Or ....
Posted on 04/24/2017 8:58:20 AM PDT by servo1969
We've all heard about how many bad things the U.S. government did to American Indians in the past. But what about today?
Like most people, the only time I hear about today's American Indians is when people are outraged about sports mascots or team names, like the Washington Redskins. But sports teams' names are the least of Indians' problems.
Did you know that Indians have the highest rate of poverty of any racial group in America? Did you know that alcoholism is more common among Indian youths than among youths in any other ethnic group? Did you know that the rate of child abuse among Indians is twice as high as the national average?
Until I visited Indian reservations for my book, The New Trail of Tears, I didn't know any of this. What was at the root of these terrible problems? I wondered. And the deeper I dug, the more I realized that, between the 19th century and today, nothing has changed: it's still the government.
The two main agencies that oversee the activities of Indians who live on reservations are the Bureau of Indian Affairs, or BIA, and the Bureau of Indian Education, or BIE. Education, economic development, tribal courts, road maintenance, agriculture and social services - the federal government basically funds and controls all of it. It's no wonder Indians say BIA stands for "Bossing Indians Around."
Together, these two agencies have combined budgets of $3 billion per year, and have 9,000 employees. That's one employee for every 111 Indians on a reservation. Of that $3 billion per year, the BIE uses $850 million of it to educate 42,000 students. That's more than $20,000 per student, compared to a national average of $12,400 per student.
Plenty of other federal agencies also have programs for Indians. For instance, the Indian Health Service had a 2015 budget of over $4.6 billion. And yet, there are widespread and documented reports of nurses being unable to administer basic drugs, of broken resuscitation equipment, and of unsanitary medical facilities.
Obviously, inadequate funding isn't the problem.
The billions of dollars that the federal government spends on Indians every year hasn't made their lives better. In fact, by most measures of economic and social health, the lives of American Indians are only getting worse.
Aside from issues of culture, the only way out of this morass is economic growth, but the reservation system makes this almost impossible. Following a series of treaties and laws over many decades - some well intentioned, some not - the federal government decided to hold Indian land "in trust" in order to prevent non-Indians from ever buying that land. But other than Indians, the only people who have things held in trust for them are children and the mentally incompetent.
Can anything better illustrate the low regard the government has for American Indians?
The awful consequence of this land trust is that Indians can't sell their land, which means they can't use it the same way other Americans do - for example, as collateral to get a loan to start a business. What bank would lend to landowners who don't own their land?
The other effect of this absurdity is that Indians can't develop this land that they don't own. Indian reservations contain almost 30 percent of the nation's coal reserves west of the Mississippi, 50 percent of potential uranium reserves, and 20 percent of known oil and gas reserves. Those resources are estimated to be worth nearly $1.5 trillion. But the vast majority of Indian lands with natural resources remain undeveloped because of federal regulations.
For instance, for Indians to get permission to mine for coal on Indian land requires 49 steps spanning four federal agencies. Each of these 49 steps can take months or years to be approved. There are so many government regulations that just to apply for a permit to dig a hole costs $6,500.
Is it really any wonder that this community is mired in poverty?
So, what can be done?
For starters, end the trust system. Let Indians do what they want with the land they own. Get the massive federal bureaucracy out of the way. Give American Indians the opportunity to embrace the same thing that has lifted millions of other people out of poverty and into the middle class: free enterprise.
It won't happen overnight, and it won't be easy, but it will do a lot more for American Indians than changing the name of the Washington Redskins.
I'm Naomi Schaefer Riley for Prager University.
FedGov always screws over the people they are trying to “help”.
“I’m from the government and I’m here to help you” — as Reagan said: these are chilling words.
In a sane world, Native American Indians should be wealthy beyond imagination..................
Indian tribes should not be recognized as sovereign. All special rights for Indians should be abolished. The government should set up a commission to determine the just compensation to be paid under the 5th amendment to the members of Indian tribes for the loss of these rights.
We should all of us be Americans first.
Yep. I actually DID know all about that stuff, and I didn’t have to research for a book.
Want to help the indians? Find some way to invalidate all the treaties and end the reservations. Start treating them just like all other Americans protected by the U.S. constitution - no better and no worse - and they’ll start improving.
But not until then.
It’s terrible.
Sometimes the white man actually makes the tribes go to war against each other in court to determine who gets to build the next billion dollar gambling casino.
Or ....
“I’m from the government and I’m here to help you” — as Reagan said: these are chilling words.
You could take this entire article, change every instance of the word ‘government’ to ‘Democrat’, and it would be even more accurate...............
Her grandson was about to become a minister...in Canada. She said all the good ones leave.
She also said the parents don't discipline their children and they just drink and do drugs and get into trouble.
A shame to hear her talk about her own and she's very hurt that they cause their own demise.
IIRC, she was helping the Tribe to write their history and has since passed away.
, the more I realized that, between the 19th century and today, nothing has changed: it’s still the government.
Yeah, the Government is forcing the Indians to drink and molest children. What a crock of crap!
I agree. Any one who is all for socialism needs to visit an Indian reservation.
Why the American Indian has squandered away the opportunity the govt had given them is astounding.
The capitalist wild card they were handed got tossed under the table.
No federal law against booze, cigarettes, gambling, health care, you name it. Everything that the U.S. and its states tax and over charge you for or make illegal could be made into a luxury escape rejuvinatory paradise for the willing person with disposable cash.
Instead they settle for 30 beads a month from their slave masters and eternal poverty.
Of course that’s why. The whole idea of creating a “sovereign nation” within another nation that’s not really a sovereign nation, is stupid.
Either they’re American, or they’re not. The sad reality is that they were conquered, and almost wiped out. That cannot be changed. Putting them in a physical or virtual reservation, creating special laws and privileges for them, and letting them create their own laws, is a colossally idiotic idea.
Who has the courage to change this? No one.
In the end, political arrangements matter a lot less than spiritual ones.
At one point, many American Indian tribes were pretty staunchly Christian, the early evangelists having succeeded. But God has no grandchildren, and faith faded, and in the meantime Christians started becoming shy of asserting their faith to all comers.
I hope faith revival comes even to American Indians. Without embracing God in faith, we’re simply goners, playing shuffleboard to amuse ourselves on the way to an everlasting enmity against the God of love, the common enmity of humanity when it was born.
Whatever political sovereignty issues may or may not apply, the bigger trouble is that we humans think we’re sovereign over everything that matters. No we aren’t. We are at best, servants of God. It could be worse; we could be servants of the devil, like we all are at first.
She also owns a piece on a reservation in Canada by inheritance. Said she's never been there and she has no heir.
She works and pays taxes just like you or myself.
They are American citizens.
Nothing is stopping them from being successful except themselves.
Look at the steel walkers!!
Casinos is not the way....
I’ve never understood the necessity of living in a racially pure community, quarantined from the rest of the world.
The Indian Reorganization Act was more than 80 years ago. Get up off your a$$es, sober up, join mainstream society and assimilate just like everyone else did.
My best inheritance from my father was, “you have a smart father and a smart mother, you figure it out.” Most of the time he was bragging himself up a bit but kids take things literally. So that meant I was smart and could figure it out.
Todays kids and ethnics are told, “you are too damn dumb to take care of your self.” and they take it literally.
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