Thought for the Day~ America, as my daughter has recently learned to the amazement of the family, was founded on John Locke's principle of the individual's right to Life, Liberty and Property. The fundamental problem of the reservation system is that it has at one point or another violated all three of these basic rights.
America, in the broader sense, has succeeded because property rights backed up by most people being able to trust the Law to protect these rights has enough confidence to go out into the world and produce a little more than is needed to get by.
Reservations have not succeeded precisely because there is no such trust and only those who are born already supernaturally confident can really achieve big things. As far as I know it is virtually impossible for any NDN anywhere to get a bank loan on what everyone pretends is "his property" to fix up the place or build a nicer home or take his equity and go start a business as millions of his fellow Americans have done for a very long time. So no economy to speak of exists within the boundaries of a reservation and everybody leaves to go to Walmart.
Why? Because the land isn't really owned. Not the same way it would be if the same land was off the reservation. We are treated like children on our so called sovereign lands by a government that pretends it must look out for our well being. So we get a lot of free s**t but very few opportunities.
Not good.
Your Friendly neighborhood Ravenspeaker
One More:
Thought for the Day~ When we hurt, anybody can sell us anything for almost any amount if they promise it will relieve the pain. Even a partial solution will do no matter how temporary.
A solution that sort of helps but has to be kept going such as a drug that relieves pain for an hour or so and has to be retaken again is actually worth quite a bit less than a cure that might require some pain in the short run but handles everything in the long run.
People who benefit by distributing the temporary solution such as drug dealers and BIA agents do not want cures because they won't be needed after the withdrawals of dependency go away.
Indians are dependent on a lot of Free S**t that almost kinda sorta helps for a few days but has to be distributed again next month to also kinda sort of almost handle things.
Better for us to take the cure for things even if there are some withdrawals we will have to go through. Why do we need a BIA or similar Federal office to oversee what we do with and on our own land?
Your Friendly Neighborhood Ravenspeaker
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