I know that many people fail to understand why it will not be anywhere near as "easy" for the United States to come to a point where Americans have "Universal Health Care". One of the biggest reasons that it is likely that it will never happen is one that most people are either unaware of or feel is "something minor" that can be worked out. It is not "something minor". It has nothing to do with insurance companies. It has little to do with much of anything other than history.
To truly understand you need to be cognizant of the perspective of American history from the perspective of the MOST disenfranchised group of people in the history of America. That of Native Americans.
A little of the history can be found here: It doesn't work that way on the Reservation
I also suggest reading A Silent Chernobyl and The Mountains Weep.
I'll wait while you read...
Understand, please; I am Lakota first. Being an "American" comes a distant second, at best. I will never "see" things from the same perspective as the "average American" because, like every OTHER Native American raised in one of the Concentration Camps that Americans call "Reservations", I am not "like" other Americans. I understand where "you" are collectively coming from but me understanding where you are coming from is nowhere near as important as you truly understanding where those of us who are Native American are coming from.
I have posted a couple of posts with regards to the Indian Health Service. We could do without IHS. The problem is that IHS is something called a "Treaty Obligation". It is something that the Senate and the House of Representatives cannot legally do away with unless treaties are renegotiated. Unfortunately, given the history and the lack of trust that has been earned it is not possible to renegotiate the treaties involved without some concessions on the part of the "average American". Concessions that the "average American" isn't likely to take in stride.
One of those necessities with regards to those negotiations is that the UN Treaty on the Rights of Indigenous people be passed into law. The ONLY "major players" on the world stage who have NOT passed it are the United States and Canada.
SOME of the concessions are things that honest people admit the "average American" isn't willing to "give up". The return of ALL Native American religious spaces is likely going to be required as part of any treaty renegotiation. Native Americans have given up nearly 2.3 billion acres, trillions of dollars in natural resources and thousands of religious sites over the last 517 years. I'm sorry to be the one to say this but it's YOUR turn to "give" and the place to start is by returning our religious sites to our exclusive control. Not the Bureau of Indian Affairs. Not the National Park Service. The House and Senate KNOW that the "average American" isn't willing to give up so much as one square millimeter of dirt, even when the places where that dirt is are as SACRED to Native Americans as Jeruselem is to Christians, Muslims AND Jewish people.
Here's the deal...if you truly want Universal Health Care as badly as you claim... be prepared to "give up" things that you may not necessarily want to give up. The Supreme court has already ruled on the issue of segregation. Separate but equal isn't equal so you can't simply shuffle those of us who are Native American off to a health care system that is already abysmal and expect that there won't be legal challenges under a system that allegedly is "for everyone". You also can't expect that Native Americans are going to willingly concede anything without there being significant returns on our investment. In this case that means returning religious sites to us and passage of the UN Treaty on the Rights of Indigenous People. Given the history the passage of that treaty is imperative rather than simply an option. Native Americans NEED that legal protection. It is something that we have NEVER had and likely never will have without the passage of that particular treaty.
All of those things are in addition to what my friend Placbo Stud has to say on his post: Why Universal Health Care can not work in the US. Placebo has a point in addition to those that I raise... Americans do have a different outlook and mindset than Europeans. It is an outlook that negatively impacts every facet of life and one which desperately needs to be changed.
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noillusionsindc
Andy Heizeler
Diary of a Hopeful Starving Student
Placebostudman
nanatehay
gal80
Salon.com
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I also believe that Native American sacred sites need to be given back regardless of treaty renegotiation.
What people don't realize is that the ENTIRE USA is an Indiginous American Sacred Site. Name one square foot of U.S. land on which an IA didn't die.
You can't
Just sayin'
~It took until 1924 for Indigenous People in the United States to be ABLE to become citizens and even then they had to GIVE UP their rights under the treaties in order to do so.
~It took until 1940 for Indigenous People in the United States to be citizens UPON BIRTH. (My MOTHER was born in 1938... she was NOT LEGALLY A CITIZEN of the United States until AFTER my father died in 1991!)
~It took until 1979 for Indigenous People in the United States to be LEGALLY ABLE to speak their NATIVE languages.
There is a REASON that I am Lakota FIRST... it is because I am a FIRST GENERATION United States Citizen BY BIRTH even though my ancestors have lived in what is now the United States for thousands of years!
What's keeping us from having separate health care payment structures for Native Americans to prevent all the renegotiation you speak of? I don't really see how your post is at all relevant to universal health care except in a purely administrative manner.
Perhaps the reason why the U.S. and Canada are the only two countries that have failed to accept the UN Treaty you speak of is because they're the two countries that are materially different from everywhere else in the world when it comes to this issue.
If you want your religious sites back make some money and buy the land. The history of humanity is filled with tales of cultures being displaced, murdered, enslaved, and having their land taken away and repurposed. Your peoples aren't alone in this regard. Claiming special priveleges for your group, for something that's happened to everyone's ancestors at one time or another, is pretty silly. I'm sorry you've got a tough time of it right now, but perhaps if you didn't hold such a hard line towards negotiations, the average american's you so clearly despise might be more willing to assist you in making a better life for yourself in a culture you've failed to make economic head roads into thus far.
Being bitter isn't going to get you anything except for bitterness.
You say Canada also is not a signatory to Indigenous People's Rights Treaty - but we have universal health care. (How it works with respect to on and off-rez registered Natives I don't know. )
My feeling is that, there being no law keeping Natives on reservations, they should consider joining the rest of the country. Especially in Canada, a lot of the reservations are in the north where there isn't any way to make a living - and the old ways just aren't feasible any more...not to mention that hardly anyone wants to follow said old ways and give up modern comforts.
FWIW, on my recent trip to Peru I thought, wow, if only a lot of the dispirited Natives (non 'integrated') wandering the streets of Calgary and Winnipeg, etc., could spend a little time in a country where essentially EVeryone is Indian. And where a lot of the people, especially in the countryside, have retained much of their life and culture (and the tour guides talk about the cruelties of the Spaniards and still pay homage to Pachamama...)
Anyway...the Natives having been bulldozed before, I am afraid they won't be any kind of 'problem' if the government wanted to do universal health care...
AFTER Canada obtained "Universal" Health Care (which is NOT) the United States Government entered into a treaty with the tribes to provide "health care" to Native Americans. In return for said "health care" we agreed NOT to file for Medicaid, Medicare, Food Stamps, Social Security, VA benefits, etc... and for MANY years we did not QUALIFY for those benefits (BY LAW). It has only been in the last few years that we HAVE qualified for ANY of them... and THAT was only done because of INTERNATIONAL pressure rather than because of any kind of sense of justice or fair play on the part of the people in DC.
Treaties are NOT things that can (or should be) violated and/or changed every every time that the wind blows someone's skirt up and tickles their pubic hair. Native Americans are UNIQUE in that EVERY treaty that Native Americans have entered into in the last 517 years with the US Government has been VIOLATED BY THE US GOVERNMENT. Is there another people in the entire WORLD that the US Government can knowingly, willingly and with malice aforethought violate EVERY treaty ever made with them without there being ANY ramifications for doing so? How do you think the Queen would react if suddenly the US Navy started sinking UK ships "just because"?
P.S. Exitence of Contradiction: Did you really say to a Native American, "If you want your religious sites back make some money and buy the land."??? Seriously??? I'm sorry, but you are SUCH an total dumbass.
P.P.S. Mrs Raptor: Please excuse him. He's a total dumbass. It's embarrassing to be in the same species as him.
I get SO TIRED of hearing the Privileged in the US telling me that I want "special treatment". I'd give damn near ANYTHING to be LIKE them and privileged. But I'm not and the REASON that I keep fighting to be EQUAL is so that MAYBE my grandchildren will someday be EQUAL to those privileged souls that inhabit most of the United States.
I do NOT want "special treatment"... I want EQUAL treatment under the law. Something that I am currently DENIED based entirely on my RACE.
YOUR religion, religious sites, religious artifacts and beliefs are 100% protected by the First Amendment to this document called the Constitution. The United States Supreme Court ruled in 1988 that I do NOT have ANY First Amendment Rights based ENTIRELY on my RACE. If that isn't "racism" defined NOTHING is. I can't "change" the COLOR OF MY SKIN any more than President Barack Obama can!
A PRIME example with regards to some of the ILLEGAL activity that has been done with the FULL support of the Supreme Court is the LEASE of one of the Upper Plains Tribes' MOST SACRED spaces... the Paha Sapa. We LEASED our beloved Paha Sapa (Black Hills) to the Federal Government in the 1870s. When the lease EXPIRED in the 19teens the US Government flatly REFUSED to RETURN the Paha Sapa TO the tribes. In 1922 we said "Ok, if you aren't going to RETURN it per the terms of the lease, THEN PURCHASE it." For YEARS we quibbled over the land in question as the case made the EXCRUCIATINGLY SLOW trip to the Supreme Court. In 1980 the Supreme Court awarded us a total of $712,404,323.00. By then the people who had filed the suit had died and we no longer wanted MONEY... we wanted the property RETURNED IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE TERMS OF THE LEASE. The Supreme Court REFUSED to ALLOW us to AMEND the lawsuit to indicate that we want the LAND back even though they HAVE allowed numerous other lawsuits to be amended. The money WAS to be "held in an interest bearing trust" by the Bureau of Indian Affairs until such time as the TRIBES all agreed to take the money. Along came Bill Clinton in the 1990s with his "balancing the budget" and he STOLE 100% of the money in question to "BALANCE THE BUDGET". The money is now GONE! ALL OF IT. Not one thin DIME was used in the manner specified by the Supreme Court. That account would CURRENTLY hold more than a BILLION DOLLARS if not for "balancing the budget".
Instead, ONCE AGAIN, Native Americans, Just like we have for the last 517 years get f*cked up the ass with NO LUBE and YOU continue on your privileged way whistling a happy tune and DARING to complain because we demand EQUAL treatment under the LAW.
Now, REMOVE yourself, your ignorance and your racism from MY little corner of cyber space and do NOT bother to return until you (a) learn how to use a dictionary, (b) acquire some manners and (c) surgically remove your racism.
So right. I am very with you on this. I am a native Los Angeleno, and await the day when First Nations people and Mexicans take back California. It could happen, couldn't it?
I've read all of Louise Erdrich's books (beautiful writing AND history together; all are interwoven into a heartbreaking, unforgettable view into the rape of the First Nations tribes. Also, I recommend Michael Dorris' "The Broken Cord" (a distressing account of reservation life) to anyone not familiar with reservation conditions or the impact of white immigrants into this land (Safe Bet - don't know if these books would be deemed 'unbiased' - I wonder where anyone can find an unbiased source, anyway?).
I read "Bury My Heart in Wounded Knee" in 1970, and have never since put my hand on my heart or recited the Pledge of Allegiance to this country.
Last year, when Rev. Jeremiah Wright's sermon snippets were put into context on Bill Moyers' show, I cheered him on. Rev. Wright got it all right - America needs to look inward and face the destruction of our native peoples, their theft of their lands, the horrors of slavery, the treatment of immigrants (etc etc don't get me started, eh?); to this day America continues to destroy many other peoples and lands across the seas.
I myself find no honor or pride in just being an American; when I've traveled to other countries I can understand why they feel the way they do about us. There are wonderful, beautiful, caring people here in America, tho - when enough of our voices are raised, we can create change - that I believe.
Until now I didn't know you were Lakota - thanks for the post, and thanks for intro'ing us to Placebostudman! Rated.
I couldn't deny my ancestry if I wanted to... Cheekbones, skin color, facial features... they ALL scream "Indian" as loudly as a cheerleader at a football game.
Here is where I start out on the limb. History tells me "to the victor goes the spoils." Shitty attitude I know. All of Europe was conquered by superior armies far from their homeland. In 2009 I don't see the need to rewrite world history. I may be wrong but I don't see France complaining to Rome about they way their indigenous peoples were vanquished by Ceasar's armies.
Next comes an even less palatable idea. Who was more wronged by the settling of the United States. Native Americans who were conquered by superior military force or Africans who were captured, brought here in slave ships * and forced to do all manners of work, the women raped at will and also thought to be less than human. These are things that can not be qualified.
I have only personally known two Native Americans. Both were well assimilated in to American society. Yet one was a shaman in which nation I can no longer remember. Both looked upon their heritage with pride but both were proud to be "American."
Now the branch is going to get twig like. In just a few short years 2020 comes to mind, I'm not sure of the year "white anglo saxons" will no longer be the largest ethnic group. It will be Latinos with or without a sensible immigration/integration plan. Do you then hold Latinos responsible for the wrongs done by the previous dominate group?
The concept I don't understand is why do native americans insist upon clinging to the crappy land that is a reservation. If a full blooded Sioux is born on a reservation is he Indian or American. Or more importantly can he be president. I participated in the historic election of Barack Obama. I worked along side people of every race with the exception of native american (I'm speaking of here in Anne Arundel County Maryland), and every age group. On one day we had a girl working on the campaign who voted for the first time in the primary and she was only seventeen. She was allowed to vote because she would be eighteen when the general election was held. Along side her that day was a woman who cast her first vote for FDR in 1944. Through it all I saw the pride of blacks bursting out like a father when he is told "It's a girl."
Assimilating into a society does not require the surrender of ones heritage. We proudly display my families "coat of arms" declaring we are proud to be of Irish stock. German Americans still celebrate Oktoberfest. Italian Americans proudly celebrate Columbus day. Christopher Columbus now there is a son-of-a-bitch to be pissed at. The Amish still live in the 18th century for the most part. They don't even waiver from their religious beliefs when white society comes to their schools and kill their children.
I hope this does not read like a rant that is not my intention. My intention is to try to understand the native americans mind set. Is it better to assimilate there by incorporating some of what it means to be a native american in to the fabric of the America or to continue in essence waging a war that as you said in one of your pieces began 500 plus years ago. I have no answer but as a student of peaceful protests that lead to monumental changes, like the Voting Rights Act if 1965 or the ending of the Viet Nam War I have many questions. Change begins outside a system but the real change comes when one works from within. So why not exercise the legal rights you have and be an American of native descent as opposed to the citizen of another nation surrounded by "the enemy?"
PS About the Latinos becoming the majority race. Whenever I hear whites gripe about it I always say "What does it tell you that white anglo saxons no longer want to immigrate to America?"
* an aside - we in Baltimore are proud of our ship the USS Constellation the most successful slave ship hunter ever to sail the seven seas
The US, Canada and Australia have the largest populations of indigenous people who have had their basic human rights violated on a grand scale and who have, until recently, denied that there was "a problem" at all. That is changing rapidly in Australia, where they have already signed the UN Treaty on the Rights of Indigenous People, but in the US and Canada the genocide continues and the people committing it simply don't care that they are exterminating people like so many cockroaches.
That's WHY we so desperately NEED the UN Treaty on the Rights of Indigenous People passed. As things sit right now we have darn little legal protection and whatever the prevailing "society" wants to hand us as though we are Oliver begging for "more" when in reality we didn't a first helping we are supposed to be "grateful" for even when it is to our detriment.
I'll freely admit that The United States of America has screwed over Native Americans since the beginning of this country and that settlers did so before that and that we continue to do so even today. I don't dispute any of your historical facts or current events, I dispute your viewpoint towards them. Unless you're willing to take up arms or undertake guerrilla warfare tactics that we erroneously label as terrorism in this country in order to discredit our enemies as an act of propaganda, then, by your own lack of action, you have accepted and admitted to the fact that the war is over, and has been won by the immigrants.
Thus, since we have a system of accounting for real estate in this country, your only options are to buy the land back, or to go to war in an attempt to usurp the government, and the governmental processes keeping the land from you. Lobbying for a return of the land through some extraordinary governmental action will only create the same sort of displacement injuries among a new group of people that your forefathers were forced to endure. Since the group that is currently on the land has assimilated into current day society, pays taxes, votes, and is FULLY governed by the federal government, that federal government is not likely to grant favors to Native Americans (who would happily, and understandably secede) over the wishes of it's fully governed citizens.
When people say that you're expecting unequal treatment, it refers exactly to this point, your people are not fully governed by the Federal Government, but everyone else in this country is. Until that changes, nothing else will.
There are *thousands* of sites like the Paha Sapa that are deeply religious to Native Americans. It always amazes me the number of people who *don't* equate OUR religious spaces with THEIR churches and yet there is NO real difference other than that our spaces Wakan Tanka created and your spaces man created. At the very LEAST the most important to Native Americans culturally should be returned without so much as a whimper. Unfortunately MOST Americans see those sites as "so much dirt" rather than something that is sacred. Kinda makes me want to walk into my local catholic church and urinate in the holy water (or the baptismal font)some days.
There's a difference between what happened in Europe and what happened in North American AND Australia... Rome didn't commit blatant genocide. Europeans when they got to North America and Australia took a page out of the "Russian playbook" with regards to natives and DID commit genocide on a grand scale. The other difference is that in Europe the "conquerors" eventually LEFT and in North America and Australia they didn't. That difference alone is largely responsible for the difference in attitude about the events in question.
On of the MAJOR differences between slavery and what has been done with Indigenous People in the US is that EVENTUALLY slavery ENDED. The genocide of the Indigenous people is STILL GOING ON! It's 2009... what I discussed in "A Silent Chernobyl" and what Mother discussed in "The Mountains Weep" are being done TODAY. Don't you think that MAYBE it MIGHT be time for y'all to STOP slaughtering us hand over fist as though we are so many cattle? Those things are NOT something that is being done by some "other" ethnic group... that is something being done by people such as John Kerry, John McCain and Ted Kennedy... WHITE men with the POWER to force submission regardless of the ramifications to the people in question.
It is going to be a LONG time after 2020 (or whenever) before whites "give up" their ability to exterminate others at will and without ramifications biting them in the ass. As I said in a response to someone else... I don't want special treatment... I want my CHILDREN and my GRANDCHILDREN (both of which I currently have) to have EQUAL treatment... something that has NOT occurred for at least 517 years.
There is NO such animal as a "full blooded Sioux". For several reasons. The most important being that the word "Sioux" is a FRENCH word meaning "ENEMY" or "SNAKE"... it is a designation given to Lakota, Crow, Dakota, Nakota, Blackfoot, Brulee and if memory serves 6 other tribes because they had SIMILAR lifestyles when they were "discovered" by french trappers. It is AS RACIST to refer to one of the members of the tribes in question in that manner as it is to call the President a "N***er"! I AM LAKOTA... I am NOT "Sioux".
WE aren't the ones who "insist" on clinging to the concentration camps known as reservations. It has only been in fairly recent years that it was LEGAL for us to LEAVE the reservations. When you don't have ANY other choice what DO you do? You stay where the GUNS keep you. That's one of the things that MOST Americans simply do NOT understand... All over "Indian country" there are US Army FORTS... the PURPOSE of those forts was to keep us ON the reservations BY FORCE. TODAY what keeps us on the reservation is basic economics. The AVERAGE household income on Pine Ridge Reservation is LESS than 6K per year. According to the US Census Bureau Pine Ridge is the POOREST place in the United States. WHERE do you GO when you can't AFFORD a pot to piss in or a window to throw it out of? For God's Sake roughly HALF of the residents of Pine Ridge don't have "basics" like ELECTRICITY and RUNNING WATER. How the HELL can ANYONE in their right mind EXPECT people to do anything OTHER than "cling to" the reservation when they have NO OTHER OPTIONS?
Education? HA! The CRUMMIEST schools in the nation are NOT in Harlem or some other big city... they are ON the reservations... our children aren't taught to read, basic math skills aren't taught to them in school, basic science isn't taught... and the problem is NOT lack of intelligence but rather a lack of basic things like BOOKS, PAPER, PENCILS, CRAYONS, ETC... I can TEACH someone to read... but I can't teach them to read without the TOOLS necessary to DO so... such as BOOKS. I can TEACH someone to do math... but I can't teach them to do it without the TOOLS to do so to start with.
The Amish aren't any more "integrated" into the REST of society than Native Americans are... that's a rather POOR analogy. The difference between the Amish and Native Americans is that the Amish are (a) white and (b) live the way they do for RELIGIOUS reasons. Back to that "Freedom of Religion" thing in the Constitution... YOU, as a white person, HAVE unquestioned First Amendment rights... *I* as a RED person do NOT have ANY rights under the First Amendment according to the US Supreme Court.
We CANNOT just "exercise our rights" ... we DO NOT HAVE the rights that YOU do. Until we DO, and that will NOT happen without the passage of the UN Treaty on the Rights of Indigenous People is signed into law, we are "stuck" with laws that specifically DENY us the same rights that every OTHER "American" possesses by virtue of having been born.
Some of them even sport mottos about the Indians taking back the U.S.
And, given demographics and a little more time, that's exactly what they're doing.
Wonder how they and their rez brothers will get along...Mrs. R., is there a feeling of common purpose? Or is this like Anglo-Saxon Americans who didn't feel very brotherly towards the Irish and Jewish and Italian?
Any other solution is unacceptable, but I don't think this will ever really happen.
As a VERY wise man said long ago... Whites *can't* win... one drop of Indian Blood an Indian makes.
Thousands of broken promises, millions dead, BILLIONS of dollars "disappeared", countless treaties violated, countless LEASES violated... and we got NOTHING left to GIVE but still people like existence demand that we give.
As far as that is concerned, superior intelligence is neccisary, as well as superior tactics. I wouldn't say the weak only use guns or whatever, but I will say this.
You have to think about strategy. Look at Lord Admiral Nelson. He kicked ass because of superior tactics at Trefalgar.
As far as Custer was concerned, his fatal error was supreme arrogance.
Superior firepower can win in some cases. But it takes some serious superiority. Like nukes and Japan.
Otherwise, well put.
I think you're right though. The real problem here is that jackasses don't care about broken promises. People would rather sweep this under the rug. They don't care that we are actually murdering a culture, to this very day.
I worked with the Potowatomi Tribal Elder program and saw the deleterious effects some of the more progressive invasive programs have had over the years. It is truly a shame what is being lost.
When I worked with the Menominee, the stories I heard about the early church activites in the region were down right sickening.
I see no way to stop this, other than to have another Native American Movement, and one that is coordinated between all the tribes. One hoop. Even then it's going to be difficult to impossible to get anything done. Appealing to the UN won't help. They are too weak an entity. This has to happen from within.
Oh and please don't misunderstand about the nukes, I'm not suggesting anyone get nuked.
I am not saying that your plight as a Lakota isn't dire. What I am asking is it legal for you to "go to town" and get a job? I understand that the whites especially out west are still as racist to native Americans as whites are in the south to blacks. But the issues would be seperate in one you have no right to work off the reservation in the other your civil rights are being violated. If you claim that you don't have the same civil rights as set out in the Civil Rights act of 1964 and the Voting rights act of 1965. When was the last time this was tested in a court of law. If it was recent say the last thirty years I would have the producers for Dateline, 20/20, Sixty Minutes, Countdown with Keith Olbermann and The Rachel Maddow show on speed dial. I wouldn't stop calling until I got a prime time show the current plight of the original Americans.
I agree with Andy about just making the native Americans American citizens for a start. I disagree that this is somehow a difficult thing to do. It was ten years from the start of the Montgomery Bus Boycott to the Voting Rights act of 1965. The injustices you seek to right can be addressed but it takes peaceful protest to win support. In other words you need your Martin Luther King, Jr. Only you know whether that person exist
You have listed the same three Senators as part of the problem - could you explain why those three?
I care about the plight of people everywhere. However I wonder if the solution in your eyes is for us to give back America. That I am sorry is like the blacks who still want reparations, their 40 acres and a mule. Simply put too many generations have come and gone to expect Americans to give you back the land. We should definitely give you all the rights of every American.
Custer ASSUMED a number of things that simply were NOT the case. He ASSUMED that the valley at the Greasy Grass River (Little Big Horn) was indefensible. He ASSUMED that because of how MUCH the natives were spread out in the valley. He ASSUMED that he could "sneak up" on them and massacre them. He ASSUMED that Sitting Bull was in charge that day. He ASSUMED that the "diversion" that his men engaged in would WORK and the Indians fighting would all head to the opposite end of the valley so as to leave the women and children naked to the slaughter that he had planned. ALL of his assumptions were WRONG.
Sitting Bull was NOT in charge that day... a rather brilliant tactician by the name of Crazy Horse was. Crazy Horse HAD the INTELLIGENCE to KNOW that the attack on the far end of the valley was NOT the main attack and he ensured the protection of the women, children and elders that Custer was there to slaughter and turned what Wasichu (Loosely, "white war chief" although variants of it are used to mean the US President AND whites in general) was certain would be a "crushing blow" into a massive victory.
I know a mite more about THAT particular battle than I do most during that same time period because my husband's great grandfather was that rather brilliant tactician known as Crazy Horse and I have been hearing the oral histories of our people since I was born. Many of those histories, from many different families (tribal circles) tell of that battle from different perspectives and it is NOT that difficult to piece together what REALLY happened as opposed to what the History books TELL us happened.
*Chortles* You forget something Andy... While we may have "ended" WWII using Nukes... Japan has a FAR better educational system, a FAR better medical system, a FAR more stable economy, etc... TODAY than the United States... so tell me... who REALLY "won"? Taking the long view... I would say that the Japanese "won" that one in the end. Just because the fighting stops does NOT mean that the war is over... it merely means that the fighting stopped. "There's more than one way to skin a cat. "
Can I just "walk off" the reservation? Yes and No. I left the reservation with my (white) father in 1972 and you would not BELIEVE the paperwork that he had to have in order to remove me legally when my grandfather died. Had it been my (red) mother who came to get me when my grandfather died all those years ago I would not have been allowed to leave and neither would SHE have.
About the time that the Indian Child Welfare Act was passed in 1979 the Army STOPPED physically keeping us on the reservations. However, 30 years down the road from the passage of ICWA( it is STILL not enforced) something other than physical restraints keep most on the reservations... economics. As I said... if you don't have a pot to piss in OR a window to throw it out of you don't have the resources TO leave in the first place. Regardless of how "near" or "far" the nearest city is the REALITY is that 60PLUS percent unemployment amongst Native Americans is a HUGE stumbling block. (And white folks complain about a mere 10% unemployment rate...) "Taking a chance" and leaving the res for the city isn't really an option when you KNOW from the outset that the likelihood of you GETTING a job are slim to none. I HAVE an education... and I have played hell working in MY field purely and simply because of two things... My race and my gender. I am very obviously a Native American Female... and DAMN if THAT hasn't caused more than a few employers to completely ignore my EDUCATION (Just so that we are clear... I have a Bachelor of Science in Nursing, a Bachelor of Science in Environmental Engineering and an associates in Business Administration. ) and concentrate on either my race or my gender... and it is more normally my race that they concentrate on. (I have to admit though that the man who looked at me and said "But you are a WOMAN... how do you handle being waist deep in muck?" STILL causes me a bit of laughter. The look on his face when I said "CHEST WADERS!" was priceless)
In 18 months I will be going BACK to the Res... BY CHOICE. To do a job that is NECESSARY and which I am more than qualified for. I won't be paid more than a stipend from a monetary standpoint for about 5 years BUT I didn't get into this particular field for the money but rather so that I could FINALLY GO HOME where I belong and where I am HAPPY. There's a HUGE difference between me and you... and it's NOT our respective races... it is the KNOWLEDGE that I do not BELONG "out here". This ain't HOME. My heart isn't in it. Economics keeps me here for another 18 months... when this contract is finished I'm DONE... I'm going HOME. I'm going where I DO belong to help people who NEED all the help they can get. I'm doing it with open eyes, an open heart and open arms.
Sweet cheeks... In 1988 (pay attention to the year there) the United States Supreme Court RULED THAT WE DO NOT HAVE CIVIL RIGHTS UNDER THE UNITED STATES CONSTITUTION! That was long after the civil rights lawsuits of the 60s.
As for Kennedy, Kerry and McCain... scroll up and click on the link for "The Mountains Weep" and you will find the answer. I strongly advise grabbing a barf bag before you read that post though because you are LIKELY to get physically ill when you read what the "gentlemen" in question are directly responsible FOR.
No, I don't believe that IS the solution. In the first place, whites, in their supreme greed, have DESTROYED what we held sacred and that damage can NEVER be "undone". In the second place, what MOST of us want is acknowledgment that what was done was WRONG and UNDERSTANDING that YOUR "solutions" have done nothing other than make things WORSE. It's TIME to get the hell out of the way. OUR solutions will likely NOT be yours... but that doesn't make them "wrong" as has been claimed by innumerable "Christians" in the past... it simply makes them DIFFERENT. Yep, solutions cost money... guess what... During the Clinton Administration a BILLION DOLLARS was STOLEN to balance YOUR Budget... give it back with interest and we have the "money" part of the problem solved. Then get the hell out of the way and WATCH what some CREATIVITY can do.
As far as the Nukes thing...you may have a very excellent point there. In fact, the solution to everything may be staring us right in the face.
We nuke.....ourselves. Then, when rebuilding ourselves we'll use the latest manufacutring techniuqes and technologies, we'll be forced to re-invent and update all our buildings, educational institutions and infrastructure (whatever the hell that is).
Seriously though, very cool info on the battle.
Reminds me of the time I told my buddy in Iraq that one day our kids would be driving Iraqi cars and playing Iraqi video games and this would all be worth it. He didn't laugh.
You are an amazing and passionate woman and I am always impressed by your posts.
Rated for Truth.