Dead Indians irrelevant to Reagan

Guatemala Genocide Conviction Should Prompt More Just Vision for American Continent

By Roberto Cintli RodriguezThroughout the duration of the Ríos Montt dictatorship, his regime was the bloodiest on the American continent. Why did the world permit his brutality, and why did it take more than 30 years to successfully prosecute him? His genocidal campaigns, in full view to the world, were committed in real time.

The simple answer is the actions--and inactions--of US President Ronald Reagan, the man who provided cover for every tin-pot dictator on the continent. A better answer is the preeminence of "America," with its mythological foundation and narrative. The best answer is the actions--or rather, inertia--of the citizens of the United States of America. It is we who permitted the atrocities of not simply this dictator, but all the military dictators on the continent during that bloodthirsty era.

The majority of US voters put Reagan in office, not once, but twice ... and then rewarded his imperial reign by subsequently electing his vice president, Papa Bush, into office. And then he got airports, freeways and buildings named after him.

Former Congressman Dennis Kucinich recently called for a truth and reconciliation commission to investigate how the United States got itself into Afghanistan, Iraq and Pakistan (plus Yemen and Somalia). That would be an important step. However, before it takes place, a commission must be created to examine the US role in Central America, primarily in the 1980s, which resulted in the deaths and disappearances of hundreds of thousands of civilians from Guatemala, El Salvador, Nicaragua and Honduras. All these wars were financed by US tax dollars. All those ruthless dictators and their leading military officers were trained by the US military. Yet in Reagan-speak, the United States was simply spreading democracy (with heavy weaponry) in Central America--the same goal Bush claimed in launching the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. And from a Reagan-based perspective, the hundreds of thousands of Central American victims were little brown people whose lives were irrelevant.Comment:  Dead Indians were also irrelevant to the politicians--most of them conservatives--who also supported Central American thugs and killers. That's because these politicians are racist at the core.

Ronald Reagan and killing Indians, see Guatemalan Dictator Charged with Genocide and Reagan Aided Atrocities Against Indians.

Below:  "Ronald Reagan campaigning in the Central Coast area in the 1960s." (Photo: Fresh Conservative/flickr)

"Apache" shot Reagan during filming

A story about filming the TV series Death Valley Days, with Ronald Reagan as the host, in 1964:

Reagan accidentally shot by 'Apache' during filming

By Bill DonovanMartin Link, who was director of the Navajo museum at the time, said he remembers that quite well because Reagan made the front pages of papers all over the world because of his encounter with one Navajo during the filming of that episodes.

Reagan was an Army officer in that episode and Navajos were hired to play Apaches--something that happened quite often in those days. In the scene, Reagan's troop was supposed to be fighting the Apaches and bullets, arrows and lances were flying all over the place.

Of course, the bullets were blanks but the arrows and lances were real and the "Apaches" were told that they were to keep all of these dangerous objects away from Reagan and the other "soldiers."

Of course, something happened and Reagan was hit in the leg with either a lance or an arrow and was taken to St. Mary's Hospital to be treated, said Link. It turned out to be a minor wound and Reagan was not in any real danger of losing his life but the story got a lot of play in the media because of Reagan's popularity.Comment:  For more on Ronald Reagan and Indians, see Thoughts on Casino Jack Documentary and Guatemalan Dictator Charged with Genocide.

Thoughts on Casino Jack documentary

I recently watched Casino Jack and the United States of Money, a documentary on the Jack Abramoff scandal. I followed the story when it unfolded in the early-to-mid 2000s, of course. But this documentary put everything in context and helped cement the information in my mind.

Abramoff's Indian lobbying scandal was perhaps the worst of his crimes. You may recall these highlights:Abramoff and his partner Scanlon are alleged to have engaged in a series of corrupt practices in connection to their lobbying work for various Indian gaming tribes. The fees paid to Abramoff and Scanlon for this work are believed to exceed $85 million.

In particular, Abramoff and Scanlon were alleged to have conspired with Washington power broker Grover Norquist and Christian activist Ralph Reed to coordinate lobbying against his own clients and prospective clients with the objective of forcing them to engage Abramoff and Scanlon to lobby against their own covert operations. Reed was paid to campaign against gambling interests that competed with Abramoff clients.And:In emails now made public by the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs, which is investigating his activities, Abramoff repeatedly referred to Native Americans as "monkeys," "troglodites," and "morons."

Abramoff once asked his co-conspirator Scanlon to meet a client, saying in an email, "I have to meet with the monkeys from the Choctaw tribal council. You need to close the deal... with the client..." In another email message he wrote, "we need to get some money from those monkeys!!"More interesting to me was the history leading up to this scandal. Here are some thoughts I posted as I watched Casino Jack:

Roots of Tea Party hate

The doc makes it clear that the Republican Tea Party = hate and intolerance = lies and hypocrisy was launched by Reagan, Rove, Norquist, Ralph Reed, and Jack Abramoff in the 1980s.

he Young Republicans watched Patton and substituted "liberals" for "Nazis" in Patton's speech urging death to the evildoers.

Norquist modeled himself on Lenin in terms of using lies and propaganda to foment a revolution.

"Hostage shame" helped spur the Young Republicans in the '80s. Shame at letting 9/11 happen helped spur the Republicans in the 2000s.

So it's all about proving their manhood without, you know, actually going to war. Hence today's war on women, opposition to gay marriage, and love of guns. Real men are strong and tough, not weak and compassionate.

Obviously the Young Republicans weren't in office or setting policy then. But they were creating the ideology of worshiping Reagan as a demi-god, drowning government in a bathtub, and vilifying liberals as traitors. Which led directly to the Tea Party and today's partisan gridlock.

The Young Republicans compared themselves to James Bond and Indiana Jones. They thought of themselves as heroic "freedom fighters," the moral equivalent of the Founding Fathers. "The cult of the freedom fighter," says Thomas Frank.

Hence their similarities to the Taliban, the "freedom fighters" whom Reagan was talking about. As well as to Hitler, Stalin, and Lenin.

Which explains why they loved so many thuggish dictators. And why they love America's present security state. To them, iron-fisted rule = freedom (from liberal values).

Killers = "freedom fighters"

Jonas Savimbi's UNITA was financed by apartheid South Africa. It "was famous for kidnapping thousands of children, turning vast farmlands into minefields, and murdering political opponents."

The Young Republicans considered Savimbi one of them because he was a man who stood up to Communism. The way Patton would've done: by crushing and killing the bad guys.

Maybe the Young Republicans learned their dogma from the robot in Lost in Space. Crush, kill, destroy!

Reagan sent Savimbi a letter and a George Washington bowl as a token of support. Thus launching Reagan's career of backing right-wing oppressors and murderers.

Americans in general and conservatives in particular like to invent an enemy to prove themselves against. Sort of a national manhood test. Previous enemies have included Indians, immigrants, unions, Nazis, and Commies. The present enemy is "terrorists" (Muslims), with China coming on strong.

Written and produced by Jack Abramoff, the movie Red Scorpion was a fictionalized version of the Angola conflict with a white super-soldier (Dolph Lundgren) helping a noble black freedom fighter overthrow the dirty Commies.

First taste of power

The Republican revolution reached fruition in 1994, when Newt Gingrich led the party takeover of both houses of Congress. It began with demonizing women, "secularist humanists," and others who weren't white male Christians at the 1992 convention--the beginning of the so-called "culture wars."

After demonizing Clinton for invented scandals (Whitewater), gay rights, and healthcare reform, they made their big play: their first, but not last, attempt to shut down the government. Does this sound familiar?

Gingrich had close ties to Norquist and Reed. So the Lenin/Patton/Savimbi wannabes were nearing the reins of power.

"Under Ralph Reed, the Christian Coalition became a political powerhouse." Reed campaigned with Pat Robertson against unmarried sex, gambling, and abortion. (Two of three issues aimed at keeping women in the kitchen and bedroom.)

This is when Norquist became an anti-tax crusader and made his "drown government in a bathtub" comment. He founded the K Street project to pressure lobbyists to fire Democrats and hire Republicans.

Norquist promoted House Majority Leader Tom DeLay as the "hammer" to get Republican legislation through Congress. Their goal was to eliminate rules and regulations on corporations. Abramoff turned to lobbying and promised access to DeLay, whom he took on trips around the world.

Marianas = capitalist dream

Tom DeLay began implementing the former Young Republicans' corrupt schemes. Perhaps the most interesting one was in the Marianas Islands. Some thoughts on that:

DeLay explicitly touted the Marianas as a free-enterprise zone. It's a perfect example of what happens when you don't regulate capitalism.

Jack Abramoff CNMI scandalIn testimony before the Senate, it was described that 91% of the private-sector workforce were immigrants, and were being paid barely half the U.S. minimum hourly wage. Stories also emerged of workers forced to live behind barbed wire in squalid shacks without plumbing. A Department of the Interior report found that "Chinese women were subject to forced abortions and that women and children were subject to forced prostitution in the local sex-tourism industry." The Senate passed the Murkowski worker reform bill unanimously. The bill was then blocked by Tom DeLay in the house.Abramoff ties cloud Schaffer's '99 fact-finding tripAt heart of the issue is the islands' massive textile industry, which is exempted from the U.S. minimum wage as well as most American immigration laws. The Northern Marianas economy is built on thousands of workers from China, the Philippines and Bangladesh, some of whom pay labor recruiters as much as $7,000 to land a job on U.S. soil.

A class-action lawsuit filed the year Schaffer toured the islands alleged that many of those workers lived in slum conditions, housed seven to a room in barracks surrounded by barbed wire designed to keep the workers in. Workers in some factories labored 12 hours a day, seven days a week, the suit alleged—without pay if they fell behind set quotas.

A U.S. Interior Department investigation found that pregnant workers were forced to get illegal abortions or lose their jobs. Some were recruited for factories but forced into the sex trade instead.

The islands' factories were cited by the U.S. Department of Labor more than 1,000 times for safety violations in the late 1990s.

"There were some examples of problems that we found, and we raised those with the equivalent of the attorney general," Schaffer said of his visit. But in many others, "the workers were smiling; they were happy."

Said Matthew Miller, spokesman for the Democratic Senate Campaign Committee: "The fact that (Schaffer) sided against the human rights of those workers, not just then, but still today, shows he was more interested in doing the bidding of the people who set up the trip than in actually investigating abuses."

At the time, those alleged abuses and a push by the Clinton administration led to a flurry of congressional action. Several bills passed the Senate that would have brought the islands' factories under stricter American laws, but the legislation failed in the House.

Hired by factory owners and the government of the Commonwealth of Northern Mariana Islands, Abramoff and his firm were paid more than $11 million over nine years to fend off those efforts, according to reports.Conservative Congressmen on "fact-finding" pleasure junkets didn't notice anything wrong. Until someone met with a worker who offered to sell a kidney so he could pay off his debt and go home. Wow.

This is what Tom DeLay wanted to turn America into, too. It's what the Republican Party still wants.

You're a freakin' idiot if you don't understand this. Read a history book about sweatshops and child labor. Or look at the evidence in front of your face. Unregulated capitalism => indentured servitude if not slave labor.

Mini-review

Casino Jack uses entertaining techniques to keep the story interesting. For example, it didn't rely on static screen images of text with the key passages highlighted. Instead, actors Stanley Tucci and Paul Rudd dramatized e-mail exchanges while a shadowy figure typed the messages and the letters appeared on the screen.

When the conspirators met during a racquetball game, Casino Jack showed two people playing to illustrate the words. When someone talked about showering money on politicians, a rain of dollar bills fell from the sky. Little things like this were effective in bringing the story alive.

I'd say the first two-thirds of the documentary--from Abramoff's beginnings through the Indian gaming scandal--were intriguing. But as Abramoff became involved in several more scandals, the story became more convoluted and harder to follow. I guess the SunCruz Casinos scandal was integral to Abramoff's arrest, trial, and conviction, but I would've spent less time on these scandals. The meat of the story is how Abramoff became a super-lobbyist, not what happened after he did.

Anyway, Casino Jack and the United States of Money is an eye-opening look at how corrupt our politics have become. If you think our government still follows the Founding Fathers' noble ideals, you need to watch this documentary. Rob's rating: 8.0 of 10.

For more on the movie, see Summing Up the Abramoff Scandal and Preview of Casino Jack. For more on related subjects, see The Facts About Indian Gaming and The Best Indian Movies.

Below:  Jack Abramoff.

Guatemalan dictator charged with genocide

Efraín Ríos Montt: Guatemala human rights groups welcome genocide trial

Judge rules that Guatemala's former dictator Efraín Ríos Montt must face charges of genocide and crimes against humanity

By Rory CarrollHuman rights groups celebrated on Friday after a court in Guatemala ruled that the former dictator Efraín Ríos Montt, who presided over one of Latin America's bloodiest civil wars, will face trial on charges of genocide and crimes against humanity.

Members of the Ixil tribe, which suffered horrific atrocities at the hands of the army, said they had waited decades for this moment but expressed disappointment that the retired general was placed under house arrest rather than jailed.

After a day-long hearing, Judge Carol Patricia Flores Blanco ruled on Thursday that there was sufficient evidence linking Ríos Montt to the massacre of 1,700 indigenous people during his 17-month rule in 1982 and 1983.

The judge agreed with prosecutors who said the 85-year-old, as head of the government at the time, should answer for the armed forces' actions. It was one of the more brutal phases of a 36-year conflict which ended in 1996 after claiming 200,000 lives. The trial's preliminary hearing was scheduled for March.Comment:  ‎"The Reagan administration armed and supported Ríos Montt, calling him a bulwark against communism," the article adds. Can we put Reagan on trial posthumously for his crimes against humanity?

I guess we've tried political and military leaders for genocide in Cambodia and Rwanda. And Milosevic for "ethnic cleansing" in the Balkans. But I'm not sure we've ever tried a head of state for the genocide of indigenous people.

In any case, this is a shift in the right direction. Perhaps a paradigm shift. Never again will tyrants be able to kill their own people without fearing the consequences.

For more on the subject, see Racism Against Guatemala's Indians and Reagan Aided Atrocities Against Indians.

Below:  Cowboy helped kill Indians...same as it ever was.

Reagan aided atrocities against Indians

Ronald Reagan, Enabler of Atrocities

By Robert Parry[E]ven as the United States celebrates Reagan’s centennial birthday and lavishes praise on his supposed accomplishments, very little time has been spent reflecting on the unnecessary bloodbaths that Reagan enabled in many parts of the world.

Those grisly deaths and ugly tortures get whisked away as if they were just small necessities in Reagan’s larger success “winning the Cold War”--even though the competition between the United States and the Soviet Union was already winding down before Reagan arrived on the national scene.

Yet, Reagan’s Cold War obsessions helped unleash right-wing “death squads” and murderous militaries on the common people in many parts of the Third World, but nowhere worse than in Latin America.It's not well-known, but many of these "common people" were Indians:In April 1981, a secret CIA cable described a massacre at Cocob, near Nebaj in the Ixil Indian territory. On April 17, 1981, government troops attacked the area believed to support leftist guerrillas, the cable said.

According to a CIA source, "the social population appeared to fully support the guerrillas" and "the soldiers were forced to fire at anything that moved." The CIA cable added that "the Guatemalan authorities admitted that 'many civilians' were killed in Cocob, many of whom undoubtedly were non-combatants."

Despite the CIA account and other similar reports, Reagan permitted Guatemala's army to buy $3.2 million in military trucks and jeeps in June 1981. To permit the sale, Reagan removed the vehicles from a list of military equipment that was covered by the human rights embargo.

Confident of Reagan’s sympathies, the Guatemalan government continued its political repression without apology.And:On Feb. 25, 1999, a Guatemalan truth commission issued a report on the staggering human rights crimes that Reagan and his administration had aided, abetted and concealed.

The Historical Clarification Commission, an independent human rights body, estimated that the Guatemalan conflict claimed the lives of some 200,000 people with the most savage bloodletting occurring in the 1980s.

Based on a review of about 20 percent of the dead, the panel blamed the army for 93 percent of the killings and leftist guerrillas for three percent. Four percent were listed as unresolved.

The report documented that in the 1980s, the army committed 626 massacres against Mayan villages. "The massacres that eliminated entire Mayan villages … are neither perfidious allegations nor figments of the imagination, but an authentic chapter in Guatemala's history," the commission concluded.

The army "completely exterminated Mayan communities, destroyed their livestock and crops," the report said. In the northern highlands, the report termed the slaughter "genocide."

Besides carrying out murder and "disappearances," the army routinely engaged in torture and rape. "The rape of women, during torture or before being murdered, was a common practice" by the military and paramilitary forces, the report found.

The report added that the "government of the United States, through various agencies including the CIA, provided direct and indirect support for some [of these] state operations." The report concluded that the U.S. government also gave money and training to a Guatemalan military that committed "acts of genocide" against the Mayans.Comment:  200,000 Guatemalans, most of them Indians, killed. The Reagan administration knew about the deaths but did nothing to stop them. Instead, it encouraged and aided the killers.

A recent poll said today's increasingly conservative Americans think Reagan is the best president ever. They probably think highly of George W. Bush, whose death toll is also in the hundreds of thousands, too. Meanwhile, there's no love for George Washington (strong central government), Abraham Lincoln (government support for blacks), or Theodore Roosevelt (government regulation of industry).

For more on the subject, see Rob's Reply to Reagan.

Teabaggers lie about Thanksgiving

Apparently Rush Limbaugh didn't just make up his lies about Thanksgiving. They're part of the standard teabagger prevarication along with Obama's birth certificate and "death panels."

The Pilgrims Were ... Socialists?

By Kate ZernikeIn one common telling, the pilgrims who came to Plymouth established a communal system, where all had to pool whatever they hunted or grew on their lands. Because they could not reap the fruits of their labors, no one had any incentive to work, and the system failed—confusion, thievery and famine ensued.

Finally, the governor of the colony, William Bradford, abolished this system and gave each household a parcel of land. With private property to call their own, the Pilgrims were suddenly very industrious and found themselves with more corn than they knew what to do with. So they invited the Indians over to celebrate. (In some other versions, the first Thanksgiving is not a feast but a brief respite from famine. But the moral is always the same: socialism doesn’t work.) The same commune-to-capitalism, famine-to-feast story is told of Jamestown, the first English settlement, in 1607. Dick Armey, the former House majority leader and Texas congressman who has become a Tea Party promoter, related it as a cautionary tale in a speech to the National Press Club earlier this year.

Rush Limbaugh repeats the Thanksgiving story of Plymouth every year, reading it from a chapter in one of his books titled “Dead White Guys, or What Your History Books Never Told You.” (Some details change; one year, he had the Pilgrims growing organic vegetables.)

The version is also taught in a one-day course called “The Making of America,” which became popular with Tea Party groups across the country after Glenn Beck recommended the work of its author, W. Cleon Skousen, who died in 2006. Tea Party blogs have reposted “The Great Thanksgiving Hoax” from a Web site celebrating the work of the libertarian economist Ludwig von Mises, a favorite of Ron Paul devotees. The post concludes: “Thus the real reason for Thanksgiving, deleted from the official story, is: Socialism does not work; the one and only source of abundance is free markets, and we thank God we live in a country where we can have them.”

Leave aside the question of whether this country is on the march to socialism (conservatives say yes, and blame the Democrats). What does the record say?

Historians say that the settlers in Plymouth, and their supporters in England, did indeed agree to hold their property in common—William Bradford, the governor, referred to it in his writings as the “common course.” But the plan was in the interest of realizing a profit sooner, and was only intended for the short term; historians say the Pilgrims were more like shareholders in an early corporation than subjects of socialism.

“It was directed ultimately to private profit,” said Richard Pickering, a historian of early America and the deputy director of Plimoth Plantation, a museum devoted to keeping the Pilgrims’ story alive.

The arrangement did not produce famine. If it had, Bradford would not have declared the three days of sport and feasting in 1621 that became known as the first Thanksgiving. “The celebration would never have happened if the harvest was going to be less than enough to get them by,” Mr. Pickering said. “They would have saved it and rationed it to get by.”

The competing versions of the story note Bradford’s writings about “confusion and discontent” and accusations of “laziness” among the colonists. But Mr. Pickering said this grumbling had more to do with the fact that the Plymouth colony was bringing together settlers from all over England, at a time when most people never moved more than 10 miles from home. They spoke different dialects and had different methods of farming, and looked upon each other with great wariness.

“One man’s laziness is another man’s industry, based on the agricultural methods they’ve learned as young people,” he said.

Bradford did get rid of the common course—but it was in 1623, after the first Thanksgiving, and not because the system wasn’t working. The Pilgrims just didn’t like it. In the accounts of colonists, Mr. Pickering said, “there was griping and groaning.”

“Bachelors didn’t want to feed the wives of married men, and women don’t want to do the laundry of the bachelors,” he said.

The real reason agriculture became more profitable over the years, Mr. Pickering said, is that the Pilgrims were getting better at farming crops like corn that had been unknown to them in England.Comment:  You don't have to be a historian to dissect the conservatives' lies. Let's go straight to the source: History of Plymouth Plantation by William Bradford.

In a section labeled "Private and communal farming (1623)," Bradford does speak highly of privately owning land and its effect on the colonists:All this while no supply was heard of, neither knew they when they might expect any. So they began to think how they might raise as much corn as they could, and obtain a better crop than they had done, that they might not still thus languish in misery. At length, after much debate of things, the Governor (with the advice of the chiefest amongst them) gave way that they should set corn every man for his own particular, and in that regard trust to themselves; in all other thing to go on in the general way as before. And so assigned to every family a parcel of land, according to the proportion of their number, for that end, only for present use (but made no division for inheritance) and ranged all boys and youth under some family. This had very good success, for it made all hands very industrious, so as much more corn was planted than otherwise would have been by any means the Governor or any other could use, and saved him a great deal of trouble, and gave far better content. The women now went willingly into the field, and took their little ones with them to set corn; which before would allege weakness and inability; whom to have compelled would have been thought great tyranny and oppression.Sounds important, but in a section labeled "First harvest (1621)," he also speaks highly of the harvest under the "common course":They began now to gather in the small harvest they had, and to fit up their houses and dwellings against winter, being all well recovered in health and strength and had all things in good plenty. For as some were thus employed in affairs abroad, others were exercised in fishing, about cod and bass and other fish, of which they took good store, of which every family had their portion. All the summer there was no want; and now began to come in store of fowl, as winter approached, of which this place did abound when they came first (but afterward decreased by degrees). And besides waterfowl there was a great store of wild turkeys, of which they took many, besides venison, etc. Besides they had about a peck a meal a week to a person, or now since harvest, Indian corn to the proportion. Which made many afterwards write so largely of their plenty here to their friends in England, which were not feigned but true reports.Celebrating "plenty" in 1621

How much clearer could Bradford have made it? The first harvest provided more than enough for everyone. That's why the Pilgrims celebrated with a three-day feast. If they'd still been suffering, they wouldn't have had enough food for the feast. And they wouldn't have wanted to hold one.

While most Americans commemorate the Thanksgiving of 1621, teabaggers are trying to rewrite history. Here's an idea, you lying sacks of excrement: If you think 1623 was the first harvest worth celebrating, denounce your fellow Americans who don't know any better. Tell them to knock off all the displays, pageants, and parades featuring the Pilgrims and Indians eating together. Protest and march until everyone--churches, textbook publishers, even Plymouth Plantation itself--understands that we're commemorating the wrong Thanksgiving.

Be sure to condemn your fellow conservatives most harshly, because they're the most likely to regurgitate the standard myth. For instance, Ronald Reagan didn't know anything about a failed harvest in 1621. He repeatedly told Americans the same story Obama reiterated decades later.

Until you denounce Reagan and other liberal dupes, teabaggers, you're a craven bunch of liars and hypocrites. You don't believe what you're saying; you're simply fabricating history to promote your far-right agenda. You're just like the Communists and the Nazis: You hope that if you tell a big enough lie, people will start believing you.

For more teabagger lies, see Beck Slams Tribal Flag Song, Islamophobia Just Like Stephen's, and Teabaggers = Constitutional Hypocrites.

Reagan wrong about Thanksgiving?!

How do you know when a teabagger is lying? When he opens his mouth.

Once again teabaggers have rewritten reality--this time to claim the Pilgrims' harvest of 1621 was bad. They think the first good harvest wasn't until 1623, when the Pilgrims switched to a private system of land ownership. In other words, they think the bountiful first Thanksgiving is a myth and we should be celebrating the third Thanksgiving instead.

Somehow the liberal/socialist/godless academia/media/elite must've gotten to conservative icon Ronald Reagan. Because he believed the same things most Americans believe. Here's what Reagan said about the Thanksgiving of 1621:Proclamation 4883--November 12, 1981

On this day of thanksgiving, it is appropriate that we recall the first thanksgiving, celebrated in the autumn of 1621. After surviving a bitter winter, the Pilgrims planted and harvested a bountiful crop. After the harvest they gathered their families together and joined in celebration and prayer with the native Americans who had taught them so much.

Proclamation 5098--September 15, 1983

Since the Pilgrims observed the initial Thanksgiving holiday in 1621, this occasion has served as a singular expression of the transcending spiritual values that played an instrumental part in the founding of our country.

Proclamation 5269--October 19, 1984

As we remember the faith and values that made America great, we should recall that our tradition of Thanksgiving is older than our Nation itself. Indeed, the native American Thanksgiving antedated those of the new Americans. In the words of the eloquent Seneca tradition of the Iroquois, "…give it your thought, that with one mind we may now give thanks to Him our Creator."

From the first Pilgrim observance in 1621, to the nine years before and during the American Revolution when the Continental Congress declared days of Fast and Prayer and days of Thanksgiving, we have turned to Almighty God to express our gratitude for the bounty and good fortune we enjoy as individuals and as a nation. America truly has been blessed.

Proclamation 5412--November 15, 1985

A band of settlers arriving in Maine in 1607 held a service of thanks for their safe journey, and twelve years later settlers in Virginia set aside a day of thanksgiving for their survival. In 1621 Governor William Bradford created the most famous of all such observances at Plymouth Colony when a bounteous harvest prompted him to proclaim a special day "to render thanksgiving to the Almighty God for all His blessings." The Spaniards in California and the Dutch in New Amsterdam also held services to give public thanks to God.Comment:  Will Limbaugh and other teabagger scum denounce Reagan the way they've denounced Obama? Because Reagan and Obama repeated the same myths uttered by every president since Lincoln.

Or will the party faithful rise up and denounce Limbaugh and company for their lies? Because Obama's Thanksgiving proclamation was exactly as valid as Reagan's were.

Don't hold your breath waiting for either outcome. As far as I can tell, there isn't a teabagger alive who has a shred of integrity.

For more on Ronald Reagan and Indians, see Name Alpine School for Reagan? and Rob's Reply to Reagan.

Name Alpine school for Reagan?

Editor's Blog:  GUHSD Committee Should Check Reagan Record on Native American Issues Before Naming Alpine High School for Former President

By Miriam RafteryIn 1988, while on a visit to Moscow, President Reagan responded to a university student’s question about Native Americans. Referring to tribal reservations, he said, “Maybe we made a mistake. Maybe we should have humored them” for “wanting to stay in that kind of primitive lifestyle.”

The remark was deemed offensive by Native Americans, as a New York Times letter to the editor from a Cornell University’s American Indian program visiting professor noted.

In an open letter to President Reagan signed Mitakuye Oyasin (All our relations), the American Indian Movement of Colorado termed Regan's comments about Indians as primitives "insulting" and "ignorant." The group also took offense at a Reagan comment suggesting Indians had become wealthy from oil under reservation lands. Its letter cited the Arizona Republic, which reported that Reagan's administration allowed oil companies to drain $5.7 billion in oil royalties from Indian and other federal lands and that Reagan's Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) officials "repeatedly sided with oil companies against Indian nations and individuals who are due royalties, but are left in poverty." Healthcare funds for Indian health were deeply cut in the Reagan years. In addition, removing incentives for physicians to work on remote reservations led to a shortage of physicians to treat Native Americans, AIM observed.

Indian Country Today, in a 2004 article titled “Assessing the Presidents: Ronald Reagan,” note that those remarks dovetailed with “the worst of his Indian-specific practices while in office.” The “Reagan Revolution” of tax-slashing and cutting federal programs included the Reagan administration recommending “the wholesale dismantling of the BIA.” Reagan also lamented the cost of Indian-specific federal programs and proposed steep budget cuts in social programs employing many Indians on reservations, where 60% lived in poverty. He also tried to expand states’ roles in governing treaty fishing and tribal education.Comment:  For more on the subject, see Rob's Response to Reagan.

Army and Apaches vs. Reagan

A Ludicrous Story--a wooden Cochise

Cavalry Charge (1951)--directed by Lewis R. Foster
starring: Ronald Reagan, Rhonda FlemingIronically, the first time a Native American is cast to portray Cochise in a movie, he is neither listed in the film's credits nor given an opportunity to act. On top of that, the whole premise is insulting to the point that perhaps he should have been relieved at being so far in the background: Imagine if you will that Mangas Coloradas and Cochise, along with some other Indian identified only as "Chee," have decided to let a White Man who now lives as an Indian and calls himself Chief Grey Cloud rule the Apache Nation and speak for them.

Of course that's not a complete synopsis of the movie's plot, which is not much less unlikely and involves a contingent of the Union Army trying to enlist the help of the Apaches in their drive to wipe out a small band of Confederate soldiers, led by a charming and irreverent Ronald Reagan. It's actually a Western comedy disguised as an action movie and in many ways is quite watchable, especially if you enjoy seeing a future U.S. President thumbing his nose at the American government (as a character in 1861, of course).

When we first see Cochise he is standing like a wooden cigar store Indian, facing a much more animated Mangas Coloradas (played by Iron Eyes Cody) inside a somewhat "correct" looking wickiup. Cochise is white haired and looks much older than he would have been in 1861. When we hear him speak at all, it is in an obviously fake "Indian-speak'" so typical of 1950s cowboys and Indian movies. One glaring error in the scene in which Cochise and the others appear is that they all pass around a peace pipe ... something the Apache tribe did not embrace.Comment:  For more on the subject, see The Best Indian Movies.