[todeen]

Originally Posted by steve B

I have mixed feelings about it.

In some ways it's further erasing that population of American citizens (who in some ways are citizens of two nations (or more) on the same land. *



As one chief put it several years ago

"The day a sports team name is my peoples biggest problem will be a very happy day. "(may have the exact quote wrong, but it's pretty close)

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* In CT, the state couldn't prevent foxwoods casino because it was on land federally recognized as belonging to a tribe. As such it was not US territory!

The independent governor was very anti gambling. What he did do was use a very little used piece of the CT constitution that said he could make a treaty with a foreign nation. So he did, granting the tribe exclusive rights to have slot machines in CT for something like 5 million. The legislature wouldn't act because they had a defecit, and it was a bit of money. And just before the election the tribe publicly said they'd had a much better than expected year and gifted the state something like 40 million as a thank you for the treaty that effectively kept other casinos out of the state.

About Native casinos, WA State (where I live) and ID State have had them for a long time! We have 5 within an hour of Spokane...or possibly more.

Our regional multi-state tribes recently co-sponsored a bill that ended the use of tribal mascots in our high schools. The only way to keep a mascot was to regain tribal authorization. Two schools with highly successful sports programs (multi national championships within the last decade - North Central HS in Spokane, and Kamiakin HS in Kennewick) failed to gain reauthorization. So maybe it's a regional thing. I know that ND Natives wanted to maintain their NCAA mascot but could not.

Our local MiLB team (Spokane Indians) has a partnership with our local tribe - the Spokane Tribe - and this partnership has been highlighted by Copperstown HOF. They are owned by George Brett and his brother. They also own the local WHL hockey team, the Spokane Chiefs. Our MiLB mascots are a salmon and a dinosaur. The have uniforms written in Salish. They have a museum walk in the stadium. They donate money to tribal causes - like saving local salmon populations.

When I think of the Cleveland Indians in comparison with my MiLB team they failed at promoting and respecting Native peoples.

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