In this opednews.com story, I wrote about this Neanderthal legislator's antics and caustic words back then - this Paul Gosar creep. Perhaps this man's mindset may find a home in some Eastern Bloc country, but sooner or later, in a free democracy, renegade politicians like Gosar always seem to find a mean dead end street. And I hope he's found one with his plans for this rotten land-grab.
Here's another excerpt of the story I wrote here last December on the land-swap was being railroaded through U.S. Congress last December: Gosar's horrid diatribe calling American Indians "wards of the state" and adding that, 'Tribes, you can call yourselves sovereign nations, but when it comes down to the final test, you're not really sovereign because we still have plenary authority over you,'" has only served to add insult to injury of what has become a very volatile and controversial land swap.
Anyhow, Paul Gosar, you are not the dictator of Arizona, although it is quite apparent that you think you are just that. You and other tyrants like John McCain, who have been running rough shod over the U.S. Constitution for far too long now do not have a monopoly on truth, nor do you have a license to do whatever you want to do. This very brave and honest President, Barack Obama, has definitely thrown a monkey wrench into the gears of your tea-bagging machine to create lakes of methane and craters so deep they look like the landscape of some unoccupied and uninhabitable exoplanet somewhere in the Sombrero Galaxy. This is still the United States of America and political pawns like you, Gosar, and McCain, Flake, and Kirkpatrick, still have adversaries who very much want to protect Mother Earth. And yes, Native Americans do have supporters at the federal level. President Obama, overall, has been a good friend to American Indians in his two terms as this country's top leader. Mr. Peltier has been imprisoned for four decades now and Natives consider him a political prisoner. President Obama still has some time left in office and who knows, a full pardon and clemency may come late in Obama's second term. Untold Presidents prior to him, after all, have turned their backs on Peltier and a deaf ear to the wants and wishes of American Indians, after all.
But as for Oak Flat, it's a universal applause for Barack and his stance. As Stephen Fox writes in the Indian Country Today Media Network story that is cited above: "For centuries, the Oak Flat area in the Tonto National Forest has been considered sacred to Apaches, Yavapais, and other Native Americans. Located about an hour due east of Phoenix, Arizona, this unique and stunningly beautiful land has long played a vital role in Native ceremonies, religion, tradition, and culture."
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Oak Flat has always been a place where Native Americans in the region have gone to pray, to conduct ceremonial dances, to gather acorns for sustenance, to collect medicines and ceremonial items, and to seek and obtain peace and personal cleansing."
"Public lands, like Oak Flat, are carved out of the ancestral homelands of Indian tribes, and the historical and spiritual connections of Native Americans to these lands have not been extinguished. The United States has legal and moral obligations to provide access to Native Americans and to protect these traditional territories in a manner that respects the cultural, historical and religious importance to Indian tribes."
"For over a decade, hundreds of tribal governments, tribal organizations, and hundreds of thousands of individual grassroots activists united in opposition to the Land Exchange to protect these tribal homelands. Because of this staunch opposition, House of Representatives Leadership twice pulled the bill from consideration because it lacked the votes for passage during the 113th Congress. The Senate also refused to advance the bill through regular order."
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