I think we do agree more than we disagree. I do think Lakota and other nations should have autonomy much like the states do with some sort of congressional representation. An issue with that, though, is that First Nations are not monolithic…they do have some dislike (and even hatred) of each other…so you can’t lump em up, but you can’t give senators to each and every one either.
However, your denigrating my experience sent me off…plus, and you didn’t say this but I read into it…that it’s perfectly ok for whites to be poor because some other whites many miles away and unrelated are rich…but those poor Lakota…we need to DO SOMETHING! This sets me off, because I grew up a poor white…and Bill Gates and others didn’t give me crap. I had many experiences of groups and government seeing it was perfectly ok for me to be poor and I shouldn’t get help, but if I wasn’t white…ohhh then there is all this help… Growing up there requires energy and determination to leave. You have to leave what is familiar and family/friends and it sucks…but unless you want to be poor that is what you need to do.
So these are stats compared with the USA or with the world as a whole, etc. So what are the stas comparing the Lakota to others in rural dakota? It seems we need some perspective.
Also, when has a breakaway attempt from the US govt. ever turned out good for those breaking away? Learn from history any?
There are survivalists/militia/Freemen types declaring themselves “sovereign” every day. Doesn’t mean a thing. They still have to pay taxes, obey the traffic laws, carry a U.S. passport to travel overseas, etc. When they don’t, the government pays them some attention they don’t appreciate… but the government wins, as well it should, in a republic under the rule of law.
I’m with those who think that sovereignty isn’t the big issue – it’s what you do with it. Are the Lakota proposing to resurrect the life they led before the white man came? I somehow suspect they aren’t. And if they aren’t, then they’re in the same dilemma the Plains states are in now – no jobs, but plenty of despair. Sovereignty doesn’t make these problems magically disappear.
I don’t think anyone believes that magic will happen. I just think it is the noble mindset that it is better to be hungry and free than hungry and conscripted. The old American colonies only barely made it after their revolution, but they felt that their freedom mattered.
There was a guy, I think from New Jersey who proposed something that called the ‘Buffalo Commons’ idea. Basically, it called the colonization of the some of the plains and parts of the West as a ‘mistake’. The tax revenue and everything was a drain from these states. He proposed removing the people from this area and letting the area revert to it’s wild state. There would still be mining and such…but not allow permanent settling there. It got the ‘Buffalo Common’ name because Buffalo could be released and allowed to migrate like they used to
Of course, his name was held in as much regard as the Devil himself. However, at the time I didn’t think it was a bad idea…and still think it might have merit
It may also be premature to toss this off as a couple of lunatics with a webpage, not representing the Lakota nation in general. As news continues to emerge, the Rapid City Journal reports:
A group [that] represents the Lakota Sioux Indian representatives **from various reservations and states ** said Wednesday that it is declaring sovereign nation status and withdrawing from all treaties with the U.S. government… Means was part of a four member Lakota delegation that traveled to Washington, culminating years of internal discussion among treaty representatives of the various Lakota communities.Emphsis added.
That is a pretty nice road, about as good as the one that leads to my place in Montana. Of course, from a road like that I then have a few miles of dirt & gravel to drive (and I pay to have gravel dumped every year to keep the road up).
I don’t know the Lakota, but I do know the Navajo thanks to work with my church and also Navajo friends. The Federal government is certainly a problem, but there are also issues within the tribal governments.
There is a LOT of corruption at the tribal level that prevents development. Pe ople are prevented from running power, water, etc. It can be hard to get a building permit. People who want to develop are stopped cold by others. If you really fuck with the powers, they can play games where they knock you off of the tribal rolls (we see that in California with the casino tribes).
The land itself has a weird ownership structure as well - which keeps the tribe from being able to profit from it at times. Rez land can’t be subdivided and sold, for example. This is to protect the Indians, but it also serves to make it harder from them to profit from their property.
The Alaskan model seems to have worked a bit better than the lower 48 reservation model. Tribes were incorporated with ownership. Some have sold off their tribal land and moved on, others have licensed the oil & mineral rights.
That all said - the weird semi-nation status of the reservations have always been odd and hard to parse.
Declaring myself independent isn’t illegal. What’s illegal is, well, breaking laws. I can declare myself independent and no one cares, it’s when I fire on Fort Sumpter and (this is the big one) stop paying my taxes that the government cares.
As for the contention that the Lakota have some special status that would allow the to secede that I don’t have, well, that might be true, except “The Lakota” aren’t declaring independence, these couple of guys are. No one in the government cares how many press conferences they hold, what they care about is whether they shoot at the cops.
As shown just before you posted, that may not represent the truth. These representatives may have the blessings of many tribes in several states, following years of inter-tribal discussions and negotiations. Indeed, one would have to wonder how you can get the attention of foreign states if they perceive you as renegade nuts rather than represenatives of a large number of people.
Oh my god! That’s horrid! The condition of the roads remind me of…rural northern California, where I and a couple million other white folks grew up. :rolleyes:
However that these people exist gives lie to statements like this
Since they haven’t shot the 50 year old VP yet, or denied him his half million dollar suburban home.
For a nice reservation, check out the Shakopee Mdewakanton Sioux - a casino tribe just South of Minneapolis where tribal membership entitles you to quite a bit of income. Wealth hasn’t solved the tribe’s problems however, and has brought new problems.
If the Lakota do gain sovereignty from the US, specifically the Bureau of Indian Affairs (God - imagine if after the Civil War we’d established a Bureau of Negro Affairs!), could counter-claims be made on the Lakota?
Just because the Lakota now live in Dakota, it’s not their homeland any more than a New Yorker’s traditional dish is New-Yorkshire pudding. They took it every bit as brutally as it was in turn taken from them. And they were able to take it because they were on European horses, killing and enslaving the children of tribes made vulnerable by European smallpox.
Sure, lose the Bureau of Indian Affairs. But lose the concept of hereditary guilt while you’re at it. It has a nasty habit of boomeranging.
Sorry, I looked on BBC, CBC, CNN, and there seems to be no mention of this. Only Fox has a small blurb at the bottom of their page. Seems this isn’t really as newsworthy to the rest of the world, or even the mainstream US media.
I had many experiences of groups and government seeing it was perfectly ok for me to be poor and I shouldn’t get help, but if I wasn’t white…ohhh then there is all this help… Growing up there requires energy and determination to leave. You have to leave what is familiar and family/friends and it sucks…but unless you want to be poor that is what you need to do.