What did Trump tap into?

[sringwal]

Like how do “both sides” when all of the people one side is putting out as examples have echoed support for individual leaders of totalitarian regimes. Dems aren’t doing that. You can’t both sides that.

 

[sringwal]

With the caveat of Manchin, which is why I put him in the semi-serious - he doesn’t spew the same nut job rhetoric. Old school Republican trickle down economics grifter, yes, but this iteration is, somehow, worse. Keep in mind - Manchin was probably the last of the Dixiecrats in the senate. A holdover from a different era.

 

[gtyellowjacket]

What would you expect her to say? She wouldn’t be able to just come out and say: “I’m in favor of India becoming a Hindu state in which Muslims are second class citizens at best.”

Modi doesn’t just love her because she’s a prominent American Hindu politician. Would he love an American Hindu politician who criticizes his increasingly authoritarian regime?

Why would the BJP feel it so necessary to support her just because she’s Hindu? Don’t you think it’s more likely that she has demonstrated support for Hindutva to the BJP and Modi?

Her anti-Islam views dovetail perfectly with the Modi regime’s goals in India. She’s had these views for her entire career, one of the only things she hasn’t flip flopped on, along with her deep homophobia.

I would challenge that she is deeply homophobic. She worked as a very young woman from a religious household to limit gay rights in Hawaii but those views changed dramatically in her mid-twenties. She came out in support of gay marriage in 2012, the same election cycle that Obama changed his position. She offered a very public apology to the lgbtq community at the time.

I think that it could also be said that Modi's anti-islam views dovetail nicely with her anti-islam views. She's not shy about saying that radical Islam is our real enemy and if we're going to be going out on foreign adventures it should be to fight that instead of regime change. People leveled the same criticism when she visited Assad, A bad guy, but he was fighting isis.

I'm just saying Modi supporting her, the first American Hindu congressperson, is not very compelling proof that she is a Hindu nationalist. I'm going to want a bit more.

 

[Paine]

I would challenge that she is deeply homophobic. She worked as a very young woman from a religious household to limit gay rights in Hawaii but those views changed dramatically in her mid-twenties. She came out in support of gay marriage in 2012, the same election cycle that Obama changed his position. She offered a very public apology to the lgbtq community at the time.

I think that it could also be said that Modi's anti-islam views dovetail nicely with her anti-islam views. She's not shy about saying that radical Islam is our real enemy and if we're going to be going out on foreign adventures it should be to fight that instead of regime change. People leveled the same criticism when she visited Assad, A bad guy, but he was fighting isis.

I'm just saying Modi supporting her, the first American Hindu congressperson, is not very compelling proof that she is a Hindu nationalist. I'm going to want a bit more.

If the facts laid out before you won’t convince you of her ideology, then I don’t think anything else I say will. Did you read the whole article from The Intercept that I posted above?

How much does she talk about her the left-wing positions she supposedly holds now? Is she out advocating for the Republican Party to support gay rights? Medicare for All?

If she had any convinction in her left-wing positions, she wouldn’t be supporting Trump. She’s a grifter who wants power and to be close to power.

Or maybe her hatred towards Muslims is stronger than her conviction that every American should have health care.

 

[Paine]

IN JUNE 2014, after Modi won the election, nearly 700 of his supporters gathered at a Hindu temple in Atlanta to celebrate and plan their path forward. To mobilize their community, the speakers laid out a plan that included a call for donations to Gabbard’s re-election campaign. They described the Hawaii Democrat as an “American Hindu” who “has fought against the anti-Modi resolution introduced recently by some members” of Congress.

The event was organized by the Overseas Friends of the BJP, the American chapter of the Bharatiya Janata Party. Gabbard had landed on the group’s radar as one of America’s few pro-Modi lawmakers. In December 2013, she had voiced her opposition to House Resolution 417, which chided India to protect “the rights and freedoms of religious minorities” and referred to incidents of mass violence against minority Muslims that had taken place under Modi’s watch. Gabbard later told the press that “there was a lot of misinformation that surrounded the event in 2002.”

——

Dozens of Gabbard’s donors have either expressed strong sympathy with or have ties to the Sangh Parivar — a network of religious, political, paramilitary, and student groups that subscribe to the Hindu supremacist, exclusionary ideology known as Hindutva, according to an Intercept analysis of Gabbard’s financial disclosures from 2011 until October 2018. We cross-checked the names of Gabbard’s donors against open-source materials linked to Sangh organizations, such as event announcements and the groups’ websites.

According to our analysis, at least 105 current and former officers and members of U.S. Sangh affiliates, and their families, have donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to Gabbard’s campaigns since 2011. Gabbard’s ties to Hindu nationalists in the United States run so deep that the progressive newspaper Telegraph India in 2015 christened her the Sangh’s American mascot.

Since 2013, Gabbard has attended conferences across the United States organized by Sangh affiliates, like the Vishwa Hindu Parishad of America, whose counterpart in India has been linked to advocating violence against Muslims in India and was classified last summer as a “militant religious organization” in the CIA World Factbook. (The BJP has hotly contested this classification.) The Sangh organizations in the U.S. reportedly provide social and financial support for their Indian counterparts. A 2014 study by the South Asia Citizens Web found that between 2001 and 2012, five Sangh-affiliated charitable groups allocated more than $55 million for program services, funds that are largely sent to Sangh groups in India.

 

[gtyellowjacket]

IN JUNE 2014, after Modi won the election, nearly 700 of his supporters gathered at a Hindu temple in Atlanta to celebrate and plan their path forward. To mobilize their community, the speakers laid out a plan that included a call for donations to Gabbard’s re-election campaign. They described the Hawaii Democrat as an “American Hindu” who “has fought against the anti-Modi resolution introduced recently by some members” of Congress.

The event was organized by the Overseas Friends of the BJP, the American chapter of the Bharatiya Janata Party. Gabbard had landed on the group’s radar as one of America’s few pro-Modi lawmakers. In December 2013, she had voiced her opposition to House Resolution 417, which chided India to protect “the rights and freedoms of religious minorities” and referred to incidents of mass violence against minority Muslims that had taken place under Modi’s watch. Gabbard later told the press that “there was a lot of misinformation that surrounded the event in 2002.”

——

Dozens of Gabbard’s donors have either expressed strong sympathy with or have ties to the Sangh Parivar — a network of religious, political, paramilitary, and student groups that subscribe to the Hindu supremacist, exclusionary ideology known as Hindutva, according to an Intercept analysis of Gabbard’s financial disclosures from 2011 until October 2018. We cross-checked the names of Gabbard’s donors against open-source materials linked to Sangh organizations, such as event announcements and the groups’ websites.

According to our analysis, at least 105 current and former officers and members of U.S. Sangh affiliates, and their families, have donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to Gabbard’s campaigns since 2011. Gabbard’s ties to Hindu nationalists in the United States run so deep that the progressive newspaper Telegraph India in 2015 christened her the Sangh’s American mascot.

Since 2013, Gabbard has attended conferences across the United States organized by Sangh affiliates, like the Vishwa Hindu Parishad of America, whose counterpart in India has been linked to advocating violence against Muslims in India and was classified last summer as a “militant religious organization” in the CIA World Factbook. (The BJP has hotly contested this classification.) The Sangh organizations in the U.S. reportedly provide social and financial support for their Indian counterparts. A 2014 study by the South Asia Citizens Web found that between 2001 and 2012, five Sangh-affiliated charitable groups allocated more than $55 million for program services, funds that are largely sent to Sangh groups in India.

Once again, Hindus supporting the first Hindu American congressperson. I'm not shocked and not sure why that proves she is a Hindu nationalist, especially when she has repeatedly said she's not. To me, it sounds like a weak attempt to smear her by associating her with some unsavory folks.

What if Harris was supported by black nationalists or Trump was supported by rabid zionists, does that automatically make them the same? Of course not.

 

[Paine]

Once again, Hindus supporting the first Hindu American congressperson. I'm not shocked and not sure why that proves she is a Hindu nationalist, especially when she has repeatedly said she's not. To me, it sounds like a weak attempt to smear her by associating her with some unsavory folks.

What if Harris was supported by black nationalists or Trump was supported by rabid zionists, does that automatically make them the same? Of course not.

If Harris attended a Black nationalist conference then yes, I would think she supports black nationalism. Trump is supported by rabid Zionists, so we don’t even have to imagine that hypothetical.

She can say she isn’t this or that all she wants. If you’re taking politicians at face value when they say stuff like that, that’s on you.

 

[1moretimeagain]

I'm a little disappointed in the group. The thread title is "What did Trump tap into?", and not one person answered, Laura Loomer.

 

[Zoo_View]

Not talking about 90% of the voters. For the 90% its something of a tribal thing, so they are locked in. Talking about the 10% of the voters that decide elections.

Perhaps, the so called Obama voters that could go either way is what I'm talking about. To me, their current perception of Democrats has changed since Obama ran. Maybe its that FOX and company have ramped up the propaganda lies since Obama. Maybe Trump has broken thru painting the Dems as bad since he's been on the scene.

A good example would be an in-law relative I have that grew up in the mid west and now lives in NC. College degree in economics. Worked for the Federal Government for most of career. Retired. He's not a low information voter. Pretty sure he voted for Obama. Pretty sure he will vote for Harris simply because he knows the danger Trump presents. But......if it was any other Republican running, I fear he would vote for the Pub. When we discuss it a little bit, it seems to come thru that he's feeling there is just something about Democrats he's not liking. He didn't use to feel that way about Dems.

I don't think he's the only one in the 10%. Sorry, its just my opinion that something has changed. And I can't figure out how in the heck the outcome of this election is even close considering how bad Trump is.

That you’re only “pretty sure” he voted for Obama and are only “pretty sure” that he’s voting for Harris says that your relative is either mythical or that you don’t discuss politics.

 

[superrific]

Once again, Hindus supporting the first Hindu American congressperson. I'm not shocked and not sure why that proves she is a Hindu nationalist, especially when she has repeatedly said she's not. To me, it sounds like a weak attempt to smear her by associating her with some unsavory folks.

What if Harris was supported by black nationalists or Trump was supported by rabid zionists, does that automatically make them the same? Of course not.

1. Well, are those Hindus supporting any other Hindu American congresspersons? What about Modi? Has Modi ever met with Ro Khanna or Pramila Jayapal? What? He hasn't? They're actually Indian, as opposed to Tulsi, and Modi hasn't met with him. Funny that.

2. Do you know any Hindus? Serious question. I doubt it. I still remember the conversation on the old board when you tried to lecture me about "Ghandi" LOL.
Anyway, I was married to a Hindu for a decade. And that wife came to hate Tulsi Gabbard because of her association with Modi, who my ex-wife (like myself) absolutely cannot stand. Hindus wouldn't cheer a person in politics just because they are Hindu. In fact, a lot of Indian Hindus are here precisely because they can't stand that Hindu nationalist shit.

The idea that these Hindu nationalists all turned out to celebrate the fact that she was elected, as opposed to the substance of her ideas, is just not accurate.

3. Are you aware of her advocacy for Modi? Recall that Modi was banned from the U.S. BY THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION because he launched a mob against Muslims that killed over 2500 people. And Gabbard went to the floor of the House and argued that the ban should be lifted, because it would potentially harm relations with India. Right. Because relations with India tanked after Modi was banned in 2005, huh? Spoiler alert: they did not.

Now it's true that relations would probably be bad if Modi was PM. And he is now PM. But he was not PM when she was stanning for him on the House floor.

Whether you think these criticisms are right or wrong, it's not reasonably disputable that she fell out of favor with Dems because of her shilling for Modi and her advocacy of the BJP more generally. She didn't fall out of favor with Dems because of a stance that many or most Dems agree with.

4. Oh, and why is she supporting Trump? Look at all the things she said about his foreign policy! They weren't nice. And on what policy issue does she agree with Trump? None. They just hate the same people.

 

[SnoopRob]

Not talking about 90% of the voters. For the 90% its something of a tribal thing, so they are locked in. Talking about the 10% of the voters that decide elections.

Perhaps, the so called Obama voters that could go either way is what I'm talking about. To me, their current perception of Democrats has changed since Obama ran. Maybe its that FOX and company have ramped up the propaganda lies since Obama. Maybe Trump has broken thru painting the Dems as bad since he's been on the scene.

A good example would be an in-law relative I have that grew up in the mid west and now lives in NC. College degree in economics. Worked for the Federal Government for most of career. Retired. He's not a low information voter. Pretty sure he voted for Obama. Pretty sure he will vote for Harris simply because he knows the danger Trump presents. But......if it was any other Republican running, I fear he would vote for the Pub. When we discuss it a little bit, it seems to come thru that he's feeling there is just something about Democrats he's not liking. He didn't use to feel that way about Dems.

I don't think he's the only one in the 10%. Sorry, its just my opinion that something has changed. And I can't figure out how in the heck the outcome of this election is even close considering how bad Trump is.

There aren't 10% of swing voters that decide elections, that's simply not correct. There are some small amount of voters who do move back and forth, but it's not nearly that many. The folks who really decide elections largely leaners who may or may not vote...and the party that can better drive turnout of these low-propensity voters is the party that will win the election.

For your example of your retired in-law to be of any use to this conversation, you'd have to be able to share why he now feels differently about Dems than he did before. I can certainly guess, and my guess isn't terribly kind to your relative, but it would be little more than a guess without real knowledge of what's changed in his mind.

As to why this election is close is because we are in a time where change has come rapidly in a number of areas over the last 25 or so years and a lot of folks are unhappy about those changes. Trump is an authoritarian telling them he'll fix it all by taking things back to the way they used to be and a lot of folks are willing to support that over adapting to the change that is taking place around them. Trump can't actually undo most of the change that has happened, but he can make a lot of symbolic changes (that will hurt a lot of actual people) and for folks who are bothered by these changes they don't like, that's better than nothing.

It would be lovely to think that fascism would lose by 50-80% at the US ballot box. But we've learned over the last decade that it won't and that far, far too many of those around us will support it. But that is not the Dems' fault, that is the fault of those who vote for the fascists.