, that could easily turn the earth's population into newts.

24) On February 13th, 2008, Eliot Spitzer paid $4,300 to spend the night with the hooker Ashley Dupré. He could have kept sleeping with her every night until about March 2098.

25) [suggested in the comments] she could buy her own island and become queen of that island.

26) [suggested in the comments by Gottlob K. Bremselhäcker, M.A. (Oxon.) ] The average cost of making a Hollywood movie is at least $106 million at last count. Use $141 million to make a movie in which a billionaire retired Silicon Valley executive throws a huge part of her personal fortune into running for governor of California. After bombarding every conceivable media with a many-pronged campaign of a scale never seen before in statewide politics, she unexpectedly loses the race by a wide margin to a scrappy veteran politician, but in the process learns the important lesson that money isn't everything, in politics or in life. Sharp political satire in the mode of "Primary Colors," "Wag the Dog" or "Bulworth" but with a touching, cathartic finale in which the protagonist makes amends with her illegal immigrant former housekeeper she attempted to turn into a political prop. Critics will say it is entertaining but somewhat improbable.

27) Speaking of movies, why not make a shot-by-shot remake of Metropolis (1927), which cost 5.3 Million Reichmarks at the time, approx. $200 Million in today's currency, but you could save some money by casting Mel Gibson as Freder.

28) A Bell 429 Heliocopter costs $4.865 Million. You could buy one for me & twenty-eight of my friends.

29) You can't buy a narwhal, & you can also no longer buy the Avenging Narwhal Playset action figures from Accouterments, so, therefore, you can buy infinite narwhals with $141.5 Million.

Only 111.5 left...

I'll keep updating the post with more ideas. Leave suggestions in the comments! We will get to 141.5! If you want to read the boring ways she spent it, read here.

Election Day Endorsements Part 2: Oh, shit, man, what time is it, did the polls already close?

It's probably too late to make proper endorsements, half-way thru election day, since so many people vote early in California anyway. I'm nervous about the fate of Prop 19, which has been behind in the polls, & could be the last realistic time for awhile to end prohibition. The bloggers for itwaslost are more champagne drinkers & hookah smokers, not cannabis connoisseurs, but there's been a lot of good arguments everywhere why Prop 19 benefits the whole state, not just those who ever plan on smoking some pot legally. Former San Jose Police Chief Joseph McNamara has been campaigning from a law enforcement angle, he's written some good editorials & stars in this tv ad:

I also really liked the sound arguments laid down by the New York Times' Nicholas Krystof:

[...]Our nearly century-long experiment in banning marijuana has failed as abysmally as Prohibition did, and California may now be pioneering a saner approach. Sure, there are risks if California legalizes pot. But our present drug policy has three catastrophic consequences.

First, it squanders billions of dollars that might be better used for education. California now spends more money on prisons than on higher education. It spends about $216,000 per year on each juvenile detainee, and just $8,000 on each child in the troubled Oakland public school system.

Each year, some 750,000 Americans are arrested for possession of small amounts of marijuana. Is that really the optimal use of our police force?

In contrast, legalizing and taxing marijuana would bring in substantial sums that could be used to pay for schools, libraries or early childhood education. A Harvard economist, Jeffrey A. Miron, calculates that marijuana could generate $8.7 billion in tax revenue each year if legalized nationally, while legalization would also save the same sum annually in enforcement costs.

That’s a $17 billion swing in the nation’s finances — enough to send every 3- and 4-year-old in a poor family to a high-quality preschool. And that’s an investment that would improve education outcomes and reduce crime and drug use in the future — with enough left over to pay for an extensive nationwide campaign to discourage drug use.

The second big problem with the drug war is that it has exacerbated poverty and devastated the family structure of African-Americans. Partly that’s because drug laws are enforced inequitably. Black and Latino men are much more likely than whites to be stopped and searched and, when drugs are found, prosecuted.

Here in Los Angeles, blacks are arrested for marijuana possession at seven times the rate whites are, according to a study by the Drug Policy Alliance, which favors legalization. Yet surveys consistently find that young whites use marijuana at higher rates than young blacks.

Partly because of drug laws, a black man now has a one-in-three chance of serving time in prison at some point in his life, according to the Sentencing Project, a group that seeks reform in the criminal justice system. This makes it more difficult for black men to find jobs, more difficult for black women to find suitable husbands, and less common for black children to grow up in stable families with black male role models. So, sure, drugs have devastated black communities — but the remedy of criminal sentencing has made the situation worse.

He continues with more about crime and gangs and pot's risks.

There's also a really compelling environmental reason which not many people are discussing. It goes something along the lines of: Grow houses use a disgusting amount of electricity & water, much of it pirated from the grid. Let's let the sun do the work growing the state's pot! And if you don't believe there's untold thousands of grow houses peppered around California in every neighborhood, then there's some oregano in a baggy I'd like to sell you.

And lastly, a word about the opposition. Take for instance the wording of the Los Angeles Times' "No" endorsement: "The marijuana legalization measure is poorly thought out, badly crafted and replete with loopholes and contradictions." This is just something its opponents have made up, to make it sound like it was written by irresponsible stoners, knowing most of us aren't political enough to read the details of the bill ourselves. Exactly the opposite is true. The San Francisco Chronicle's Debra J Saunders wrote:

The establishment spin goes something like this: Even if marijuana legalization makes sense, Prop. 19 is so poorly written that voters must reject it.

Bunk. The measure is tightly written to give state and local governments unimpeded authority in deciding whether to allow the sale of marijuana, and if so, how to tax and regulate it.

There won't be a better bill. Marijuana prohibition enables and enriches criminal cartels and gangs. Californians have a chance to end the madness, and voters should grab it.

As for the Stoners Against 19 campaign, led by Dragonfly Whatshername, I don't even want to respond to them. It's naive! When you weigh, on one side, decriminalizing something millions of people do safely, versus, on the other side, things are fine as they are & omg what if tobacco companies want to sell pot!? then there's just no contest. Sure, having millions on non-criminals smoking pot illegally is a copacetic status quo. If you're white.

Election Day Endorsements Part 1: FIGHT GERRYMANDERING! Yes on Prop 20! No on Prop 27!

I just talked to some friends who were confused about California Propositions 20 & 27. I will explain as simply as I can:

Gerrymandering (not to be confused with jerrybrowning) is when politicians draw their own districts to keep them safe, often in grotesque ungodly shapes (literally around neighborhoods & houses where voters are unsympathetic. And you better believe it's racial too.) Safe districts = uncompetitive elections, more extreme candidates, more polarized politics, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

A previous ballot initiative created an independent commission to draw the lines (after the census) for some districting, & Prop 20 will extend the powers of that commission to state congressional districts! Prop 27 is the politicians fighting back, and will kill that commission before it's even created. Yes on 20! No on 27!

Here are some pictures of perverted pornographic REAL districts to inspire you:

I'd like to point out that the Chicago district above is a single blob, with a narrow sliver on the left.

"Protect the Third Amendment!" Jon Stewart's Rally to Restore Sanity - Protest Sign Suggestions

The Huffington Post commissioned signs for Jon Stewart's forthcoming Rally to Restore Sanity. I sent in a half dozen, so far only one has been added to their 144-deep slideshow, but here's the rest:

There's other good ones at the huffpost here. Here's Stewart's original announcement of his rally, including some splendid sign suggestions:

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Rally to Restore Sanity Announcement
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Rally to Restore Sanity

Videos: "We don't know you, we don't want you! We don't like you, we don't want you!"

I know I'm late to come to an appreciation of Auto-Tune the News, but yes. This one, number 11, includes the brilliant remixing of a vituperative session of the EU. The rap in front of Glenn Beck's chalkboard is also inspired.

Whenever you hear the boss swaggerin down the hall,
you know he gonna drop a double cup on your tennis balls!
You have to be a soldier, a real man,
to soothe a male staffer with the stroke from a tender hand!
Ain't nothin wrong with a Massa massage
when you're in a chronic platonic quintuple menage!
The entourage gripped in a bear hug that they can't escape
Tryna pretend they don't notice when he ejacu- -

莎拉裴琳準備2012年選總統?(Is Palin gunning for 2012?)

#Shakespalin folio

While I was warning not to be too hard on Palin for comparing herself to Shakespeare, I didn't realize that twitter was exploring a hatchtag called #Shakespalin, here are some highlights:

But soft, what light from yonder window breaks? It is the East, and I can see Russia from my front porch.
-@freehawk

To suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous liberals, or to quit halfterm, and by opposing, rake in speaking fees
-@normative

Henry VI, part you know, well, all of them.
-@acoyne

I came, I saw, I refudiated.
-@homescribe

Neither a thinker nor a reader be / for thought oft loses both itself and friend / and reading dulls the edge of Fox TV
-@djsamk

"How's all that bein' and not bein' workin' out for ya?"
-@jon_ames

All the perfume in Arabia shall not sweeten this ink-stained, crib-noted hand.
-@spskenski

All the world's a stage, and I can see all of it from my house.
-@paulandstorm

Friends, Real Americans, countrymen, lend me your ears; I come to bury Caesar, not to play "gotcha" journalism
-@paulandstorm

More on Sarah Palin poetry here. My essay on Palin & the English language here.

Lowell Darling for California Governor

Yes, there is someone you should vote for in the California gubernatorial race, my dear Californian readers. His name is Lowell Darling, the profession noted below his name on the ballot in the Democratic primary on June 8, 2010 is "Independent Artist". Darling ran for governor of California once before, in 1977, and he's taking another shot at it. His only campaign promise is to do nothing until the legislative idiocy that prevents California from doing anything about it's perennial fiscal apocalypse is fixed. Read more in this nice little N.Y Times piece about him if you wish:



http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/14/us/14calif.html

and please do have a look at his video art here:

http://www.lowelldarling.com/archive.html

Politics: No reason to not yet declare neutrality in regards to Jerry Brown's gubernatorial candidacy

This website, of course, does not ever explicity declare a preference for one political candidate over another, staying way above the grimy fray. That being said, we see no reason not to become a fan on facebook of California Attorney General Jerry Brown. And his website's color scheme is looking pretty stylish - do I detect a hint of Shepard Fairey-esque design? And what's that, look how easy they've made it to contribute to his campaign! - & what's ten or twenty-five dollars to the charismatic Democratic likely-nominee when his Republican likely-opponant in the general election has already spent almost fifty million dollars, mostly of her own money (more than two months before the primary), and he's spent "about ten dollars". It's a weird world when you're running for governor of a state as large & important as a medium-size first world country, (previous occupants include Leland Stanford, Ronald Reagan, & at least one other movie star), in a year with wind in the teabagging right's sails, against billionares and demon sheep, when you're as old as John McCain & a political history as wide-ranging and varied as Picasso. Governor Moonbeam! Pragmatic Mayor of Oakland! Who are you? Would you terribly mind running our fucked-up state again for a few years? If it's not inconvenient for you...

Demon Arnophilia: Carly for California's Kinky Sheep Spot

Failed HP CEO, now turned cancer-survivin' California Republican senatorial candidate, Carly Fiorina has released the best paschal-themed political commercial of the 2010 primaries. (The sexy demon sheep appears in the last sixty seconds.) As a side note, I'll mention that I saw Mr Campbell speak a year ago, and I believe he is a deeply intelligent, sane politician (and a social liberal, as all successful Californian Republicans need to be, thank heavens.) He is almost certainly not a demon sheep, but let's let history be the judge.



PS. I recommend this mp3 podcast with second-by-second breakdown interpretation of the ad.

Jon Stewart drops two portmanteaus in thirty seconds

It's already set up to be a grand decade in the development of portmanteaus (Humpty-Dumpty's theory of word-combination & the adaptability of language.) Mere seconds after Jon Stewart dropped "newsfotainment", he coined a second one, asking "Is synergasm a word?"

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Fox News Covers Scott Brown's Victory
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Health Care Crisis

one from the archives

click to make it big....