Sunday, November 22, 2009

De-addnex Oklahoma?


The history of the State of Oklahoma is essentially the story of the marginalization of the Indian population of the United States and then the seizure of those lands to further the expansion of white America and the 19th Century rush to exploit nature for all it could provide: land for farming, ranching and most of all for oil. The Cherokee, moved over the Trail of Tears from Georgia to Oklahoma were only the most well known of many tragic exploitations.

Exploitation is still the goal of Oklahoma, as one can gather from this short clip of Sen. James Inhofe in a session of the Senate Committee Environment and Public Works, Chaired by California's Barbara Boxer.

It seems that the rest of the nation has moved beyond the pompous self-indulgent, might I use the word rapacious, resource exploitation of the 19th Century, but that the State of Oklahoma has not. It continues to elect, and re-elect such as Sen. Inhofe. Perhaps it is time that we consider de-annexing the State of Oklahoma and returning it to the rule of the Indian tribes that still live there.

PS: To my politically correct Green friends, I used the term "Indian" as a number of my "Native American" friend have used that term to describe themselves, as in the name of this important publication: Indian Country Today.



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