McCain sells out Arizona natives

[TimothyC]

ABOUT an hour east of Phoenix, near a mining town called Superior, men, women and children of the San Carlos Apache tribe have been camped out at a place called Oak Flat for more than three months, protesting the latest assault on their culture.

Three hundred people, mostly Apache, marched 44 miles from tribal headquarters to begin this occupation on Feb. 9. The campground lies at the core of an ancient Apache holy place, where coming-of-age ceremonies, especially for girls, have been performed for many generations, along with traditional acorn gathering. It belongs to the public, under the multiple-use mandate of the Forest Service, and has had special protections since 1955, when President Dwight D. Eisenhower decreed the area closed to mining — which, like cattle grazing, is otherwise common in national forests — because of its cultural and natural value. President Richard M. Nixon’s Interior Department in 1971 renewed this ban.

Despite these protections, in December 2014, Congress promised to hand the title for Oak Flat over to a private, Australian-British mining concern. A fine-print rider trading away the Indian holy land was added at the last minute to the must-pass military spending bill, the National Defense Authorization Act. By doing this, Congress has handed over a sacred Native American site to a foreign-owned company for what may be the first time in our nation’s history.

The Apache are occupying Oak Flat to protest this action — to them, a sacrilegious and craven sell-off of a place “where Apaches go to pray,” in the words of the San Carlos Apache tribal chairman, Terry Rambler. The site will doubtless be destroyed for any purpose other than mining; Resolution Copper Mining will hollow out a vast chamber that, when it caves in, will leave a two-mile-wide, 1,000-foot-deep pit. The company itself has likened the result of its planned mining at Oak Flat to that of a nearby meteor crater.

The land grab was sneakily anti-democratic even by congressional standards. For more than a decade, the parcel containing Oak Flat has been coveted by Rio Tinto, Resolution’s parent company — which already mines on its own private land in the surrounding area — for the high-value ores beneath it.

The swap — which will trade 5,300 acres of private parcels owned by the company to the Forest Service and give 2,400 acres including Oak Flat to Resolution so that it can mine the land without oversight — had been attempted multiple times by Arizona members of Congress on behalf of the company. (Among those involved was Rick Renzi, a former Republican representative who was sent to federal prison in February for three years for corruption related to earlier versions of the land-transfer deal.) It always failed in Congress because of lack of support. But this time was different. This time, the giveaway language was slipped onto the defense bill by Senators John McCain and Jeff Flake of Arizona at the 11th hour. The tactic was successful only because, like most last-minute riders, it bypassed public scrutiny.

It’s worth noting that Rio Tinto affiliates have been McCain campaign contributors, and that Mr. Flake, before he made it to Congress, was a paid lobbyist for Rio Tinto Rössing Uranium (a huge uranium mine in Namibia). Mr. McCain and others assert that the mining project will be a boost to the local economy, though it’s unclear how many of the 1,400 promised jobs would be local; a Superior-area miners’ group, in fact, opposes the swap on the basis that it won’t help the local people or economy. Rio Tinto, incidentally, has been called out in the past for environmental devastation.

“Why is this place sacred?” said Wendsler Nosie Sr., a former chairman of the San Carlos Apache, in a recent interview with Cronkite News. “No difference to Mount Sinai. How the holy spirit came to be.” If you don’t want to take his word for it, the archaeological record at Oak Flat contains abundant evidence that the Apache have been here “since well before recorded history,” according to congressional testimony by the Society for American Archaeology.

If Oak Flat were a Christian holy site, or for that matter Jewish or Muslim, no senator who wished to remain in office would dare to sneak a backdoor deal for its destruction into a spending bill — no matter what mining-company profits or jobs might result. But this is Indian religion. Clearly the Arizona congressional delegation isn’t afraid of a couple of million conquered natives.

The truth is that for Mr. McCain, Mr. Flake and others who would allow this precious public land to be destroyed, it’s not only the Indians who are invisible. The rest of us are also ghosts, remnants of a quaint idea of democracy.

Oak Flat may still be saved, albeit with difficulty, since the bill’s language stipulates quite simply that 60 days after the federal “environmental impact statement” is complete, the land will belong to Resolution — in other words, that the swap will occur no matter what the environmental study says. But, like all laws and pieces of laws, it can be reversed by new legislative language.

The deal is an impressive new low in congressional corruption, unworthy of our country’s ideals no matter what side of the aisle you’re on. It’s exactly the kind of cynical maneuvering that has taught the electorate to disrespect politicians — a disdain for government that hurts everyone. If ever there was a time for Congress to prove its moral mettle to the public, this is that time. The rider should be repealed.

Can we please string the whole lot up on corruption right after we get them back from their punishment at hands of the ghost of Ike?

[FTeik]

Lets hope this will be the next stop of the DoJ after it dealt with FIFA. One can always hope ... .

[Flagg]

Wow, it's like what ISIS does only somehow less bad because white people will make money!

[K. A. Pital]

A fine-print rider trading away the Indian holy land was added at the last minute to the must-pass military spending bill, the National Defense Authorization Act.

How many times have they done this, eh?

[Flagg]

A fine-print rider trading away the Indian holy land was added at the last minute to the must-pass military spending bill, the National Defense Authorization Act.

How many times have they done this, eh?

They do shit like this all the fucking time, both parties, almost certainly. Now, which party does it more...? I'd say Republicans because they are still devious little shits no matter how fucking stupid they are, but I'll admit I'm gleefully biased. So I figure in all honestly Republicans probably do it more, but either way it's probably by a very slim margin.

But as far as how both parties treat the natives... Well, they both fuck them in the ass, but Democrats wear a condom most of the time and always give them a kiss on the cheek. And to that I say (I only wish we had an emote with both hands giving the finger at the same time). I mean we killed most of them, then stole, destroyed, or built over their fucking land already, do we have to punch their baby and kick their fucking dog, too? Because I kind of think we did that when we put a bunch of American Indian mass murdering presidents (well, less so for Roosevelt, but his hands were still so bloody it wouldn't ever come off) on Mt. Rushmore, defacing the original mountain in the Black hills, which is considered incredibly sacred land by most if not all of the plains tribes.

[LaCroix]

What would happen if they set up camp and try to drive the mining company off that land to prevent the destruction of their holy site? Another long march?

[The Romulan Republic]

Depends on what you mean by "...drive the mining company off..." Violent resistance would probably elicit a much harsher response than non-violent resistance, though I can see a possibility for arrests/police brutality in the latter case.

But if you're talking some old style "Round them all up and force them onto a reservation at gunpoint"... no. America, for all its faults, is not in the 19th. century any more.

[Flagg]

What would happen if they set up camp and try to drive the mining company off that land to prevent the destruction of their holy site? Another long march?

If they just set up camp? Bunch of federal law enforcement would move in and arrest them, then bulldoze the camp. Assuming they acted nonviolently, and make the feds drag them to vans, busses, whatever.

If they did a "Clive Bundy" standoff (though they wouldn't be cowards and hide behind their women and children hoping their deaths are caught on video)? Obama would likely tell the federal agents to stay calm, negotiate, and things would move forward positively until some asshole on either side will accidentally or intentionally fire off a round (or a can of something being cooked isn't opened and blows up) and it will turn into a bloody (literally) mess, the nation will be outraged (whether at the natives for protecting their land using violence and killing federal agents or at the US government doing what it does best: killing Native Americans. Well to be honest, brown people in general), and there will be a bunch of talking and calls for stuff and things, then some talentless Hollywood douchebag everyone "loves" for some reason will die (or some other tragedy porn bullshit will happen) and be a nice distraction for when absolutely nothing happens. Well, nothing except for Resolution Mining starting their desecration of/working newly acquired/stolen land. But at least it will make some foreigner rich. Which is maybe (Totally not. In fact, somehow worse) a step up from what ISIS is doing?

But more likely it will spend years if not decades in court and Resolution Mining will either fight until it gets to SCOTUS where anything could happen since 1/3 of the current court, if not more (I'm always hopeful Roberts will have a seizure on the interstate and plow into some very heavy inanimate object and no one but him is killed ) will be dead or retired, and depending on who get's appointed as replacements it could go either way.

The best outcome would be for the clogged toilet that is the Unites States Congress to be snaked thoroughly so all the turds are cleared out and legislation is passed overturning this abomination that McCain should be removed from Congress for by the citizens of Arizona. But since most are either 90 aka The Walking Dead, "Jan Brewer Stupid", or see a Native American and think they're an Arab Terrorist out to kill "Good Old Sheriff Joe" (so reach for their open carried AR-15 because their dick is so small and they can only get it to it's fully erect 1 & 1/10cm for porking their fat ugly wife in their single-wide trailer (with 8 kids in the other room all wishing the walls were made of something more substantial than cardboard) if they carry around and point their weapon menacingly at at least one "goddamned foreigner" (IRONY!) every day), so he'll be there until he gets ass cancer and dies (oh, pleasepleasepleasepleaseplease! ), or he loses his primary to someone more mentally unstable, but that has crashed far fewer planes than old John "Crashy" McCain has. It's like what, 4 or 5 planes he crashed?