Back in June, after one of the Democratic debates, I mentioned Tulsi Gabbard in generally approving terms. It was the first time I’d ever seen here, and she made a favorable impression on me — especially in comparison to the gibbering lunatics occupying the rest of the stage. A commenter suggested that she had some very odd things in her past, including involvement in a religious cult.
There appears to be something to this, and I just ran across this detailed item about it earlier today. Have a look.
I have no idea whether any of this is true, so caveat lector. But there does seem to be a fair bit of “smoke” here.
4 Comments
I’ll just say that spreading rumors of cult membership seems to be in the opposition’s toolkit. Recently I’ve noticed ‘insider’ attempts to paint Trump supporters as cultish, with the claim that we “worship Trump as god”. An appalling lie, and being repeated by the same people who like to claim that “Trump was never a conservative”. It’s often hidden within a rant against gun control.
It is a slander designed to cause rifts in the community of Trump voters. I’ve no idea who started it but it seems like a bit of designed propaganda.
So I will probably look askance at any similar accusations made against relatively sane opponents of the globalist elites or the Deep State. The confirmed art collecting and clubs of those same globalists makes this little allegation look like Sunday school.
Gee Tina I dunno.
About a month or so ago, a little less, as I found myself cockle-doodle-doo’ed by a husband of one of my girlfriend’s cousins that Trump is going down! he adding, conspiratorially-like, “I’ve heard it on good sources.”
Which, knowing what fans of Hillary that whole branch of would-be kinfolks is, I figured ‘Well probably so.’
An’ right as rain this past week I hear from no less than Hillary herself has proclaimed “Tulsi is an agent of Putin.”
Sounds fair enough sketchy to me.
There was a profile about Rep. Gabbard that included results of an interview with Mr. Butler, in the New Yorker about two years ago: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/11/06/what-does-tulsi-gabbard-believe
The author’s perspective seems to be that the cultish-weirdness business was all in the past, Butler is this just this genial old surfer who teaches Hindu philosophy and sometimes makes strange bedfellows in pursuit of political power (and who doesn’t?). I suspect that Rep. Gabbard is like most other politicians, that she is willing to offer boob bait for the bubbas, but ultimately she believes in her own will to power more than anything else.
RL,
I think it is very unusual, where cults are concerned, for them to recede into the past, at least as far as their leaders are concerned. In fact I can think of no examples at all of any cult leader voluntarily giving it all up; they generally prefer to die (and take their followers with them) than lose that power.
Tina,
I realize it’s sort of a shabby thing to spread rumors. It does seem in this case, though, that there is some “there” there — in contrast to stories about Trump’s followers worshiping him as a god. (Some “god”!)