DENVER- Is it a vanguard action? Check it out and decide, but make sure YOUR itinerary includes TUES 25TH protest of Tar Sands pipeline with American Indian Movement at the UC-Denver Auraria Campus, WED 26TH protest of Obama visit, also on Auraria Campus, and SAT 29TH global march to demand Robin Hood Tax, the 1% tax on all international banking transactions. Really, just 1%? The Robin Hood of yore took more like 99% and left his highborn victims with just enough to limp back to the castle. 1% from the 1% is a start.
Tag: American Indian Movement
Occupy Denver recognizes Colo. AIM, mixes metaphor to Unoccupy America!
This weekend the General Assembly of Occupy Denver recognized that its intended occupation was actually a re-occupation, of lands to which original inhabitants lay claim. On Sunday the GA consensus voiced its solidarity with the American Indian Movement of Colorado who submitted a statement for ratification. It's reprinted below via The Sole Reader: COLORADO AIM’S CHALLENGE TO #OCCUPYDENVER An Indigenous Platform Proposal for “Occupy Denver” “Now we put our minds together to see what kind of world we can create for the seventh generation yet to come.” John Mohawk (1944-2006), Seneca Nation As indigenous peoples, we welcome the awakening of those who are relatively new to our homeland. We are thankful, and rejoice, for the emergence of a movement that is mindful of its place in the environment, that seeks economic and social justice, that strives for an end to oppression in all its forms, that demands an adequate standard of food, employment, shelter and health care for all, and that calls for envisioning a new, respectful and honorable society. We have been waiting for 519 years for such a movement, ever since that fateful day in October, 1492 when a different worldview arrived – one of greed, hierarchy, destruction and genocide. In observing the “Occupy Together” expansion, we are reminded that the territories of our indigenous nations have been “under occupation” for decades, if not centuries. We remind the occupants of this encampment in Denver that they are on the territories of the Cheyenne, Arapaho and Ute peoples. In the U.S., indigenous nations were the first targets of corporate/government oppression. The landmark case of Johnson v. McIntosh (1823), which institutionalized the “doctrine of discovery” in U.S. law, and which justified the theft of 2 billion acres of indigenous territory, established a framework of corrupt political/legal/corporate collusion that continues throughout indigenous America, to the present. If this movement is serious about confronting the foundational assumptions of the current U.S. system, then it must begin by addressing the original crimes of the U.S. colonizing system against indigenous nations. Without addressing justice for indigenous peoples, there can never be a genuine movement for justice and equality in the United States. Toward that end, we challenge Occupy Denver to take the lead, and to be the first “Occupy” city to integrate into its philosophy, a set of values that respects the rights of indigenous peoples, and that recognizes the importance of employing indigenous visions and models in restoring environmental, social, cultural, economic and political health to our homeland. We call on Occupy Denver to adopt, as a starting point, the following: 1. To repudiate the Doctrine of Christian Discovery, to endorse the repeal of the papal bull Inter Caetera (1493) to work for the reversal of the U.S. Supreme Court case of Johnson v. M’Intosh 1823), and call for a repeal of the Columbus Day holiday as a Colorado and United States holiday. 2. To endorse the right of all indigenous peoples to the international right of self-determination, by virtue of which they freely determine their political status,
AP says “In face of Federal inaction on Immigration”…
Way to slant a headline! "State initiatives to stem immigration fizzle in the face of Federal inaction." How about reporting it like this? "Racist State Legislators, in the face of opposition from Mainstream Americans, who would be the REAL targets of their Racial Profiling initiatives, even with massive funding from Nazi organizations like News Corp and Freedom Corporation (Channel 5 news, the Gazette...) and their Corporate Overlords, despite Nazi-Klan related heavily subsidized "grass roots" organizations such as the TeaParty and Minutemen, with all that expensive and highly organized firepower, still failed to force their Racist Agenda on the states the same way they FAILED to do so on the Federal Government" Oooh, I bet that stings. When you call yourselves non-racist but want to profile people, most of whom are United States Citizens, based on their appearance of belonging to heavily stereotyped and demonized ethnic, social or religious groups? You can say all you wish, Michelle Malkin, Sheriff Joe, Tancredo, Palin, Jan Brewer, all y'all Racist Freaks, that you don't racially profile people, but when you're trying to push that outrageous lie on any of the MILLIONS of Americans you've already profiled, like myself, we'll call you the Liars you truly are. When La Migra and local police organizations confronted Me, personally, with violent threats of sudden murder, pointing MACHINE GUNS at me, for the so-called "crime" of looking Mex or in one case looking Arabic in the words of the Officially Non-Racist officers "like a sand-nigger", and then coward bitches like Malkin and Tancredo saying that doesn't go Far Enough? Bitches, you LOST that argument. Calling me stupid or crazy for presenting the evidence, as your Lunatic Moron Minions have, repeatedly, (because that's your only defense against the Truth, as always) didn't stop MILLIONS of Americans from recognizing the same truth I've recognized and reported for so long. TeaBags, RepubliKlan, Minutemen, your policies are and always were Racist and, since you apply them primarily against AMERICANS that makes you Anti-American Terrorists. Y'all can line up and take turns helping yourseves to a Texas-size all you can eat buffet of Kiss my Dark-skinned Liberal Ass. Y vuestros Mamas Tambien, putos.
Geronimo and a Senate Committee on Stereotypes
Pursuant to the Operation Geronimo now shrouded in a cloud of "No, we aren't going to give you any evidence beyond our word" maneuver? Well, no. The committee hearing is on Racial Stereotyping as applied to American Indians and they HAD first dibs on naming rights, after the Chiricahua Apache and St Jerome (in Spanish it's Geronimo) of course, but definitely somewhere further up the line than the Navy SEALS assassination squad/highly organized lynching. At the time Geronimo was arrested on essentially Terrorism charges, not much was known about Apache sepulture, either rituals or where the graves went. But instead of burying him in Arizona, Mexico, New Mexico or Colorado, in an Apache ceremony, they buried him at Ft Sill OK. In the Apache (Prisoner Of War) section of the base cemetery. There's a couple of new legends come about, that the skull of the Skull and Bones society was his. Wouldn't surprise me at all. Folks who get a giggle from handling parts of dead humans would get an extra thrill from robbing an army Cemetery and the racist factor would make it even sweeter for them. There's an extra legend that representatives from some of the larger Apache Tribes, Chricahua, Mescalero, Jicarillo and White Mountain, re-buried him in a secret location. Which, really, at the time of his death, Apache rituals for burial were actually secret, and I've had no desire whatsoever to disrespect their customs by "digging around" asking rude questions. But from somewhere the now familiar refrain of "we don't want his followers making a shrine of his grave" was pulled out and he was buried in Ft Sill instead of New Mexico. There was a lawsuit against the United States Army and the Skull and Bones society filed in 2009 and dismissed LAST YEAR, seeking the return of the skull and bones so they could be returned to be reburied in New Mexico. On the 99th anniversary of Geronimo's death a group of 20 of the warrior's decendants sued the U.S. government, Skull and Bones and Yale in an attempt to rebury their ancestor's bones near his birthplace. In 2010 Judge Richard Roberts granted a Justice Department motion to dismiss the suit. Geronimo's relatives, he said, failed to establish that the government waived its right not to be sued. Roberts also dismissed the lawsuit against Skull and Bones and Yale, saying the plaintiffs cited a law that applies only to Native American cultural items excavated or discovered after 1990. Meaning. if you're Rich enough and have enough ties to the Officially Unofficial American Aristocracy, you can do with the bones of any Mere Peasant whatever the fuck you want. A Bush-appointed probably-skull-and-bones member, so-called "Justice" said so. The so-called "Justice Department" didn't want to investigate or prosecute the desecration of Indian graves, what a SURPRISE that was. Bunch of Racist Pricks. Maybe somebody should find out where Judge Roberts Momma is buried, dig her nasty mouldered ass out of the ground and chop THAT up, see how HE and the other Racist Pricks like THAT? I
Give the Black Hills back to the Lakota
Close down the strip-mine gold operation in Deadwood, stop maintaining the blasphemous idols carved onto Mount Rushmore, stop maintaining the Custer National Monument, let them rot into the Earth. They poison the very heart of the Earth Mother, Wakan Tonka. That means not "Great Spirit" like it's usually translated, but The Great Buffalo. The Lakota and other "sioux" tribes, and other Northern Plains tribes hold the Black Hills to be exactly that Heart. It's said that from satellite images the Black Hills look like a massive bison heart. That might be a Rorshacht test, an inkblot or a cloud that you can project onto, or a seance where the medium will tell you, or rather, you'll tell him/her exactly what you wanted to hear. Maybe, but it sure does look like a bison heart. Mount Rushmore and the Gold and now, coal mining operations are literally carving the still beating heart of the Earth. The Earth screams at us to stop, but the Big Money men don't listen. They carve images of some of their leading Capitalists onto the walls of that heart, and command all the people of America to pay to maintain their blasphemous idolatry. Deadwood was founded by Lt Colonel George A. Custer while he was still in the Army. An illegal encampment of illegal immigrants onto the ultimate in American Land. Unlike migrant workers with the same title, they came not to try make an honest living, not to keep alive the hope of citizenship, the fabled "land of opportunity" touted in the propaganda. They came to slaughter Wakan Tonka slowly, carve her open and cut holes in her heart while she's still alive. The Supreme Court very recently ruled that the land was, indeed, illegally seized, and offered as repayment ... a settlement that would be less than a hundredth of a penny on every ten dollars taken out by the greed freaks. Close down Sturgis, close down Deadwood. Open the gates of the Concentration/POW camps like Wounded Knee and Pine Ridge "reservations". Give the land back and save your Pious self-righteous "concern" for whether the Lakota and other sioux will make a profit from THEIR land. Don't ask what they will do with it, it's none of your God-damned business. You could use that same logic to lock me into servitude, where all my property (such as it is) could be seized and administered by "those who can manage it better". Who's the richest man in the world, Bill Gates, Hosni Mubarak, Queen Elizabeth the Second? Hmm? Whoever it is, by the logic which denies the Lakota and, by extension, every tribe in America, full title to their lands, anybody who is NOT the richest man in the world could have his property seized and "administered" for him by those who are richer. Give them back their land and don't worry about what they'll do with it. It will be a damn sight better than what the Thieves have done with it. None of that "Noble Savage" crap either, it's protectionist talk,
Brits on Kenya: “Oopsies!!”
Turns out that the common knowledge of the past 50+ years was right, the American backed British colonial government was, despite American and British denials, murdering, torturing and "disappearing" people, just like they did in every other nation where they sent in the Royal Marines to take over the local management and "bring civilization to the Wogs" I'm sure the redcoats would love to see that particular word disappear, but hey, it shows the true nature of Imperialism and Colonialism in all its ugly inglory. What that means HERE, you know how the TeaBags and other Right Wing Extremists like the Klan and their "unofficial" affiliates the Minutemen like to harp on President Obama's Dad being a MauMau? And that the term "freedom fighter" is just a Liberal euphemism for barbaric terrorist? Like how the MauMau were supposedly preying on the defenseless and weak Colonial Overlords, the Darkie Horde (the stupid bastards say the same thing about the Nat Turner Rebellion in American Slavery) rising up against their lawful White masters with no reason, because they had been well treated, and given as much Human Rights as one could appropriately give Savages... I capitalized that last because Michael "Savage" Weiner likes to do that stupid racist bullshit, depicting any "savages" who defy the Natural White Order as brutal, vicious and stupidly bloodthirsty. The British also depicted his Irgun cousins the same way. Guess there's an Uncle Tom in every group. But the notion, for the past more than 50 years, was that the British were a benevolent Master Race and merely "misconstrued" as being The Actual Bloodthirsty Vicious Savages in the equation. Well, TeaBags and other Racist organizations, "Eat and smile, byotches!" Ok so that sounds unnecessarily harsh. No Indeed. It's Necessary. "Oh, Jonah with his Whitey Bashing again!" not really. I AM half white myself. I could point out that Indigenous Rebellions including oh, let's see, every American Indian nation/tribe fighting back against people who came in, took everything and decided to kill up a mess of folks for not getting off "their" land. But that would be yet another episode of overkill. And we're not supposed to report on things that happened in the past, but since "the past" starts anew at every heartbeat that would conveniently silence people. Also it's supposed to be bad manners and just plain Tacky to point out when "the past" is still happening. And enabled by Historical Hysterical Revisionists like Fox News, Heritage Foundation and the TeaTards and MinuteMurderers. Sure, they like to dress up and re-enact scenes from the Revolution and the Civil War ooo bad me! Naughty Wicked! I didn't call it "the war between the states". Scenes where British Colonialists rebelled over paying taxes which supported the very Colonialist armies which enabled them to remain in America in the first damn place. And killed mostly Other Colonials and British Soldiers, with a few Hessian mercenaries and of course as many American Indians as they could fit into the killing spree. I mean, that IS what the original Tea Party and Minutemen
Revisiting the Weather Underground’s 1970 pantheon of empire-fighters
Former Weatherman Bill Ayers, now a respected professor of education, was recently nominated for emeritus status but ran into trouble when a right wing blogger complained that a 1970 underground publication coauthored by Ayers, Prairie Fire, had been dedicated to Sirhan Sirhan, the assassin of Robert F. Kennedy. (Let's not leave aside the possibility that lone Sirhan was the fall guy in a conference room full of CIA operatives, the immediately the suppressed narrative, which would make Sirhan a victim among the 209 other anti-imperialist heroes to which the Weather Underground wanted to dedicate their efforts.) While hindsight might reveal the WUO to have erred with some of its honorees, it seems likely the majority might be worthy of a following up. Preceding the longer list is a preliminary dedication to the three WUO comrades who died in the NYC townhouse accident: Teddy Gold, Diana Oughton and Terry Robbins. The full page list framed this dedication: To Harriet Tubman and John Brown To all who continue to fight To all political prisoners in the US Here's the total list, for your own wiki googling, alphabetized and annotated. The dedication page of PRAIRIE FIRE changed between the varied mimeographed copies produced by WUO satellite publishers around the US between the years 1970 through 1974. Bracketed names represent people not included on all reprints. Frank Khali Abney Sundiata Acoli Ahmend Akil Eugene Allen W. T. Allen Gary Alston Michael Alston - BPP, BLA James Amaker Hekima Anna - RNA11 Karl Armstrong -New Years Eve Gang Atuma Robert Austin Richie B. Baba Kwasi Balagoon Joe Bandy [Jimmy Barett] Leon Bates Herman Bell - BPP, SF8 Odell Bennett Bro. Bernard Jesse Bishop Debbie Black Victor Gerardo Bono - MOSCA Anthony Bottoms - Jalil Abdul Muntaqim - BLM, NY3 Billy X Boulware Clarence Jabari Shinda Bount Joseph Bowen Raymond Brooks H. Rap Brown Henry Sha sha Brown - BLA Isaiah Brown Richard Brown - BPP, SF8 [Sarah Brown] Marilyn Buck Fred Burton Carter Camp - AIM Larry Cannon Michael Clark - De Mau Mau Dennis Cole Oscar Collazo - PRNP Marshal Conway Paul Coppella Andres Figueroa Cordero - PRNP Carol Crooks Tony Cruz E. Dabney Dalou James Daniels Alicia Davis Tyrone Davis Alexander de Hoyo [Albert Deutschmann] Fleeta Drumgo - SQ6 Timothy Earl Dudley Ahmed Evans Jesse Evans Keith X Farries James Fedd Stephen X Ferguson Juan Fernandez Micky Finn Fish Joe-Joe Fleischman Irving Flores - PRNP Allen Fooke Jr. Robert Foulks Eugene Gaither Thomas Gaither Denny Gathing Nathaniel Gides Frank Goree Ernest Grahm? Jim Grant Nancy Harras Jodi Jean Harris Richard Harris - BPP, Panther21 Stanley Harris James Hastings Herman Hawkins Robert Hayes Alf Hill David Hilliard - BPP Fred Hilton - Kamau Sadiki - BLA [Bruce Hobson] - Venceremos [Jean Hobson] - Venceremos Mark Holder -BLA [Doc Holiday] Louis X Holloway Hutch Thomas Ingram Andrew Jackson - BLA [Chester Jackson] Jaja Patricia James Ollie Jamonds Alfredo Jasper Anthony X Jenkins Randolph X Jenkins David Johnson - SQ6 Edward Joseph X. - Jamal - BPP, Panther21 Gari Kaiser Ron Karenga -creator of Kwanzaa Muhonnet Kassimir Ja Ja Omar Kenyatta Melvin Kearney - BLA Samuel Killey Kimanthi Kin-Du Stephanie Klein Komie Kombuibe Lolita Lebron - PRNP Russell Little - SLA Jesse Lopez Hugh Lumpkin Albert Lyon Gail Madden Ruchell Cinque Magee - SQ6 Louise Martinez Randy McCleary George Meritt Gloria Miller Armado Miramon Rafael Miranda - PRNP Rose Mohrstine Gilbert Montague Richard Dhoruba Moore Obgarofowe James Morse Benjamin Murdock [Morton Newman] - Venceremos Roy Nixt Karrim Nyabadfudi Imari Obadele - RNA11 Odessabakely Alberto Ortiz Jacqueline Paige Charles Parker Darrell Peatry - De Mau Mau Betty Person Hugo Pinnell - SQ6 William Poole William Prather Eller Geronimo Pratt Euther X Presha Arthur Prince Offaga Quaddus - RNA11 Oji Outlaw T. S. Reddy Joseph Remiro - SLA Harrison Robison Rock Norma Rockamore Eddy Sanchez Rodolfe Sanchez Marvin Saunders Ruben Scott - BPP [Robert Seabrock] - Venceremos Assata Shakur Shango Harold Simmons John Simone Samual Singeton Sirhan Sirhan Marvin X Smith Nathaniel Smith Martin Sostre
Marlon Brando’s lost Oscar speech
In 1973 Marlon Brando declined a best actor award for the Godfather in solidarity with the American Indian. Yada yada yada, only that much we remember. Something to do with Wounded Knee, but the average American might be excused for confusing the massacre of 300 Lakota in 1890, the contemporary deadly FBI-AIM confrontation, and Dee Brown's bestseller. A new documentary Reel Injun, about Hollywood's skewed portrayal of Native Americans, unearths Apache Sasheen Littlefeather's incredibly poised delivery of Brando's Oscar message. Littlefeather was confined by time limits to present only this abbreviation, interrupted by audience booing and then simultaneous applause. Youtube has the clip, for which the transcript is below. "Marlon Brando ... has asked me to tell you, in a very long speech which I cannot share with you presently —because of time— but I will be glad to share with the press afterward, that he must... very regretfully cannot accept this very generous award. And the reason for this being... are the treatment of American Indians today by the film industry… excuse me… and on television in movie re-runs, and also the recent happenings at Wounded Knee. I beg at this time that I have not intruded upon this evening and that we will, in the future…our hearts and our understanding will meet with love and generosity. Thank you on behalf of Marlon Brando." Brando's formal statement was released to reporters after the ceremonies. For 200 years we have said to the Indian people who are fighting for their land, their life, their families and their right to be free: ''Lay down your arms, my friends, and then we will remain together. Only if you lay down your arms, my friends, can we then talk of peace and come to an agreement which will be good for you.''? When they laid down their arms, we murdered them. We lied to them. We cheated them out of their lands. We starved them into signing fraudulent agreements that we called treaties which we never kept. We turned them into beggars on a continent that gave life for as long as life can remember. And by any interpretation of history, however twisted, we did not do right. We were not lawful nor were we just in what we did. For them, we do not have to restore these people, we do not have to live up to some agreements, because it is given to us by virtue of our power to attack the rights of others, to take their property, to take their lives when they are trying to defend their land and liberty, and to make their virtues a crime and our own vices virtues.? ? But there is one thing which is beyond the reach of this perversity and that is the tremendous verdict of history. And history will surely judge us. But do we care? What kind of moral schizophrenia is it that allows us to shout at the top of our national voice for all the world to hear that we live
How to discuss the “mosque rule” at the Powwow… Suggestions?
The Powwow will be September 25 at Rock Ledge Ranch, "technically" according to the West Side Pioneer, local newsletter, a part of the Garden of the Gods. Which is a sacred site for American Indians. The same people who put this really offensive sign up at Bancroft Park that Old Colorado City was the first "permanent settlement" in the region. Meaning, the First Permanent WHITE Settlement. By the way, there's a town bordering Ft Worth called White Settlement. Name says it all, too. You can get arrested for the crime of "Being, while Black or Brown" but I digress. Neglects the fact that even the Anasazi had settlements throughout the region, most within 300 miles of here. People in our International audience might not think that's close, but in the Western United States, that's known as "right around the corner". Even the migrant tribes had their regular spots that they "migrated" to every year. Much like Rich Folks who have a summer home in the Hamptons and a winter play-house in Vail or Aspen and the beach house in Nassau, and the long term lease on that chateau in Monte Carlo. Only not exactly on a "at whim" basis. But the Garden of the Gods, and the Medicine Wheel at Standing Bear Butte, indeed the entire Black Hills, and Hueco Tanks, and The Iowa Bluffs, all have gotten the status of being places where people can worship freely in the past 32 years. The American Indian Religious Freedom Act was passed in 1978. What Custer was trying to break up at Little Bighorn was a RELIGIOUS GATHERING. A "punitive" expedition because several of the Tribes met on grounds the U.S. Government flatly refused to recognize as neutral. They assigned each tribe a reservation and told them to stay on those reservations. The gathering at Little Bighorn was to make medicine against a white folks encroachment on not only Reservation Land, but holy ground, at Deadwood. By the way, if you buy "Black Hills Gold" you're buying into the murder of the Black Hills, which are regarded as the Heart of the World. It goes beyond the example of the Mount Rushmore statues being like breaking into the Vatican and carving your name on all the walls. There was a Colorado Statute that forbade, on pain of DEATH, practicing the American Indian rituals. The Garden of the Gods is ringed by interloping "private" properties which were built in defiance of the treaties establishing it as a religious site. One of them built by General William Jackson Palmer, Real Estate Thief and Corporate Welfare Recipient Extraordinaire. His idolatrous statue is parked in the middle of the intersection of Platte and Nevada right by Acacia Park. The "good christian" City Leaders who considered and still consider the Indian rituals to be satanic have no problem at all with breaking the commandment about Graven Images and Idolatry when it comes to worship of Murderous Thieves like Palmer and Custer. What's that you said, Jonah? STILL oppose the Religious Freedom of
One of the stories pushed aside in favor of fluff…
Former chief of the Cherokee nation, Wilma Mankiller, passed away of pancreatic cancer on Tuesday. Her memorial services are today in Talequah, the capital of the Cherokee nation in Oklahoma.
An Idea whose time has come…
Seriously, since the NeoCons still insist that we have Hegemony over the entire known Universe, a religious belief that we are so much better than the rest of the world that we owe it to them to run their countries for them... then why not grant each person in each Conque errr... "Liberated" country full United States Citizenship? My soon-to-be brother in law is Tongan by birth, he very seldom goes TO Tonga and was raised in Hawaii from the time he was about a year old. Homeland Security cleared him soon after 9/11, he had a job at DFW loading meals onto flights for AA. One time some Fearful Freak Redneck got all nine-eleven nine-eleven nine-eleven stupid about a Large Dark-skinned fellow being on the plane with his Obviously Non-Racist Arse. Stupid fears, held by stupid people. So he was going to marry my sister last week. Cool, eh? But I.C.E. has to have the last word on everything, he didn't have his ORIGINAL Birth Certificate, so the Frightened Ones wouldn't let them get their marriage license until he proves (apparently with something more than the huge file that the Frightened Feds keep on every "foreign national", even and especially those who grew up here) that he is who he says he is. I mean, come the hell on, they've got hair samples (do you think for a moment that a Racist and Fascist Totalitarian Police State wouldn't have that? think not? Welcome to the REAL world, check your delusions at the door upon entrance) fingerprints, biometrics, iris scans, etc etc etc... as well as a dossier of his entire life history, but he can't get his ID card updated without proving who he is without his Original Birth Certificate. One of Miss Johnnies sons was born on Guam, but they didn't make it to the Air Force Base hospital so he wasn't on U.S. soil. Even though the U.S. Military runs Guam any way they see fit, but only in the Proper Neo-Colonialist Manner, they only beat the Wogs three times a week. How Very Civilized of them. So he's a citizen, both his parents including his dad who died from Agent Orange in service to the USAF, were citizens, but there's still that Birth Certificate bullshit. My other sister, Audrey, same way, born at home off base in London... Citizen, but not "native". And, has trouble getting her Drivers License renewed because of that Original Birth Certificate. Which is purest bullshit, just like the manufactured FAKE scandal about President Obama's Birth Certificate. Guam and Tonga were added to the "not really conquered vassal possessions even though we treat them as such" list through the Wondrous agency of World War 2. And kept in such bondage by the U.S. Military "needing" the bases in THEIR countries in order to maintain our delusion of Masters over sea and land. "We goddamn OWN the world, so we NEED those bases to keep the Peasant Natives from thinking they own their own countries!" Audrey was born
NLG DU chapter hosts Ward Churchill
DENVER- Ward Churchill will speak Tues, Oct 7, 12-1pm at DU's Sturm College of Law, Room 180, on THE MYTH OF ACADEMIC FREEDOM, sponsored by the National Lawyers Guild. Detractors are already raising a stir. They're not scholars, what stake do they have in repudiating Churchill's work? If they are simply cheerleading the Eichmann-remark backlash which led to Churchill's dismissal, the charges of plagiarism seem to have already been debunked. Churchill's colleagues have weighed in with their testimony, and leading academics have likewise spoken against the actions taken against him. Nevertheless, the National Lawyers Guild got some flak for sponsoring this lecture. Here's a note circulated to its members: Dear NLG: I am dismayed that you are sponsoring a talk by Ward Churchill. I do not regard him as a fit spokesperson for the progressive movement. While his firing was undoubtedly motivated by the opprobrium engendered by his outrageous and ill-considered comparison of the people in the World Trade Center to Adolf Eichmann, the grounds cited by the University of Colorado for his firing are plagiarism, a serious breach of academic ethics. Churchill is a fourth-rate thinker, he should not have been granted a doctoral degree in the first place, and he should not now be able to peddle his mediocre cant on the lecture circuit -- why are you enabling him to do so, and why do imagine that he is qualified to address the issue of academic freedom in general? It is clear that his comments were not made pursuant to his work as an academic, so whether his firing was justified or not, his case is hardly exemplary of the infringement of academic freedom. I do not plan to attend. I'll withhold the idiot's name. But let's look into what the email author did not, before opening his trap to parrot the usual disinfo talking points. From Tom Mayer, Department of Sociology, University of Colorado at Boulder: The research misconduct charges against Ward Churchill are of two general kinds: charges of faulty research and charges of plagiarism. The faulty research accusations have been largely discredited through the efforts of professors Eric Cheyfitz, Michael Yellow Bird, David Stannard, Huanani-Kay Trask, James Craven, Ruth Hsu, and others. These independent scholars, all of whom are intimately familiar with Native American history and culture, have shown that the Report of the Investigative Committee (henceforth called Report) finding Churchill guilty of research misconduct contains numerous errors of omission and commission. The Report improperly converts legitimate scholarly controversies into indictments of the positions taken by Professor Churchill. ... Procedural fairness in modern jurisprudence requires that accusation, formal charging, decisions about evidence, and imposition of penalties should be clearly separated. This has not happened in the case of Ward Churchill. The CU administration, usually in the person of Provost Philip DiStefano, has functioned as Churchill’s accuser, grand jury, tribunal selector, and sentencing judge. This concatenation of roles makes it easy for political motivations to penetrate