COBELL SETTLEMENT IS A FAIR AND JUST SETTLEMENT...IN LA LA LAND.

The Cobell Settlement is a fair settlement a just settlement, in LA LA Land. (la la land: A state of mind characterized by unrealistic expectations or a lack of seriousness.)

Recently Barack Obama, Black Eagle, made the statement that the Cobell settlement was fair and just. Some have said that he was mistaken. It couldn't be; he wouldn't say that to the Indian faces throughout all the land. "Someone" should tell him the truth. "Someone" should have told him that he might have been confusing a fair and just settlement to the African American Farmers with the pile o'crap being served to the people who collectively adopted him. There are as many reasons Indians adopt someone into their Nations as there are Indian Nations. One of those reasons is so that when Indians have a problem, the Indians and adoptees alike share in those problems now. "Someone" should have let him know that since he's been adopted, the Indians' problems are now "our" problems together, he and us.

In a recent Indian Country Today article Richard Monette offered an explanation for why Black Eagle would utter such an insult to Indian people in public: “He’s either being duped, or he doesn’t know, and someone is intentionally not letting him know.” "Someone" sure gets a lot of blame to chew on enit?

In the same article Kimberly Craven posits that maybe Black Eagle is "totally unaware" that thousands of Indians are opposed to the settlement, "or if he is, he obviously doesn't care." Let's hope that Barack Obama, our Black Eagle, is just unaware because otherwise the possibilties get more and more depressing.

There are obvious differences between Land-less Indians and large land-based-Indians, between D.C. Indians and reservation Indians, between assimilated Indians and traditional Indians. If you are from an Indian Nation with 16 whole acres to call your reservation, you will have different perspectives from large-land-based-Indians. If your Indian Nation's boundaries are encompassed within 16 acres or in some cases, even less, you won't have the same needs. Land-less Indians won't have 19 file cabinets full of land titles. Land-less Indians aren't wondering why surveys and maps designating treaty agreements were lost. Land-less Indians aren't wondering when cadastral survey corner markers will be replaced. Back in the day like around the early 1900s surveyors used posts to mark legal corners. By posts we don't mean they buried a fencepost. They buried a 16 inch piece of fir pine with a marker on top which was either plowed under, removed, lost in flooding, or rotted away. Now to establish cadastral surveys those corners have to be re-established. They aren't necessarily done by measurement; they are "legally interpreted" by people who may be STATE-elected officials who may or may not be collecting land information for their government's use. Land-less Indians aren't wondering why every single proof of land transactions were either destroyed, lost, or hidden away in a cave in Lenexa, KS. Not hidden? Try identifying which box the document is in, which book it's in, and the title of the document which has changed drastically over the years. Then try to identify how many tribes are in the same book or ledger and which tribe the entire ledger is filed under. Landless Indians don't have a plethora of cultural sites they work ceaselessly to protect. Land-less Indians won't have a fisheries department with 25 employees. They won't have a forestry department. Land-less Indians won't have hundreds of land leases to negotiate each year. Land-less Indians won't have to wonder why nobody seeks justice for the thousands of trespasses that occur daily on our reservations. They won't have the responsibility for supporting an entire government's infrastructure. And that is primary reason number one why the mis-informed and the land-less indians will gladly accept a pittance of $1000 dollars. Something out of nothing for them and a continued "status quo" of the lack of treatment our Native land issues.

But if you're an Oklahoma Indian with a law degree, by god, you must know what you're doing. If you're that big toe to President Obama on Indian Issues, surely you must have thought that throwing a mere pittance of $1000 dollars to every IIM account holder will not fix anything. Surely an Indian Advisor by now would have advised to provide true justice by providing for free Cadastral Surveys by objective surveyors with no conflict of interest, free appraisals by the same token, free N.E.P.A. evaluations, and funding to support a true lease compliance staff to recover millions in reparations every year from every single trespass onto our lands. Only then would you begin to discuss individual payments.

Black Eagle really is an advocate; it's just that he's advocating for a group of African American Farmers to receive a just and fair settlement of $48,500 dollars per farmer, while the Indian people he's been adopted by will receive $1000 per account holder and a bonus of $500 dollars depending on how much money you can prove the government had their hands on; all while Elouise Cobell and her lawyer buddies will walk away with 116 million dollars.

For those of you keeping track that means Native Americans will each receive 3% of what each of the African American Farmers will receive, except for Elouise and Company. Indians will receive 3% of what African American farmers will receive for not getting loans on land that used to be Indian land. Indians will receive 3% of what African American Farmers will receive for decades and generations of mismanagement of trust responsibilities and lost revenues.

It's hard to find anybody in the White Puzzle Palace, Non-Indian and Indian alike, who will understand the real fallacy with using the words just and fair when discussing the Cobell settlement. One would have thought that a large land-based-Indian tribal member would have understood but after the comments by Jodi Gillette at ATNI, one wonders if the leadership has stars in their eyes from a position in life or if they're the ones confused about what a rip off the Cobell settlement will be. Elouise cobell has a national spotlight and uses it with vigor to proudly proclaim the thousands of Indians in support of her settlement. The thousands of Indians who in reality don't support her cannot access the press with any effect to show their disapproval. When the Nez Perce Members who signed their letter of support of the settlement tried to have their names removed from the list, they were told there was no way to remove their names by one of the Cobell staff members. If the thousands of Indians who truly understand what trust responsibilities have been mismanaged cannot gain the support of President Obama, then perhaps Black Eagle will find he doesn't have the support of those same thousands of Indians. The realization may come as a surprise and too late for Black Eagle to recover from. Maybe that's what it will take for those in leadership to realize how many are opposed to the settlement.

Who's really in La La land? Those who argue for the settlement or those Indians who are waiting for a truly fair and just settlement to appear?

Senate Committee on Indian Affairs & Job Training

Bravo to Rep Lynch, Stephen F. , MA; Rep Kaptur, Marcy OH; Rep Lipinski, Daniel IL; Rep Quigley, Mike IL; and Rep Shuler, Heath NC. These distinguished people had an issue and they came up with a solution. They needed (?) Native American Iron workers. Or they wanted them, or they just saw an opportunity to help some Indians in need of work. At any rate, they have begun the long legislative journey to provide a means to that end: H.R.1129.

H.R.1129
This fancy piece of social work just passed by the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs, and they liked it. This will provide (with "available" funds) an annual grant to someone, some corporation, some entity (National Training Center?) to train Indians how to become Iron Workers and then assist them with job placement. BRAVO! BRAVO!

Why didn't anybody do this instead of the current Non-Tribal-Contractor-Friendly Cadastral Surveying Program?

We can do that? We can provide necessary training for a specific need? We don't have to accept all these non-native contractors who will hold their hand out for money every year when we NEED cadastral surveys conducted? We don't have to accept State, County, and City Surveyors who are trained as CFEDS surveyors, and who also hold the distinction of having a conflict of interest as it relates to releasing the survey information publicly, and representing entities with whom we may have border disputes, and tax disputes? Wow!

Someone should make up a bill like this to replace the horrible CFEDS program. It's only feeding contractors annual jobs on our reservations and we get nothing more than a survey from it. We aren't becoming empowered; we really are at the mercy of a bunch of people, even within the federal government who will subvert our sovereignty, or who will release our National information to several government entities that never were empowered to sign treaties with us.

I'm sure that the Senate Committe on Indian Affairs would gladly look a bill like this over and pass it along. The Tribes would.

"Think outside the box because the box probably belongs to a contractor"

This isn't new; read more here:

Surveys on a reservation A penny for your appraisal

A Grand Contracted Mess Yet More Motivations

President Obama's Contract Reform memo, a fix to the Grand Contracting Mess

Here's how you manage leasing!

If you ever wanted to know why land owners complain about the BIA leasing process, about Gross Revenue Crop Share versus Cash Rent Leases, read about how the Fort Hall Landowner's Alliance led by Ernestine Werelus has been effecting major change in how the leasing process is conducted on their land.

Read about how nefarious deals between a willing or un-educated employee and a farmer who bids low is now being stopped. Farmers will mail bids to the owners. No more Agency Letterhead sent to land owners who mistakenly have believed the bids to be under the approval of the agency employees.

A cautionary note to all landowners: make sure that the appraisals are kept under lock and key (literally) so farmers do not have access to the information of which they are not clients. (REMEMBER OFFICE OF SPECIAL TRUSTEE DOES NOT EVEN LIST THE TRIBE AS A CLIENT ON APPRAISALS THAT PASS THROUGH THEIR OFFICE SO IN ALL EQUALITY, KEEP THE INFORMATION FROM BEING SHARED OPENLY WITH THE FARMERS)

There are a lot of subtle changes that make a vast world of difference: BIA and OST officials should not allow single-low-bids to substitute for competitive bidding. Ask Donna and Ross if they have audited any agencies who are allowing single bids to be a competitive bid. They have been made aware of this practice, and so have BIA officials but we still don't seem to have any changes, a year later.

One more note of caution: Somebody should really explain to the rest of the world after they explain to Indians, how appraisers reach appraisal Fair Annual Rental Rates in states of Non-Disclosure. Idaho is one such state so, if nobody is required to disclose information, how do appraisers reach conclusions?

A Grand Contracted Mess

Remember back when I discussed the contracting of CFEDS surveyors and even Appraisers? Remember when I said that accountability walked out the door, when Office of Special Trustee and Bureau of Indian Affairs, and Bureau of Land Management all CONTRACTED their work out?
Here is what happens when anyone, I mean anyone, contracts work out to civilians who are under no authority to be reprimanded. Boo Hoo! Their contract service goes away and then you wonder what happened to their stolen documents, the stolen information, the breach of security of sensitive documents, sensitive information. It happened at the State Department as seen on Yahoo, news page by the Associated Press Writers, titled 3 CANDIDATES PASSPORT FILES BREACHED.
Now for any Natives out there, ask yourself if you want a CONTRACTOR to the Federal Government who also has an elected position in their county, their state, their city, to come on the reservation and survey your land. If this contractor who works for another government does come on the reservation and surveys your land, he is now privy to information such as the title of the land, and the description, and the owner. If you are the owner who has been waiting for years to have your land changed from Fee (tax) to Trust land, congratulations, the tax man just came onto your land!
If you are a County Treasurer wondering how much you should charge that crazy Indian living in the corner of your county that is on the reservation for land that he didn't know was out of Trust, congratulations! With a quick phone call to the appraising firm that works for the BUREAU OF INDIAN AFFAIRS, or the OFFICE OF SPECIAL TRUSTEE, you are also on the list of people who will gain access to this information.
If you are with Office of Special Trustee, DO NOT TELL ME IT DIDN'T HAPPEN, DON'T TELL ME IT WON'T HAPPEN, DON'T SAY ONE WORD!
Look at the State Department. You think you're more intimidating than Condoleeza Rice? You think you can control someone who isn't an employee of yours?
If you do, then you're stupid. What am I saying "if?"
For those of you on reservations, listen up. They, meaning Office of Special Trustee, Bureau of Land Management, and the Glorious Bureau of Indian Affairs have all been contaminated with a dose of guillability.
We currently have CONTRACTORS performing
ALL OUR APPRAISALS
ALL OUR SURVEYS
on our reservations. Well maybe not all the appraisals, maybe not all the surveys, but they could................
Makes you wonder if they'll be walking your property next week don't it?

P.S. Ever wonder how power companies get easements? They have to provide appraisals, and surveys. Ever wonder who did that for them? Look at their employee records. In the words of Borat, Wowwie Wow Wow Wow! They have appraisers and surveyors on staff! How come they didn't contract out for that? And more importantly, why didn't a Federal Surveyor and a Federal Appraiser do it for us? Check your power lines, check your negotiations for payments on the land that these power companies use. There better be a Federal survey, and a Federally reviewed appraisal.

P.P.S. IT CAN GET REALLY DEEP AROUND HERE SO PUT YER WADERS ON!!!!!!!