[Indigsol] Russell Means speaks out (on Palestine, Obama, ...)

[Greg Macdougall]

http://counterpunch.org/norrell01122009.html
Palestinians and American Indians 
      Russell Means Breaks the Silence on Obama 
      By BRENDA NORRELL 
      American
Indian activist Russell Means said President-elect Obama was selected
by the colonial powers as president to improve the US image globally in
the aftermath of George Bush. Further, Means said Obama’s appointments
show that he is a Zionist controlled by Israel. Speaking on Red Town
Radio today, Means said what is happening now to Palestinians is what
happened to American Indians.
      
“Every
policy the Palestinians are now enduring was practiced on the American
Indian,” Means said on the Blog Talk Radio show, hosted by Brenda
Golden, Muskoke Creek. “What the American Indian Movement says is that
the American Indians are the Palestinians of the United States, and the
Palestinians are the American Indians of the Middle East,” Means said.
Further, he points out that the Zionists who control Israel now control
the United States. “The power of the US in world politics diminishes
every day.”
      
“Now
they have found a house servant by the name of Obama.” Means said Obama
was selected as a “man in charge to take the heat,” because of the “bad
cop” image that Bush put forth in the world. “Now, all of a sudden, it
is, ‘We’re so great. We elected a black man to be president.’”
      
Means
added that Obama is a black man who was raised by his white grandmother
and has appointed Zionists to key positions and that the US is headed
for a new era of menial jobs. On Indian lands, Means reminds us, the
only people who get ahead are those who sell out to the colonial
system. Now, there is massive and sophisticated propaganda by the
Zionists and the U.S. Both countries, he said, are liars. In the US,
American Indians have been shut out of history, philosophy and the
arts, in a “total blackout.” The United States does not want to be
reminded of the smallpox blankets, theft, colonialism and mistreatment
of the American Indian, he said.
      
Means
said most Americans do not realize that the financial collapse of this
country is only beginning: “Americans cannot continue the lifestyles of
consumers when there is no production. Low income jobs and menial jobs
are the only ones left.” “Health care in the US reveals how the
policies used in experimentations on American Indians became US
policies. The US health care system is now stringent and calloused,
with constant refusals of treatment. This has always been the case with
the Indian Health Service. Now it is the policy of the HMOs. Family
ranchers and family farmers are now in the way of progress, the same
way the American Indian was once viewed. Now, family farmers and family
ranchers are being gutted, because they function on massive credit.
They are trying to pay back debts, which is not possible with
manipulated agriculture prices. The family farmer and family rancher
are now going to be extinct.”
      
Means
points out that the federal government has also taken over and polluted
the educational system; “Americans don’t even know their own history.
Along with this federal control, came the passage of English-only laws
in many states. However, for Indigenous Peoples it is positive to know
many languages. If you speak two languages, you are speaking with two
brains. That is the way it is to us. That’s how we look at life. In the
mid-Twentieth Century, US schools listened to the communities and local
governing boards.”
      
“However,
now the US educational policy has taken away local control and mandated
federal guidelines. So now education has become a matter of money.
Meanwhile, the real history is silenced. While the United States
attempts to portray itself as a peace loving nation, the fact is the
United States is at war every year. The United States breaks a host of
international laws every year, which has been the pattern since 1946.
American Indians were aware of what the US was doing, because the US
had already broken all treaties with American Indians; treaties
guaranteed by the US Constitution,” he said.
      
About
the American revolution to throw off the British, Means pointed out how
“his-story” has been manipulated; “There is a great deal of propaganda
about why the US broke away from England. But the fact is that George
Washington, the largest landowner, along with the slave owners, broke
with England so that the original treaties of England with American
Indians in the west would not have to be honored. The US broke with
England, to invade the west and take the land. ”
      
The
US was created to break international laws,” Means said, adding that it
is obvious today that this is the pattern of the U.S. Means said the
United States was initiated as an outlaw and renegade nation and that
“today, its imperial policies mean that Israel is a surrogate of the
US, receiving aid from the U.S. With the combined US and international
aid, Israeli receives $12 billion a year for its “military and the
settlers in the West Bank.”
      
Means
said 80 percent of the people in the West Bank are paid to stay there.
“It is America who pays them to stay there. But even in Israel, where
there is a free press and not everyone agrees with Israel waging war on
Palestine. He said 20 to 30 percent of the people in Israel are against
the war on Palestine. Like the United States, Israel has been at war
every year of its existence.”
      
Means
often refers to Israel as the 51st state, of warmongers and
imperialists. “America and Israel are based on lies, resulting in the
massive deaths in Iraq. Now, the US and Israel are focused on Iran
because its oil reserves.” Means said Indian lands have become “open
air concentration camps.” “If you chose to stay on the reservation, you
are guaranteed to be poor, unless you are part of the colonial
apparatus set up by the Bureau of Indian Affairs,” he said.
      
“On
Indian lands, everyone fights to be part of the tribal governments
because that is where the money is. Everyone fights to be part of the
colonial system. The only way you can be part of the colonial system is
to obey. Those returning home to Indian lands cannot ‘rock the boat,’
demand their treaty rights or their rights guaranteed by the US
Constitution.”
      
Means
said the American Indian Movement made people aware that the US
Constitution was based upon that of the Iroquois Six Nations. “However,
the US Constitution only includes one-third of the Great Law of Peace.
If all of the Great Law of Peace had been adopted, this country would
be much different and much wealthier.” However, it was turned into a
country of consumers. He said what you get with a country of consumers
is greed. “What is going on in Palestine is going on in America. The
United States is taking away the homes of the people.” Now in the
United States, there is “communism from the left” and “right-wing
socialism.” He said the problem with socialism is that it is bereft of
consensus and spirituality.
      
Means,
now 70, said he has experienced the US when it reached its zenith in
the world in the 1950s, “At that time, America was a productive
country. In the years that followed, the ruling elite sold out the
unions, as the labor movement was razor thin close to taking over
politics in America. The most watershed event was Brown vs. Board of
Education, the US Supreme Court ruling which desegregated schools. The
white male started losing his power. Then, in the social revolution
that followed, white males lost control of their women and their
women’s vote, and lost control of the work place. While civil rights
was the chosen remedy of most social movements, American Indians
remained dedicated to ‘sovereign rights,’ individual sovereign rights.
We are the only ones that held on to the sovereign concept, he said.
The other social movements were saying, “Please Mr. White Male let me
be equal to you.”
      
Means
said things will be different now, “Our grandmother the Mother Earth is
tired of the human race. She is going to eliminate it and I champion
her, Mother earth.” Means said matriarchy is what Indigenous people are
all about. “We know that women are the givers of life and men are the
takers of life. We have to follow the woman in order to gain balance.”
He said in a matriarchal society, there is a balanced society, as each
celebrates their strengths together. “True individual freedom has to be
done by consensus, otherwise it is mob rule.” In the US, now there are
fake elections. “The people are convinced they are actually electing a
president. However, it is the Electoral College that actually selects
the US president.”
      
The
charade is now coming to a close, as the ‘Patriot Act’ means that Posse
Comitatus is dead and buried. Means said everyone has the
responsibility to be free. “You are free to be responsible. That is the
essence of freedom.” He said everyone should know their rights.
Otherwise, they are guaranteed slavery.
      
“Einstein
said, ‘The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over
again and expecting a different outcome,’” “That’s America, that’s the
Indian reservation. That’s pathetic and an injustice to human beings.”
He said “human brains are doped up with all this ignorance and greed.”
      
Red
Town Radio show host Brenda Golden, an enrolled Muscogee (Creek) Nation
of Oklahoma, grew up in Clearview, Oklahoma. Golden attended Sequoyah
Indian School in Tahlequah before joining the Air Force. Later, she
received her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in business administration
from the University of Oklahoma. She has worked in Indian Country as an
educator, tribal liaison, grant writer, board member and volunteer
since the early 1990's.
      
Golden said she is hosting Red Town Radio http://www.blogtalkradio.com/RedTownRadio, on Blog Talk Radio, to offer a platform for Indigenous issues.
      
Listen
to more of the show, including David Hill, who called in, and pointed
out that while the US cut school funds and school lunches, the US
increased aid to Israel.
      
Brenda Norrell is human rights editor for U.N. OBSERVER
      & International Report. She also runs the Censored http://www.bsnorrell.blogspot.com/ website and is a contributor to Red State Rebels http://redstaterebels.org/ . She can be reached at: brendanorrell at gmail.com


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