Of all the views that are detached from reality, the most delusional is that Christians are persecuted in the U.S.

Having the career of the beloved CIA Director and the commanding general in Afghanistan instantly destroyed due to highly invasive and unwarranted electronic surveillance is almost enough to make one believe not only that there is a god, but that he is an ardent civil libertarian.

American political culture quickly and always outpaces any attempt to satirize it.

Transparency is for those who carry out public duties and exercise public power. Privacy is for everyone else.

When people in power can operate in the dark, inevitably they abuse that power. So, you need outside forces to bring light and transparency to what they're doing. And, one of the ways you do that is through journalism, and through guaranteeing a free press. That is its purpose, to provide a check on those who wield power.

One should be weary of drawing too many inferences from a single poll. You can find wildly disparate results with two different polls. There is no question that American Muslims remain one of the most marginalized and demonized groups in United States. There has been a sustained propaganda campaign against Muslims for over a decade and it doesn't disappear over night. Those attitudes are hardened. But one of the things that polling often doesn't measure is the intensity of opinions.

Colin Powell speaks regularly to high-ranking U.S. officials, he knows a lot about what's going on in the government. And so he's a powerful person who merits transparency, just like any other powerful people do.