Indian Gaming: Why is the Backlash Growing?

Editorials

Indian Country Today
TIME HAS SLANTED VIEW OF INDIAN COUNTRY
Posted: December 13, 2002 - 9:15am EST

Make no mistake, Indian country, in a cyclical repeat of American history another attack on tribal rights is coming on full steam. The long hard fight for the hearts and minds of the American public on the economic reconstruction of Indian country is not yet guaranteed - not by a long shot. Brace for it, strategize collectively, dedicate and apply significant resources, develop national campaigns to get tribal perspectives heard, get ready to fight the forthcoming media stampede to ridicule and misrepresent this new era of Indian economic recovery.

Every experienced tribal leader cognizant of America¹s legacy of distorting Indian history and of taking Indian assets knew this day would come, again. In the national media, once a certain tack on coverage is taken by two or more of the heavyweights, the herd instinct is to follow. TIME Magazine, a venerable weekly, just launched the latest and most concentrated anti-Indian rights hatchet job imaginable in its Dec. 16 cover story, "Look Who¹s Cashing In At Indian Casinos," billed as a "special investigation" by Donald L. Barlett and James B. Steele.

To read the complete editorial click here.

Native American Press/Ojibwe News
‘PLANETARY POWER’
December 13, 2002

Roman Sigana, an old friend who passed to the Happy Hunting Ground all too soon last year, spoke English as a forcibly-imposed second language and had no compunctions about revising ‘the English’ to fit his own understanding of the world.

Roman would sometimes walk into Press/ON’s Bemidji office with a sheaf of documents, objecting vigorously to the ‘planetary power’ asserted by the U.S. Congress over Indian people.

The article in this week’s edition of Time Magazine, “Look who’s cashing in at Indian Casinos,” made me think of Roman and Congressional plenary power over Indian affairs, or as Roman used to call it, ‘planetary power.” I can’t help but think that here is another sad example of Congress’ attempts to “solve the Indian problem.”

It’s not always clear whether we end up being victims or beneficiaries of Congressional attempts to solve the Indian problem through high-stakes Indian gambling. Indian people have already survived attempts at genocide, forced removal, reorganization, re-education, relocation, becoming farmers, becoming industrialists, forcible assimilation and then sometimes-coerced “return” to canned pan-Indian “traditional culture.”

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The December 16, 2002 edition of TIME Magazine in its story “Look who’s cashing in at Indian Casinos” a special (sic) investigation by Donald L. Bartlett, and James B. Steele, the once proud publication at best distorts and shamefully lies at it’s worst in presenting it’s story.

Recently, the Wall Street Journal and the Tulsa World have both decided to take their integrity for a spin and write editorials and articles, which fan the flames of racism with lies.

But, let’s start with the first sentence in the story: “Imagine, if you will, Congress passing a bill to make Indian tribes more self-sufficient that gives billions of dollars to the white backers of Indian businesses – and nothing to hundreds of thousands of Native Americans living in poverty.” It asks the reader to “imagine” which is exactly what the article did in making its premise. If someone imagines some thought or concept then the idea comes from the reader not the writer. Congress never passed a bill, which gives billions of dollars to one Indian to fund gaming or enrich an investor. Never, never and no matter how many times TIME magazine says it, doesn’t make it true. Unfortunately, Time has a good reputation and most people will read that first sentence and believe the rest of the article.

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The tone is fast and breathy, like someone who is making discoveries and is amazed by revelation. Look what we are finding out, they exclaim. There is this; then there is that. And we discovered it. We discovered it.

TIME magazine is devoting itself fairly big time to a breathless would-be exposé of Indian gaming, which it presents as riddled with conflict, corruption and unfair income distribution. For yet another week in TIME ("Special Report Indian Casinos," Dec. 23) and again on national television (Nachman, MSNBC, Dec. 17), the writing team of Donald L. Barlett and James B. Steele continued their exposition with another feature article fashioned from recycled journalism, aimed in very opinionated fashion to negate any positive logic about the economic results of sovereignty-based gaming developments in Indian country.

To read the complete editorial click here.

Don't go betting the house on a tribal-gaming series

Despite disservice of Time magazine articles, Indian people can learn something from them

Time magazine reporters Donald Barlett and James Steele missed the mark on some issues in their December two-part series about tribal casinos. The articles leave the reader with misconceptions and new stereotypes that affect not just casino tribes, but all Indian people.

Yet, tribal governments - real tribal governments - need to examine some of the issues revealed in the series.

In Part I of the series, the reporters paint a picture of select American Indian tribes that make billions of casino dollars with non-Native backers, while feeding off the federal government and cheating their own people out of casino wealth.

In Part II of the series, what seems to provoke and annoy these reporters most is that Indian casinos have learned the art of buying influence in Washington, D.C. Indeed, some tribes have found money can put a senator or congressman in their pocket.

Underlying this sweeping article that makes no cultural distinctions between American Indians, there is a ring of truth.

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In an extraordinary two-part series on the multibillion-dollar tribal gaming industry, Time magazine has exposed a lot of warts.

But there are warts evident in the Time investigation as well. In consecutive issues this month, Time gave light to wretched problems that have blossomed since the advent of tribal casino-style gaming in 1988 with passage of the national Indian Gaming Regulatory Act, or IGRA.

Its reporters identified the grotesque profits being reaped in many cases by a handful of individuals, some of whom didn't even acknowledge their status as "Indians" until after the passage of IGRA. It pointed out the non-Indian money men who are making fortunes, and the political shenanigans of "wealthy Indian tribes" - a nomenclature, by the way, unheard of before IGRA.

To read the complete editorial, go to http://www.mnindiangaming.org/template.cfm?view=news_detail&releaseID=40

It is the natural tendency of human beings to react in a hot, angry and sloppy manner when they feel threatened; the anthropological term for this response is "fight or flight." Mr. Ernie Stevens’ interests, as the chairman of the National Indian Gaming Association felt threatened, so he fought back with justifications, rhetoric and excuses. To give a unilateral defense for a system that is clearly flawed, however, is a losing and silly fight. To give this defense without so much as conceding that there are indeed some problems in Indian gaming is downright disturbing. Therefore, in regards to the TIME Magazine article on Native gaming, Natives should demand more of an explanation of these abuses and illustrations than just passing them off as mere "isolated circumstances."

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In response to a recent backlash from publications such as TIME and The Wall Street Journal, as well as periodic columns by William Safire, the tribes in the Pacific Northwest invite your scrutiny. Here, we have come to believe that our tribes are approaching the gambling industry much as we have our other governance and resource responsibilities - with caution, with respect and with great honor.

It’s rather easy to dismiss one’s honor when speaking in terms of millions of dollars. But the American people have to realize that Indian people feel as though we’ve been through this before - when the values of the external society felt driven to take lands in Westward expansion and later to take our great Columbia River and its abundant salmon. Many of our elders warned us that our success would attract unwanted attention from those who would covet our newfound prosperity and influence.

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Global Gaming Business, Vol. 2 No. 2 January 15, 2003
A DANGEROUS AGENDA
Paul Dworin, Publisher

It’s not our policy here at Global Gaming Business to take other people to task for their opinions, even when they’re wrong. We let other people do it for us. But every once in a while we come across such an egregious example of wrong-headed thinking we feel compelled to comment.

I’m speaking here, of course, of the now infamous Time magazine two-part “investigative report” on Indian gaming, which opines, among other things, that only a few Indian tribes (and their “white” non-Indian backers) have become fabulously wealthy while the vast majority of tribes haven’t benefited at all from gaming.

The Time series is so fundamentally flawed it defies belief the magazine’s editors allowed it to see the light of day. (They wouldn’t, however, let their cover see the light of day: We wanted to use the cover to illustrate our story, but Time said “no.” I guess maybe they’re a little sensitive.)

To read the complete editorial, click here.

Imagine this news headline: "Dirty Dealing: U.S. corporations are making millions for investors and providing little to the poor."

How would the business world react?

Aren't U.S. corporations expected to make money for their investors? Isn't that expected in a capitalistic society? And while businesses create jobs, do we expect them to solve this country's poverty problems?

So imagine much of Indian Country's reaction to Time magazine's Dec. 16 cover story and this Internet headline: "Dirty Dealing: Indian Casinos are making millions for their investors and providing little to the poor."

To read the complete editorial, go to http://www.mnindiangaming.org/template.cfm?view=news_detail&releaseID=41

It is an overlooked fact the real threat posed by Indians in the 19th-century was not their warring ways, but rather their tribal economies. Missionaries, administrators and Indian "reformers" viewed tribal communalism as a stumbling block in the road to civilization, and a threat to the fabric of industrial capitalism, woven as it was from self-interest and cut-throat competition. It thus became the goal of missionaries, administrators and reformers to do all in their power to dissolve the tribal bonds and force Indians into the mold of the economically self-interested individualist, through techniques such as missionizing, allotment, and boarding schools.

Such efforts, which many jurists today would call "ethnocidal," failed, though not, perhaps, from want of trying. After all, a communal outlook doesn't mean you can't appreciate the value of a dollar. The problem overlooked by 19th-century Friends of the Indian, the real roadblock in the way of Native economic self-sufficiency, lay outside of Indian Country.

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Time Magazine's recent vandalism to the public's understanding of Indian gaming could roll back years of progress for our tribes, progress that is just now starting to lift centuries of darkness from all over Indian Country.

The relentlessly negative reporting by Donald L. Barlett and James B. Steele basically repackaged stale, outdated and previously reported news from the Wall Street Journal and Boston Globe, to name just two media outlets. William Safire of the New York Times also followed suit by parroting the magazine's distorted view of Indian gaming.

The Time Magazine story was also inaccurate in its description of me as currently working as a lobbyist. I'm not. And it cynically referred to my "rubber-stamping" a gaming agreement with the Mohegans while chairman of the National Indian Gaming Commission. In fact, I openly and enthusiastically advocated on behalf of the agreement because, in addition to Sol Kerzner, it marked the first time respected Wall Street institutions became involved in supporting an Indian gaming venture. That was a historic threshold, important because it was the beginning of a departure away from tribes' complete dependence on wealthy, individual investors - the same people Time went out of its way to malign.

To read the complete editorial, go to http://www.pechanga.net/press_release/that wasnt reporting that was vandalism.htm