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In The Hoop
WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 12, 2001

Welcome to In The Hoop, Indianz.Com's occasional column about assorted Indian issues.

There goes the crowd
A skeleton crew of onlookers shuffled in and out of a federal courtroom yesterday, the second day of the contempt trial against Secretary of Interior Gale Norton and Assistant Secretary Neal McCaleb.

Among the no-shows was Mr. McCaleb himself. He was busy looking at his shoes in other meetings, according to some sources.

Also missing was the contingent of reporters who flocked to the courthouse on Monday. They must have realized this wasn't a "glamorous" trial say, on the level of O.J. Simpson, but it has nonetheless been filled with all sorts of exciting disclosures.

Exciting, that's if you can wade through the hours and hours of testimony and the line-by-line reviews of reports by court monitor Joseph S. Kieffer III. Mr. Kieffer himself has sat through the proceedings so far (although he exited a bit early yesterday) and was even overheard proclaiming in the basement lunchroom that he "loves" In The Hoop.

So do we.

Griles Gaffes
Did you hear the one about the guy who's in charge of trust reform telling tribal leaders about an EDS report that is available online?

Yes, we're talking about none other than Deputy Secretary J. Steven Griles.

You may recall this Bush official at such events as the National Congress of American Indians, where he told tribal leaders that a report on the Trust Asset and Accounting Management System (TAAMS) and data cleanup was on his department's web site.

He just forgot to mention that his department didn't actually get around to putting the document on its web site until nearly a week after he made the pronouncement.

Well, he's done it again. In a meeting last Friday with a select group of tribal leaders, he told them an overall report on trust reform prepared by EDS (the contents of which were reported by Indianz.Com today) was being put on his department's indiantrust.doi.gov web site.

He neglected to mention, according to participants in the talks, that the site -- per his direct order --- is not accessible

Sounds like he pulled a Matt Fader.

In Your Hoop
Where in the world is Secretary Gale Norton? Email In the Hoop and give us your best guess.

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