At the Last Democratic Debate, Did Tulsi Gabbard Bungle Her Closing Statement Big Time?

Tulis Gabbard

The most valuable free email newsletter on the internet is the Tom Woods newsletter. (Sign up for it here.)

It is the only email newsletter that I open immediately when it hits my inbox. Tom always has very valuable insights. But I have to disagree with the email he put out today. He wrote:

Subject: How to bungle a closing statement big time 

Imagine you're Tulsi Gabbard, and the Democratic Party wants to slit your throat.

You refer -- provocatively -- to the "Bush-Clinton-Trump" foreign policy, thereby identifying the empire as a bipartisan phenomenon.

You've attacked Hillary Clinton as personifying the "rot" within the Democratic Party.

The mass media despises you, and constantly puts you in a bad light.

You have no major allies.

Therefore:

You need to look into that camera and appeal directly to people who see the world the way you do.

You need to differentiate yourself sharply from everyone else on that stage.

And here's what she said:

My personal commitment to you, to all of my fellow Americans, is to treat you with respect and compassion, something that we in Hawaii called aloha. Every single person deserves to be treated with respect, regardless of race, religion, or gender, or even your politics. Inclusion, unity, respect, aloha, these will be the operating principles for my administration.

Now, Dr. Martin Luther King visited Hawaii first back in 1959, where he expressed his appreciation for what we call the aloha spirit. He said we look to you for inspiration as a bold example for what you have already succeeded in the areas of racial harmony and racial justice, where we are still struggling to achieve in other sections of the country. He later went on to say, as I looked out at the various faces and various colors mingled together like the waters of the sea, I see only one face, the face of the future.

Working side by side, let's defeat the divisiveness of Donald Trump, come together and usher in a 21st century of racial harmony, of racial justice, peace, inclusion, and true equality, working side by side. Let's make Dr. King's dream our reality.

So she gives a forgettable, boilerplate speech full of platitudes that could have been uttered by anyone.

Missed opportunity.

I thought Gabbard's closing statement was brilliant. Now, I am not exactly the kumbaya, "we are the world" type, so her message here didn't resonate with me at all on a personal level. And it was social justice warrior-lite, so more problems for me.

BUT, if you take into consideration that she is a candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination, it was shrewd.

It was aimed primarily at the black community. She already has the anti-war crowd and, on every television interview, she has been brilliant in exposing the Hillary and warmonger attack machines, so she made a calculated decision to go after the black vote.

The black community doesn't appear to have a strong interest in supporting Elizabeth Warren or Bernie Sanders. From all reports, Pete Buttigieg is not going to get the black vote because he is gay.

The black community must think Cory Booker is full of it since he is not getting the black vote (Hey, Cory, I figured out your problem. For a small fee, I can fix it. Email me.)

The black community thinks Kamala Harris is a cop.

So remarkably, Joe Biden (riding the coattails of Obama) is getting the biggest chunk of the black support, 36%.

And, of course, the big problem with Sleepy Joe is that he makes Peter Sellers, as Chauncy Gardner in Being There, look like a Rhodes scholar. Joe is one banana peel slip (without the banana peel) away from crashing his own campaign.

In other words, the black vote could be up for grabs, with none of the other Democratic candidates appearing to be in a position to easily pick up Biden's votes if the banana peel moment comes.

The black vote is a perfect target for Tulsi to aim at.

Now what I really liked was that while in her closing statement she talked a very special blend of  kumbaya, aloha and MLK, that surely indicates she "cares", there weren't any mad promises for reparations, calls for more blacks in the Mormon tabernacle choir, etc.

So I admire the cleverness of the close and the lack of any promises of more government interventions. The clear indication being that her focus is and will be where it belongs, ending US involvement in a lot of wars.

-RW