This blog will chronicle my comments and other critical articles, cartoons and videos. Time has come for us to put America first and Party 2nd. This page will have the good, bad and ugly of Republicans, Democrats and Libertarians alike, but will always offer pluralistic solutions effective June 8, 2012

Thursday, March 31, 2016

Poll: Trump would be most disliked nominee in modern era

Courtesy - The Hill


Getty Images













If Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump gets the GOP's nomination, he would be the most disliked major-party nominee in modern times, according to a Washington Post-ABC News poll released Thursday.
Trump has a 67 percent unfavorable rating, with just 30 percent favorable.

The businessman is viewed unfavorably by 75 percent of women, 66 percent of independents, 85 percent of Hispanics and 80 percent of young adults.
Nearly half of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents also view him unfavorably.
His rival Ted Cruz has a 51 percent unfavorable rating and 35 percent favorable.

The poll was conducted by phone from March 3-6 among 1,000 adults. The margin of error is 3.5 percent.
Trump is currently leading in the delegate count, ahead of his rivals Cruz and John Kasich. He trails in hypothetical head-to-head match ups against Clinton and Bernie Sandersaccording to a RealClearPolitics average of polls.

Trump and Abortion by Nicholas Kristof

Nicholas and I may have a few brain cells in common... there was a time, his article which appeared after mine was identical.

This is a powerful piece

Mike Ghouse



Courtesy New York Times

Just when you thought Donald Trump couldn’t say anything more shocking, he suggested that women who get abortions should be punished.

On MSNBC, he said abortion must be banned and then “there has to be some form of punishment” for women who manage to get abortions.

He declined to say what the punishment should be, dodging a question about whether it should be “10 years” in prison or something milder. But his comment raised the possibility of following the lead of countries like El Salvador, where women can be dragged off from a hospital to prison for getting an abortion. Indeed, rights groups say that womenwere wrongly imprisoned in El Salvador simply for having miscarriages.

Trump doesn’t seem to have thought deeply about the issue — what a surprise! — and he departed from the mainstream anti-abortion position of targeting not women but abortion providers. As one personsaid on Twitter: “He’s a walking cartoon parody of every leftist accusation against Republicans.”

After the TV interview was over and the backlash had begun, Trump tried to back off his comment, saying in a statement, “The doctor or any other person performing this illegal act upon a woman would be held legally responsible, not the woman.”

Who knows where that leaves us!

One lesson is that Trump is an uninformed opportunist, but the episode does highlight two basic problems for the anti-abortion movement.

First, as long as the focus is on the fetus or on the claim of “protecting women,” many in the public are sympathetic to the anti-abortion view. The moment the focus shifts to criminalizing women, sympathy shifts.

Anti-abortion activists have generally taken a savvy approach over the years by concentrating on extreme situations — such as late-term so-called partial-birth abortions — and on legislating obstacles that in practice reduce access: Of the 1,074 state restrictions on abortion put in place after Roe v. Wade in 1973, more than one-quarter were enacted since 2010, according to the Guttmacher Institute.

Many Americans are ambivalent on abortion. But Trump has now turned the attention back from the fetus to the woman. And remember that three in 10 American women get an abortion at some point in their lives

Second, the data suggests that one of the most effective ways to reduce the number of abortions would be to increase the availability of publicly funded family planning. In 2013, publicly funded family planningprevented two million unintended pregnancies, including almost 700,000 abortions, according to the Guttmacher Institute.

Yet Republicans try to defund Title X, the traditional family planning program in the United States. After inflation, its funding level is less than one-third what it was in 1980.

In truth, Trump’s stance — whatever it is — would matter only if a more conservative Supreme Court revisited Roe v. Wade and some states were allowed to ban abortion altogether.

Moreover, medical abortion, achieved by taking two kinds of pills, is gaining ground on surgical abortion and is much more difficult to stop. In particular, one of the pills, misoprostol, is very cheap, has other uses and is at least 80 percent effective on its own in inducing an abortion early in pregnancy. The upshot is that early abortions will be increasingly difficult to prevent.

Trump’s comments about punishing women are worth pondering because they reflect the logical conclusion of equating a fetus with any other human being.

This penalizing approach has been tried before and failed. A dozen years ago, I went to Portugal to cover such an effort. The police staked out women’s health clinics, looking to arrest women who appeared likely to have just had abortions based on being pale or seeming upset. Some 48 women and a 16-year-old girl were prosecuted, along with accomplices such as husbands, boyfriends, parents and even a taxi driver who drove a woman to a clinic.

The women were humiliated on trial, their most intimate gynecological history revealed to the public. And the public was revolted. The women were all acquitted, and the public turned decisively in favor of abortion rights, by a majority of 79 percent to 14 percent.

“Forbidding abortion doesn’t save anyone or anything,” Sonia Fertuzinhos, a member of the Portuguese Parliament, told me at the time. “It just gets women arrested and humiliated in the public arena.”

The episode left many Portuguese both anti-abortion and pro-choice. They were distressed by abortion, especially late in pregnancies, but they were aghast at the idea of prosecuting young women for making wrenching personal choices. I think many Americans feel the same way.

So maybe Trump, in his flip-flopping wavering about women’s issues, can at least remind us of a larger truth. Whatever one thinks of abortion, criminalizing it would be worse.




Credi

Tuesday, March 29, 2016

Time for Trump to learn, let the court slap heavy fines

TIME FOR TRUMP TO LEARN.
I hope everyone who has been messed by Trump staffers sue Mr. Trump, as he is the one who eggs on his staff to be violent, let the courts pile up cases upon cases, he said he will pay for it, let him, it is not the money, and it is the fact that his rudeness is established in the court.   This man Trump learns to treat people with respect.

America has always been a great country and Tramp is trashing it with his attitudes, language and violence.  Let him learn to behave.  

 Let’s hope Trump’s bad news is good news for America.  Let me write this in bullets;
Trump’s Campaign Chief Corey Lewandowski was arrested and charged with simple battery. Corey had grabbed the arm of the reporter Michelle Fields and pushed her out.

Corey denied and trump denied.

Michelle’s ugly boss man at Brietbart does not want to press charges against Trump, everyone should be outraged at this, and because she is woman the assholes discounted her story. I am glad she pursued.

References:
 



Mike Ghouse

Monday, March 14, 2016

Stand Up To Trump by Tom Steyer

To put it bluntly, if the goodmen do nothing to stop Trump, they are giving him permission to continue to pit one American against the other.  This will be the demise of the Republican party. If the majority of them don't speak up, they are with him, and we the people have to defeat Trump from destroying America. 


Mike Ghouse
www.CenterforAmericanPolitics.com 


# # #

Stand Up To Trump

Courtesy - Medium.com 



The most sacred duty of the President of the United States of America is to defend and protect the Constitution and the principles it enshrines: freedom, fairness, and equality. Donald Trump, a racist and a liar, has become the front runner for the Republican presidential nomination by standing in opposition to these principles.

America faces very real challenges. The climate crisis, inequality, stagnant wages, student debt?—?the list goes on. Rather than address these serious problems, Trump uses hate-filled rhetoric to divide America by race, religion, and ancestry. He deliberately incites violence against those who dare question him.

Donald Trump is unfit for office and endangers our nation.

But it is important to understand that Trump is simply the latest in a long line of authoritarian figures that prey on deeply held fears. Conservative candidates have stoked those fears for decades pitting Americans against one another for electoral gain. If Republican leaders support his candidacy now, they support his values and become part of the problem.

Trump manipulates the fearful by promising that he will use his fraudulent deal-making prowess to protect and take care of his supporters. He is a schoolyard bully promising protection, even as he runs for President of the world’s greatest country on a platform that will worsen the real threats America must face. He preys on America’s prejudices and scapegoats entire races of people, all for the sake of his own ego.

Trump’s vitriol attracts large crowds and may even win him the Republican presidential nomination but dishonors our best traditions. It spits in the face of every protection and opportunity our Constitution promises. We have a moral obligation?—?and a patriotic duty?—?to speak out against this hatred and intimidation and to fight for an America that our children and grandchildren will be proud to call home.

Across the country, Americans of all backgrounds and beliefs are doing just that, standing up to Trump’s hatred. I am proud to stand with them, and I thank them for leading the way. Together, we are proclaiming to the world that Trump is not ours. We will not be silent. We will not stand back and let him put a torch to the ideals and principles that Americans hold dear.

Our country is better than Trump’s rhetoric. We are better than his hatred and better than his racism. And we will embrace the values of freedom, fairness, and equality?—?values that have already made America great.

Tom Steyer is a business leader and philanthropist who has pledged to give most of his wealth to charitable causes.

Sunday, March 13, 2016

Women Presidential & Vice Presidential Candidates of the USA

WOMEN PRESIDENTIAL AND VICE PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATES

A Selected List

Many women have sought to become President of the United States. A number received national attention, either as pioneers in the electoral process, as potential candidates, or as candidates of minor parties with a significant national presence. Others were from minor parties or were fringe candidates who entered major party primaries.

Barack Obama’s Revolution in Foreign Policy

For the first time in fifty years, a U.S., President has done the right thing, a conservative thing to develop and implement a foreign policy based on friendship and treaties rather than animosity and hostilities. His approach brings long term peace and security to them by turning enemies into friends and partners in peace and cooperation.

Mike Ghouse
www.CenterforAmericanPolitics.com    


Barack Obama's revolution in Foreign Policy
Courtesy : Atlantic Magazine



It is a criticism I have heard from more than one person who has worked with President Obama: that he regards himself as the smartest person in the room—any room. Jeffrey Goldberg’s fascinating article reveals that this is a considerable understatement. The president seems to think he is the smartest person in the world, perhaps ever.
 
Power corrupts in subtle ways. It appears to have made Obama arrogant. As described in Goldberg’s story, he is impatient to the point of rudeness with members of his own administration. His response to Secretary of State John Kerry when he hands him a paper on Syria is: “Oh, another proposal?” “Samantha, enough,” he snaps at the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. “I’ve already read your book.” We learn, too, that he “secretly disdains … the Washington foreign-policy establishment.”
 
The president is also bluntly critical of traditional American allies. He is said to have told Prime Minister David Cameron that Britain “would no longer be able to claim a ‘special relationship’ with the United States” if it did not “pay [its] fair share” by increasing defense spending. The Pakistanis and the Saudis get especially short shrift here, as—predictably—does Israel.




 


Republican ad gone viral - it is worth watching


Incredible Message!

This is a timely (hh ha) ad indeed.

In fact, I left Republican Party for similar reasons; it is not what the individuals did or said that mattered to me, it is the silent approval by the majority that mattered to me.  What good are they if they take shit and live in it neck deep with no guts even to taunt the extremists.

 Politics is a proportionate part of my life, as a result I did not want to spend as much time fighting the rascals, so I asked myself, am I with a party who have a similar share of extremists like all other groups, which would have been ok, but here the whole system was in deep shit.  So I chose to go independent.

Pluralism runs in my veins and that is where I will put a greater part of my time, but with Trump in the forefront, Pluralism in politics get activated in me, and I have been on Fox, NPR and several radio stations about Trump, not as a Muslim but as an American.

Over 8 articles have appeared in major papers so far, and I will do my share of building a cohesive America where no American has to live in fear of the other.


Islam does not hate America  - http://americatogetherfoundation.blogspot.com/2016/03/mr-trump-islam-does-not-hate-us.html



Wednesday, March 9, 2016

Dangerous Presidents in America from Day # 1

Cruz, Rubio and Trump are the three most dangerous men whom America has ever given birth to, and they are set to ruin the American economy and the American way of life.  



 On Day #1 - they want to repeal Obama care. Forget their hatred for the President, but look at their political meanness to deprive 22 Million Americans of their health insurance. Many of those Americans may be facing life threatening ailments, when they repeal Obama-care on Day # 1, a number of them may die for lack of access to the necessary health care. Does life of Americans matter to them? 

For the first time in American history, the U.S. Government has put the money to right use, to care for Americans rather than blow it on destroying other nations like Iraq and Afghanistan. For the first time pre-existing conditions were covered by health insurance, it is important to know that many American lives have been saved and will continue to be saved.  These three men care less about ordinary Americans. While they can afford to buy any insurance, the average Americans living from pay check to pay check cannot. 

Our country needs a strong defense system to fight off external aggression as well as internal health aggressions. The three should be grateful to Obama for having implemented the measures and means of paving the way for a healthier America and saving American lives.

Furthermore, on Day #1 – they also want to tear up the Iran deal.  That would certainly appease Netanyahu, but completely disregards the long term security of Israel, and as a consequence it would free Iran to pursue the Nuclear Weapons program which brings uncertainty and instability to the region.

President Obama has removed a potential threat to Israel with this deal; and the American Jews have the wisdom to recognize this and support it.  

President Carter, the architect and the facilitator of a permanent Peace Treaty between Israel and its onetime arch enemy Egypt brought relief, after that Israel had one less enemy to worry and thus saved tension, tanks and lives.   I am sure the thoughtful American Jewry will express their gratitude to President Carter. Indeed, Israel should install a statue of President Carter at the Ben Gurion Airport to express their gratitude to him.

President Clinton on the other hand took out another enemy on the east; Jordan, and
President Obama has given the iron dome to Israel and has removed another enemy; Iran.

Tearing up the Iran Deal would be one of the gravest blunders in the US Foreign policy. It would amount to recklessly rejecting Iran’s partnership treaty with Russia, China, UK, Germany, France and the United States.  How do you build coalitions if you are disrespectful to nations that work with us on common goals of reducing conflicts and focusing on economic development?  If we mess with this deal; Iran is likely to become another Rogue Nuclear nation like North Korea and pose a direct and greater threat to Israel.

For the first time in fifty years, a U.S., President has done the right thing, a conservative thing to develop and implement a foreign policy based on friendship and treaties rather than animosity and hostilities.

We may destroy Iran, but we will also destroy ourselves much more.  Gas prices will go up for millions of servicemen/repairmen to make service calls, as it happened towards the end of the Bush era. Small businesses will fold, divorces will become routine, home foreclosures will be back, loss of lives of our men and women, and a few more trillion dollars of deficit will be added to our budget.

Why is little Rubio screaming in every sentence to save our ally Israel? Israel does not need friends like him who will ruin their long term security. Israel needs prudent, wise and visionaries like Obama, Clinton and Carter who will bring long term peace and security to them by turning enemies into friends and partners in peace and cooperation.    

The things Rubio has been clinging on to are repeal Obama-care, tearing up the Iran Deal and supporting Israel’s paranoia.  Every sentence he utters is about supporting Israel, and I am sure Trump supporters resent that, because they want America first and not Israel.  Rubio’s non-sensual rhetoric may increase anti-Semitism in the form of resentment. He and Cruz are dangerous to Israel not only from Americans, but also from those five nations (Russia, China, UK, France and Germany) whose nuclear contracts with Iran they plan to trash, and it is like spitting in their faces.  The costs of the idiotic behavior of Rubio will not fall on themselves, but on the average. I wonder if Saudi Arabia, Germany or UK can throw enough bones at him to let him bark for them. He does not give a crap about the 22 Million Americans’ health care or our economy. He has a serious character flaw.

Ted Cruz, the bloody war monger will carpet bomb other nations like Bush did,  and he will add a few more trillion dollars of deficit to the budget, and shoot the unemployment rate through the roof to go up to 12%, more divorces will follow, home foreclosures will rise, and businesses will start closing down.  Yes, neither Cruz does care what happens to America. He and some of his macho men may draw sadistic pleasure from destroying other nations, but we the people do not want destruction, for which we end up paying again.

Furthermore, Cruz has been disrespectful towards the Supreme Court Justices and their decisions.  Is he above the law to use such vulgar language about them?  He does not seem care, he would let our government shut down and ruin our credit ratings, and he does not give a rat’s ass about the 22 Million Americans’ health care either. Voting for Cruz is regressing to the big bad times of Bush Administration.

Trump will turn his back on nuclear Non-proliferation Deals and peace negotiations just to advance his own agenda, and not necessarily what is good for America. Foreign leaders are not his employees whom he fire at his whim; instead they will turn around and tell him to take a hike. The Muslim nations, some 56 of them would not want to be humiliated by these idiots and will turn to Russia or the UK to purchase their military hardware. Who will be the losers? The men and women employed in our export and defense industry. That is a large number of people and it may hurt our economy severely.   

These three men, Rubio, Cruz and Trump are wrecking balls, and we will be screwed on Day # 1 if we were to elect them as our President. It is time to redefine conservatism; none of the three loose mouths are conservatives in my books.
Dr. Mike Ghouse is a community consultant, social scientist, thinker, writer, news maker, and a speaker on PluralismInterfaithIslampolitics, terrorismhuman rightsIndiaIsrael-Palestine and foreign policy. He is committed to building cohesive societies and offers pluralistic solutions on issues of the day. Visit his 63 links at

Tuesday, March 8, 2016

Delegates Counter 2016

Republicans  http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2016/president/republican_delegate_count.html

Democats
 http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2016/president/democratic_delegate_count.html


Thanks to Real Clear Politics

Thank you

Mike Ghouse
(214) 325-1916 talk/text

Dr. Mike Ghouse is a community consultant, social scientist, thinker, writer, news maker, and a speaker on PluralismInterfaithIslampolitics, terrorism, human rights, India, Israel-Palestine and foreign policy. He is committed to building cohesive societies and offers pluralistic solutions on issues of the day. Visit him in 63 links at www.MikeGhouse.net for his writings at TheGhousediary.com and several blogs listed there in. 

Presidential Candidates satisfaction survey

What a contrast!

Mike Ghouse

Sunday, March 6, 2016

The most dangerous presidents on Day # 1

Mike Ghouse

Cruz, Rubio and Trump are the three most dangerous men that America has ever given birth to, and they are set to ruin American economy and the American way of life on Day # 1 in their office. Do we want to put them in?

The article is submitted to Huffington Post, and until it is published, I am supposed to wait, it will be out out Tuesday AM, if it is delayed, I can publish it at www.TheGhouseDiary.com and www.CenterforAmericanPolitics.comMonday evening, right here... let's hear your opinions.


Thank you

Mike Ghouse
(214) 325-1916 talk/text

Dr. Mike Ghouse is a community consultant, social scientist, thinker, writer, news maker, and a speaker on PluralismInterfaithIslampolitics, terrorismhuman rightsIndiaIsrael-Palestine and foreign policy. He is committed to building cohesive societies and offers pluralistic solutions on issues of the day. Visit him in 63 links at www.MikeGhouse.net for his writings at TheGhousediary.com and several blogs listed there in.

Saturday, March 5, 2016

Republican Party will not be the same

Presidents do change the character of the party. Bill Clinton brought the Democratic Party to the center; Obama took it a tad to the left. Bush took further to the right, and now Trump will bring it ‘towards’ the center. Most Republicans are conformists and are willing to surrender their freedom for the party, and when an Authoritarian like Trump is at the helm of affairs, all will start bowing to him, one by one. It was embarrassing to watch Chris Christie kiss ass Trump, and others will follow the suit.

Trump said that he will work with Paul Ryan, the speaker of the house, but if he is not willing he is going to pay a price, a heavy price. This is how Trump will make others kneel to him and of course, the Republicans will do that, they love authority figures.

Trump will change the character of the Republican Party. More about Trump in an article “The rise of American Authoritarianism,” atwww.CenterforAmericanPolitics.com

Relax, no need to be tense, Hillary Clinton will be the 45th President of the United States of America, and not Trump and she will set the country on a moderate course, which is reflective of most Americans.

 Thank you

Mike Ghouse
(214) 325-1916 talk/text

Dr. Mike Ghouse is a community consultant, social scientist, thinker, writer, news maker, and a speaker on PluralismInterfaithIslampolitics, terrorism, human rights, India, Israel-Palestine and foreign policy. He is committed to building cohesive societies and offers pluralistic solutions on issues of the day. Visit him in 63 links at www.MikeGhouse.net for his writings at TheGhousediary.com and several blogs listed there in. 

Adam, Conservatives and Progressives

ADAM, FREEDOM AND CONSERVATISM | TheGhouseDiary.com
As our founding fathers have laid it out; life liberty and pursuit of happiness are our inalienable rights.  The freedom to speak, think, act and assemble is our inalienable right; this right was given by the creator to us upon birth, and it is as much a part of our life as brain, heart, kidneys, blood and other elements of the body are.  

I don’t have the full knowledge of genesis of creation in Hindu, Buddhist, Jain, Zoroastrian, Sikh, Baha’i, Wicca, Native and other traditions, but it is embedded in the Abrahimic Traditions.

Adam’s story makes a point that is so relevant today; he was offered a choice to be a conservative or a progressive. He was told, if you do nothing, status quo will not change, you’ll continue to live in your comfort zone (conservative) in the heaven here with me. Or if chose to eat the forbidden fruit, you’ll bear the consequences, a change (progress) will dawn upon you,  that you don’t know what to do with it, your body system will produce crap and you’ll have to find a place to dump it. I don’t like the smell of it, and will throw you out of here. 

Adam deliberated on it, there was a challenge for him and consequences for the choices he would make, do I want to remain a conservative or a progressive? He took the bold step, he ate the forbidden fruit. 

What did God do? He could have slapped Adam to behave and be obedient, but he chose to keep his word and set an example.  He gave Adam complete freedom to choose and Adam chose to live with the temptation.  
Thank God for giving us the inalienable right to be free, right to choose and the right to act freely. Thanks to Adam for choosing to be a progressive, otherwise we would not have experienced anything all, we might as well have been dead creatures living in that garden called paradise doing nothing, speaking nothing, eating nothing. What a bore!

The creator or the process of evolution would not have endowed us with the ability to talk, if it was not meant for us to use.  This is all God’s plan. We must honor free speech no matter how difficult it is and we must be progressive to see and experience the world, and conservative enough not to fall of the stratosphere in taking bold risks.

 
Thank you

Mike Ghouse
(214) 325-1916 talk/text

Dr. Mike Ghouse is a community consultant, social scientist, thinker, writer, news maker, and a speaker on PluralismInterfaithIslampolitics, terrorismhuman rightsIndiaIsrael-Palestine and foreign policy. He is committed to building cohesive societies and offers pluralistic solutions on issues of the day. Visit him in 63 links at www.MikeGhouse.net for his writings at TheGhousediary.com and several blogs listed there in. 

Friday, March 4, 2016

What makes America Great?

What makes America great? It is the exercise of freedom without fear that makes America, the greatest nation on the earth. 

The CIA guy says, "“If some future president is going to decide to waterboard, he’d better bring his own bucket, because he’s going to have to do it himself,” Hayden said last November in an ABC TV documentary, The Spymasters." 

and "“I pity the poor SOB who is President Trump's CIA director and gets the order to do interrogation techniques ‘worse’ than waterboarding,” Rizzo said, “not to mention the CIA general counsel or Justice Department attorney general who has the legal issue dropped in his or her lap.”

and, "If they don’t resign, the former general counsel suggested, they’d better get ready for a world of hurt in the media and the courts and on Capitol Hill."

This is the America I cherish. Men with conscience, conscience above the boss, job or income. This is what give me hope about humanity, too many good people over a few evil men.

Mike Ghouse

www.CenterforAmericanPolitics.com 



U.S.
CIA WOULD REFUSE TRUMP TORTURE ORDERS, TOP FORMER OFFICIALS SAY
BY JEFF STEIN ON 2/12/16 AT 12:29 PM

Courtesy - Newsweek


Donald Trump would face huge resistance at the CIA if he were elected president and ordered the spy agency to resume waterboarding—or “worse,” as the Republican candidate has repeatedly pledged.

John Rizzo, who was a top CIA lawyer during the time the agency used “enhanced interrogation techniques,” or EITs, on prisoners, predicts CIA officials would rather resign than obey orders to revert to “hard measures” like waterboarding and beatings.

“I think certainly many of those who were connected to the EIT program over its six years’ span—and hundreds are still there—would? resign or retire rather than have to go down that perilous road again,” Rizzo tells Newsweek. “Who could blame them?”

Try Newsweek for only $1.25 per week

Trump, the leading Republican candidate after his presidential primary victory in New Hampshire, has repeatedly pledged to reinstate waterboarding and ”a hell of a lot worse” if he wins the presidency.

“It works, OK?”  the New York real estate mogul has claimed. “It works. Only a stupid person would say it doesn't work."  Even if it doesn’t work, he said in November, it should be used because terrorist suspects “deserve it anyway, for what they're doing."

The issue of waterboarding’s effectiveness—not to mention whether it amounts to torture—has been hotly debated for years. Former CIA and FBI interrogators have said publicly that such measures not only violate Geneva Convention prohibitions on torture, but are not as effective in the long run as breaking down prisoners with other techniques. Frazier Thompson, who heads the federal unit that interrogates key terrorism suspects, added his voice to that message this week, telling NPR that "rapport-based techniques elicit the most credible information."

No less than John Yoo, one of the George W. Bush administration officials who wrote legal memoranda green-lighting harsh measures, said this week that Trump completely misunderstood their use.

"I'm afraid Mr. Trump thinks of waterboarding, or worse, as a kind of punishment, like a sentence [or] revenge or reprisals," he told Fox News on Tuesday. "That's not what its purpose is. The purpose of it is not to take revenge for past acts. It's to figure out what to do now to get intelligence to stop future attacks."

After revelations surfaced a decade ago that the CIA was using such rough techniques on prisoners in secret sites around the world, the agency was embroiled in a years-long global uproar and a controversial Senate Intelligence Committee investigation.

It was such an ordeal for the CIA that one of its former chiefs, General Michael Hayden, declared recently that the agency would never do it again. Likewise, the nation’s current top spy official, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, said this week that the CIA should stick with the stricter Army Field Manual on interrogations, because it “comports with American values.”

“If some future president is going to decide to waterboard, he’d better bring his own bucket, because he’s going to have to do it himself,” Hayden said last November in an ABC TV documentary, The Spymasters.  

“I agree with Mike,” says Rizzo, who recounted the agency’s turmoil over waterboarding and other issues in a 2014 memoir, Company Man: Thirty Years of Controversy and Crisis in the CIA.

And woe to the CIA director, Rizzo added, who gets orders to resume waterboarding “or worse” from a President Trump.

“I pity the poor SOB who is President Trump's CIA director and gets the order to do interrogation techniques ‘worse’ than waterboarding,” Rizzo said, “not to mention the CIA general counsel or Justice Department attorney general who has the legal issue dropped in his or her lap.”

If they don’t resign, the former general counsel suggested, they’d better get ready for a world of hurt in the media and the courts and on Capitol Hill.

Election Math for 3/15/2016 by Steve Kornacki

Steve Kornacki predicts the following outcomes
Some rough math for the 4 possible delegate count scenarios after 3/15, with OH and FL as the variables:
Scenario-1 Rubio Wins Florida, Kasich wins Ohio
548 Trump
394 Rubio
371 Cruz
104 Kasich

Scenario 2 – Rubio wins Florida, Trump wins Ohio
614 Trump
394 Rubio
371 Cruz
38 Kasich
Scenario 3 – Trump wins Florida, Kasich wins Ohio
647 Trump
371 Cruz
295 Rubio
104 Kasich
Scenario 4 – Trump wins Ohio, Florida
713 Trump
371 Cruz
295 Rubio
38 Kasich

The Presidential Penis: A Short History

I can see normal men talk about the size of their Penis, but to have to come out on the public stage with 15 million people watching was incredible.

A sentence made me laugh, "With the prospect of Hillary Clinton becoming the first penis-free president, it’s not surprising that her Republican rivals want to remind the world that their genital anatomy is the traditional norm."

In India, it's subtle - masculanity is expressed in 56" size chest as claimed by PM Modi

Guess who is at the bottom?

By the way, I was reluctant to post this, but this site is about politics

Mike Ghouse

www.CenterforAmericanPolitics.com 



The Presidential Penis: A Short History

Courtesy - New Republic

An obsession with the president's phallus is a feature of American history long pre-dating Donald Trump.

BY JEET HEER

March 4, 2016
Every American president has had a penis. The possession of a generative member is, in fact, the one trait they all share. Some have been Whigs, some Democrats, and some Republicans. There have been slave-owning presidents and abolitionists, bearded presidents and clean-shaven ones, Easterners and Southerners. Almost all have been white, but at least one has been black. Yet all have been men.




With the prospect of Hillary Clinton becoming the first penis-free president, it’s not surprising that her Republican rivals want to remind the world that their genital anatomy is the traditional norm.

Donald Trump’s claim during the Republican debate in Detroit that he was amply endowed might have shocked many, but it belongs to a venerable history. Structurally, the president occupies the same position in American politics as kings and queens do in monarchies. The monarch’s body is, traditionally, the microcosm of the state, hence closely monitored. It’s not just of prurient interest to know whether the king is sleeping with the queen (or a consort). It’s a fact upon which the fate of the realm, and the royal lineage, hangs. Hence the ancient tradition of royal gossip, which in the American republic has been replaced by a concern for the presidential penis.

Stephen Jaffe/Getty Images

It’s not an accident that during the vicious presidential campaign of 1800 Thomas Jefferson accused John Adams of having a “hideous hermaphroditical character, which has neither the force and firmness of a man, nor the gentleness and sensibility of a woman.” Hermaphrodites are, of course, defined by their sexual organs. 

The Founding Fathers created a framework for American politics that resulted in a repeated focus on the the penises of aspiring presidents and presidents alike. Was Abraham Lincoln interested in sleeping with black women, as Stephen Douglas alleged? Did Grover Cleveland have a child outside of wedlock? Did John F. Kennedy have more mistresses than there are stars in the sky? Such questions have been the very fabric of American public life. 

Lyndon Johnson was always eager to let those around him know that he had an usually large penis. Reviewing a biography of Johnson in the New York Review of Books, historian Marshall Frady noted:

He early became fabled for a Rabelaisian earthiness, urinating in the parking lot of the House Office Building as the urge took him; if a colleague came into a Capitol bathroom as he was finishing at the urinal there, he would sometimes swing around still holding his member, which he liked to call “Jumbo,” hooting once, “Have you ever seen anything as big as this?,” and shaking it in almost a brandishing manner as he began discoursing about some pending legislation. At the same time, he would oblige aides to take dictation standing in the door of his office bathroom while he went about emptying his bowels, as if in some alpha-male ritual assertion of his primacy. Even on the floors of the House and Senate, he would extravagantly rummage away at his groin, sometimes reaching his hand through a pocket and leaning with half-lifted leg for more thorough access.


The December 2000 issue of Esquire.


Thanks to various sex scandals, we have detailed descriptions of Bill Clinton’s penis. According to Robert Bennet, Clinton’s lawyer in the Paula Jones case, “In terms of size, shape, direction, whatever the devious mind wants to concoct, the president is a normal man. There are no blemishes, there are no moles, there are no growths.” The Independent offered a more prosaic account: His erect penis is about five inches long, has the circumference of a quarter, and heads off at an angle, presumably rather like a finger bent at the joint.

Americans might be cringing at Marco Rubio’s nudge-nudge-wink-wink comment about Trump having “small hands” and Trump’s reassurances that both his hands and penis are in good shape. Yet this locker-room banter belongs to an old tradition running from Adams to Bill Clinton. The only way to stop American presidents from alluding to their penises is to elect a woman, which is likely to happen in November. 

Jeet Heer is a senior editor at the New Republic.
@HeerJeet