It Sucks That My Kid Can't Be President Of Taiwan

He’s got dual citizenship, and I believe that the law as it reads now states that to be prez you can only have Taiwanese citizenship, ie, give up his baby blue USof A passport.

Don’t these things work on reciprocity? If a Taiwanese couple had a kid in Chicago, even if they didn’t have Green cards or were just visiting, and the kid would still be granted US citizenship, right?

Therefore, as a US citizen, that kid could be President of the US. Right?

So, what do you think? Do I have a shot at it, or should I stop telling my kid he could be President of Taiwan some day?

How many dual passport holding US prez’ have there been?

HG

You want him to have a shot at being prez? I thought you were teaching him to be honorable and honest. :wink:

So, the taiwanese kid would qualify…(techinically that is. :smiley: Until the pack of lawyers showed up.)
usconstitution.net/const.html#A2Sec1

[quote]
How many dual passport holding US prez’ have there been? [/quote]
AFAIK, none. But it COULD happen (which is what is cool about American. Any natural born citizen can become president). With US immigration policy as it is now (or has been up until 911), the idea of a foreign couple giving birth to their child in the USA, giving the kid automatic citizenship, and receiving citizenship in its own country upon return, it is more possible and more than likely possible in the future to have Americans from Taiwan running for office there…maybe president!

BTW, isn’t there some American from Taiwan in the Pacific Northwest who is in Congress. Is he a natural born citizen or a Green card assimalitizen?

This is the mock-pessimism that huants your posts Jaboney. Have a kid. You’ll loosen up. :wink:

Nah, you know I think politics is a noble profession, imperfectly practiced.

Tell your kid to become US prez first, then Taiwan’s prez. Couldn’t do it the other way around. Think how buggy that’d make the mainland.

No

I think at least some of the reasoning behind the regulation is:

  1. If the Prez of TW had US citizenship, the US would have a hard time saying when he could and couldn’t visit, where he could and couldn’t go, etc.

  2. If TW was attacked by you-know-who, it’d be kind of a downer for the locals if he was airlifted off the roof of the US Embassy by a Blackhawk.

Maybe your kid can press the button on every parents massive ego.

vicariously living through your children?

Lurkky point number 2: very funny! (and rather tricky too, almost impossible, as there is no US embassy) perhaps the Panamanian embassy would do?

I think it sucks too. I’d rather have your kid as president than anyone else who is likely to run.

This is the mock-pessimism that huants your posts Jaboney. Have a kid. You’ll loosen up. :wink:[/quote]

Yeah, you must have been thinking of me there, JD, not Jaboney. Unlike the J-man, I think that politics is an ignoble profession (the base pursuit of power), all too perfectly practiced, in most cases (in the US, Taiwan, and elsewhere).

So as for not having a shot at being prez – well, I could only wish that I could have the power to draw up a list of professions that my son could be statutorily precluded from. Professional boxer, crab fisherman, coal miner in China, president, drug dealer, lawyer, those fortune teller guys on Taiwan TV with the pointers that predict the stock market… you get the idea – it’s a long list. President (of any country) would certainly be near the top though. Hard to think of too many other vocations that require one to sacrifice so much in terms of principle, honor, contribution to society, honesty, commitment to family, etc. to achieve.

Personally, I think that you (and your boy) are very lucky that he will not even be faced with the temptation to go down that particular road. :thumbsup: :slight_smile:

-H