Guest Post by Willis Eschenbach
The National Wildlife Federation (NWF) has issued a new report (PDF) asserting that the Early Asian Immigrants (incorrectly referred to as “Native” Americans) are hit the hardest by “climate-induced weather extremes”. I’ll leave aside the obvious problems with that fanciful claim, and the oddity of the idea of “climate-induced weather” whatever that means, to look at the NWF’s proposed solution to their imaginary problem.
Their solution? Well, their brilliant plan is that everyone but the Immigrants should pony up some money to give to the Immigrants.
Now, the history of the Early Asian Immigrants is a sad and tragic one. They were cheated, lied to, killed indiscriminately, and their culture and ways were denigrated and often destroyed.
The response of the US Government, after many years, was to give the remaining tribes of Immigrants their own nations. These are sovereign areas with their own leaders, where many US laws do not apply. Me, I’d give just about anything to be able to write my own laws, and not have to obey some US laws. But I don’t get to.
Now, however, the NWF wants to change the rules. They want to alter the laws so that the separate Immigrant nations can not only be sovereign and independent and run casinos and not be subject to various state laws, but they can also suck up tax money paid by people who live in my nation. As an example of what they want to change, they say:
Indian [sic] Tribes are also excluded —– because of statutes, regulations, or practice —– from dozens of federal natural resource programs that provide assistance to states, local governments, and other entities.
Well … yes indeed, they are excluded from using my tax money for a host of things, and for very good reasons. That’s the price they pay for independence and sovereignty, that they don’t get treated the same as other US citizens, or like a State, or like a local government—because they aren’t any of those things, they are a sovereign nation with all that implies. For example, I can’t go on the reservation and do what I want, that’s the Immigrant national land. Immigrants don’t have to follow a variety of laws, and rightly so. And I don’t get any money from tribal funds that they are getting from Immigrant casinos, casinos that are illegal for me to operate.
So while I definitely feel for the Immigrants, who historically have suffered unimaginably, they can’t have it both ways. If they want to be full participants in the American rush to have the US government reimburse them for every imaginary problem, they can’t also be exempt from various laws and State taxes and some even from Federal taxes and get to have their own nations. If they want the full panoply of dubious benefits that the rest of the citizens get, sorry, they’ve got to become just like me, subject to all of the nonsense which us Late European Immigrants have to put up with.
Or they could just pay for the things that they need from their casino takings … which were $7,300,000,000 ($7.3 billion with a “b”) just in California alone in 2009, and $26,400,000,000 nationally, and on which in many states they paid no state taxes. I say they should use their own money for that kind of quixotic quest. If they want to use my taxes to fight imaginary menaces, well, they should have to pay taxes just like I do and be subject to the same idiotic rules that constrain me.
In any case, if the Immigrants are entitled to my tax money, it seems only fair that in return I should be able to open my own casino. But I don’t need to make billions. If I can only make a few million dollars from my casino, I assure you that I can protect myself against the worst that man-made warming can do, and save the Government a pile of money in the process … plus I’ll pay all applicable taxes on my takings.
It’s a win-win kind of deal.
w.
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UPDATE:
Willis has free reign to publish here, however this is not an article (in its present form) I would have published if consulted. Once published, I can’t put the cat back in the bag. – Anthony
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A note from the author. Anthony has most graciously given me the room to write here without censorship or interference or suggestions of any type,and has my great thanks for the freedom. As such, I ask that everyone be clear that what I write is mine, and what Anthony writes is his. He is passionate about his causes, as am I about mine. I thought long and hard about this before I posted it, as I do with all of my posts, but even more so because it is a touchy subject. I re-wrote it several times to try to make it clearer and clearer.
Now, I could have just said “Ooooh, too hot to handle” and picked a less controversial subject … but if Anthony and I and all the guest posters did that, this would be the most boring blog on the planet.
All I ask is that people quote my words when they object, because most people are treating this subject like a web-based Rorschach test, and reading into it all of their hopes, fears, and prejudices.
Again, my thanks to Anthony for his marvelous blog,
w.
It’s the same as the ‘slavery reparations’ demands. I never owned a slave myself [& I personally feel like I’m an indentured servant to the government], but I’m supposed to pay for what someone else did a century and a half ago?? [And America’s national apologia for slavery — electing an incompetent failure who doesn’t have a drop of slave blood — how’s that working out, eh?]
The truth of this article is even worse. A lot of these “tribes” [called “bands” in California] are populated and run by scheming European descendants who have little or no Native American ancestry. They are simply a special interest group that pays a cut of their casino income to the state governments in return for special treatment — all at the expense of hard-bitten taxpayers.
It’s the same in Hawaii [sorry: “Hawai’i”], where supposedly native Hawaiians receive extra special treatment and legal rights. Lots pf putative Hawaiian ‘natives’ look like they just got off the boat from Scandinavia. But suggesting a DNA requirement to determine native Hawaiian ancestry results in instant howls of “racism!!”. Reading the incessant hurt feelings reports in the Letters to the Editor section of any Hawaiian newspaper is enough to make any normal person retch. What is the world coming to? I thought we were all supposed to be equal.
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[BTW, nice example of an “Indian” note, Willis. I collect old U.S. currency, and that note looks great in a frame. You can find ’em on ebay. They’re about 25% bigger than modern currency notes. There were “Indian” gold coins produced, too.]
We’re all Early African immigrants. At some point, political correctness regarding long-established terminology that does not insult anyone has to stop. (Never mind that “Africa” is not an African word…)
@ur momisugly Roger Sowell; So, what he said was true, it’s just that it wasn’t PC enough for you. Got it.
This rant is more than a bit embarrassing. We don’t need any more hate labels – everyone is an “immigrant” from somewhere.
This about explains it:
from a native american (aka someone born in America)
There seem to be a lot of very touchy people who misread the essence of Willis’ posting. He has zero gripe with native Americans and no enmity with their legal and economic status. His point was that the NWF has an extremely weird argument. They want US taxpayers to subsidize the Indian nations even further than they already do. This to pay for some imaginary “climate-induced weather extremes” which they purport to be harming the Indians. That’s the only point; the NWF is full of beans. Climb down. Willis is not complaining about the Indians, he is pointing out the absurdities in the NWF’s proposal.
Jason Joice M.D. says:
August 8, 2011 at 5:02 am
“A couple of things. First, like Dave Stephens pointed out, Native American is not an incorrect word.”
It’s a political distinction. We’re all the same species and our species is not “native” to anywhere except Africa. I believe that’s the point Willis was making but he certainly could have explained it better. Religious beliefs notwithstanding if wolves could talk I’m sure they’d consider you and I both as foreign invaders because they were here before any of our ancestors arrived. So what gave you the right to invade their land and start hunting on it? All claims of ownership, borders, and sovereign lands are anthropogenic inventions that nature doesn’t recognize.
This history is more tangled and painful than any essay can hope to adequately address, but one theme should not be forgotten when the squabbling over which group is to blame for the mess and who is being insensitive to whom. It is the government which has consistently made bad situations worse — from the beginning right up to the present — trampling on the natural rights and the liberty of everybody to some degree. Willis, although you get diverted into an equal rights debate, your first inclination is correct, which is to point out how the rules keep changing and only make things worse.
NWF is just another rent seeking leech. As for Native Americans and Climate Whatever – If I were in their position I would take whatever money the idiots in DC were shelling out while the getting was good. As the modern Asians (and S&P now too) have been saying of late, there’s not a lot time left for such spreading of our wealth.
Personally I think this post would have been better if it had restricted itself to the climate angles without bringing in quite so many social ones. Not to say social isn’t important, more that I don’t think a science blog is the place for it. I hate political correctness with a passion but opening up another front isn’t a good move. If it must stay, a bit of a glossary for those of us outside of North America might be helpful.
In 2010, the median US household income was $52,026. This means that for every $1 million this scheme proposes to spend, it will consume the entire annual income of 20 households. If there is anything lacking in this scheme, it is any sense of the economic destruction it implies with those who will be imposed upon to fund it.
A few years ago, a federal lawsuit moved sufficient forward for it to be clear how the federal government had grossly mismanaged and stolen hundreds of millions in royalties due to native peoples. If the NWF wants to truly help this group, the easiest way would be to help them to maximize the amount of oil and gas resources on their lands that can be developed and from which they can earn royalties that are honestly accounted for.
@bladeshearerJack Maloney:
“everyone is an ‘immigrant’ from somewhere.”
I’m not! My father’s father was, but my Dad and I were born right here. My Dad emmigrated to the ‘happy hunting grounds’ a few years ago, but he was never big on hunting; he liked beer and cards, and fishing sometimes. I might emmigrate to Oz or NZ one day, then I’d be one too (after I got there). But the way things are going with the economy, I’ll probably just die a pauper right here and then emmigrate up to the “happing hunting grounts” myself.
Could we be looking at a case of minorities hoist by their own petard?
Willis,
You’d be speaking of the extensions to the Harvard Project American Indian Economic Project that began in the late 70s & early 80s?
http://hpaied.org/
Stephen Cornell http://www.banffcentre.ca/departments/leadership/aboriginal/faculty/faculty_member.aspx?facId=165 and
Joseph Kalt
http://belfercenter.ksg.harvard.edu/experts/51/joseph_kalt.html
published extensively on native economic development.
Their Harvard model was exported to Australia, Canada etc in various shapes and forms.
Their earlier papers comparing various tribes forays into logging, agriculture and such endeavours or suggestions for self-development $ schemes, when analysed, make interesting reading.
re Casinos; that must be a mighty investment in telecommunication infrastructure you have their in outback US. Especially now that the one arm bandits are digital.
Dave Springer says:
August 8, 2011 at 5:45 am
Question. Who regulates to prevent water, air, and land pollution, and protect endangered species?
Heh, the picture got skipped completely.
http://lib.store.yahoo.net/lib/demotivators/governmentdemotivationalposter.jpg
I agree. The NWF is cracko. They are the ones taking political correctness down to the size of a hair on a gnat’s arse. At this level, I can play this game too. I would like to put in a complaint over my difficulties related to having red hair, being short, being of Irish descent, etc. There has GOT to be tax dollars in there somewhere for me.
And to put a fine point on it, these complaints I have logged and my need for tax dollars are related to FUTURE problems arising from PROPOSED scenarios.
Dave Stephens says:
August 8, 2011 at 4:33 am
“If Native Americans aren’t “native” after 14 thousand years or more, then the word “native” has NO meaning.”
I was born in North America. That makes me a “native” too. Nobody gets to choose where they are born. You’re fortunate if you can choose where to live after you are born. Ancestral rights are political inventions worth nothing absent the ability to defend the claimed rights.
“Native Americans” were at constant war between tribes before Europeans decided to settle and would still be at war. I think if the groups want full sovereign nation status they should receive it and be treated as a separate country rather than “In Name Only” except for benefits. Most of the current crop of “Native Americans” have a small percent of “Native Blood”. My Great Grandmother was descended from the Cherokee Nation that was not displaced from the Appalachian region during the trail of tears. That would make me as much as one eighth Indian but I was raised as an American Citizen of European decent. There are those with lower percent heritage claiming native status in an attempt to be something they are not. Europeans brought the Americas out of the “Stone Age”. Yes Willis is correct about the history of the “Natives”. They should be paying tribute to the descendants of the Europeans for all the advances that were introduced into their lives.
Fred H. Haynie says:
August 8, 2011 at 6:41 am
Dave Springer says:
August 8, 2011 at 5:45 am
“Question. Who regulates to prevent water, air, and land pollution, and protect endangered species?”
Lawyers mostly.
Its amazing how quickly the “Race” card gets played. Just yesterday Bishops Hill had its resident troll trying it!
Where do you start? Spanish out of S.America? Dutch out of the East Indies? Criminal class out of Australia? (Sorry Antipodean readers, I could not resist it!).
Probably best to have steered clear of this one Willis. The NWF is probably to be trusted about as much as the WWF when it comes to “climate-induced weather extremes”!
Van Jones is likely behind this
I agree with many before. Willis, you do a discredit to this blog by demeaning Native Americans. Your point that the NWF recommendations are ridiculous could be made without espousing your lack of respect for Native Americans. Shame on you.
Hmmm. Just like the Canadian model for what we call “First Nations”.