Letters: Our new weapon is our vote

Yá’át’ééh shí Diné, close your eyes and let someone read this to you. In November 2020 the Trump wagon train and Trump cavalry came across the Southwest wanting our votes … what followed them was hate, racism, discrimination, and death.

Over 500 in our tribe plus all the other Southwest tribes lost loved ones. The tribes were waiting and watching. Tuesday, Nov. 2, 2020, all tribes were on full attack on the Trump cavalry.

It was a battle, New Mexico tribes, Arizona tribes, Nevada tribes, and Colorado tribes. All burned some wagons and chased Trump’s cavalry across the Mississippi River, right into our eastern tribes who took out the cavalry in Pennsylvania.

You see folks, this is the new Indian war, the new Little Bighorn, with a new orange Custer, but the ending was the same. You see my Native people, our new bow and arrow is our vote paid for in full by our ancestors’ blood. Just like the twins who took the head of the giant.

Mr. President Biden and Madam Vice President Kamala, to the USA you are very welcome.

Richard Anderson Jr.
Gallup, N.M.

Watch out leaders, we’re coming for you next

It has been said that “our national nightmare is over.” The United States has overwhelmingly, with the largest-ever vote tally, made Joe Biden our next president-elect.

This should be a clear sign for those who are local that your days are numbered in the upcoming 2022 election here on the Navajo Nation. The voters will no longer tolerate your recent alignments with incompetent leadership of the maligned White House.

The Navajo people watched in disgust when Myron and Jonathan took seats next to the loser of the 2020 presidential election. The Navajo people stood in protest, in the cold, as the Navajo Nation Council invited a misguided White House team into the sacred Navajo Council Chambers, possibly infecting the place with COVID-19.

Myron and Jonathan, as well as many on the Navajo Nation Council, have certainly made it clear that the Navajo people come last. There is a void of leadership in Window Rock to help the Navajo people. There is a void in a plan to fight the health pandemic on the reservation to protect the Navajo people. There is a void in enforcement of restrictions and curfews designed to curb the spread of COVID-19. The coming 2022 election will void the lack of leadership from Jonathan, Myron and the Council.

Today, these “leaders” have done nothing to effectively spend federal CARES Act funds on those affected by the virus. The more than $715 million should allow for people to buy food, protective equipment, and cleaning supplies both on and off the reservation. Yet, Council “leaders” are channeling money to friends and business cronies who will pocket the money.

As it stands today, these businesses stand first in line to get CARES Act money. These “leaders” have told the Navajo people to wait at the back of the line and you will get what’s left. Myron, Jonathan and the Council even gave the casino first place in line, ahead of the Navajo people. We have heard this so many times from them.

Remember, Navajo people vote — not the casinos, not the businesses, not the chapter house — the Navajo people vote. The Council, along with Jonathan and Myron, all promised the Navajo people $1,500, but the Navajo controller’s office reports that the hardship payment will only amount to $249. What happened to the promise to the Navajo people? Every day, Myron and Jonathan are out handing out boxes when they should be in their offices governing.

Also, the Council is refusing to enhance the hardship account and blocking every move to give the Navajo people its fair and complete share of the CARES Act.

The election of Joe Biden was the right thing to do, by denying another term to a leader who put himself first along with his friends and family. The election of Joe Biden is a sign that the people are in charge and not the deniers of science and even today, the deniers of a fair election. Myron, Jonathan and the Council all have subscribed to the deniers. It has been said that “elections have consequences.”

Twenty-twenty-two is on the horizon and change has already come for the White House. Now the Navajo people are looking to make change in Window Rock, after being shoved to the back of the line. Soon Myron, Jonathan, and Council members, you can come join us in the line, we will save you a place right behind us.

Steven James
Sheep Springs, N.M.

Little Singer article left out one hero

The article on the Little Singer School is quite impressive (“Coming full circle; Little Singer School gets bold new building,” Nov. 5, 2020). It was a great piece that highlighted the struggles the community of Birdsprings so desperately needed.

My only wish was that the people recognized the one person who made it possible to have the first school built. Yes, it was Little Singer’s dream to one day have a school there in the community to keep the children home with the their families, but it was my grandmother, Polly Curley, and her friend, Ron Swenson, who went about meeting with various entities to get the first school built.

She paved the groundwork as far as getting the money and the help to build the school and the little red geodesic domes on the site. She went to a little engineering college, Foothills College in Los Altos, California, and recruited architecture and engineering students to help with the build. Family and myself were tasked with feeding the college students during the building of the structures.

I can remember coming down the small hill from the east every morning to start a fire so the ladies from the community would have coals to cook food for the students. My grandmother wrote a book about how and why the school was built. Little Singer was never alive when the school was completed as he had passed on years before.

My grandmother was adopted by Little Singer as a child and brought up as his daughter. Many, many people have stood up and taken credit for the idea and building of the school. My grandmother was never one to make a fuss about it.

As her grandson, my only wish is that credit be given to the one person who had the will and determination to see the project done. I can share the book with you if you would like to see and read it. It chronicles her many trips she and her friend, Dottie Palmer, took as her writer and the person who helped record and write the book.

Waylon T. Curley
Winslow, Ariz.

America founded on violence, greed

Columbus, in his report to Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand wrote, “So tractable, so peaceable, are these people, that I swear to your Majesties there is not in the world a better nation. They love their neighbors as themselves, and their discourse is ever sweet and gentle, and accompanied with a smile; and though it is true that they are naked, yet their manners are decorous and praiseworthy.”

He was describing the Arawak and Taino people of the Caribbean. This would have been generally descriptive of the indigenous peoples of the Western hemisphere. He then proceeded to round up Native peoples for the slave market in Spain.

The preferred capture was of young girls, 10- to 13-year-olds for sex slaves. He came back again and again to earn the distinction of America’s first slave trader.

As Columbus expanded his cruel exploits, any resistance was quickly squashed. They chopped the legs and arms off of resisting Natives and burned them alive. He set the precedent with these atrocities for his successors under all flags of imperialism.

The pope issued papal bulls in 1455 declaring that all people of color are to be vanquished and all their possessions taken. In 1493, the pope “gifted” all of the Western hemisphere to Spain. These papal orders evolved into the Doctrine of Discovery, which has been and remains the authorization and justification for the newcomers to get rich by any means, initiating the biggest land theft and greatest genocide in history.

The Doctrine of Discovery is inhumane, immoral, illegal, and it is a brazen violation of human rights. Inexplicably it remains a principal of American law. Personal wealth was an intent in the forming of America. The founding fathers (wealthy slave-owning white men) designed a government that would benefit their one-percent status.

If the banner of freedom, justice, and prosperity for all had been true, women, working people, the poor, and people of color would not have had to struggle and die for their rights before being amended to the Constitution, yet the injustices continue. Violence is exponentially perpetrated upon the earth and people of good heart. The violence is exacted by those who rabidly brawl for more wealth and to have/retain power.

The appeal for racial equity and justice is met with brute force. There is great imbalance in America. America is in danger of collapse as a “great civilization” due to the provisos for greed and the white supremacy bias in its founding, intentional or naively not. This is the foundational wrong of America.

The almighty Creator set humanity on this earth, all with a common set of instructions for life, the core principles being to honor all creation and to have compassion.

Columbus’ description of Caribbean indigenous peoples corroborates that indigenous peoples remained true to those instructions, indeed, even to this modern day. The one real hope for true greatness of America would be to honor and live the original instructions the Creator designed and intended for all humankind. D

Duane “Chili” Yazzie
Shiprock, N.M.

Biden, Harris not fit to lead

Why is the Navajo Nation president, well actually it’s not just him, influencing the Navajo people to vote Democrat?

If Biden-Harris is willing to change the U.S. Constitution, their way of thinking the Treaty rights will be easy pickings, less payout by the federal government. No respect for life. One is not medically fit to lead and the other is full of disrespect and vindictiveness.

Both Trump and Harris are alike more than they think. Bullies. I’d rather vote for the running mate that’s not full of arrogance. How is it the people don’t really see this?

Ernest Jones
Chinle, Ariz.

Thanks for your vote

Yá’át’ééh. Thank you to all the voters who voted in the general election and a special thank you to voters of Coconino County District 4 who provided their sincere vote of confidence in me to be your next county supervisor.

As I visited communities and conversed with many of you, I listened to your concerns about how to strengthen our county and to promote diversity. I want to ensure you that your voices were heard loud and clear. I will certainly use my 45 years of experience and education to advocate strongly on your behalf.

Ahéhee’, Gracias, Askwali, and Thank You.

Judy Begay
Supervisor-elect Coconino County Board of Supervisors District 4
Coalmine Mesa, Ariz.

---