I knew I knew that cowboy

Okay, so I FINALLY figured out where I "knew" Ken Salazar from.



Okay, no I never met the new Secretary of the Interior. But as I was trying to track down confirmation for the rumor I heard that he was going to be heading to Alaska soon, and saw a pic of him in his hat, I had the lightbulb ding.



When Celtic Diva and I were in Denver, Salazar was everywhere. I remember THAT. But he first caught my attention when he did what I thought was a very respectful and poignant welcome for the convention week by honoring First Americans. The pic is of the "official" welcome for the convention, just after a parade led by these Native dignitaries of the area. My post of the day remarked on this cowboy and Indian presentation: The senator reminded the audience that Native Americans have been at the forefront of America for centuries, including more recent wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.


(Yes, that's me quoting myself.) I had remarked at the time that it was pretty cool Native culture was being honored so prominently - the Native American touches were quite noticeable in Denver the whole time - but this opening was the most traditional, and Salazar's words the most respectful. For those that don't know the Sec. of the Interior oversees the Bureau of Indian Affairs - how this guy has treated Native people/culture/issues in the past is of great importance! Although I'm sure Salazar's main reason for trekking up to the Great North is oil-based, I'm sure he will be finding time (read: he BETTER find time! :) ) to look into the BIA activities up here, and Native issues in general.



Mystery solved. All I had to do was read my own blog!



Wierdly enough, it was the UK Guardian that I finally found confirmation that Salazar would (soon?) be heading to Alaska:

He promised to hold four regional meetings - in Alaska, near the Gulf, along the west coast and the east coast - to gather opinions from governors, environmentalists and energy industry experts.

While I was hunting, however, I came across several interesting articles regarding Native issues and/or Alaska. My brain was fried today from work (actually, a coworker!) so my contributions are meager, you can check out some of the very exciting happenings in Native issues lately!

Bit from an older Alaska Dispatch article about Mark Begich being a "breath of fresh air." Although kinnd of an article about conservation and environment, the Alaska Native implications are pretty clear in the contrast of Stevens and Begich.

A Huffington Post story that humanizes some subsistence and oil issues - by Ricki Ott.

New York Times article about remembering the Indian nations. From the National Congress of American Indians President''s state of Indian nations address:

“When the President says that Indian nations are a priority for his new Administration, I take him at his word,” Mr. Garcia said. “With all my heart, I believe this is the true and right thing to do. I hope that, as the President says, the waiting is over, because Indians have been waiting a long, long time for the government’s actions to meet our own.”

Keeping an eye on presidential Native developments

With the pick of Salazar as Secretary of Interior, so ends my brief advocating for former Gov. Tony Knowles, or another Native-friendly, or Native person, to fill the role. My reaction was kind of... Oh? Huh. Eh.

Not that Salazar will be bad (I know only what I've read in the last few days), certainly, but he has no real record to speak of with Native issues. Unfortunately for Native people, the Bureau of Indian Affairs is lumped in under the Department of the Interior, meaning the other issues the secretary deals with will almost certainly take precedence over Native issues, and therefore a Native person unlikely to be chosen. Okay, maybe "unlikely" is not the right word... more like, never happened in the history of the department. In this case, it is not so much that Native issues are not important, I think, than the environment is THE issue. At least that's what I hope. A former governor of a state that produces children with oil in their blood was probably pretty unlikely (but it was a nice thought while it lasted!) In any case, though Salazar has become the top guy (outside of Obama) for environmental, resources, etc., he has also become the top guy in regards to Native issues. My best wishes to him!

Oh well. Obama is making good progress on the promises of filling top roles, especially to do with Native issues, with Native people. A Rosebud Sioux, Wizipan Garriot, was named as his First Americans Public Liaison. The position itself is brand new, as promised to Native people during the campaign by the big O, so my hopes are high that he will keep to the others.

Most of the positions announced so far are the positions "just" in the transition team, so it will only be in the next few months that we'll really be hearing about exactly what the Native positions will be and who will fill them. Before the liaison announcement, they said that the precentage of Native people in the transition team was 1.2 percent. While this sounds shockingly low to a Native from Alaska, where our Native population hovers between 15 and 20% of the overall state population, depending on the report, it is actually keeping with general stats in the U.S. for what the population of Natives is - somewhere between 1.1 and 1.5 percent.

Now some of what we are looking at will be the other new Native-oriented positions, including Native White House advisor. I'd also like to see a Native person filling the top positions in the Bureau of Indian Affairs (most of which has been done in recent decades.) I'm not sure if it's the President that fills those, or the Secretary, but fingers are crossed.

And if he's having trouble, there's a Tlingit woman in Anchorage ready to head to D.C. at a moments notice!

Although not totally related to all of this, here's an interesting opinion piece on "the how and why of Obama's Native support" from Indian Country Today.