Any support for Tulsi Gabbard should be anathema to any honest-to-goodness, self-respecting leftist. Pls save me the speech on how ideological purity is not practical and how screwing Muslims in India is better than screwing Muslims in Syria, and how an Islamophobic opportunist is our only hope in Congress, and the only way to transform our system from within. I thought we were done with compromised lesser-evilism after Hillary Clinton’s very recent and conspicuous humiliation. One cannot use the war on terror script to resist the war on terror (and the subsequent destabilization of the Middle East).
The woman has no deen or imaan as they say in Urdu, she supported Bernie but is also Sheldon Adelson’s best bud and is now cozying up to Trump. They have a lot in common: their touching concern for “Islamic extremism” – how to squash it internationally whilst registering and deporting it at home.
Ashley Smith: At Modi’s invitation, Gabbard toured India for three weeks, during which various Hindu fundamentalists welcomed her as their American champion. In perhaps the foulest episode of the tour, the India Foundation, a formation aligned with the Hindu fascist group Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), hosted Gabbard for a discussion on the future of India-American relations. After the reactionary lovefest, India’s Telegraph newspaper dubbed her “Sangh’s American Mascot.”
Back in the U.S. Gabbard defended Modi against any and all criticism. She was one of the few Democrats who spoke against the federal government’s decision to deny Modi a visa in 2014 because of his suppression of religious freedom. A year earlier, she waged a successful campaign to scuttle legislation calling on India to improve its treatment of religious minorities.
GABBARD’S UNRELENTING Islamophobia compromises any claim she makes to be an antiwar politician. She does oppose the neoconservative strategy of regime change put forward by the Bush administration hawks, but so do a lot of liberals and conservatives alike–because it failed to achieve much regime change and succeeded mostly in curbing the reach of the American empire. In reality, Gabbard doesn’t oppose American warmongering, let alone American imperialism. She supports the “war on terror,” even if that means backing reactionary dictatorships that oppress their populations. More here.