Posted on 10/08/2017 5:15:07 AM PDT by Kaslin
There is a move afoot to cast Christopher Columbus as an evil person instead of the person celebrated as the first to traverse the Atlantic Ocean, discovering there were two major continents not previously known to the world as it existed in 1492. In another feel-good moment, some cities are renaming Columbus Day as Indigenous People’s Day. American Indians are desperate for real help, not placating moments.
Naomi Schaefer Riley has defined how bad things are for American Indians and how Washington, D.C., bureaucracy is destroying the lives of these Americans in her terrific and terrifying book "The New Trail of Tears." Ms. Riley traveled all over the country seeing and hearing the experiences of these citizens and conveys that in her book. One of the fascinating aspects of her book is how the Canadians mistreat their Indians (called First Nation People in Canada). Interesting to know they are just as inept in adapting their people to modern society as we are in the States.
You don’t need to go far into Ms. Riley’s book to begin to grasp how bad matters are for American Indians. According to statistics maintained by the federal agencies (that are supposed to be helping), the estimated three million American Indians have the highest poverty rate of any minority group – almost twice the national average. They also have the highest rate of crime, suicide, alcoholism, gang membership and sexual abuse. The rate of child abuse is twice the national average. Indian women report being raped at 2.5 times the national average. As staggering as these figures are they are even higher for the one million American Indians living on reservations.
Lest you think these American citizens are not just a group of social deviants, it is fair to say that if one lived under the control of the American governmental entities as they do one might exhibit some of the breakdowns in social behavior that American Indians have.
That brought me to ask Ms. Riley whether the mission of the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) and the Bureau of Indian Education (BIE) was actually helping or hurting the people they supervise. When speaking of the BIE, Ms. Riley said “They are terrible. They have gone through 33 directors in 32 years with many directors fired for misconduct. The educational system for American Indians needs real reforms.”
Ms. Riley went on to say “They are spending $20,000 per student and they cannot even keep the roofs on the buildings. A lot of the problem is nepotism in tribal schools. They could really use charter schools.” Riley’s book goes in-depth into the horrifying conditions of the educational systems for American Indians and how that is central to challenges they face as a people.
Riley answered a question I have been asking for years: Why are people living on reservations in the year 2017? She said “Most people will say to protect the Native Americans. Part of it is the tribal leadership telling families they don’t want to mix with mainstream America.”
The Indians live under intolerable restrictions. Individuals cannot get a loan to build a home because the tribal land is held in trust. Everything is owned by the Tribe and has to be approved by multiple layers of the federal government. Thus nothing ever gets done. Though they have mineral and/or oil rights on their land, they need to go through a multitude of approvals to produce from these assets.
Ms. Riley said the most surprising thing she found “was the sheer shock of the living conditions these people are living in. They have housing shortages and live in broken down trailers. They are far away from where the rest of us live, so we never experience the squalor.”
The Indians are then led to focus on certain businesses. As Riley stated “Gambling, cigarettes, alcohol, drugs – who would not want these businesses to form the economic backbone of their community?” Once you review the decision-making process and the control by the BIA or BIE and the Tribal leadership, you come to conclude they are actually living in a Communist system. This system has failed as badly as any other Communist system anywhere in the world.
This all leads to the ultimate negative impact. On the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota, Ms. Riley cites “The average life expectancy for men on the reservation is 48, and for women it’s 52. Suicide and poor health are partly to blame for these numbers, but so is violence.” That violence is within the community, and not from outside.
I could go on, but why further depress you. You should read first-hand "The New Trail of Tears." You will learn that many focus on false solutions that do nothing to help except to assuage their own guilt.
I contacted Major League Baseball to find out what they are doing to help American Indians. This is because Commissioner Rob Manfred has pressed the Cleveland Indians to rid themselves of their long-time symbol, Chief Wahoo. What has MLB actually done to help Native Americans? A couple of teams have held Native American Heritage Games, and there are a couple of players of Native American descent. Overall, this is another feel-good moment that does nothing to solve the problems or focus leaders on the challenges facing American Indians.
City Councilman Mitch O’Farrell led the charge to change the name of Columbus Day to Indigenous People’s Day in Los Angeles. Mr. O’Farrell’s office could not identify that there are actually any American Indians who live in his district or the city of Los Angeles. When asked what Councilman O’Farrell has done to help Americans Indians as they struggle to overcome the hurdles placed in front of them by government, we were told of some other acts of placating, feel-good legislation offered by the Councilman.
Tomorrow some will celebrate Columbus Day while others celebrate Indigenous People’s Day. Indigenous People’s Day will make some people feel good about themselves but will harm the American Indians who need real help. Americans will be diverted because of these feel-good acts. It’s time for actual help to be delivered to these American citizens.
Amen to that... The corruption of native 'leaders' is appalling.... In Canada it has been revealed that some reservation chiefs have been making themselves wealthy from the billions in aid given to band councils and they have enriched themselves and their families rather than helping their entire community.
CBC - Some native chiefs earn more than PM: tax watchdog November 2010 - ..."The data shows that 222 aboriginal chiefs and counselors from First Nations communities across Canada earn more money than their provincial premiers, and 82 make more than the prime minister.
"There's a pretty atrocious example coming from [the] Maritimes, $978,000 tax-free … for someone off-reserve," said Craig. "That's for a community of about 304 people. "It's disgusting this is going on in Canada."
National Post - B.C. First Nations chief and family paid more than $4.1M over last four years
November 2014 - OTTAWA — An elderly B.C. First Nations chief and his ex-wife, along with one of their sons and a grandson, received more than $4.1-million in remuneration over the past four years.
Shuswap First Nation Chief Paul Sam, 80, gets a tax-free salary that has averaged $264,000 over that period to run a tiny reserve near Invermere, a resort community near the Alberta border.
The Shuswap have 267 members, of whom just 87 live on the reserve.
His son, Dean Martin, is doing even better, with an average annual annual salary of $536,000 over the period running a band corporation that operates various businesses on and near the reserve.
The figures were provided this week to The Vancouver Sun by disgruntled Shuswap members who are challenging in next month’s election a family that has ruled for more than three decades.
The reservation system needs to be abolished and the billions allotted yearly should be distributed equally amongst all native persons.
I contacted Major League Baseball to find out what they are doing to help American Indians. This is because Commissioner Rob Manfred has pressed the Cleveland Indians to rid themselves of their long-time symbol, Chief Wahoo.
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The Cleveland Indians have a logo that honors American Indians (at least as any rational person would see it) and that somehow obligates them to “help” American Indians?
Browns are actually indians that migrated north
Blacks and Indians are all from the recent stone age
Best long-term solution? Abolish reservations.
Disease did the most damage. It’s hard to fight effectively when half of your society is dead or dying.
Trees, plants and animals don't vote
PRIVATE PROPERTY.
HOME OWNERSHIP.
EDUCATIONAL CHOICE.
NO MORE PATERNALISM.
There—that fixes it.
What’s the problem? Don’t Native Americans go to state universities tuition-free? They can’t find the universities?
It was.
But they didn't have the compass or guns.
Look what happened to the mighty Songhai Empire at the Battle of Tondibi
They were larger and more powerful than The Moroccans.
But the Moroccans had Arquebus' and English cannons.
They have all the help they need. They just do nothing with it.
What struck me when I drove west in 2014 was the number of Indians that lived in isolated trailers in New Mexico. The ancient Indians developed adobe which was perfect for insulation and for moderate temperature controls. The thick walls meant a cooler interior during the day and warmer at night. But now they are living in sweltering, poorly insulated trailers. It doesn’t make sense to me.
Did it have a sewer system?
Columbus discovered nothing except a funding stream.
The tribes were opportunistic warriors, envisioning a martial advantage through adaptation if advanced weaponry and horses.
Skip the Columbus-was-a-great-discoverer day as he rather stumbled across the “America’s” groping his way to Asia... besides, the Norse were hear prior, Asian cultures were here before that, the Berbers and their ships of Tarshish were probably gunkholing around as well.
Historically it is coming to be more of a documented fact that the oceans were not an obstacle but rather, a super-highway!
I read a bunch of responses below on this thread. This very first response is the best. “Get rid of the government help.”
There are all kinds of Indians and each tribe’s situation is unique. We can work it out ourselves with conservative solutions that actually work. Many of the reservations are indeed dysfunctional. But, many reservations are great assets for their people, both economically and culturally. Most tribes don’t even have a substantial reservation to call home, but still function for their people.
This article is a perfect reflection of the white liberal’s world view.
I’ve known several Indians who were very successful....to a tee they left the reservation and got real jobs. Welfare has done the same thing to the indians it did to the blacks!!!
I had a dear friend who was a Seneca Indian...lived on the Reservation near Buffalo. She said the young men are all on drugs and booze and there is absolutely no discipline. She said all the good ones have gone BACK to Canada.
The writer believed it did not.
I don’t know
“One of the major problems that large centers like Cahokia faced was keeping a steady supply of food. A related problem was waste disposal for the dense population, and Cahokia became unhealthy from polluted waterways. Because it was such an unhealthy place to live, Snow believes that the town had to rely on social and political attractions to bring in a steady supply of new immigrants; otherwise the town’s death rate would have caused it to be abandoned earlier.[14]”
It does if the trailer was given to you by the almighty government!!!
Help them with nothing until they accept assimilation into American culture.
We don’t need any more diversity crap.
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