It may have made sense in 1787, but that was a long long time ago

If there was one thing incredibly stupid about the controversy over President Obama's birth certificate, it was that it mattered at all.

Some of the anachronistic stuff in the U.S. Constitution has been done away with. We no longer count a black person as three-fifths of a white person. We even allow women to vote.

But some things are just silly now.

"No Person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the Office of President; neither shall any Person be eligible to that Office who shall not have attained to the Age of thirty five Years, and been fourteen Years a Resident within the United States."

In 1787, there may have been a reason to have such a law. Many people were terrified at the possibility that one of the extraneous crowned heads of Europe might find a way to rule our country. After all, each country over there had a job for only one sovereign, and maybe the less-talented brother could end up over here.

President and Mrs. Windsor

Think Neil Bush, for example. Or without the ban, Prince Andrew. And Fergie as First Lady.

It isn't as if anything like that would ever happen. All this portion of the Constitution does is tell immigrants that no matter how successful they get, they can never be president.

Hey, Donald Trump can't either.

Actually, the restriction seems to have hurt Republicans more than Democrats so far. There were certainly some members of the GOP in the early '70s who would have liked to see Henry Kissinger of the other side of the desk in the Oval Office, and early in this century, Austrian-born Arnold Schwarzenegger became the first Republican in a decade to win a major statewide election in California.

President Gropenfuhrer?

Who knows?

The only Democrat I can think of who might have been an interesting candidate was Gov. Jennifer Granholm of Michigan, who had the misfortune -- at least for our purposes here -- of being born north of the border in Vancouver.

The fact is, though, that it's a silly restriction in the modern world. Anyone wanting to be president who would have to run the primary gauntlet and then still get 50-plus percent of the vote in the general election.

What seems silliest to me is that people like Sarah Palin, Shelly Bachman and at some point, even Alana Thompson are eligible to be president and brilliant people like my daughter Pauline Kastner can never even think about running because she was born in France and lived the first seven years of her life there.

That's right. Honey Boo Boo can be president and Pauline can't.

She actually may rise very high in our government.

Honey Boo Boo?

No, Pauline. She has already been in the Foreign Service for more than 10 years, and I'm still betting on ambassadorships or an undersecretary job before she retires. I can't imagine that she would ever run for office, mostly because I think she's too intelligent to put up with the bullshit a successful career in politics requires.

Pauline and a plane

She is finishing her three-year tour in Jamaica this summer, and just last week had the responsibility of handling some of the crucial preparations for President Obama's visit.

We talked about it today, and she told me she had to deliver a few things to the airport before the president left for Panama. They didn't actually let her board Air Force One, although she was thrilled to see it.

Hey, it's their loss.