Harjo: A call for change after 2006 elections
Friday, November 17, 2006
"The 2006 midterm elections and their resounding call for change were set in motion by that ill wind, Katrina, in August 2005.
When the levies broke in Louisiana, they did more than flood the Big Easy. The sight of people losing everything and the world losing a great city had the effect of a bucket of cold water across the face of America.
Dormant and first-time voters awoke thinking the war in Iraq was a mess that was diverting people and money from the home front. A critical mass of people started asking who lost the war, who lost New Orleans and who lost that huge budget surplus?
More and more Americans blamed President Bush and the Republican-controlled Congress for making the rich richer and the poor poorer, and moving jobs away from people in the middle.
Some people snapped to the racial, social and class issues revealed on network and cable television, and started talking about them in terms of political action.
Others tried to shut down such talk with the ever-popular refrain, ''Look, you can't blame that on the president.'' A lot of people must have answered, ''Why not,'' because Bush's favorable ratings dropped precipitously.
Members of the president's party panicked and started shooting themselves in the foot (except for you-know-who, who shot the nearest trial lawyer in the face).
Potty-mouthed and sticky-fingered politicians - and one with a predilection for teenaged boys - couldn't resist being themselves in public and getting on the front page. Few officeholders were overly confident about their chances of being re-elected."
Get the Story:
Suzan Shown Harjo: Post-election: People talking and 'macaca' walking
(Indian Country Today 11/17)
Related Stories:
Harjo: GOP self-destructs at an amazing rate
(10/27)
Harjo: From Abramoff to
Foley, Whiteman magic (10/13)
Harjo:
Sen. Allen uses 'R-word' with impunity (9/29)
Harjo: Urban Indian health funding still at
risk (09/08)
Harjo: Sen. 'Macaca' Allen
no stranger to racial gaffes (8/31)
Harjo: Ross Swimmer still taking care of
Indians (08/21)
Harjo: Good people being
taken out by snakes in DC (07/21)
Harjo:
Ann Coulter's failed supermodel career (06/23)
Parents, museum visit stirred Harjo's passions
(6/16)
Harjo: Mascots preferred over
real Indian people (6/12)
Harjo: Poarch
Creeks worked against Native people (6/5)
Harjo: Indians forced to pay price for Abramoff
(04/28)
Suzan Harjo: Girl-empowerment for
Indian Country (04/15)
Harjo: Scientists
study Ancient One but learn nothing (03/17)
Harjo: NY Times story on drugs accurate but
untrue (02/27)
Harjo: Pseudo-Indians
should pay for identify theft (02/10)
Harjo: Indian art world suffered severe losses
(01/20)
Harjo: The Mantle of Shame Awards
for 2005 (1/4)
Harjo: Indian people have
no word for 'mascot' (12/9)
Harjo: My
photo album of Vine Deloria Jr. (11/24)
Harjo: 'Scooter' Libby scandal and Rosa Parks
(11/11)
Harjo: White man's words trump
Native views (10/21)
Harjo: Native
nations stand up to 'Fighting Sioux' (10/03)
Harjo: Indian people know what it's like to be
uprooted (9/23)
Harjo: We can prove that
Native people ate corn (08/26)
Harjo:
Hanging onto mascots, toys of racism (08/12)
Harjo: Elite group wants control over dead
Indians (08/05)
Harjo: O'Connor trampled
on Native religious rights (07/08)
Harjo: Ruling expected any day on use of R-word
(06/17)
Harjo: NCAA should ban all 'Native'
imagery (05/27)
Harjo: Native people,
like 'extinct' bird, survive (05/13)
Harjo: Native women aren't safe in Indian
Country (04/29)
Harjo: Characteristics
of the non-Indian Indians (04/08)
Churchill tells Suzan Shown Harjo: Kiss my ---
(02/17)
Suzan Shown Harjo: Churchill went
'tribe-shopping' (2/11)
Anti-fry bread
column stirs Indian Country passions (02/07)
Harjo: Eliminate fry bread and other 'Indian'
foods (01/21)
Harjo: The 'good' Indians
versus the 'hostiles' (12/17)
Harjo:
Pine Ridge election about character (10/29)
Harjo: Anderson harassed Indian reporter over BIA
death (07/02)
Copyright © 2000-2006 Indianz.Com
Subscribe