Tulsi Gabbard Quotes
It is clear that there needs to be a closer working relationship between the United States and India. How can we have a close relationship if decision-makers in Washington know very little, if anything, about the religious beliefs, values, and practices of India's 800 million Hindus?
Gabbard, Tulsi. Quoted in "US must understand Hinduism to understand India: Tulsi Gabbard." Rediff, 19 Dec. 2013.
Muslims participating in political demonstrations Theological & Legal Expert. A fatwa is a religious legal ruling
India had just recently gained its independence from Britain.
The inscrutability of the “oriental” was not racial as Nicholson and many others thought as most Asians who became Westernized tend to behave and respond to the Western culture in which they were brought up. However, many of the “oriental” cultures place a premium on inscrutability and avoidance of candor. Therefore, often they interact with Westerners and are unsure of the certainty of what they hear and observe. Or they hear it in ways that in their culture would not indicate strong feeling when that was intended by the Westerner. For example, Arab oratory tends to repeat something intensely felt several if not many times. A Western Diplomat who thinks he “makes himself clear” might slow down and emphasize each word distinctly—a sign of strong emphasis in Western oratory—but if only stated once or twice might not be taken as seriously meant. So communicating between cultures has often caused difficulties which people have assumed were racial characteristics but were cultural.
Although, on sever occasions Mao tried to reach out to the United States, the fact that he was leading a communist movement and Chiang Kai-shek, our recognized ruler of China hated Mao caused his overtures to be rebuffed. American military leaders knew very little about China and our intelligence was almost non-existent. They assumed that he was under the control of Russia and Joseph Stalin when in fact, the Russians wanted to oust Mao for not following Stalin’s communist orthodoxy. They succeeded in firing him as head of the party and replacing him with a committee of more loyal communists. Not only did the US rebuff Mau’s outreach attempts, but American money and military material financed 6 different military campaigns by Chiang to exterminate Mao and his communists.
None succeeded as the vast majority of the peasants supported Mao and his troops and provided support and information in Chiang’s attempts. Some historians believe we “bet on the wrong horse”.
Tulsi Gabbard is an American politician and United States Army Reserve officer who served as the U.S. Representative for Hawaii's 2nd congressional district from 2013 to 2021. Elected in 2012, she was the first Hindu member of Congress and also the first Samoan-American voting member of Congress. In early February 2019 she announced her candidacy for the Democratic nomination in the 2020 United States presidential election.
