Nikki Haley bets against Trump; endorses Rubio

South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley endorsed the candidacy of Marco Rubio.

GOV. NIKKI HALEY's endorsement of Marco Rubio is one more move in the chess game of high stakes politics. 

"I wanted somebody with fight, I wanted somebody with passion, I wanted somebody who had conviction to do the right thing," Haley said during her announcement Wednesday (Feb. 17). "But I wanted somebody humble enough, who remembers that you work for all the people -- and I wanted somebody to go and show my parents that the best decision they made for their children was coming to America.”

RELATED: Nikki Haley needs to take an ethnic studies class

The Indian/American governor of South Carolina, the daughter of immigrants, puts herself in the Republican's "establishment" camp and may positioned herself favorably for her political future when her governorship terms out in 2019.

The highly popular governor was in the limelight last month when she was chosen to give the Republican rebuttal to President Obama's State of the Union address. In her speech she urged voters not to listen to the "angriest voices" in an obvious reference to Donald Trump. In followup interviews she criticized Trump for his campaign of fear mongering and opposed his proposals for banning all Muslims from entering the U.S. and his anti-refugee views.

RELATED: Time to bring down the Confederate flag

In her SOTU response, she received praise from both Democrats and Republicans as a voice of reason and may have put herself in a position as a dark horse candidate for Vice President - if not in 2016, certainly after her term as governor ends in time for the 2020 Presidential campaign.

While Donald Trump and Ted Cruz battle for the extremist vote, Rubio, Jeb Bush and Ohio Gov. John Kasich are going after the Republican moderates, if there are any left of that silent breed.

By endorsing Rubio as a moderate Republican, she positions herself with the GOP moderates, who she is betting will outlast the more extreme elements of her party beyond this year's election.

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, who also coveted the governor's endorsement, said he will carry on despite expressing disappointment with Haley's decision to back his rival.

Haley's endorsement is not without risks. If Trump wins the GOP's nomination (which, more and more, looks like a very real possibility) you can bet that the businessman will have a long memory on his increasing list of winners and losers.

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For more news about Asian Americans & Pacific Islanders, read AsAm News.

Gov. Nikki Haley needs to take an ethnic studies class to understand America's racial history

South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley gave the Republican rebuttal to President Obama's State of the Union.

FRESH OFF her rebuttal to President Obama's final State of the Union on Jan. 12, during which Gov. Nikki Haley criticized some Republican's statements against immigrants, the Indian American South Carolina governor response to a reporter's question what prompted her statement. Haley  clarified that she was thinking about all the Republican presidential candidates. The last straw, she said, was Donald Trump's call to ban Muslims from entering the U.S.

"When you've got immigrants who are coming here legally, we've never in the history of this country passed any laws or done anything based on race or religion. Let's not start that now," she said.

Whhaa ...?? 

Haley should have known better considering last summer she had to make the decision to take down the Confederate flag in front of the Charleston courthouse after white supremacist Dylan Roof shot and killed nine African/American Bible class students.

There is a lengthy list of American laws based on race or xenophobia. Here are a few examples:

• We can began at the founding of the United States when slave-owners helped write the Declaration of Independence. When they used the phrase, "all men are created equal" they were not referring to their slaves, which they considered "property."
• The 1787 Three-Fifths Compromise was created to make the Constitution - the very foundation of U.S. law - palatable to the slave-owning South. Also written into the Constitution was a provision to make it illegal to assist a slave's escape to freedom, even if it is to a state forbidding slavery.
• The Trail of Tears is the result of the the Indian Removal Act of 1830 forcing Native Americans off their traditional lands. 
• The Jim Crow laws which states used mainly  against African/Americans. Laws that provided segregated schools, separate drinking fountains, separate bathrooms and separate entrances for Euro/Americans and African/Americans. 
• The Chinese Exclusion Act which later morphed into a ban against all Asians and  members of the "Mongolian" race. 
• There were laws in many states, including California, that prevented nonwhites to own land or to buy a home. 
• In the 19th century, there were laws forbidding Native Americans' spiritual practices such as "ghost dancing."
• Anti-miscegenation laws which, if they were still in effect, would have prevented the marriage of the child of Indian/American immigrants to a European/American.
• Executive Order 9066 mandated the internment of the West Coast's Americans of Japanese descent during World War II.
• Operation Wetback allowed federal authorities to deport over one million Mexican/Americans throughout the Southwest. Many American citizens were victimized by the sweeps and forced to leave the U.S.

Because our schools downplay these dark chapters in our history (if they are mentioned at all). The racist laws reinforced a sense of - let's be frank - white exceptionalism that is not wholly deserved. That belief of white American superiority impacts our actions throughout the world and affects the the treatment of foreign visitors, immigrants, refugees or anybody who is "different" from the what is generally perceived as the so-called (white) American image. 

Demographic shifts indicate that European/Americans will no longer be the dominant racial group in the U.S. by mid-century. The popular image of Americans solely being descendants of European immigrants perpetuated and reinforced by our media products (Motion pictures, television and Internet) needs to change, but I digress.

I often wonder why a person of color, including Nikki Haley, chooses to be a member of the current brand of the Republican Party with its hate-spewing rhetoric and xenophobic rants. A lack of historical context might be part of the explanation. That's a topic for another post.

Haley's performance after Obama's SOTU pumped her up in the eyes of the GOP. Her name is in the mix when considering candidates for Vice President. As the child of immigrants, raised as a Sikh, who reportedly experienced racial bias while growing up in South Carolina, Haley needs to brush up on her history to understand whose shoulders she stands on. 

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Gov. Bobby Jindal running for president

Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal will try to rise from his underdog campaign for President of the U.S.A.

LOUISIANA GOVERNOR Bobby Jindal this morning announced that he will be running for President of the United States of America. It was no major surprise to political news junkies, but I kind of like the way he announced his major decision. In contrast to the high-tech use of Twitter or Instagram that other candidates have been using, he did a simple video of a conversation with his children, whom he wanted to tell the news to his three children first.

It's kind of a strange video in that the single shot scene was from high up in a tree looking down at the Jindal family. You can't even see the governor (he's behind a tree branch) except for the top of his head. Weird.

As the conversation continued, his daughter Selia took a cue from the Obama daughters and took the opportunity to ask for a puppy. "I gave in, but with some conditions." said Jindal on his Facebook page.

The Louisiana-born Jindal, 44, is the first Indian American to run for president, AKA Leader of the Free World, or even to seek the GOP nomination. (By the way, he derides the use of Indian American. He believes hyphenated Americans should be considered Americans first.)

In the latest NBC/WSJ poll, he received less than one percent support from Republican primary voters. In the latest NBC/WSJ poll, he received less than one percent support from Republican primary voters. In the most recent Fox News poll, the news was even worse. Jindal wasn't just behind all the other candidates, he was also behind "None of the Above," which got 2 percent.

He is considered a long shot but his announcement will put his name out there into the  national landscape, beyond his state of Louisiana and maybe that would get him the serious attention he needs to run for higher office.

He was once viewed as a rising star in the Republican party but a series of decisions and issue positions he took appeared to be an attempt to appease ultra-conservative voters and distanced him from the mainstream Republicans. He has recently struggled with low approval ratings in his own home state amid budget problems. 

But Jindal's supporters believe his resume and accomplishments will appeal to conservative Christians in the GOP primary electorate. He describes himself as an evangelical Catholic and he has been an outspoken advocate for Christian values and boasts of deep cuts to spending in his home state.

This is shaping up to be one of the most interesting presidential campaigns in recent memory. Jindal, Donald Trump and 10 others on the Republican side; Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders on the Democrats' side. Just think, only 18 months to go!

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