The "More Like This" tag above applies to the Maryland Conservatarian who has administered a well-timed, well-aimed scolding to those who, with lameness overflowing, have challenged the natural-born citizenship of Senator John McCain, who was born in the Canal Zone in a military hospital back when the Canal Zone was unambiguously U.S. territory.

There are two ways to be born a citizen i.e. to be a natural-born citizen. One is to be born to a U.S. citizen and the other is to be born on U.S. soil. Either works; McCain has both and is actually a thrice-natural-born U.S. citizen: two by two citizen parents and one by being born on U.S. soil. Had McCain been born to a green-card soldier momma, fathered by a non-citizen and been delivered at La Charite in East Berlin, there would be an issue.

While there are some who claim that those who are born to U.S. citizens outside the United States are "naturalized" and not "natural-born" citizens, this interpretation flies in the face of the common-sense meaning of "naturalization," a formal procedure for becoming a citizen. McCain was not naturalized; he was and is a natural-born American citizen, period. If McCain was not naturally-born a citizen of the United States, one must ask: of what country was he born a citizen, or was he a newborn without a country? At what point did he go from being a non-citizen to citizen? If it occurred at birth, then that is tantamount to being a natural-born citizen. If it happened afterwards, what law governs how many days, minutes, seconds, it takes to become a citizen? What statute? Furthermore, how and when does the United States government acquire jurisdiction over him if not at the moment of birth? Does one get citizenship from birth but not AT birth? It defies common sense.