Obama: Does he speak with forked tongue?

On June 2, 2008, Obama delivered a four minute speech over the airwaves to those attending the National Congress of American Indians in Reno, Nevada. His presentation was a substitute for a planned personal appearance.

He promised a new approach to government relations with America's first nations, including "an appointment of an American Indian tribal advisor to my senior white house staff." He also said,

Few have been ignored by Washington as the American Indians…too often Washington pays lip service to working with tribes…. Now, I understand the tragic history between the United States and tribal nations. Our government hasn't always been honest and truthful in our dealings. And we've got to acknowledge that if we're going to move forward in a fair and honest way. Indian nations have never asked much of the United States - only for what was promised by the treaty obligations made to their forebears. So let me be absolutely clear - I believe treaty commitments are paramount law, and I will fulfill those commitments as president of the United States.

Many of us, who listened to these words with hope and joy in our hearts, wept. We don't want to believe that all of this will wind up being more promises and lies. Yet there is reason for concern in a nation where Clinton was the first president to visit an Indian reservation since Franklin D. Roosevelt visited one on Sept. 9, 1936, and where one of the two individuals that is celebrated in the U.S. with a federal holiday is Christopher Columbus.

One concern is that, as of Nov. 21, with a number of appointments and speculations for cabinet positions being made by Obama who do not represent the best interests of Indigenous People (I'll get to that in a minute), there is a remarkable absence of any reference to American Indians on his official website, in spite of his rhetoric. Sure, it is too soon to tell and there is still time. And perhaps some responsibility should go to the NCAI, whose staff is apparently working with Obama's transition team member, John Podesta, to submit resumes of qualified candidates. But still, how could there be NO speculation about his appointment of an American Indian to any position on the blogs and NO reference to American Indians or Indian policy on his website?

For example, I spent several hours searching Obama's website at change.gov. First of all, I found nothing in the headings that relates to American Indians. Then I inserted "American Indian" into the search function and got "We found 52 results for 'American Indian." I did the same for "Native American" and got 35 hits. I looked at most of the items and found not a single reference to this topic, nor to issues relating to the poverty and other problems facing Indian people. Yet there are categories for supporting a number of other causes.

One of the hits was "Policy Working Groups." This is a description of the people he has appointed to develop priority policy plans in the economy, energy and environment, health care, immigration, national security, and Technology, Innovation & Government Reform." Not a single American Indian or reference to American Indian issues here either.

Okay, what about the staffing positions and short-lists already in play? Janet Napolitano, as a top contender for Homeland Security, has generally been an ally to Indian country. Tom Daschle, a probable for Secretary of Health and Human Services, also has been a friend to the Lakota in South Dakota. And a top contender for Secretary of the Interior, Raul Grijalva, has supported Indian rights and health care bills. However, a number of appointments and possibilities thus far seem to have been either complicit in or unaware of the U.S. policies that have directly or indirectly allowed for genocide of Indigenous Peoples around the world. No administration is going to be able to understand or mitigate the United States treatment of American Indians, past or present, with people in key positions who can rationalize any policy that leads to the killing of Indigenous peoples.

As far as I know, there are at least three of Obama's possible selections whose record is typical of the "white washing" of such activities as are described in my book, Unlearning the Language of Conquest.

For example, consider his former associate, Samantha Power, his current foreign policy advisor. Her scholarship is typical of the adventures in denial that many Ivy league academics practice. Here is what Edward S. Herman says about her published writings in his article, "Richard Holbrooke, Samantha Power, and the 'Worthy-Genocide' Establishment" (Kafka Era Studies Number 5), ZNet, March 24, 2007:

Power never departs from the selectivity dictated by the establishment party line. That requires, first and foremost, simply ignoring cases of direct U.S. or U.S.-sponsored (or otherwise approved) genocide. Thus the Vietnam war, in which millions were directly killed by U.S. forces, does not show up in Power's index or text. Guatemala, where there was a mass killing of as many as 100,000 Mayan Indians between 1978 and 1985, in what Amnesty International called "A Government Program of Political Murder," but by a government installed and supported by the United States, also does not show up in Power's index. A major U.S.-encouraged and supported genocide occurred in Indonesia in 1965-66 in which over 700,000 people were murdered. This genocide is not mentioned by Samantha Power and the names Indonesia and Suharto do not appear in her index.

Interestingly, today I found a reference to Herman's article at MySimmons blog in a piece entitled, "First Stop on the Tour of Complicity." Notice the last sentence and see that I am not the only one making these connections!

As Herman amply argues, Power's scholarship on genocide clearly and systematically avoids any uncomfortable mention of the massive slaughterhouses created by the US in Southeast Asia or Central America, such as the 30-year long bloodbath in East Timor that witnessed the killing of nearly one third of the entire population of the Timorese by the Indonesian military - all the while fully armed and trained by the U.S., which actually gave the green light to the invasion of tiny East Timor in 1975. Genocide is always something that "they" do, not us. Tell that to the Indians, Samantha!

Another influential academic, also from Harvard, is Sarah Sewall who is leading the transition's national security team and is a likely future appointee. She is the director of the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at the John F. Kennedy School of Government. She is known for her unique interest in a sort of partnership between human rights and military force. She recently authored The U.S. Army/Marine Corps Counterinsurgency Field Manual and one of her Center's conferences, held in January 2005, was held at the School of Assassins, which is linked to acts of political repression in Latin America. According to Tom Hayden in his 2007 piece entitled "Harvard's Humanitarian Hawks" that mentions this fact in The Nation (http://www.thenation.com/doc/200707 30/hayden)," She goes on to make an ambiguous comment about the dirty war supported by US Special Forces in El Salvador, now known as the "El Salvador option." Tom quotes her as having said, "Military annals today tally that effort as a success, but others cannot get past the shame of America's indirect role in fostering death squads."

Of course, both she and Power are only academics who might be persuasive for policy, perhaps like the academic heroes of the Bush administration who inspired the authors of the "Century for a New America." Then there is Eric Holder, Jr., a possible choice being considered for Attorney General. He is an attorney whose law firm is representing Chiquita Brands, a corporation alleged to have paid Columbian death squads to murder labor leaders?

If I had the time and did not think the reader has already gotten my point, I'm afraid more research into the names likely to be running things for the next four year might uncover similar stories that are an anathema to a progressive vision for giving due recognition and fair treatment to First Nations who continue to struggle in these United States. Personally, I still have hope that Obama somehow knows what he is doing; that he is continuing to placate the powers that be until he is positioned to implement the policies many of us put him into office to actualize. Yet it is naive to think that his cabinet and advisors, if they follow the current trend, will not have the power to prevent him from walking his talk.

In his scholarly text, A Time Before Deception: Truth in Communication, Culture and Ethics, Thomas Cooper acknowledges the historical integrity of Indigenous Peoples and their ancient belief that people who do not tell the truth must have a mental illness that prevents them from understanding reality.

Hollywood's cliché about "White man speaks with forked tongue" not withstanding, the history of deceit used against American Indians is infamous, although, as I say in Unlearning the Language of Conquest, too few Americans really know the extent to which this is true.

In any case, Obama, who was given the name "Black Eagle" by the Crow and means "one who helps the people throughout the land," may be our last chance for actualizing the renewed hope that honesty and integrity have a chance to reassert their vibrations once again into the American landscape.