American Indians getting more involved in politics

[Judi Lynn]

Dec. 30, 2005, 12:20AM
American Indians getting more involved in politics

Associated Press

WALKER, Minn. — Irene Folstrom traveled a long way from the Indian reservation where she was born — to Stanford University, then on to law school at Cornell.

Tribal members often urged her to bring her talents back home to help tackle drugs, gangs and violence on the impoverished Ojibwe reservation. But Folstrom would just smile and nod — until her uncle was stabbed to death on the Leech Lake reservation and a cousin was killed by a drunken driver.
(snip)

Folstrom, 31, abandoned plans to stay with her husband during his medical residency in Arizona and returned to Minnesota, launching a state Senate bid that could make her the first American Indian woman elected to the Legislature.
(snip)

But that appears to be changing. INDN'S List, a Tulsa, Okla.-based group, was launched in February to work for Democratic Indian candidates — Indians traditionally have voted heavily Democratic — and get out the Indian vote. The group operated its first camp to groom prospective lawmakers in October.
(snip/...)

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/politics/3555184.html
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[joannc]

1. Thanks for posting this

This is something I have been telling other Natives,you want change,get involved.

[Judi Lynn]

2. It's going to take a big effort from a lot of people to overcome

freakish things like Republicans owning the voting machines in many places, controlling the state elections by Secretaries of State who are also Bush campaign chairmen, etc., etc., etc.

I really liked this article. Thanks for your comment.

[slor]

3. "first American Indian woman elected to the Legislature..."

That is amazing and maddening! Is this because so few have run? Well, this must change, I am going to send her money.

[Toots]

4. This is in Minnisota

Other states have many Indians representing their areas. Alaska for one is almost half Indian/Native Legislature and not all Indians rally to the Democrats....

[Xenotime]

5. They are just working on taking back...

what was rightfully theirs.

[hippywife]

6. Headed up by a woman who

could have been our only liberal representation in Congress if it hadn't been for Dan Boren (D but should be R-OK-like so much of our so-called Dem representation in this state.) He could have stayed in the 5th district and knocked out Earnest Istook (R) but instead moved to Dist. 2 and played very dirty to knock out a fellow Dem and a true Dem at that. She's a great gal and would have been a wonderful representative to send to Washington.

[ismnotwasm]

7. Finding a voice, or rather, finding ears to listen

Has been a horribly long journey for Indians. The numbers weren't there.
It was hip, for a while to "side" with Indians in the sixties and seventies. Other issues came to the forefront and the ears that listened to Native voices were few and far in-between. There have always been Indian activists. Who listens to the powerless? Or those wrapped in Third world poverty?

Oh, we embrace pan-Indian culture, sweat lodges, eagle feathers, beadwork, pow-wows, carvings--to the point where it's entertainment.

But let a Indian band try to bury their dead on some found on some construction site. Another, long drawn out court battle.

Looking at American Native history, really looking at it, is very, very painful. And that's just in the LAST century. People disconnect easily from what they consider remote history.
The social damage from what I've always considered a diaspora situation persists to this day.

I'm so very glad you posted this. It's been a long time coming.