Devil's advocate: Two wrongs DO make a right?
When we have a sitting president finishing up his second term in office, I would say the issue is dead and the argument done.
Devil's advocate: Two wrongs DO make a right?
Guys, you are not analyzing this correctly.
Everyone admits that Obama's father, like Cruz', was not an American citizen. That is utterly settled.
So now we have to turn to the mothers of each. The requirement at the time both were born was that to be a citizen from birth when one parent is not a citizen (regardless of where the birth in question took place), the citizen parent had to reside in the US for at least 5 years after attaining the age of 14. In the case of Cruz, this requirement has been met, so he was a citizen from the moment he was born. In the case of Obama, it wasn't met - his mother was under 19 when he was born. So, based on that, Obama never was and never could be eligible. HOWEVER, there is one exception to that - if he was born on US soil. Hence the fight/controversy over whether he was born in Hawaii or not.
FYI, there is an old Supreme Court case, Minor v. Happersett (1874), which indicated that the term "natural born citizen" was different and more stringent than a "mere" citizen. It involved being the product of 2 American citizen parents at the time of one's birth. This safeguard (and it applies in U.S. law ONLY to the President) was viewed as having been put in place to ensure that not only did the President have a first loyalty to this country, but that his parents did as well - meaning that the environment in which the future President was raised was one loyal to the well-being of this country. Given the circumstances of Obama's upbringing, we can see the wisdom of that - and he is ineligible even if born in Hawaii, for the simple reason that his father was never a US citizen. If this test is used, then Cruz is not eligible - nor are my own kids, because my wife (though a legal resident at the time), was not a US citizen when they were born (she is now), even though I am a NBC. Under the definition in the first part of this post, Cruz and my kids are NBCs, but Obama's status is in question until the Hawaii thing can be resolved.