I'm rolling around in my head my previous statement that Donald J. Trump is morally unfit to hold the office of President of the United States of America. It is a bold statement, and there are many ways to challenge it.
For instance, if my contention is that Donald J. Trump is _uniquely_ unqualified to hold the office he was elected to - and, give or take the marginal case of Andrew Jackson, this is my contention - by what empirical and objective test can he be so disqualified? It's not like our Presidents are a gallery of saints. He lies? Every politician does. It's basically part of the job description. He mistreats women? We had a President who took one of his slaves as a concubine, and we put his face on a fucking mountain. He disrespects minorities? Yeah try just about EVERY PRESIDENT EVER.
The answer I have right now is a surprising and ironic one. We have a President-Elect who spent a great deal of time publically questioning whether our sitting President was a legitimate US citizen. This President-Elect also belongs to a party some of whose members have advocated, as a policy measure, the ending of American citizenship as a birthright.
I contend that, on the day Donald J. Trump was elected President, he was not capable of passing a naturalization test to become a citizen of the United States of America. I further contend that his inability to meet this minimal qualification disqualifies him from the position of executive leader of the United States of America. He cannot possibly meaningfully conform to the oath he will make to uphold a Constitution he does not understand.
I don't think this is an argument as to moral unfitness. So I do think I was wrong to argue that Donald J. Trump is morally unfit to hold the office he was elected to, because I can't support that argument to a standard I am personally satisfied by. And of course it's not a particularly strong legal argument, because I just made up out of thin air a new rule with no precedent or explicit basis in the Constitution or in law.
Well, I mean, I don't want to underestimate lawyers. Somebody very clever might be able to make a legal case by, for instance, saying that the Oath of Office is legally binding and that Trump's ignorance makes him legally incompetent to swear that oath. I wouldn't place money on it, though.
But mostly it's that I think it's a sensible argument, and a valid argument, and me personally I really need a reason to dissent other than that the guy scares the ever-living shit out of me.
