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May 30, 2011 ---Printer Version (5)
Suicide, You Decide

They found his body late Saturday morning. Wesley BigTrack, age 15, hung himself. Gone. Everyone left behind, to pick up the pieces. His sister died in a drunk driving accident this past summer. His sister was just recently sentenced to prison for that accident.

So, the family buried a young daughter, saw another arrested and then sentenced, and now, their son. This is just one family.

One family that has serious drug and alcohol problems. Common knowledge. A lot of people look down on them for that. Others know it is a tragedy.

One family, with no way out. No counseling, no treatment, for their addictions and the addictions of their children. No counseling for the trauma of the death of a child.

Nowhere for someone to go who has a troubled mind, a broken heart, and no coping skills, save for alcohol, drugs, violence and anger.

The suicide prevention program receives government funding, but like so many programs out there, the government just throws money at the tribe, never audits who is running the program or how it is spent.

A few conferences, a guest speaker, applause, a blanket, and we're done.

Swada, also known as Big Swada because she is so overweight her husband has to push her around in a wheelchair, runs that program. She also is a friend to the Turdclan. She is Molly McDonald's sister. Molly and Mary McDonald. They are the sisters of Russell McDonald (recently in the runoff for Chairman) who is the president of the Little Hoop Community College.

He likes to be called "Doctor" because he has a Ph.D. I assume he got it out of a cereal box because he has screwed up every program he has ever run, and been overpaid for it.  His sister Molly gives custody to fathers without background checks that would show they are a threat to their young children, Swada runs the Suicide Prevention Program. She is paid well for it. They hire their own family, and it is about how much money they can get for themselves and their family, not about what the community needs, or what the program was intended for.

But, they gained a certain amount of privilege and influence after Uncle Demus McDonald and their father, Tony, sold off Mary McDonald, as a young teenager, to be sexually abused by the Turdlings for a few days. It made her pliable enough to lie about being the girlfriend of one of the falsely accused who served time, more than a decade, in prison for that murder, while the real murderers, the Turdlings, still walk around, taking all the money and jobs for themselves and their friends.

Remember Mary? Remember how you could not even pick out the guy you said was your 'boyfriend' from the 'six pack' (picture) line up? That was because you and he had never met. But you lied. And your lies put him in prison.  There is an innocent man still in prison. Been in prison over 25 years. When do you think will be a good time for you to tell the truth? Have you, personally, not protected the evil out there long enough? Or is the whole family so dependent on your keeping your mouth shut that you just "put it out of your mind," ? That was, as you say, "a long time ago." 

So, you have it: Piggy Cavenaugh has used the funds for the clinic and mental health as her personal piggy bank. Her family is wealthy.

The McDonalds have taken over every program they get into, putting family members on the payroll, whether they are qualified or not; whether they work or not--- and Daddy is a preacher?  Oh the evil that church has protected all these many years! Is that where people go, when children die? To find comfort in the arms of the Lord? In that church? Does the mother of Swada, Mary, Molly and Russell sing the hymns and make you cry?

You can protect the evil out there, or you can protect the innocent. You cannot do both.

The corruption that robs the programs, the schools, the children, is not a joke.  The casino gives you nothing, but it makes the Turdclan and the Matheneys rich. It makes Myra "the Unsung Hero" as the goofball Mayor of Devils Lake likes to call her, very, very rich... But it does nothing for your community. 

And now, with a Suicide Prevention Program in name only, out there, no outreach, no prevention, another young life is gone.

Are we getting closer to the 'kinds of people' you can have compassion for? If not, there is more, much more to come. 

Suicides don't 'just happen'.

Wesley had no coping skills. Alcohol and drugs, violence and bullying, are the only 'coping skills' taught on the rez. And they are taught by example.

You have one of Eddie's murderers now as your chairman. Look at his smile. He just ate your children, and he is hungry for more. His whole family is. So are his friends. They take everything for themselves and leave nothing but futility for your children. Shall we celebrate the swearing in?

Growing up is hard. Especially the teen years, for anyone, anywhere. But on the rez? Where any connection to another person is life or death in the mind of a fragile adolescent? Where losing that person, and having no family to turn to, no programs to support you, means you have nothing... where do you turn?

Is it time to speak out? Is it time to tell the Truth? Is it time? There are more children making bad decisions based on what you have shown them so far in this life, in this world, in that place. They are not safe. You have protected the evil with lies and with silence.

This one is on you, Mary McDonald, Swada, Molly, Russell, Tony, Demus, Lavigna, Piggy, (and Piggy's whole family). This one is on you Turdlings. Everyone knows that you are the evil that is being paid for with the lives of these innocent babies, young children, adolescents.

Richard continues to serve time for the murders committed by the Yanktons. The Yanktons continue to walk free, help themselves to the money, the funds, the safety of your silence.

This one is on you, Dennis Fisher, Lynn Crooks, Semans, Belgarde, Brunelle... and you too, Pauline. It's on your all. This is your evil and it is eating the children of Spirit Lake alive, spitting in the faces of their families, crushing their bones beneath your feet, like twigs. Not that you care. Do you even pretend to care? Or do you just show up for the free food?

This one is on you, NLO, Brian Pearson, Justin Yankton, All of you. You know who you are. This is what happens when you steal from the community you are supposed to be serving. This is what happens when you think it is all about your comfort, and not about the survival of your own people.

There are more murders and suicides to come. You decide when you think is a good time to stop protecting evil. You decide when you think it is time to stop calling them your friends. You decide when it is a good time to start telling the truth. I'm sure the children won't mind.

Turdling Roll Call

Kalum Yankton, who is the incestuous offspring of his grandfather, James Yankton and his mother, Angie, (James has a lot of children by his own daughters, nieces so don't act surprised), has always just taken whatever he has wanted.

He is one of the bigger meth dealers on the rez. Living right across the street from a Badger, he literally robbed people's homes and cars, and was seen and reported, but no one ever bothered to even go talk to him, much less 'investigate' the crimes.

He openly wore jewelry he had stolen from people, smiling as he waved it in front of their faces. He and one of his friends chased Mike Meade down the road and ran him off into the Lake. It was a big deal for about 3 weeks and then everyone forgot about Mike Meade. Some friends, eh?

Mike made some big mistakes and it cost him his life. Having Kalum as a dealer and friend, was the biggest.

Kalum had robbed the post office, gotten away with it... no one touched him. He's Turdclan. They are (or 'were') untouchable.

Well, it looks like that might not be the case anymore.

May 21, 2011:

Court documents charge 24-year-old Denise Greywater, 38-year-old Michael Greywater, 28-year-old Alonzo Green and 30-year-old Kalum Yankton with burglary of a post office and conspiracy to convert stolen money orders.

Authorities say they stole three money orders for a total of $585.
Michael and Denise Greywater are also charged with false statements.
All four defendants have pleaded not guilty to all counts.

Kalum had, a few years ago, robbed his own grandmother, Turdmother, of money, pills and jewelry. She hurried bailed him out of jail, dropped the charges.

When Donovan Wind was Chief of Police on the rez, Kalum walked into his house, into his bedroom at 3:30 AM, woke up him and his sleeping wife -- just standing there staring at him. When Donovan asked him what he was doing there, Kalum said he just wanted to be sure they were still friends. Donovan assured him that they were.

He was never charged with anything on that one!

Having gotten away with it, all his life, with no penalty--ever; he naturally figured, as did his cousins, they could just walk in and do it again. Only this time, they got busted.  Having Kalum with them was supposed to be a 'free pass'. It has always been that way in the past. But not this time.

By the way, breaking into a post office? That is a Federal Offense.

Amazing how suddenly, with a very active Attorney General in office, suddenly, the bigger criminals on the rez are getting busted. Imagine what it would have been like had the last, long term AG done his job? I hear he is running for one of the open Senate Seats. Clearly, if you want to have criminals protected, he's your man.

Meanwhile, Tim Purdon's office is doing the real work. Work that had been left undone for decades. I wonder if he will ever get around to looking at an old murder case or two, or three, or four... ? I know where he can find one of the murderers real easy-- He's just been elected Chairman of the tribe but a rigged vote.  Should be easy to find him. He has dead children following him around the rez. And he's laughing about it.

There's another funeral to attend. And you have to decide: Do you protect the Evil with your silence and your lies? Or do you protect the children by speaking the truth?

You know where to find me.

~Cat

 

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May 25, 2011 ---Printer Version (5)
How Could This Happen?

The investigation is ongoing and will be for awhile. If I hear anything of relevance, that is not being covered by media and newspapers, I will post it here.

Right now, the Tribe needs to do some major reflecting on how this all happened. It did not happen out of the blue. It did not happen randomly. A series of events, some small, most large, were in play for a very long time, leading up to the horrors of last week.

Not having a safe place for women and children to go, leads to this. People need to be able to escape from abusive situations.  Abuse leads to more abuse, depression, addictions, violence, suicide and murder.

Allowing Chuck and Mary to get away with faking drug tests, is not serving the community's best interests. It serves only Chuck and Mary, and those who make money from manufacturing, selling, delivering and using drugs. 

Allowing Piggy Cavenaugh to abuse the Clinic Funds and Program to enrich her own family, does not serve the community. Her lack of qualifications, and her employing members of her family, over-paying the unqualified, means that anyone that needs to heal from addiction, can't trust the system in the tribe.  They have to go outside of the tribe or they have to get arrested and jailed outside of the tribe.

Addictions are the most damaging of sicknesses. Addictions are caused. They don't 'just happen'. They turn good people into pathetic heaps, or even, into monsters that murder.

The Schools need to actively get rid of the drugs, the bullying and overall atmosphere of disrespect: Disrespect for teachers, each other, and for themselves. 

Children that are exposed to addiction in the home are also exposed to violence.

Children that are molested, raped, assaulted, abused, neglected, do not grow up to be healthy, balanced individuals. They grow up angry, confused, lost-- easy prey for drug dealers, gangs, and other bad ideas.

The silence that has condoned the most corrupt evil in the community, allowed children to be drawn into the sticky webs of those corrupt, criminal families have created.

Having a police department that is untrained and poorly directed, a "Joke", does not make the community safer.

Allowing your elected leaders to hide their behavior from you by hiding the minutes of the meetings and not letting you know how much money the casino makes, is only allowing the criminals to run your community.

Allowing unqualified people to serve as judges in your community, who render rulings that defy logic, common sense and which endanger the children, does not serve the community's best interests. It is merely a formality for when the corrupt want to get away with their crimes, including trafficking in children.

Electing a murderer as your Chairman?  Remember when he was indicted for embezzling all those HUD Funds? The papers put that on his resume when they touted the election as "Previously ran the Housing Department." Like Capone "previously ran an import business".

Allowing the criminals to run the casino?

Allowing a pill head to run the Personnel Department?

Nepotism, and corruption; addiction and openly allowing alcohol and underage parties to be shrugged off, does not make the community safe. It makes it dangerous. Especially for children.

Can you see where the tribe is rotting from the inside out?

Can you see where all the pieces were in place so that these little children had no safe place? Their mother had no safe place?

And, if we don't all start acting like it's important to us, it's going to happen again.

It will happen again. Don't act surprised. You've seen it all coming for a very long time.

All the evil and corruption has been protected, winked at, shrugged off.

We can either protect and nurture evil, or we can protect the children. We cannot do both.

Until the community is safe, no child is safe.

If we don't learn from this and find a way to do the hard work of coming together, remembering who we are, and getting this garbage OUT of the community, we can only expect it to happen again.

If we don't offer comfort to the mother, to those who survived this, without judgment, we can expect none.

She loved her children. She did everything she could. There was no rescue and no refuge for her or for them in a community run by and for the most corrupt among you.

This has been going on for decades. It won't stop until we, all of us together, turn it around.

People outside the rez don't know what goes on inside the rez. They have no idea what people are up against and how great the struggles are.  The schools don't teach a true or accurate history.

We are divided more by ignorance than by anything else. Ignorance caused by us being kept in the dark about our True History, or even recent events.

Until the recent and new Attorney General in ND going after bigger game, Federal and State government has, until recently, ignored the pleas for help from Indian people, and supported, defended, reinforced the criminals that have been running their communities.

For perspective: Imagine if you can, having your community and every aspect of your lives, work, businesses, run by the Mafia. And, if you complain, you are ignored. You are bullied by those in charge and you have nowhere to turn. If you ask your elected State and or Federal officials for help, they refer you back to the very Mafia that is the problem, and tell you that you must first go through channels and they can only act if the Mafia tells them there is a problem.

How safe would your children be?

This has been the case on this rez, and many others, for generations. Now maybe, you can understand why things are so dysfunctional on the rez; why so many are 'angry', and why so many 'fall through the cracks' or whatever you want to call it when abuse, violence and addictions destroy a human being.

Walking Eagle Roll Call

This is just one family out there, not even the biggest or the most corrupt, that has been, for decades, fleecing the tribe, bullying people and getting away with it: (see WDAZ link)

Eight members of the Spirit Lake Tribe have been indicted by a federal grand jury and charged with conspiracy to embezzle from an Indian tribal organization and aiding and abetting, U.S. Attorney Timothy Purdon said Wednesday.

The eight defendants are Martina Kazena, William Kazena, Raymond Jetty, III, Tanya Jetty, Shaela Jetty, Lorna Walking Eagle, Rochelle Walking Eagle and Bruce Walking Eagle. They made their initial appearances on May 7, 2011, in Grand Forks and all plead not guilty.

The eight were indicted as part of the conspiracy and are alleged to "willfully embezzle, steal, and misapply property, moneys, funds, and credits belonging to the Vocational Rehabilitation Program," which is administered by the Spirit Lake Tribe in Fort Totten, ND, according to the indictment.

Earlier this year, five other tribal members, including two tribal council members, pleaded not guilty to similar charges.

The maximum sentence for conspiracy to embezzle from an Indian tribal organization is five years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

The case is being investigated by the FBI.

A trial for all defendants is scheduled for July 12 in United States District Court in Grand Forks.

Oh, by the way, Chelsea Walking Eagle? You are listed as an absconded offender for failure to register. Yeah, back to the Big House for you. ND Sex Offender Registry

Wait 'til they get into Carl Walkingeagle's aliases and his 'investments'. Millions of Tribal dollars will be found. I hope they give it back to the tribe.  (Carl is one of the "Tribal Council Members" referenced above, along with his wife. The Kazena's are also his family.)

That is just one family. And, like I said, not the Big Fish in that pond.

The Mean While

While these pigs were making obscene salaries, perks, they were robbing the tribe. While elders were cold and could not cook their food last winter, they were laughing it up.

While a mother struggled to save her children and herself and get away from an abusive, violent, meth addicted partner, the Walking Eagles and their pals were robbing the tribe of the money that should have gone to help people like her and her children escape the violence.

Piggy Cavenaugh was buying computers for her family, driving the car to the casino and writing herself checks to cash for gambling. Laughing all the way, while a mother struggled at a minimum wage job that gave her no way out in that very casino.

Piggy had to have seen the woman who needed the programs that Piggy had robbed, a thousand times.

Still think it is harmless? Still think it is a joke?

Still think having judges who gives children to the custody of fathers who have violent records is something to shrug off?

Do you really think that what happened is an aberration? Think there are not more situations just like that out there? How many? Four? Ten? Thirty? (Does it matter?).

Everyone that was robbing the system of the programs that would have protected and helped that woman save her children, literally, walked right past her everyday as they were spending the money on themselves. 

Will they attend the funerals? Make Speeches? Probably. Will they say they are sorry? Don't hold your breath.  Will anyone in the community call them on it? (I dream!) They will still be greeted as wealthy, powerful, influential members of the community they are bleeding to death. Bleeding to death. Blood on their hands...

How many mothers and children are, this very minute, in the same exact situation, being ignored?

Everyone wants to think this was out of the blue and there is no rhyme nor reason and no way to predict it would have happened.

It was predictable. And it will happen again. Because nothing has changed. Nothing ever changes. Except, there are two more tiny caskets going into the ground.

Comfort

This could have been prevented if a lot of people in powerful positions had not looked the other way, had not ignored the pleas for help, had not exploited the corruption for profit for so many years.

This is our doing. All of us. It is up to all of us, on the rez and elsewhere, to reflect on how it got this way and what we can do to begin the changes necessary. Or, at the very least, to begin to understand.

It is time and we must, if we are to redeem any part of ourselves, reconnect to one another, remember who we are.

Begin by offering comfort-- without judgment. It will change us all. It matters.

You know where to find me.

~Cat

 

 

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*May 24, 2011 ---Printer Version (3)
No Comfort Just Questions

* Correction: There was NO CONFESSION by Mena. She was being interviewed by the FBI and her son was with her. Today she shopped for clothes to bury her children in. Those who were sure she was confessing were basing it on what is typical for abuse cases out there, like the one I cited about Budeen (below) in today's Blog.

This is why we have to reach out. No matter what we hear or think we know about a person, chances are, we don't.

I am so relieved that she has not lost her mind and tried to take this as her doing. I leave the blog below so you can read it and know what was going around, but know it is not, was not true. It did not make sense.

People who relayed that to me are good people who were worried that this was going the wrong way. They didn't want anyone to believe any "confession" she might have been making.

The people who corrected this, are also people who care, and they wanted it to be known what was true.

I am heartened to see so many people caring about the mother who has lost so much in such a horrible way. The community is still in shock. Be kind to one another.

---

 

I am hearing that now, the mother of those two slaughtered children has turned herself in and claimed the crime as her own.

Questions:

1. It makes no sense. Why, if she killed them, were they found in his house? The house 'smelled of death' and he did not notice? He did not notice that the mattresses that sandwiched their tiny bodies was "lumpy" and reeked?
   
   
2. Why would she kill them, in that horrible way, and spare the youngest?
   
   
3. Why would he pretend to not know where the kids were and then take off running when the police showed up?
   
   
4. Why was that little girl found the way she was?  Is the mother that much of a pervert?

None of this makes sense. It's like putting together the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle, but with other puzzle pieces mixed in, and some of the necessary pieces missing.

That is how it is out there.

Too many women have no self-respect and no boundaries out there. They are not taught these things as children or when they are maturing. They are taught that they don't matter, and the only value they have in this world is if they 'belong' to some man, regardless of how worthless he is; how drunk or how abusive.

When Budeen Dunn was shot in the head, IN HER HEAD, by her 'boyfriend' during a drunken rage fight where he had her in a headlock and shot her, she could not stand to see 'her man' in jail, so she changed her story to 'accidental shooting'.  He got out.

Budeen got her 'man' back. It's a fairytale ending.

I have seen this level of destructive co-dependence out there too many times to count.

So, we don't know yet what the truth of these child murders is.

We wait while it unfolds, like some stinking, rotting blanket, with pieces missing and filth everywhere.

We wait.

Meanwhile, young girls are growing up and having their first sexual encounters at "Pig Parties", some as young as Ten-years old. Some younger.  The boys who do not participate have their manhood questioned.

Alcohol is supplied by grown men, and drugs are brought in, meth is cooked up in several locations, easy to know just by the smell, especially as the weather gets warmer and the windows are open.

Little children grow up in this, and everyone looks away thinking that it will fix itself.

The Federal Government has long supported the corruption at the top, ignored the cries and complaints of those pointing to injustice and crimes that spread out into other communities. 

The local paper, The Devil's Lake Urinal, always happy to praise those who are and have been destroying the rez, as "heroic", wonder now why "No one out there will talk to us." I suggest they try their old friend Myra Pearson, aka "NLO", as they seem to have a good working relationship with her. (*snort)

Close Your Eyes

Somewhere, in a DA's office in Fargo, Mena Shaw is taking this one on herself.  Did she do it? I don't know. Will they investigate? Or just take her word for it? We'll see.

The Feds, generally, like to close this kind of open door insight into the rez very quickly. They don't want media to pick up the stories that happen out there. Because, as media is wont to do, they will be looking for more to add to it, more to make it more interesting and stay on top in the ratings.

That might lead to some "snooping" into the mechanics of how these dynamics were set in motion in the first place; how they were kept in place and most important: WHY.

Once they do that, they might question whom has, over all these decades, benefited from this mental, spiritual, economic abuse.  That might lead to some very pale faces, with suits, and memberships in country clubs.

If they looked they might see how the whole thing was not only bound to happen, but will most certainly happen again.

Don't look. You don't want to know. You want to see this as "those people" and never look at how it was set up to be the inevitable outcome, and will again, in the not too distant future, horrify us all with even more and worse.

Don't look there. Just ignore this. You really don't want to know what goes on in Indian Country. This rez is no different from so many others.

It would break your heart.

You know where to find me.

~Cat

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The dogs have not stopped howling, jumping at phantoms in the night. Children are restless in their beds. Parents, grandparents, and guardians hug their little ones a little longer, afraid to let them go. Everywhere, there is a stirring. A horror in our midst. This is our doing. Our doing by neglect.

May 22, 2011  -- Printer Version (3)
Comfort

Having stood next to parents who have had to bury their child, I know there is no greater pain on this planet or in this life, than the loss of a child, especially one's own.  There is no comfort that can be offered that can reach through that wall of pain and disbelief.

The circumstances around the murder of these two children is coming in. I want details. I want to know so I can follow what is going on. I am not going to post those details, even though they will come out, eventually, in a court case.

The Mother, Mena, needs from the community, all of you, whether you are her friend or not, she needs comfort and support. If you cannot support and comfort a mother who is grieving this horrendous loss, because of some petty personal judgment on her or her family, then the opportunity to provide comfort to another, perhaps closer to you, will arrive. 

This is how we learn from tragedy. Or we don't learn, and have to relive the lessons again and again.

If we can come together to offer comfort to someone in our midst who is suffering this horror and grief, we can, as a community, begin to heal.

So many lessons to be learned from this. They will all be lost if we miss the opportunity to reach out, beyond ourselves and our own fears, jealousies, judgments, and help .

No Child Is Safe

Travis DuBois is a known meth user, and he worked at the Fire Department. A lot of people wonder how he passed his drug tests.

It's easy. Chuck carries clean tests with him. Little jars of clean piss that are for sale, if you think you might fail, for $50-100.

He used to ask who was going to be tested when he was called to set up a test. If it was a known user, he would bring the clean samples with him.  After the bosses quit telling him who was going to be tested, he just brought samples for sale.

Chuck has the drug testing business in his wife, Mary's name. This makes it a Tribal Contractor and she and he get preference over other companies bidding for the contract.  They get $65/ per test (More for the clean samples on hand). Figure they do at least 10 a day: $650 per day, average.

So, what does a bought-off drug test get you? Travis DuBois. 

There are more where he came from.

Do you feel safe? You shouldn't.

Now, add to the mix, Molly McDonald who likes to favor fathers, regardless of crimes they have committed, assaults, drug use, alcoholic rages, incest... to have custody of children they have never seen. Children that have been raised by their mothers or grandparents... until the father shows up, not having paid a nickel of support, not having shown any interest in how their child was getting by...

Molly, you see, never does background checks on either the parent, guardian or to the person she is going to grant custody to. She doesn't think anything like that is necessary.

When she hears children crying because they were ripped from their homes, where they were safe, and put into the absolute custody of a father who has beat, raped, molested, neglected them... she laughs. It means NOTHING to her. Nothing.

She has no qualifications to be a judge, or even a cop, or a lawyer. She only has the power given to her by the Tribal Council, specifically, by NLO.

Mena Shaw had split up with Travis DuBois, Sr.  But she had to leave her children with him, despite his being drunk and a known meth user. Was Molly involved in this? Did she give the order? I don't know.

But I do know that she would have. She may have. Based on her history of favoring fathers, regardless of potential harm to the child.

Hearings are just a formality for her.

The horrible events of early Friday morning, not discovered until yesterday afternoon... can happen many, many times again, if you allow someone as corrupt and brainless as Molly McDonald, or her pal, Pete Belgarde, to remain on the bench, rendering absurd decisions that mock Justice, and endanger children, to remain as a Judge.

If there is not a huge outcry  against her and Pete, how long will it be before another young life is ruined, or murdered? How many already are? Does it matter?

Or shall we wait for the dogs to howl, and run in circles, barking at Restless Spirits?

Evil has been protected on the rez. Evil has been protected by silence. Now, it feeds on the most innocent we know. Until we stand up to evil, speak the Truth, the Evil will continue to grow.  This did not happen last week, it happened a long time ago. It just wasn't noticed until these little lives were taken.

We can protect Evil, or we can protect the Innocent. The choice is yours, mine, ours. Everyday we hold silent on the things we know we must speak the Truth, Evil gets stronger, bigger and hungrier.

And now, Coyotes circle the graveyard. Mountain Lion waits for what is lost. A mother sobs beyond words and tears, little children don't understand why no one protected their friends. They wonder if they are next.

If you cannot offer comfort to the mother, you cannot expect it for yourself. There is a little child who will never see his sister and brother again. Imagine, if any of these were you.

Now, offer comfort. Save your judgments for the courtroom.

You know where to find me.

~Cat

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Warm winds carry the scent of white lilacs, jasmine and apple blossoms through my open window. Never has an approaching storm seemed so irresistible.

May 21, 2011  --- Printer Version (3)
So Many Stories, All End The Same Way

If you live in St. Michaels, you already know: Two little children are dead. Murdered by their father. It was earlier this afternoon when the phones started ringing. Destiny Dubois, age 9 and her younger brother, Travis Dubois, Jr., age 5.  Gone from this world.  Taken by an even that should never have happened.

Their father either shot them to death, or stabbed them and slit their throats. Depends on who the information is coming from. Doesn't really matter at this time: They are both needlessly dead and the community is in shock. Their family and friends are traumatized. But not surprised.

Another sibling was away from home at the time, so was spared. I am hearing both that the mother was also shot and or stabbed and in the hospital; or, she was not even home when this happened.  Have to wait and hear on that one.

The father, who was taken into custody after being on the run, but never making it off the rez, is sitting in Fort Totten Jail as I put this blog together. He should be transferred to Federal Custody very quickly. That jail is not safe for him. If he is suicidal, they will ignore him and he will hang himself.  If he is not suicidal, there's enough anger out there that someone could kill him, and, since they don't do autopsies on Indians, declare it as a suicide.  A lot of people out there would not question it. Even though they should.

Connecting The Dots

I'd like to be  able to tell you this all started this afternoon, but it didn't.

I'd like to tell you that it started on Monday when Head Start visited the home and the father, Travis Dubois, was drunk and incoherent.  And when they visited on Friday, yesterday, he was still drunk. But that is not when it started.

It didn't start when Kim Carlson, who ran the battered women's program out there got busted for embezzlement and they closed the program down (right after they had gotten a huge grant).  Truth is, Kim was set up by a couple of people on the Tribal Council. She took the fall, but it was Jason and/or Justin who set her up, signing checks, not asking questions, just doing as they said.

It's something that Myra and Brian, before he was sent to prison, twice, for drunk driving felonies, used to do often. It's how they drain the programs.  Get the grants, clearly there is a need, and then drain the accounts by having whomever is in the job do as they are told and 'get cash' for them.

Now, the battered women's program on the rez is closed down.  There is an outreach program of sorts in Devils Lake. Go there, and you get pamphlets. Programs are short of money these days. Be sure and thank your elected officials for voting to give BIG OIL a few extra billion dollars every year, while they are cutting off funding to programs that are needed by people they never want to associate with.

Be sure and thank the FBI for never, despite all the complaints, investigating how any of these programs are actually spending money. Thank them for ignoring the complaints of embezzlement for decades.

Thank Piggy Cavenaugh and her family, who have every single job at the clinic for themselves. Her daughter, who barely shows up for work, gets paid overtime every week. None of them are certified. None of them are qualified.

There is nowhere for the drunk and drug addicted to go to heal.

There is nowhere for the battered and abused to go for refuge and safety.

There is plenty of money for your Tribal Council to go traveling to Las Vegas...

Plenty of money for your Tribe to pay the legal bills of Walkingeagles and all the rest of them that got busted...

Plenty of money for the Tribal Council to give themselves huge $25K bonuses for last Christmas...

Just no money for the Elders and the poor to have fuel... that all goes to the wealthy and the powerful...

Just no money for the battered and abused women and children....

And now, two very young lives are ripped cruelly from our midst. No longer on this earth, no longer laughing, or playing, or crying because they are neglected, hungry, abused, beaten...

One Thousand Reasons

There are a thousand good reasons why things got this bad out there. There are horror stories I have never spoken of in this blog.

But there is only one reason that it is still going on: Corruption.

There are many reasons the Corruption still goes on: Cowardice, jealousy, racism and lies.

Good People have to become more Good People.  People have to stand up. People have to speak up. People have to tell the Truth.

Letting the murderers roam free, allowing the innocent to remain in prison, is cowardice.

It leads to corruption.

Corruption leads to a house in St. Michaels.

You can't miss it. Crime tape. Police cars...

And so many family members the police had to move them all to the Rec Hall.

There is crying, moaning, shock, and shouting.

There is a storm coming, because people didn't speak up, speak out, sooner. There is a storm coming.

The innocent will be swept away until there are no more innocent.

Then, my friends, it will just be us. Maybe by then we will have lost enough that we can put aside the jealousy, the cowardice, the lies... and find a way to come together, to remember who and what we are.

Until then... remember: One of the murderers is now your Tribal Chairman.

Killing solves nothing. Violence is not the answer. Courage requires we stand up and be heard. And if no one is listening, we still keep telling the Truth.

There are more drunken parents out there. More drug addicted parents and children out there. They have nowhere to go.

Neither do we.

You know where to find me.

~Cat

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May 18, 2011 ---Printer Version (1)
Kyle White

Kyle White hung himself in the jail the other night. He has a history of attempted suicides, but was never given mental health services. Piggy Cavenaugh can't be bothered with taking her job seriously, just taking the money. 

The result is that so many on the rez who need mental health services and counseling, have nowhere to go. They self-medicate with drugs and alcohol, and we have seen, over and over again, how much worse that makes it for not only the person, but for everyone around them.  It spirals into darker and darker territory.

There comes violence, recklessness. Laws are broken. Bones are broken. Sick people end up in jail instead of in hospitals...

There is so much generational PTSD on the rez, it would take a team of 50 qualified counselors to render appropriate care.

There would also have to be security in that people seeking help would not have to fear that Piggy and her family and pals would be breaching confidentiality regularly. Counselors could not even lock their files because Piggy would go in with a crowbar just to snoop through to see if there was anything in there she needed or wanted.

So, you get cases like Kyle White. And you get jailers who do not have him on appropriate suicide watch.  Or you get a government that really doesn't care about funding services and cuts the numbers of people on duty so even if you wanted to, you could not possibly give the right kind of supervision to prisoners to protect them from other prisoners or even themselves.

It's a vicious cycle. It's the rez. It's everywhere.

The rez gets funding that never gets properly applied to the programs it is intended for. Decades of corruption lead to this. He may or may not have been someone everyone will miss, but at one point in his life, Kyle was just a kid who needed help. He grew into an adult that needed help. He never got it.

We have got to stop throwing people away. We are running out of Indians.

You know where to find me.

~Cat

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May 17, 2011 --Printer Version (3)
St. Michael's Gang Rape

I am looking for details on this. I won't be posting the details, but I want to know, who, what, where and when. I will not be posting names of the victim.

What I have heard: There was a party in St. Mike's. A girl, underage, went to the bathroom. When she did, some men broke down the door and raped her. Another man at the party had the decency to call the police.  (I will not post his name, either, but I want to know who it was).

When the police arrived (and I want to know which police department responded inasmuch as Tribal Police have never investigated any rapes on the rez, ever...) the men were still raping her.  They barricaded themselves in a trailer and the police had to break it up to get them out.

The names of the arrested are: Neil Greywater, Lee Jackson, Box Cavanaugh, and Trent Anderson. Some of those names are familiar to you, some not-so-much.  I have seen Trent Anderson's name a few times. I will have to look it up.

I hope the victim is being cared for, has received appropriate medical care and can get some real counseling. Not the crap that Piggy Cavenaugh's department dishes out by the unqualified friends and family she pays to take the places that the qualified have been cheated out of.

Don't Bet On Black

Meet Audrey Belgarde, your new Director of the Casino.

Bennett Black lost his job, as Director, at the casino.  I was just putting together a piece on him and how he was not qualified to hold the job he has had for 15 years (and he is related to the Iris Black who ran over the toddler known as "Love Bug"). He has held that job without so much as a Driver's License.

So, Audrey Belgarde has had her eye on that job for herself. It was a simple plan. Bennett is a chronic alcoholic and often didn't show up for work, or showed up drunk.

Sure enough, he showed up drunk. His mistake was being in range of Audrey. She stood by him or he stood by her... she filed a complaint and called the police (He did reek, but he always did). The police came, breathalyzed him... and he was, of course, waaaay over the limit... and he thought he could just go home.. and why not? He'd done it so many times before.

Not this time. Audrey Belgarde (Is she related to Pete Belgarde? The cop who helped plan the 'Ear Witness' story to Eddie's murder?), wanted more. She had him fired on the spot.  She now has his job. She got it before the night was done.

Wow, if you know who to go to, you can get a job that fast, that easy! Belgarde and the Turdclan are big pals. And, since Roger's BIG WIN, changes have been going down faster than Wacky Jacky on an open fly.

Head Start, Way Behind

Apparently, Georgia (whom some of you thought was either Cat West or writing to me) took enough money out of the Head Start Program to leave it financially strapped.

She's managed to get most if not all, of the temporary hires fired because of the shortage of funds.

People are mad at her and she is taking it out on the program and the Program Director, Becky Larson, who has literally struggled and been physically attacked as she has done everything humanly possible to keep that program afloat.

NLO went down and had a chat, it seems, with Becky, and told her that she doesn't care about the children, she only cares about herself! Stunning words coming from a woman who did not raise any of her children. Not one of them.

My writer may have meant that NLO was lecturing Georgia... and that is a possibility, but either way, coming from a woman who never raised her own children (and there were so many. NLO was a virtual hatchery out there.) Hypocrisy is her specialty.

I guess we know on what side of the swamp NLO plants her flag.

Meanwhile, the program flounders. The Temporary and Substitute Help is fired. The funds are missing and that will, no doubt, raise the kind of smoke signals the Feds are looking for when they are picking a target to raid and records to investigate.

Keep in mind, while you are at it, that the Federal Government, under the Republican Leadership of the HOUSE of REPRESENTATIVES, has voted to eliminate Head Start and defund all such programs that actually help people of lower income. 

I hope the Tribe has a PLAN B for the kids. But I doubt it. Caring about the kids is so not their style. Caring about the Future is so laughable.

Back To St. Michaels

I just got word that it was the Ft. Totten PD that responded to the rape. Everyone is amazed. Typically, they want to know who is being raped, and who the rapists are first, so they don't step on any toes.  Which explains why they have never investigated any rapes on the rez, despite the statistics that show women, children are raped at a rate several times higher than much larger populations.

So, I guess the victim might have been someone important and the guys arrested have no political pull.

I could be wrong. They could have a new Chief of Police. Someone that actually cares about the job and the safety of the community. If that is so, he or she, won't last long. Tribal Council never supports anyone who might actually do that job.

But do let me know. I keep a file on statistics and families out there. I will not post the name of the victim nor of the person that made the call to the police.

You know where to find me.

~Cat

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May 16, 2011 ---Printer Version (5)
Bad Guys v Bug Light

It's spring and the bugs are HUGE this year. We have a bug light.  A huge one. You would think that the moths that are stuck to it would be a warning to other bugs, but alas, the warnings go unheeded.

"ZAP!" there goes another one! Sometimes, one after the other, four at a time... endless entertainment for simple minds such as mine. I know, I should feel bad that the bug's life ends with it literally, unable to resist the light. I get the giggles on the cluster zaps. I know you do, as well. (I see you smiling!)

And, while my computer was in the shop, everything was breaking loose on the rez. (By the way, do as I did and always keep the warranty on the work done, close by. It could save you a few hundred dollars in fan repairs/replacements.)

Emails came in, one after the other after the other detailing the arrests that were happening out there. Public arrests. A few in the casino, a few at the college, a few at the Blue Building.  It was like watching a bug light sweep through the rez.

Here are the names I have of those arrested. Let me know if there are any corrections or additions:

You already know that Carl and Barbara Walking Eagle have been arrested and indicted. You are paying their legal bills. In fact, you are probably paying all their legal bills. Justin's and his wife's, everyone's. Unless... well, we shall see.

1. Lorna Walking Eagle (Carl's Sister) ZAP!

2. Bruce Walking Eagle (Carl's Brother) ZAP!

3. Rochelle or Rocelle Walking Eagle (Carl's Daughter) ZAP!

Lorna and Rochelle were arrested at the Casino. They were Shuttle Drivers. I wonder how many people got to watch the floor show and then wondered how they were going to get home?

I hear Bruce's daughter ran out of the back door of the college... but they got her anyway.

Both Lorna and Rochelle are drinkers. Let me guess, drugs too? One bust, but how many counts? Who knows? Is this related to the Fuel Assistance Program? Maybe. (*click, click,*The sound of Dominos falling)

But wait! There's more! If you order today, you can also get....

4. Tanya Kazena (Martina Kazena's daughter. Martina is Carl's Sister and she runs the Vocational rehab program)... ZAP!

Side note here on Barbara Walkingeagle, just so you know what a cheap ass bitch she was. Despite 'saving' thousands of dollars every year by cheating the LIHAP Program (Fuel Assistance) (and who knows how many other programs she was cheating) Barbara Walking Eagle was caught working at the Library for Four Winds-- without the proper credentials. She was fined for it... a measly $250 and she did not pay! (More money for Pull Tabs there, eh Babs?)

So, I think that concludes the Walkingeagles that got arrested, Bug light style. Remember also that one of Carl's granddaughter is serving time for child endangerment. She even made it to CNN with her spectacular stupidity. (Babysitting, getting stoned with friends, toddler walks out onto highway... you remember)

Now, for the other arrests: (Remember: these names are what I have received... you have to tell me what they are for, if they are wrong, etc.)

5., 6.,7., & 8. Tanya, her husband R. J. Jetty, her daughter Shalay (sp?). They all worked for the Vocational Rehab Program (none of them qualified) which was run by Carl Walkingeagle's sister, Martina Kazena, Peggy "Piggy" Cavenaugh's program...ZAP! ZAP! ZAP! ZAP! (It was a cluster Zap! My favorite kind.)

9. A program run by Jolene Crosswhite got raided... more to follow on that. (What program does she run?).  Over $150K missing from that program, and computers? ZAP!

I wonder if they also took the computers that Piggy used the program's funds to buy as Christmas Presents for her family last year? They get new computers every year, right?

Bruce is another guy who never really worked but always lived off of women. I bet he is singing the loudest of all of them right now.

I also heard that Tribal Court got raided. I have no way to verify that.

Dominoes are falling... each bust leads to more charges, more serious charges, and of course, talking. Lots of talking.

Are there any Walkingeagles not in jail? Or should I say: Not yet in jail? Darren? Anything you want to say? Y'all check around for the Rec Department equipment that has been, ahem, "borrowed" and see if now might be a good time to return it. Anything worth more than $1500 is a felony, I think. No matter, you will find out soon enough!

I wonder if Myra is the one doing all the talking. There is a lot of speculation that she is the source of most of this. She wanted to get rid of Justin and it just snowballed. Or, she got caught in that Ronin scam, with dirty hands and is selling out everyone around her to buy herself a shorter sentence.  Well, let's ask her shall we?

Myra, "NLO", are you the one bringing all this down on your former friends? 

By the way, the sale on that property of NLO's? That worthless unarable land? That was done in 2009. That is why the Tribal Council doesn't want you to see the minutes of the meetings. They do illegal things like that all the time. August 2009. Here's the Resolution: 05-09-174 the date is 19th Day of August 2009.

The Tribe has been her piggy bank for over a decade. But, she was not alone in this. I guess, like Poopsie, she is taking everyone down with her. One way or another.

And every person that goes down, talks. Every single one of them.

Lesser Weevil

Marty Alex was still your best choice of the Bad, Worse and Evil, but you chose evil... or the primary was rigged. This is all that is left out there to run. For the most part that is.

Marty's wife is the receptionist out at the Head Start Program. I hear she is in deep crap now also. Yes, sticky fingers again. Something to do with getting travel money, gambling it away, and skipping out on a hotel bill, which the Tribe then has to pay for... but the person who was supposedly asked to sign for the leftover hotel bill from Las Vegas had refused. I am told that Walt Hollyfield then forged that person's name onto a check to clear the bill. Can't wait until the Feds get to him!

It's probably going to kill the Head Start Program. I hope not. There are really decent people in there trying to make it work and the parents and the kids really need it.  Keep your eye on it. Find out what really happened and make sure that you do all you can to keep that program. Get rid of the thieves and gold brickers out there and put in people who will run it for the kids.

Yup, and Marty was the 'good one'. The Lesser of all evils, so to speak.

See what you get when you run off all the educated and dedicated people? This is where nepotism leads.

Stealing From The Elders

I hear Wacky Jacky and her brothers are trying to steal a home from an old man out there. The elderly are not protected by anyone.  They are demanding that he just get out of his house and let them have it. I have no idea why. But they - that 'hole' family (yes, I meant "HOLE") have been bullies for their entire lives. Picking on the Elderly is nothing new for them.

The old man gets death threats from them.  He got up one morning and his car was missing from the driveway! Later that day, there was Wacky, driving it around, flipping him off.

Now that Weenie Boy has pulled off the coup and taken over the Tribal Chairmanship, the family, even before the inauguration, is resuming their gangster, thug ways. Wow, wonder what he has in store for the rest of you?

Who's On First?

I am told that Poopsie is NOT allowed back at the casino. I am then told that he has his old job as Head of Security back.  Anyone know for sure?

Yes, I know Weenie Boy's son runs the vault. But who is running the casino and the security department?

Note To Feds

Remember: Poopsie had those long range cameras installed almost 8 years ago. They are aimed at the highway so he can 'see your dust and read your plates' if you come to bust him.

Hell And High Water

The Lake is continuing to rise. Some think it will take the casino down this year or next. I am told that the roads too and from are cut off by the rising waters. Great planning guys.

The rising waters are also going to cut off the rez, the whole Tribe, from the outside world. Your Tribal Council has not done a thing to deal with this, despite the fact that they have known for over 10 years that it was going to happen.

You still don't have your wind farm. Yeah, write to me. It's been over 4 years. I would think that by now you would at least be able to run a bug light.

But regardless of how bad it gets, apparently, people still not coming together, not getting over their petty feuds, not standing by those who are standing up for them.

Probably not worth saving, right?

Let the waters rise... There is Hell to Pay and it's on it's way.

The Good People of Spirit Lake may not be enough to save the place. Like Lot and his family, you may have to leave with just the clothes on your back, fleeing before the destruction.

If you do, remember: Don't look back!

You know where to find me.

~Cat

 

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Computer back in the shop so might be awhile before I can post again! So much going on too!

I can receive and respond to emails.

~Cat

*May 7, 2011 -- Printer Version (2)
CORRECTION

I posted (below) how suspicious I was of how John Tikayne died. Apparently, it was from exposure. And he had made a phone call asking for help, but could not give his location. He would have been fine, in that snow/rain, had he stayed in his car.

He was found half in the ditch and half out. The ditch had 2-3' (assuming they meant 'feet'?) of water in it. His coat wrapped around his upper body. He could have done that. He could have been alone. He could have been that confused.

But, since there is never any investigation on any of these deaths, and Dead Indians are jokingly referred to as "suicides, exposure, hit and run, accidental" I have become more suspicious of these assumptions and make assumptions of my own. However, unlike your BIA Cops, I will continue to investigate and to make corrections when I find I am in error, or even could be in error. It happens-- more often than I like, but it happens.

Still, anyone who saw John that night, contact me. The more I know, the more everyone can know. Sometimes it is, just what it appears to be–- another unnecessary tragedy.

Possibilities

Today is John Tikayne's funeral. Everyone that knows him should be there. People who knew him should also know each other.

It's a sad thing when anyone dies at just 39 years of age.  We have seen too many deaths from alcohol and drugs.  Life's possibilities are lost.

Now, look around, and look at one another, and ask yourself: "How could anyone cover himself with a coat over their head as they are drowning?" (they can't).

Now, ask whoever is there how that could happen. Tell me what kind of a reaction you get.

We chalk too many killings out there up to 'natural causes', 'suicide', and 'accidental'. Killing Indians is easy to get away with. You don't have police who investigate. You have people who cover for their friends and family, and for the bullies.

I just want to know what happened to him, and why someone who supposedly was his friend, left him in the ditch, to drown.

Or was he dead before they dragged him to the ditch? Was it an accident? Or was it over a few paltry dollars?

Hey may or may not have been real important to you and to everyone else out there, but he was a Human Being. Whoever did this to him needs to answer for it.

If you don't seek answers for what happened to John Tikayne, and you want to buy into 'Just another drunken Indian got all confused, and "accidentally" died', go ahead. You are used to it by now. It's been used for hundreds of years. It makes a joke out of the deaths of Indians, Human Beings.

If you choose not to even question it, don't cry to me when it is your child that is dead, with some bizarre little twist, like a coat over his head, and people are clucking their tongues and saying: "Such a shame, probably alcohol. But I wonder how he managed to shoot himself in the back?"

Someone else will say: "I don't know, but there was Tikayne and he managed to throw a coat over his head as he was drowning in a ditch, one time awhile back." Everyone will nod. It will be accepted.

I don't think he did this to himself. And the truth is, none of you do either. But who among you will be brave enough to ask for the Truth?  If you don't ask for it, you will never get it. You don't deserve it.

Say good bye to Johnny Tikayne. And ask yourself: "Who's next?"

Laughing At You

I'm sorry, but there is a really stupid streak running through the voters on the rez. Of course you had a choice between bad and worse, so you picked worse. Now I am hearing that the promises made by the illiterate murderer that you voted in as your Chairman are being reneged upon before he has even been sworn in.

Among the things he promised was that he was going to have an audit of the casino. And that he was going to have all the programs audited and investigated -- all the directors scrutinized...

Audit the casino? You believed that? Like he would take away the big bucks that his brother has coming in and which supplies all the family with jobs, and ready uncounted cash? Did you really believe that? Any idea how much he gets from that every week?

So now, he is laughing at you and you are feeling 'hurt'? You expected what? Exactly?

Yup, it's going to be a bumpy Black Road for the next while. Buckle up y'all. You earned it.

You know where to find me.

~Cat

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May 5, 2011 -- Printer Version (4)
Fan

Sorry for the absence this week. I know, just as things really turn to crap, the blog gets no updates. My poor, very old computer blew a fan. But we are back.

So, anything happen while I was off?

Correction:

Johnny Tikayne was not taken by the Lake. Rather, he drowned in a ditch. Alcohol got another Indian. Left him so confused he could not drive and ran his car into the ditch, in the rain. Left him so confused he staggered out of his wrecked car, with his coat wrapped over his head, and fell down in the ditch on the other side of the road... and drowned in a few inches of water. His feet were on the road.

If Alcohol can take down Indians, into a ditch, imagine what that Lake is going to do?

Alcohol is an addiction. It kills. It takes mother's sons, husbands, brothers, and friends, and it kills them.  Your tribal leaders have no interest in helping the addicted to find wellness and sobriety. They are laughing at you as they steal your fuel assistance funds, rip off your general funds, use your money to pay their lawyers who defend them in court, for stealing from you... it never ends. 

Imagine how rich the tribe would be, how many houses would be well built, how fine the schools would be, and how healthy your families could be... if you had good people in Leadership... but you let them all be run off... with silence.

Election

Folks, I strongly suspect the election was rigged. But let's assume that it wasn't and go from there. You now have one of the Murderers of Eddie Peltier as you Tribal Chairman. He cannot read or write, and he is addicted to prescription pills (as is his entire family), so this should be interesting.

His whole family will be over at the Blue Building every day, getting bag loads of cash, and probably scoring their drugs on the spot. I'm sure Piggy Cavenaugh can arrange for prescription pads to be filled out.

I know, you hate having bullies, drug addicts and murderers running your tribe, but let's take a look at that, shall we?

How We Got Here

It's what happens when you don't stand up to the bullies, murderers, thieves in your community. It's what happens when you make friends with them and your children marry into their families and you think you are safe because you are part of their 'family'. It's what happens when you sit on your blankets and watch as those who worked hard, stayed clean, overcame every obstacle of drugs, alcohol, abuse the tribe had to offer them; went to school and got degrees, came home to help their tribe and were run off by jealousy, incompetence and bullies. Calling them "Apple Indians"... denying them the positions they were qualified for and giving it to the unqualified who were 'part of the family'...

You may not have been the one calling the names, but neither were you the one standing up for those who were trying to stand up for your community. Your silence hurt as much, if not worse, than those who were bullying them.

So, along comes an election and your choices are not great: So you get the worst of the worst. Why? Because of petty jealousies, family feuds and because so many of the good people who would have stood up for you and with you, were run off--- by your silence. 

And lo and behold, what you are left with is what your silence brought you. They bullied the good people and now, they own you. They own your income, the jobs, the housing, the food, and they own you. They own your children.

How does it feel?

Who To Blame?

Look around. There are good people who have been standing up for you in your own community, but not enough of you could even bother to stand up with them, for yourself. 

The blog has been here for more than ten years. A place for you to speak and be read. A place for you to bring information. A place where you could do your part. But so few of you ever bothered.

I did get lots of emails from Blanket Indians saying: "We are all just sitting here waiting to see what you think you can accomplish. Not seeing you have any success out here. Your failing to make changes.." things along that line.

Those emails were always very bold, about how I was not succeeding... and they would fail to sign their real name. As if they were afraid? They were afraid. They are afraid. People who chirp like that and hide without giving their real name? What are they afraid of? People out there knowing it's them? Or do they know, instinctively, they are wrong and too embarrassed to put their name on an email.

It doesn't matter.

This is not about me. It never has been. It is about you. It is about your community. It is you waking up and coming together to make the kinds of changes it takes to save your own community, your own children, your own lives, and your own dignity. It's not about me. I am just the messenger. And I narrate what you send to me. And I will narrate this all as it unfolds and as the suicides, overdoses, murders, rapes, come to my attention.

Those who complain that I never have anything good to say about Spirit Lake Nation are also lazy cowards. If you want something "good" written, you must send it to me. But you never do. What kind of a childish mind do you have where you think it is up to someone else to do the work you see needs to be done? You see it, you do it. It's your community. You want good news? You never send any!

Coyote is sniffing the air and catching the scent of your fears, lies and laziness. They know they won't have to chase you. They know you are too lazy to run. Too lazy to save your own self, and you are theirs, whenever they decided to take you down, drag you off and feed you to their young.

You get mad, you get sad, and you blame other people. The truth is, it comes down to you. You know you failed. You know you didn't even try. You know that when the murderer smiles at you, you are going to smile back and hope, just hope, they like you. 

Maybe, if you are really quiet, and never disclose anything you know... maybe they will like you--- and things will get a lot better...

Well, let's see how that works out for ya. So far, it's given your tribe the most embarrassing election results ever. I'm sure, if everyone just stays quiet, doesn't try, doesn't lift a finger to do the right thing, things will be just fine.

AhhooooOoooOoo Yaaaa!

I think Coyote got one. Or was it two?

Next

There are things you are going to have to do now. One of them is to take a good look at who you are and how things got this way and figure out what you can do about them. Figure out or perish.

If you ever had faith, then these dark days and the ones coming, will be the test of that faith. It is easy to "Praise the Lord!" when things are good and life is easy. But you will have to find your connection to your faith now, when you realize that your preachers are agents of the Devil, and those who claim Black Road Medicine are ready to take you into their lodges.

You will have to find, in yourself, what is real and what will work.

No one is going to tell you what to do. No one is going to fly in with a red cape (Or a broomstick!) and make this all go away for you.

Now, this, today and every day forward-- it is your job, your work. It has always been your work.

When you realize what it is you can do, individually and together, you will find what you have been seeking... and the light will shine and all this darkness will flee. But it is up to you. When you think it's as bad as it needs to be, then maybe, just maybe, you will get up off your blankets.

Some of you never will. Just lie down and try to enjoy it.

You know where to find me.

~Cat

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May 2, 2011 -- Printer Version (3)
Murderer, Rapist, Accessory Thief...

I'm hearing from people who say they did not vote for Marty Alex because his wife is a thief. They are saying that she stole the ticket sales from the Pow Wow one year. Probably a few thousand dollars in that. I know his family doesn't like her. Not sure why. Marty has bad judgment in women. A lot of men out there have bad judgment about women. And-- vice versa.

So, Marty's wife may or may not be a thief? I hear from people who say that talk about her is just a rumor.  I have heard about six different names for whomever did steal the money.

BUT... for the sake of argument, let's say she did. Let's say she ripped off the box office. That would make her a thief. Oh the horrors! A thief!

Have you seen the papers lately? Your Tribal council and a few other employees, including Roger Yankton's daughter, up on charges for stealing, embezzling from the tribe? Oh wait, was his daughter the one arrested for meth sales? It's one or both of those.

So, given a choice of a half-way decent man whose wife may or may not have stolen from the Pow Wow (Oh the Horrors! *Swoon) and a murderer, rapist, who has a proven track record of not being able to even read, and who has in the past, ripped off the Tribe's HUD funds, millions of dollars (why so many are still without housing, btw), or a Man who is the accessory to the Murder of Eddie Peltier, and who has ripped off the tribe with incompetence--- y'all either chose NOT to make a choice, or most of you chose the murder, rapist, embezzler AND his Accomplice over the guy whose wife pissed you off?

So many chose not to vote at all because the field did not live up to their high standards.

Well, here's what happens when you run off or allow to be run off, all the decent and qualified people. This is what happens when you don't stand up for someone when you know they are being done wrong by your neighbors and your 'leaders'. 

This is what you get when you sit on your blankets and let a handful among you do all the fighting for you--- and you don't even support them when they fight for you. This is what happens.

Both Weenie Boy and Russell have plans for the tribe. Russell wants to make it so that the Chairman has ALL the power and can over ride the votes, veto anything, and get paid even more.

Weenie Boy's plans are the same, and of course, they have already started firing people in the Blue Building, getting the place ready for their drunken, stoned out, unqualified family members to step in and 'OWN YOU ALL'.

This is what you get when you sit back and let other people take all the chances when they stand up and fight for themselves. When they fight for themselves, they are fighting for you, but you are not smart enough to see that.

And, because you think Marty's wife is a bitch, you put your entire community in the worst possible situation.

High Water

The water is rising. It has covered the roads, thrown those huge boulders onto the road like scrap wood. The lake is filling up with tears.  And with what is coming, I am sure you will all see that you are isolated. There is nothing there for you. Nothing worth fighting for. No one willing to stand up for you. At least, no one good enough.

The casino has had renovations that please the eye, but not the nose. There is rot and mold there... and it will make you sick. They know it. They hide it. The water is rising to drown that casino--- and all that money that came through there, and went into the pockets of the corrupt, will just be a memory.

Your children will see no future for themselves. It won't take much for them to feel totally alone, isolated in this world, and they will take that long walk into the graveyard.  There will be more tears and the water will rise a little higher... Maybe when the water comes in your front doors, you will get off of your blankets, and leave.

It is too much to expect that you would put aside petty feuds and do the truly hard work of electing people who are not criminals, as your Chairperson.  I pity any honest person that gets elected into Tribal Council... it's obvious they are working for no one who cares.

Let me guess: You'll re elect Carl Walking Eagle, despite him and his sad wife being arraigned for embezzlement/theft of funds... way more than whatever was in that pitiful pow wow cash box... 

You could have picked the least of all evils and instead, you went for the two worst.  They are there, laughing at how they are going to pick the Tribe Clean. It will be easy for them. You are all on your blankets.

The few of you that stood up and did the right thing, bless you for trying, but look around: Your tribe is dying... find a way out... before the roads disappear all together, taking your children to the Graveyard.

The Road got one Saturday night: Johnny Tikayne was on his way home, car accident, went into the water... got out and was walking home... and died. They say he died of exposure... he was not that old. Less than 40, from what I have heard.

Have we not seen enough of this by now?

How was Prom Night? Everyone survive?

Wow... his wife might have been a thief... so you picked a murderer/rapist/embezzler and his accessory...

Enjoy the next four years. I know I will.

Cry me a river. The lake is full.  The graveyard is sniffing at the bones of your children. And you are mad because a woman stole the Pow Wow receipts. Wow.

You know where to reach me.

~Cat

 

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