Schwarzenegger 2020: Equal Opportunity to Govern

[dcarson]

Schwarzenegger starts using Ancestry.com, uploads his DNA and finds out when there is a DNA close relative match that his mother had an affair with an GI and so his is a citizen by birth.

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by Varyon

Getting a portion of the constitution rendered unconstitutional strikes me as a complete non-starter, so it would need to be a constitutional amendment.

Well, actual legal scholars have advanced the interpretation below and there have been court cases of this nature. In real life, I believe that you would lose such a court case like this, but as an attorney, I know better than to trust 100% in any prediction of how a court will rule.

And it seems that convincing a series of judges, up to the Supreme Court, to make a controversial, but not actually wrong* decision, would fulfil the requirements of my ASBs, i.e. requiring minimal change to the world. Changing the mind of a few people, no matter how important or invested with formal power, is less of a change than changing the mind of everyone who'd need to be convinced to pass a Constitutional Amendment.

*There are crucial pillars of modern US case law with much more contrived arguments behind them, generally because the Supreme Court disagreed with the text of the Constitution, felt a given right ought to be protected and twisted and pulled until they could argue it was.

Originally Posted by RyanW

The only conceivable way is an interpretation of some amendment to have already repealed the requirement. The most reasonable way is via a reading of the 14th amendment as eliminating any idea of different tiers of citizenship. "Natural born citizen" can't be a privileged class given rights beyond those of other citizens (by the same logic, age and residence requirements are probably in jeopardy).

That would almost certainly require the intervention of alien space bats and probably a few voodoo sharks, but it's about the only legal sounding argument I can think of.

From a jurisprudential point of view, it's about as plausible as the arguments behind most other decisions where the Supreme Court legislated from the bench.

Note that age and residence requirements are different in kind from privileging place of birth. Those are objective factors that would still pass legal muster as impacting the ability of someone to do the job and from a political standpoint, limiting fundamental civil rights such as voting or running for office on the basis of age and residence has a long, fairly uncontroversial history, with opposition to such arguments being fairly fringe point of views.

On the other hand, any philosophical and political defense of 'natural-born citizens' having more rights than other, inferior types of citizens is going to contradict some deeply held principles of equality under law and be really tough to pull off, politically, for any public figure unwilling to be painted as the newest nativist candidate for the Know Nothing Party.

As an outsider looking in, I can say that I support the legal rights that derive from several controversial Supreme Court rulings, but cannot honestly say that they are sound legal judgements. On several vital occasions, it was very much a case of 'X should be a right and so we will say that Y in the Constuitution actually means X, even if that isn't supported by the text'.

The reality is, however, that when the Supreme Court rules, it doesn't matter if it's a convoluted argument and not the most reasonable interpretation of the text. Their ruling still becomes the law of the land, in some ways, even more unassilable than actual legislation.

However, this can only work for alt-Schwarzenegger if the public would be supportive or at least indifferent enough of the functional change in law resulting from the court challenge so that there is no mass movement against him.

I don't have a handle on public opinion here. It seems fairly innocuous to interpret the 5th Amendment, as per the 14th Amendment, to strictly forbid any class of 'second-class citizens' by US law. I mean, there would be those who hated it, sure, but I'm guessing most of those would already be prone to hate an immigrant candidate anyway.

Originally Posted by TGLS

A semi-plausible series of events:

2008: Trolls attack McCain and Obama over the Natural-Born Citizen Clause. This makes some noise in the media. (Comment: McCain was born in the Panama Canal Zone, and Obama needs no further comment)

2015: Continued nonsense of similar magnitude targets Ted Cruz (born in Calgary, Alberta), Marco Rubio and Bobby Jindal (just nonsense on those two). A bipartisan movement promoting the reform of the Natural-Born Citizen Clause emerges.

After failing to resolve the issue through the courts (see the efforts of Abdul Karim Hassan), a constitutional scholar suggests resolving the issue by applying the Enforcement Clause of the 14th Amendment (Laurence Tribe noted this in Sept 2016). The movement passes a radical version of this law that effectively eliminates the Natural-Born Citizen Clause.

Late 2010s: The law is upheld by the courts.

2019: Arnold Schwarzenegger Announces his Candidacy.

That's pretty much what I was thinking, but wasn't sure if it would pass the plausibility muster. Passing a law based on a controversial Constitutional interpretation seems like the path of less resistance than needing to convince the almost absolutely everyone who needs to sign off on a Constitutional Amendment.

I was thinking that somehow, in my campaign, Ted Cruz could have pushed harder on this issue, not because he felt any more able to win, but because the ASBs wanted to use him as the plaintiff in their legal test case.

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by Not

He becomes a wildly successful Republican governor of California, teams up with governors Jesse Ventura of Minnesota and Carl Weathers of Louisiana to usher in a second "Era of Good Feelings," and is personally popular enough to lead a 38 state campaign to amend the Constitution while simultaneously running for president. He is so charming even his opponent votes for him (in an non-swing state).

Schwarzenegger will be about as successful as Governor of California in my setting as in real life.

However, especially in the latter half of his tenure, the ASBs, while not yet actively interfering at any large scale, can probably arrange to boost the Propaganda skill of his team significantly and add +2 or so to Schwarzenegger's Politics and Public Speaking skill.

So while California is not meaningfully different after his tenure and he did pretty much the same things, in my campaign, Schwarzenegger should have emerged from his bout as the Governator as somewhat more popular than in real life. All the things that didn't work out can more plausibly be blamed on political opponents and he should have a significantly larger base of fervent supporters, regardless of the fact that he did not actually do anything more useful.

In the years since, the Propaganda skill boosts to his camp, as well as improvements to his personal charisma, speaking ability and political acumen, would have become even higher. In GURPS terms, by 2015 or so, alt-Schwarzenegger has the Talent of Intuitive Statesman 3 and two extra levels of Charisma (in addition to whatever political abilities you believe he already possessed) and at least 10 points more spent on Politics and Public Speaking than in real life (even accounting for how alt-Schwarzenegger has spent much more time on it 2012-2015 than real Schwarzenegger).*

So, all in all, counting additional Time Spent and more efficient Learning-on-the-Job from the Talent, alt-Schwarzenegger should be approaching skill 20 in Politics and Public Speaking, excluding Reaction Bonuses from Appearance, Charisma, Reputation and Status, which should be significant (especially as years of better Propaganda and general higher Reaction modifiers probably translate into further boosts to Reputation and Status).

Schwarzenegger can also call upon even higher bonuses and/or penalties to opponents for very important moments. Some key members of his campaign staff will also have +2 to +5 bonuses on their most important skills, including Law (Constitutional) and Propaganda, which can reach +5 and -5 to opponents for appropriately key situations.

In GURPS terms, the ASBs will want to avoid large-scale Mind Control if at all possible and are seeking the absolute easiest way, metaphysically speaking, to arrange for Schwarzenegger to have a chance to run. That means influencing a few people through long-time subtle psychic suggestion or even just Influence skills in GURPS (albeit magically enhanced for massive bonuses and possibly a penalty to Will to resist) is far preferable to any kind of blatant Mind Control or even mass magical influence.

Don't get me wrong. There is magic involved. It is just a very subtle magic that naturally seeks out the path of least resistance, especially when used by someone intelligent, and it is always easier to perform magical effects that can be rationalized as coincidences or resulting from natural causes than it is to do anything that goes against what the majority believe to be possible.

*Incidentally and only tangentially related, alt-Schwarzenegger didn't have heart surgery in 2018 and has evidenced no health problems at all since his days as California Governor. He's also fairly glowing with health and apparent happiness these days, looking younger and in better shape than many men in their fifties (not overtly supernaturally so, but definitely at the very edges of the human condition for a seventy-year-old).

[DanHoward]

Stallone proves to be prophetic.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vPBrt-mdNmQ

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by Icelander

That's pretty much what I was thinking, but wasn't sure if it would pass the plausibility muster.

It doesn't pass any plausibility test and even if bad court decisions handwaived it past popular reaction would curse any candidacy based on it.

A Consititional Amendment might give people a sense of invovlement in the process. Courts running amuck and changing the Constitution unilaterally wouldn't.

[malloyd]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

It doesn't pass any plausibility test and even if bad court decisions handwaived it past popular reaction would curse any candidacy based on it.

A Consititional Amendment might give people a sense of invovlement in the process. Courts running amuck and changing the Constitution unilaterally wouldn't.

Rather than no requirement, consider changing the qualification from being 35 and a natural born citizen to be a citizen of the US for at least 35 years. That would qualify Schwarzenegger in 2018, explaining why he didn't run earlier even if you place passage of the amendment at a more plausible historical moment.

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by malloyd

Rather than no requirement, consider changing the qualification from being 35 and a natural born citizen to be a citizen of the US for at least 35 years. That would qualify Schwarzenegger in 2018, explaining why he didn't run earlier even if you place passage of the amendment at a more plausible historical moment.

<shrug> Amend the Cosntitution so that one of the requirements is wearing purple socks if you want to. My point was that convoluted Court decisions can only go so far before arousing popular ire.

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

It doesn't pass any plausibility test and even if bad court decisions handwaived it past popular reaction would curse any candidacy based on it.

A Consititional Amendment might give people a sense of invovlement in the process. Courts running amuck and changing the Constitution unilaterally wouldn't.

This was kind of my thoughts as well. Directly contradicting the Constitution in the process of "interpreting" it strikes me as too extreme of judicial overreach for people to accept, even if they aren't strongly opposed to the content of the decision itself. It lends itself to a very dangerous precedent. I honestly think you'd need more support for repealing the natural-born citizen clause to allow the Supreme Court to functionally create a Constitutional Amendment from the bench than you would for getting it passed as an actual Amendment. It may be possible to spin things so that the general public will believe that this is supported by the 14th Amendment, but I feel you'd essentially need a general media blackout of the opposing opinion for this to really stick, as there's nothing in the 14th Amendment to support this - indeed, the very existence of the 15th and 19th Amendments make it clear the 14th didn't prevent the existence of "tiers" of citizenship.

Honestly, an Amendment is probably the path of least resistance here. Yes, for the Supreme Court to pass it, the ASB's have to at most influence five minds to favor it, while for an Amendment to pass they would have to influence enough members of the House, Senate, and the various State Legislatures. The former is clearly easier. However, in either case for such a ruling to stand, they'd have to influence enough of the general public (probably indirectly, by influencing how the media presents things) that it would have popular support, and I think this is going to be the most difficult part, to the extent that it dwarfs the difficulty difference between influencing the Supreme Court and influencing the Legislatures. If we accept that influencing the public is the most difficult part for the ASBs, we need to minimize opposition. The opposition to an Amendment is going to be in the form of those that are opposed to the content of the Amendment itself. The opposition to a "Judicial Amendment" is going to include all of those who would be opposed to the Amendment itself, as well as those who would be in favor of or indifferent to the Amendment but be opposed to such a gross case of judicial overreach. The latter set will always be larger than the first, and thus the Judicial Amendment would be more difficult for the ASBs to successfully pull off (particularly considering the possible backlash, like impeaching Supreme Court Justices and the like).

[AlexanderHowl]

It would still not work because you could not get three-quarters of the state's to agree to such an action. Such an amendment would be a basic violation of a fundamental principle of the US Constitution that is meant to protect the US from foreign domination. It would not fly in the states of the former Confederacy (plus a number of other states), so it would not succeed because of deep seated fears concerning foreign interference (and other factors). Any attempt by ASBs to force such an issue would likely cause armed insurrection throughout the USA.

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

It doesn't pass any plausibility test and even if bad court decisions handwaived it past popular reaction would curse any candidacy based on it.

A Consititional Amendment might give people a sense of invovlement in the process. Courts running amuck and changing the Constitution unilaterally wouldn't.

On the other hand, there is little to suggest Constitutional Amendments exist as a practical possibility in modern US politics.

In the past half century, meaningful constitutional change in the US has happened exclusively through courts.