John McCain not a natural born citizen

The US Constitution requires that Presidents be natural-born citizens. "No Person except a natural born Citizen...shall be eligible to the Office of President" is in Article II, Section I. This part of the Constitution was inserted due to suspicion, perhaps, of Baron von Steuben trying to get Prince Henry of Prussia to become king of the US.

The NY Times is reporting today that John McCain was born in the Panama Canal zone. Is he ineligible to be president? That's an easy one; absolutely not. The constitution is meaningless when compared to public opinion. The constitution is not only what the Supreme Court says it is, it is also what public opinion thinks it is. And public opinion would never disqualify the son of a military family born abroad from becoming president, Constitution or no Constitution.