Sunday, June 24, 2007

Tim Giago: Clinton Came, Saw and Moved On. President Bill Clinton came to the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota at the tail end of his administration. He witnessed the extreme poverty and absorbed the feelings of hopelessness, and then moved on. Nothing changed. Clinton's emissary from the Housing and Urban Development (HUD), Andrew Cuomo, now Attorney General of New York State, followed Clinton to Pine Ridge, had his photographer take pictures of the Third World conditions in housing, had the pictures blown up, framed them, hung them on his office walls, and then moved on. Nothing changed. Shannon County, the heart of the Pine Ridge Reservation, is still among the top ten poorest counties in America. Since it was proclaimed as the poorest county in America in the U. S. Census of 1980, 27 years ago, nothing has changed. I now believe that by behaving as victims of poverty, the Lakota people are shortchanging themselves. We must rid ourselves of this "victim mentality" and enter a new paradigm of "prospective prosperity." As victims of poverty the Lakota people have become the beneficiaries of handouts. This benevolence includes used clothing, used furniture and a whole lot of religious enthusiasm offered by those who believe that our road to prosperity must pass beneath the arch of a church. Plenty Indians have become infected by "that old time religion" but it hasn't done much to feed or house them. Nor has it done much to bring jobs and prosperity. I emailed www.hillaryclinton.com and asked her to follow her husband's trail to Pine Ridge, but to come here with thoughts of economic development leading to prosperity on her mind. We don't need more handouts. We need a hand up. Whether she wins or loses, the problems that exist on this reservation will still be here waiting to be solved. It seems that the mindset of South Dakota's Congressional delegation keeps us compartmentalized as victims. While they work for and introduce bills to move the white population of the state towards prosperity, they eke out bills designed to keep the people of the Great Sioux Nation in poverty. If we had some genuine, forward looking leaders amongst our people, they would also erase this picture of poverty stricken victims and instill in the people a pride that will lead to a goal of prosperity. They can do this by creating a commission to represent all nine tribes of the Sioux Nation and send this delegation to visit every wealthy tribe in America looking for funds and ideas. They would send this delegation to visit with all of the major corporations in America and make an effort to entice them to construct industry on reservation lands. There are plenty of unemployed skilled and unskilled laborers available and the corporations would also receive countless tax-free benefits. If American jobs are now outsourced to India, why not outsource a few of them to the American Indians? For those who would do good you can replace the truckloads of used clothing and furniture with truckloads of lumber, plywood, hammers, nails, concrete, trucks, backhoes, Caterpillars, road graders, and other building materials and equipment, so that our carpenters, plumbers and electricians can start to build homes for the thousands of people that are now nearly homeless. By so doing you have just created jobs and a future. Maybe a wealthy casino tribe can buy busses that can traverse this reservation that is 100 miles long and 50 miles wide so that the people without automobiles can make it to town to buy groceries, visit the hospital or report to their jobs without having to pay a friend or relative an arm and a leg to get them there. HUD can help move us toward prosperity by demolishing the "cluster houses" it built over the years to save money and begin to build houses on the land the people abandoned in order to move into the cluster communities. The cluster homes contributed to violence, gangs, drugs and crime that did not exist when the people lived in homes on their own allotment lands. Internally we have a lot of problems to solve, problems of alcoholism, drug abuse and a very high incident of high school dropouts. Contributing to these problems are the lack of jobs, adequate housing, poor healthcare and a mindset that causes us to believe we are victims. If Congress would allocate the money it spends in one day in Iraq to improve the lives of its own citizens living on the poorest reservations in America, then and only then, can it hold itself up as an example for the rest of the world. There is an old saying that a nation shall be judged on how it treats its indigenous people and to date, America has a failing record. Bill Clinton came, saw and moved on. Whether the next president is Hillary or whoever, maybe they will come to Pine Ridge, see the problems, solve them, and not move on. Or at least give the people the means to solve the problems themselves. (Tim Giago is an Oglala Lakota. He was a Nieman Fellow at Harvard in the Class of 1991. His latest book "Children Left Behind, the Dark Legacy of the Indian Missions," is now available at: order@clearlightbooks.com. The book just won the Bronze Star from the Independent Publishers Awards. He can be reached at najournalists@rushmore.com) [The Huffington Post Full Blog Feed] 2:47:20 PM    comment []

William E. Jackson Jr.: The Vices of Cheney: Where Impeachment Must Begin. For several years, in my discussions with Representatives and Senators, it has not been unusual to hear Vice President Dick Cheney referred to as President George Bush's "insurance policy." That is, against the beginning of impeachment proceedings in the House. The prevailing assumption has been that it would be necessary to impeach and convict Cheney, first, so as not to leave the government in his hands should the President leave office before the end of his term. This assumption was, and is correct--not just due to the fact that the route to holding the President ultimately accountable for "high crimes" goes through Cheney but also because the Vice President's "high crimes" are probably much greater. If the Democrats had gained control of Congress in 2005, the impeachment of Cheney might have happened. But in the summer of 2007, the Democratic members of the House Judiciary Committee have an "out" in that the prevailing political judgment among the majority is that the timing is too close to 2008 to begin such a prolonged and disruptive proceeding. Thus, as a senior Democratic member of the Judiciary Committee recently argued to me, "we are holding what otherwise would be impeachment hearings under the heading of oversight" and publicly "embarrassing" the Bush-Cheney White House. He went on to say that his colleagues (Republicans, as well as Democrats) on that committee--where the impeachment process must start--often discuss the abundant circumstantial evidence for high crimes having been committed at the highest levels of the Bush Administration. Of course, it would not be so convenient for Speaker Pelosi and the Democratic majority to finesse the constitutional scandal IF special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald--in the trial of Scooter Libby--had prominently cited, instead of hinting at, the Vice President as an unindicted co-conspirator in obstructing justice OR even in committing the original crime of intentionally revealing the identity of a known CIA covert agent. The ball of string might have unwound beyond control, to the point where Chairman John Conyers of the Judiciary Committee could not have shirked from the duty to launch certified impeachment hearings. The "I" word would at least have been on the table. Alas, the series that began in The Washington Post on June 24--" Angler: The Cheney Vice Presidency "--should result in placing it firmly on the agenda of the House. Consider this excerpt from Bart Gellman and Jo Becker's long-overdue exposure of the modus operandi of the sitting Vice President: "Stealth is among Cheney's most effective tools. Man-size Mosler safes, used elsewhere in government for classified secrets, store the workaday business of the office of the vice president. Even talking points for reporters are sometimes stamped 'Treated As: Top Secret/SCI.' Experts in and out of government said Cheney's office appears to have invented that designation, which alludes to 'sensitive compartmented information,' the most closely guarded category of government secrets. By adding the words 'treated as,' they said, Cheney seeks to protect unclassified work as though its disclosure would cause 'exceptionally grave damage to national security.' "Across the board, the vice president's office goes to unusual lengths to avoid transparency. Cheney declines to disclose the names or even the size of his staff, generally releases no public calendar and ordered the Secret Service to destroy his visitor logs. His general counsel has asserted that 'the vice presidency is a unique office that is neither a part of the executive branch nor a part of the legislative branch,' and is therefore exempt from rules governing either. Cheney is refusing to observe an executive order on the handling of national security secrets, and he proposed to abolish a federal office that insisted on auditing his compliance. "In the usual business of interagency consultation, proposals and information flow into the vice president's office from around the government, but high-ranking White House officials said in interviews that almost nothing flows out. Close aides to Cheney describe a similar one-way valve inside the office, with information flowing up to the vice president but little or no reaction flowing down." I submit that only a bunch of Congressional fools, who read The Post and The Times and McClatchy wire stories, could have failed over time to notice that the Vice President has been, and still is, systematically destroying the evidence--the paper and electronic trails--that document his impeachable offenses. That is, dangerous acts that are high crimes against the State and that subvert the Constitution of the United States. And, moreover, that could be used as evidence, after he is removed or leaves office, when he shall "nevertheless be liable and subject to Indictment, Trial, Judgment and Punishment, according to Law." [Article I, Section 3] There is a compelling and overriding national interest, if for no other reason than the above, in NOT releasing from a jail sentence, and not excusing with a presidential pardon, live witness Scooter Libby--the former chief of staff to the Vice President known as "Cheney's Cheney." The subversion of the Republic continues, before our very eyes. What is the House Judiciary Committee under Chairman Conyers prepared to do about it?! These are very grave matters. It does not take much imagination to draw up articles of impeachment against the Vice President of the United States. And let poltical considerations of timing be damned! William E. Jackson, Jr. (To be continued...) [The Huffington Post Full Blog Feed] 11:40:26 AM    comment []

Arianna Huffington: Sunday Roundup. It was a big week for Torture News. For starters, the White House has decided to close Gitmo. Apparently, it came down to a face-off between the women in Bush's life -- Laura, Barbara, Condi, and Karen Hughes -- who argued that the detention facility is a stain on America's reputation in the world, and the pro-torture tag team of Cheney and Gonzales, who argued that moving enemy combatants to U.S. jails would give them more legal rights. Score one for the ladies. And the rule of law. On the other hand, we had Justice Scalia singing the praises of torture fetishist Jack Bauer, a man prone to pronouncements such as: "I don't want to bypass the Constitution, but these are extraordinary circumstances." When you stop shuddering, check out our Sunday Roundup below. [The Huffington Post Full Blog Feed] 11:15:37 AM    comment []

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