Arnold Schwarzenegger confirms he wants to run for US president | Hacker News Reader

Arnold Schwarzenegger confirms he wants to run for US president

thehill.com

11 pointsmhb16 comments

From whitehouse.gov [1] The Constitution lists only three qualifications for the Presidency — the President must be at least 35 years of age, be a natural born citizen, and must have lived in the United States for at least 14 years.

I could see another charismatic actor [2] winning a presidential race but it will have to be one that meets the above criteria. It happened recently in Ukraine. It's happened in the US Ronald Reagan. The best candidates I have seen were all comedians but unfortunately they are smart enough to not want the job.

Perhaps Arnold could be appointed as Secretary of Defense. [3]

[1] - https://www.whitehouse.gov/about-the-white-house/our-governm...

[2] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_actor-politicians

[3] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Secretary_of_Def...

I could see this going to court if he ran with the outcome being the equal protection clause winning out over that. I might be misremembering, but I think that clause was to keep England from sneaking someone in to take the presidency of the nascent United States.

I agree it could go to court but then it is up against this process [1] which is harder than it appears as written. Judges at every level have no authority to do anything beyond starting the amendment process. The member states of this process would have to see a significant benefit to put in that kind of effort and probably a lot of money and back scratching to amend the constitution. The constitution has only been amended 27 times of the 33 proposals in 247 years. I think the closest one could get would be to appoint Arnold as Secretary of Defense. That is just below commander and chief secondary military command role of the US president during peace time.

Perhaps an interesting study would be to determine if the US being as divided as it is currently would help or hinder the amendment process.

[1] - https://www.senate.gov/reference/reference_index_subjects/Co...

Huh? The 14th amendment has already been part of the US constitution for 155 years.

Also, what is this about judges starting the amendment process?

It says he says "he would run for president in 2024, and win, if he was eligible".

He is not eligible, and he knows it.

I would think he would have a chance if allowed to enter, although he's older than a President should be. The US seems to like being a gerontocracy, which isn't always the best (or even a good) choice.

What makes you think the US like it? I don't have a link readily available but I would bet my shirt that a large majority of the country is tired of the 60/70+ people running for president. But hey, you only get to pick between the 2 that were already pre-picked for you (out of the dozen that was already vetted).

Whole lot of the upper house I thought was as old as the hills?

I was ready to nitpickingly defend the choice of "want" because, yeah, does sound he wants to but knows he can't. But then the original headline runs "Schwarzenegger says he would run, and win, in 2024 if he could" (62 characters) so there's no excuse for editing it.

however this was still a very lucrative comment by the former governator.

Well, if this happens, we can file it under "strange things that the Simpsons somehow predicted perfectly."

Demolition man as well.

In all seriousness I wouldn't be surprised if Taco Bell were the only restaurant to survive the Franchise Wars either. Their product is consistently good (as far as large-cap fast food goes, i.e. excluding Del Taco and In-N-Out), their marketing is savvy, and they aren't afraid to experiment with new concepts. McDonald's looks downright medieval in comparison

I think the whole "fuck your freedom" bit will only appeal to anti-american americans these days. Especially from someone who abused steroids for the sake of his career.

I don't know, man, the whole "screw your rights" thing really hurt. I get that it was hyperbole in the heat of the moment, but coming from Arnold it just stung.

Foreign entities are allowed to finance (read: own) US politicians. The requirement that the President be a natural born citizen seems moot in that light.

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