Rapid City celebrating what God hath wrought

June 9th is a day of celebration in Rapid City: God stalled a supercell over the Rapid Creek watershed and killed sinners in mass quantities. It is likely to happen again. Today the town is a hole filled with the stench of a century of genocide and hopelessness.

Melvin Martin:

June 9, 2011, marks the 39th anniversary of the 1972 Rapid City Flood, the worst event in the history of that town, my birthplace, and as I have stated here before, the most racist city in the U.S. for Indians. On the Internet there is next to nothing about how the flood impacted Rapid City's Indian population and nothing at all on the sole “official site” for the flood, that of the Rapid City Public Library. In what is now a portion of the so-called “flood plain” by the creek, there was a vast ghetto of the poorest of Rapid City's poor, mainly Indian people who lived in ramshackle dwellings of every description, from dilapidated old Victorian-types of houses that had been transported there from who-knows-where, to shacks and huts made from all manner of cast-off materials. There were no sidewalks to speak of and the street lights were at a minimum.

Under the Rounds and Daugaard administrations the rates of violent crime in the failed red state have increased dramatically. GOP leadership in the state, especially in Rapid City, has fostered conditions where reported aggravated assaults have increased 100%. Andrea Cook reports in the Journal:

The number, which was higher than the 252 aggravated assaults reported in Sioux Falls, shocked police officials who are trying to figure out what is happening here. Along with the growth in aggravated assaults, the city has experienced an increase in rapes and robberies, also categorized as violent crimes.

South Dakota's red state legislature loves violence but believes cannabis is evil. As the failed red state concentrates on cannabis interdiction and the incarceration of non-whites rather than on violent crime, the state's residents are falling through the cracks.

A heartbreaking plea from Pine Ridge appeared in the rez blogosphere recently:

Far more harm than good has been done by the presence of Christian groups and non-profits on the reservation (non-profits are modern era heirs to the legacy of early Christian groups). Christianity and non-profits on reservations have mostly been about profiteering, exploitation, religious indoctrination, and culture subversion.

The GOP has failed: it's time for real leaders.

Fuck you, Rapid City. Rewild the West.

Read about wildfires, insurance and climate change here and here.