BLM ends official comment on Mato Paha impact statement

Spurred by a nationwide initiative to protect sage grouse habitat and the first revision of the US Bureau of Land Management Resource Management Plan in 27 years, tribes are taking part in a review of public properties and mineral rights in South Dakota.

However, it has come to address concerns about protecting water from uranium mining, gas and oil development, and sacred sites, especially Bear Butte. The revised planning document addresses a total 247,000 acres of public land and 1.7 million acres of federal minerals in 37 counties. The majority of the land and claims are in Western South Dakota in the counties of Harding, Butte, Lawrence, Pennington, Custer, Fall River, Meade, Perkins and Stanley. Other interests taking part in the process for the management plan are: Barrick Gold of North Amer. Inc. ; Petro-Hunt ; Western Land Services ; American Colloid ; West River Eagle; Howes Grazing Association ; Moreau Grazing Association ; Powertech Uranium Corp. GCC Dacotah Cement; Wharf Resources and Wind Quarry LLC. [Talli Nauman, Native Sun News, posted at Indianz]

Human history in North America is sacred to those who were here first but to those who have arrived in the last century or two not so much.

Graves are often uncovered or disturbed by Borg-like construction operations frantically creating the conditions for sprawl.

Meade County in South Dakota is facing charges of desecrating burial sites when excavators besmirched sacred lands adjacent to Mato Paha (Bear Butte) for another road through Indian Country.

All the Tribal Historic Preservation Offices associated with the Bear Butte sacred protected area in Meade County have been notified about a study revealing the possibility of burial sites on the proposed route of a controversial bypass road near the peak, a spokesperson for Meade County Taxpayers for Responsible Government (MCTRG) said May 18. During a May 14 Meade County Commission meeting, Highway Superintendent Ken McGirr responded to questions from Chair Alan Aker, referring to the possibility of several ceremonial grave sites found during an archeological study of the proposed Sturgis bypass route just a few miles from Bear Butte, Ft. Meade and the historic Custer Trail. By raising the issue at the commission meeting, Aker indicated an interest in pursuing the route despite citizen opposition, according to Prairie Hills Audubon Society Chapter President Nancy Hilding. [Talli Nauman, Native Sun News]

Aker is a GOP former legislator and white supremacist with a history of hatred for the Earth.

Imagine these projects going through cemeteries where people of European descent are buried.

South Dakota must remand governance of Bear Butte State Park to the tribes so they can remove the colonialist stink from the name of the mountain.

Sioux Falls cleric with ties to Minnesota pedophiles: "we do not judge anyone"

Every year, the bishops of the dioceses of South Dakota, North Dakota and Minnesota attend a spiritual retreat together.

Paul Swain, a Sioux Falls cleric with close ties to an indicted Minnesota prelate led a prayer service reacting to the recent ruling by the Supreme Court of the United States upholding marriage equality. "We do not judge anyone," Swain said. "Judgment is to be left to god."

The Sioux Falls cassock is closely tied to Archbishop John Nienstedt, a defendant in a criminal pederasty case.

Ramsey County Attorney John Choi on Friday criminally charged the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis for its "role in failing to protect children and contribution to the unspeakable harm" done to three sexual abuse victims of former priest Curtis Wehmeyer. Wehmeyer said he asked the archbishop a couple of times, 'Are you aware of my past? Are you aware of my record?' Wehmeyer said that Nienstedt brushed it off and replied, 'I don't have time to look into that stuff.'" [Minnesota Public Radio News]

Nienstedt is Chairman of the Board of Trustees for the University of St. Thomas where Swain serves on the Institutional Advancement Committee. They are standing together in the front row in the above photo.

Twin Cities lawyer Joshua Newville represents six South Dakota couples who last year filed a lawsuit with the U.S. District Court seeking marriage equality in the state. Speaking on Bill Janklow's idea of public radio he said it's no longer same-sex marriage it's just marriage now.

Church officials are calling on the Minnesota sect to release details of the Nienstedt probe while South Dakota covers up atrocities committed against children and others.

What Swain and Neinstedt do together as a couple behind closed doors as consenting adults should not be judged by law enforcement or the courts; but, Swain, like Nienstedt, should resign while investigators expose a century of pedophilia crimes committed by the Roman Church.

Lalley: Thune likely to get primary contender

Surprise! Some conservatives believe John Thune is a fake.

A few years ago, a man named John Thune went to Washington. Over the past few years, I have watched Thune as he has moved away from his conservative prairie values and replaced them with what I am sure he would call pragmatism. I am sure you will see the obligatory conservative vote here and there, but when he had to really put skin in the game for us, he will almost always go with the Beltway Gang. So if I was still in S.D., I may be helping unseat the prince. You may want to consider this, also. [excerpt, LTE, Joe Bingiel]

Bingiel contacted Argus Leader content director, Patrick Lalley, and pledged to unseat Thune even finding a real conservative to oppose the Beltway insider in South Dakota's Republican US Senate primary. Lalley's comments came during Monday's broadcast of 100 Eyes.

A Washington DC based conservative group, “For America” has begun a campaign called “Dump the Leadership” aimed at the republican leaders in the House and Senate. The group says [R]epublicans have not lived up to the promises made in the “Pledge to America”. South Dakota Senator John Thune, one of those targeted, says it’s kind of a rift in the family… [WNAX]

Thune sold out to the Obama Administration by giving control of rail business to the federal Surface Transportation Board. He has been considered by some to be a vice-presidential pick yet others scratch their heads at that notion.

You used to see it a lot, before Rapid City native Dan Nelson and his once-thriving network of automobile businesses faltered under an array of alleged misdeeds and eventually a string of criminal charges. Ultimately, Nelson and a business partner ended up in prison on charges conspiring to lie on financial records. It was a big story, with tentacles that reached out in all directions. One of them touched Sen. John Thune, a Nelson friend who happened to sit, during the senator's time between the U.S. House and Senate, on a bank board where Nelson did lots of business. [Kevin Woster]

Besides, not just any job pays $33,000 a day.

"Do I plan on running for President?" Thune said, according to South Dakota's KELO-TV. "I don't. I enjoy the job I have. And being the President is a very, very hard job." "Do I like my job? I do," Thune said. "You know, I'm going to tell you guys something about it. Any job you have, there are going to be good parts about it and bad parts about it. My job's like any other job."

As for Thune signing a letter undermining America's foreign policy?

Larry Pressler is worried about America. "I think we're slipping in the wrong direction," the former U.S. senator said Thursday. Pressler said the conservative South Dakota Legislature should consider implementing a state income tax, allow for gay civil unions and reconsider the new raised speed limit. He said people need to learn how to follow before they can lead. [Mitchell Daily Republic]

Pressler was recruited for the 2014 US Senate race by Republican strategists to run as a liberal siphoning resources and votes from Democrat, Rick Weiland.

Thune wants to gut the National Weather Service, end environmental protection and to start World War III by invading Iran.

So, name a conservative with enough moxie and resources to make a primary fun? Gordon Howie? Don Haggar? Kristi Noem?

We must #DumpTheLeadership! @McConnellPress @JohnCornyn & @SenJohnThune need to go! http://t.co/FeJcQJYGrV pic.twitter.com/WlKxd38ic6
— ForAmerica (@ForAmerica) February 24, 2014

PPP: Ginsberg favorite Justice, Thomas loathed

Twin Cities lawyer Joshua Newville represents six South Dakota couples who last year filed a lawsuit with the U.S. District Court seeking marriage equality in the state. Speaking on Bill Janklow's idea of public radio today he said it's no longer same-sex marriage it's just marriage now.

Public Policy Polling has released findings that reveal Justice Clarence Thomas is the least favorite member of the Supreme Court of the United States even among African-Americans.

19% pick Ginsburg as their favorite member of the Supreme Court to 11% each for Thomas and Sotomayor, 8% each for John Roberts and Antonin Scalia, 7% for Elena Kagan, 5% for Anthony Kennedy, and 4% each for Samuel Alito and Stephen Breyer. Ginsburg leads due to her strong support among Democrats- 31% pick her as their favorite to 19% for Sotomayor, with no one else in double digits. Thomas finishes first among Republicans at 21% with Roberts and Scalia both joining him in double digits at 14%. Ginsburg is the favorite of men, women, whites, and seniors while Sotomayor finishes first with Latinos, African Americans, and young voters.

Read the rest here.

U.S. District Judge Karen Schreier’s ruling overturned South Dakota’s ban on same-sex marriage. Six couples filed a lawsuit challenging the ban, created through a 1996 state law and a 2006 constitutional amendment — passed by the state’s voters — defining marriage as one man and one woman. After Monday’s ruling, South Dakota Democratic Party Chair Ann Tornberg of Beresford expressed support for Schreier’s decision. “Because the South Dakota Attorney General’s motion to dismiss was rejected by the U.S. District Court, we are now able to move forward and proceed with a ruling on the case itself,” Tornberg said. “Discrimination has no place in South Dakota law. As we celebrate this success today, the South Dakota Democratic Party reaffirms its commitment to extend equal rights and protections for all South Dakotans.” [Randy Dockendorf, USD Prof: Judge’s Same-Sex Marriage Decision ‘Powerful’]

Tornberg's comment adheres to the SDDP platform:

The South Dakota Democratic Party is a party of inclusiveness. We recognize that South Dakota is a global and multicultural community. Each individual brings a special gift to the community. We prosper when we are all in it together. We believe in the principles of dignity, self-determination, equal opportunity, justice, and quality of life. In order to promote a more open, civil society, we support the following: Recognizing the gay rights are human rights. We believe in full equality for our LGBTQ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and questioning) citizens on the state, national and local levels. Full equality includes: non-discrimination in employment, housing and public accommodations, marriage equality, adoption rights and domestic partner benefits.

Additional reading linked here.

The Supreme Court Outlawed Interracial Marriage Bans Less than 50 Years Ago http://t.co/kB7FbmO0Cb #Loving pic.twitter.com/NB8aR1Omr6

— KQED (@KQED) June 29, 2015

By a 47/27 margin KY voters think Colonel Sanders would make for a better Senator than Mitch McConnell: http://t.co/ZSt9GQJaQ7

— PublicPolicyPolling (@ppppolls) June 29, 2015

Appeals court revives NM tribe claim to federal land, hope for Black Hills claim

Ernestine Chasing Hawk, Native Sun News Managing Editor sent this story to the Missoula-based Buffalo Post:

In 2008, during a campaign stop in Sioux Falls then Sen. Barak [sic] Obama gave Great Plains Indian tribes a ray of hope on the outcome of the century’s long legal battle over “theft of 48 million acres of their homeland.” However one of the key elements to resolving the issue is “bringing together all the different parties” and with each passing day their “window of opportunity” shrinks as time ticks away for the Obama-Biden administration.

Attorney Mario Gonzales has been litigating the "Black Hills Claim" for most of his life. He contends that the commission charged to make peace with tribes inserted language into the document signed in 1868 that Red Cloud had neither seen nor agreed to in negotiations.

A federal appeals court has revived an effort by a Native American community in northern New Mexico to reclaim the Valles Caldera National Preserve. Jemez Pueblo considers the nearly 140-square-mile swath of federally-managed public land as a spiritual sanctuary and part of its traditional homeland. The ruling comes as the National Park Service works to take over management of the preserve under legislation approved last December. While the agency hasn’t commented on the litigation, it says it has a good relationship with the pueblo. [Albuquerque Journal]

Ms. Chasing Hawk goes on to say:

The 1851 Fort Laramie Treaty gave the Sioux 60 million acres of land west of the Missouri. Gonzalez points out that the Sioux were never militarily defeated by the U.S. and would never have signed the 1868 Treaty had they thought they were ceding any land to the U.S. Arriving at Fort Laramie via Cheyenne in November, the Commission under General W. T. Sherman was dismayed to find no Sioux to parley with as planned. Red Cloud refused to come in until the garrisons at Forts Reno, Phil Kearny and C. F. Smith were withdrawn. The Commission acceded and in March, 1868 the President ordered their abandonment.


The legal battle over what has been referred to as Docket 74-A which began in 1922 is based on the argument that the Sioux never gave up any land and that the 1868 Fort Laramie Treaty was treaty of peace, not a treaty of cession. In 1980 Supreme Court said the Sioux were entitled to a mere $40 million dollars (Docket 74-A) for the “ceded land’ and na-cu (using a Lakota lexicon, na is and, cu is dew) the government wanted money back for the rations and other annuities they gave the Sioux in the 1800’s. This government action attests to the origin of the cliché, “Indian givers.” In 1980, the Supreme Court also awarded the tribe $106 million dollars (Docket 74-B) on the ground the U.S. had taken the Black Hills and paid no just compensation in violation of the Constitution’s Fifth Amendment. As a result, the tribe realized almost none of the vast mineral wealth yielded by their stolen land.

One paragraph really caught my eye:

And according to Edward Lazarus during his last days in office, Democratic “Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle did a neat little favor for one of his corporate constituents. As a rider to the defense appropriation bill, he attached a provision granting absolute immunity to the Barrick Gold Company of Toronto for any liability arising from the 125-year operation of its Homestake Mine, a gold-bearing gash in the Black Hills of South Dakota.”

Mr. Obama, it's time for for you, Mr. President, to dissolve the Black Hills National Forest; and, in cooperation with BIA Forestry and Wildfire Management, rename it Okawita Paha National Monument then make it part of the Greater Missouri Basin National Wildlife Refuge.

ip images of Valles Caldera.

South Dakota: adopt my cannabis template

South Dakota's Republicant blog is using the Colorado medical cannabis program as an example of failure citing data from the school to prison pipeline industry.

Colorado is not allowed to perform cannabis research—that responsibility has only been given to the University of Mississippi, which has the only federally funded cannabis program in the country. Colorado growers developed a high-CBD, low-THC cannabis oil called Charlotte’s Web, used to treat epilepsy.

Read that here.

Fact is: if South Dakota Democrats won't do it Republican legislator Steve Hickey can write a bill that would adopt Minnesota's medical cannabis law worthy of Federal Drug Administration scrutiny and sold by pharmacies, legalize for adults then allow Deadwood and the tribes to grow and distribute under a compact putting the gaming commission as the administrative body to tax and regulate.

In my view edibles should only be available to patients suffering from debilitating diseases, disorders or conditions and be dispensed by pharmacists and taxed like other prescriptions.

Tribes can do this: the South Dakota Legislature should be kept out of the cannabis loop completely unless Deadwood chooses to be the test bed off-reservation. Addiction? After South Dakota closed the brothels in Deadwood Democrats Bill Walsh and Tom Blair pressed a five-dollar bet limit to preserve historic Deadwood after the Syndicate Building burned to the ground.

But, a red moocher state like South Dakota is powered by sin: video lootery, a loan shark industry that preys on the least fortunate, a massive gambling addiction and a too-big-to-jail banking racket fill in the gaps created by lobbyists who enjoy the protection of single-party tyranny.

Home growing for personal enjoyment should look like this California model.

Democrats are losing even more credibility with young people and American Indians. Tribes trapped in South Dakota and in other states with off-reservation properties are considering a test of cannabis law.

For the record, I do not support widespread growing of hemp: it is an invasive species and capable of overgrowing native grasses.

If the South Dakota Democratic Party is too timid to tackle legal cannabis the task should fall to the fledgling South Dakota Progress.

.@robinskaplan will be there! @Brendan_SD speaking on #humantrafficking Monday and me on #IndustrialHemp on Tuesday. https://t.co/5DfXW5PwR6

— Tim Purdon (@TQPurdon) June 28, 2015

The so-called CannaCamp, a marijuana-themed resort, is scrambling to find a new location as reservations roll in https://t.co/EXsTT7FAE2

— DurangoHerald (@DurangoHerald) June 28, 2015

The never ending wall of hemp I am tasked with cutting down to make way for prairie grass #helpme ;) pic.twitter.com/0cEyqQYjaY

— Jane Fleming Kleeb (@janekleeb) June 27, 2015

Nesselhuf co-hosting O'Malley event

Following a visit by former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Democratic presidential candidates Lincoln Chafee, Bernie Sanders and Martin O'Malley are planning public events in Northwest Iowa.

Former Democratic Maryland governor and presidential candidate Martin O’Malley will return to Iowa on Sunday for house parties in Sioux City, Carroll and Ames. The noon event in Sioux City is set for the house of Ben Nesselhuf and Angie Schneiderman. Nesselhuf is a former South Dakota Democratic Party chairman and the former campaign manager for 2014 Iowa Democratic 4th District congressional candidate Jim Mowrer. [Des Moines Register]

A ticket with Hillary Clinton and Minnesota's Al Franken as her veep pick would be formidable against whichever clowns the GOP nominate.

Rainbow Family Responds to Cante Tinza

This beautiful letter appears at Indian Country Today in response to some Lakota warrior society resistance to a Rainbow Family Gathering in the occupied Black Hills:

First of all respect and deep gratitude for the Lakota people standing up for your lands. These lands are precious and need to be protected. My people are a community of orphans. Most of us don't know our history or our own spiritual lineage, and have never been on the land of our ancestors. We are hungry to connect with the creator like everyone else and we are on the land that these lessons came from. Isn't it natural that we would feel called to burn sage and sing songs about the hawks? [excerpt, Lillian Moore]

In nanny state hypocrisy the law enforcement industry is stirring the pot of public opinion while turning blind eyes to the Sturgis Rally bacchanal and to the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, a known criminal enterprise living in the Black Hills.

White people freaking over peak name change

Even KCCR Radio in Pierre is lying about South Dakota's highest point being the highest peak east of the Rocky Mountains: just part of the smoke screen white people hide behind. Guadalupe Peak in Texas is 1500' higher than Harney is.

Harney Peak's namesake was a vicious, vindictive murderer.

White people on the Pennington County Commission are lying, too.

Before the last of three public comments, Chairman Lyndell Petersen said, “I would comment that I’m old and lazy. And I’m too old and lazy to spend much time trying to be politically correct; cause no one has defined politically correct for me, yet. And so, I think this is uh, an exercise in futility, really.” Political correctness is a modern term and can be defined as “the avoidance, often considered as taken to extremes, of forms of expression or action that are perceived to exclude, marginalize, or insult groups of people who are socially disadvantaged or discriminated against.” As a civic leader of Rapid City and Pennington County, Petersen’s remarks were viewed by some Native American residents of Rapid City as avoiding the recent “Renewed Year of Reconciliation” proclaimed by Rapid City Mayor Sam Kooiker and Mayor Elect Steve Allender. [Richie Richards]

Harney Peak is one bar on South Dakota's Confederate battle flag. The same GOPers who would hold the CSA flag sacred are the same idiots who tell American Indians they lost and to get over it.

Bear Butte State Park should be remanded to the tribes for governance so it can be renamed correctly regardless of politics.

In another red state University of Idaho officials hope to cover up a mural depicting the lynching of an American Indian.

Statehood for the tribes and Mexico.

Letter: Thune sold out to DC

Surprise! Some conservatives believe John Thune is South Dakota's Bob Menendez.

A few years ago, a man named John Thune went to Washington. Over the past few years, I have watched Thune as he has moved away from his conservative prairie values and replaced them with what I am sure he would call pragmatism. I am sure you will see the obligatory conservative vote here and there, but when he had to really put skin in the game for us, he will almost always go with the Beltway Gang. So if I was still in S.D., I may be helping unseat the prince. You may want to consider this, also. [excerpt, LTE, Joe Bingiel]

US Senator John Thune (R-SD) has been considered by some to be a viable vice-president pick yet others scratch their heads at that notion.

You used to see it a lot, before Rapid City native Dan Nelson and his once-thriving network of automobile businesses faltered under an array of alleged misdeeds and eventually a string of criminal charges. Ultimately, Nelson and a business partner ended up in prison on charges conspiring to lie on financial records. It was a big story, with tentacles that reached out in all directions. One of them touched Sen. John Thune, a Nelson friend who happened to sit, during the senator's time between the U.S. House and Senate, on a bank board where Nelson did lots of business. [Kevin Woster]

Besides, not just any job pays $3,300 a day.

"Do I plan on running for President?" Thune said, according to South Dakota's KELO-TV. "I don't. I enjoy the job I have. And being the President is a very, very hard job." "Do I like my job? I do," Thune said. "You know, I'm going to tell you guys something about it. Any job you have, there are going to be good parts about it and bad parts about it. My job's like any other job."

As for Thune signing a letter undermining America's foreign policy?

Larry Pressler is worried about America. "I think we're slipping in the wrong direction," the former U.S. senator said Thursday. Pressler said the conservative South Dakota Legislature should consider implementing a state income tax, allow for gay civil unions and reconsider the new raised speed limit. He said people need to learn how to follow before they can lead. [Mitchell Daily Republic]

Pressler was recruited for the 2014 US Senate race by Republican strategists to run as a liberal siphoning resources and votes from Democrat, Rick Weiland.

South Dakota's senior senator, ethically compromised Republican John Thune, is considered vulnerable to defeat in 2016.

$20 bucks says South Dakota voters won't be seeing John Thune's name in two places on any ballot any time soon.

Letter: Thune, Rounds Ellsworth amendment already dead

Two Ellsworth-based B-1 bombers have already augured in just miles apart in southeastern Montana.

Headline news: "Base closure prohibition included in defense bill." It goes on to quote the two S.D. senators who brag how they attached amendments that would save Ellsworth. The only thing missing from this article was these same two senators knew weeks ago that this bill was going nowhere. It did give them and their fellow senators an opportunity to attach language that would both bloat the defense bill and allow them to say they were working for the folks back home. Sure enough, just minutes after the bill passed the Senate, a bill to fund it failed — an important fact missing from this article. So it begs the question: What was the Journal’s source for this article? A free an unbiased press should fact-check politicians. The Journal failed in this case. [LTE, John Walsh, Deadwood, links added]

Colonel Gentry Bosworth, the new commander of Ellsworth Air Force Base is getting heat from higher-ups as the Federal Aviation Administration reviews the final environmental impact of the expansion of a bomber range.

"I understand that there's still some contention about the Powder River Training Complex," he said. "And the bottom line at Ellsworth here is we're committed to being good neighbors and partners to the community as a whole, in South Dakota, North Dakota, Montana and Wyoming -- everybody that's affected." [KELO teevee]

The FAA is keeping the PRTC expansion grounded for now because of its collision with general aviation.

For all the talk of small government and local control South Dakota is driven by public sector employment. Conservation and forestry workers are the state's most distinctive jobs.

Nanny state hypocrisy: bikers and FLDS good, hippies bad

A shootout in Waco, Texas has resulted in the deaths of and injuries to several members of motorcycle clubs encouraged by a law enforcement industry that benefits from programs like Policing for Profit. Cops usually just turn away from the misery of forced prostitution that often plies kidnap victims to become playthings for abusive men.

The same is the case during the Sturgis Rally where girls as young as ten are bought and sold like methamphetamine, Wild Turkey or souvenir t-shirts.

Thanks to selective enforcement white thugs have carte blanche to commit flagrant criminal acts during the Rally. A long history of lawlessness can make the event highly virulent attracting common parasites who breed in the cesspools of human existence.

Gangs of armed men with mental illnesses and addictions to meth power their way into western South Dakota every year; and, an accepted outlaw biker culture routinely traffics illicit behaviors that would otherwise be subject to legal interdiction.

But, a red moocher state like South Dakota is powered by sin: video lootery, a loan shark industry that preys on the least fortunate and a too-big-to-jail banking racket fill in the gaps created by lobbyists who enjoy the protection of single-party tyranny. Desperate to pay off those who benefit the entrenched Republican establishment criminals have a champion sitting as attorney general.

Marty Jackley has proved his commitment to his political party while ignoring the plights of those living at the margins of South Dakota society and lives to reap the spoils of those exploits. His minions are going through the motions of pretending to care about order during the Rally even as the state plots the financial gains from rape and plunder.

The Sons of Silence, Bandidos and Hells Angels control organized crime in the Black Hills area where members have infiltrated nearly every community even operating Rapid City's Cornerstone Rescue Mission as a front for their activities. The Bandidos have a fortified compound in Rapid Valley and the Hells Angels own many properties in the area including the Cottonwood in Spearfish.

Thank you for your help Larry. I hadn’t even seen the story Todd Epp (a part-time contributor) had posted about the Sturgis Rally. When I received your email commenting on Todd’s “opinion” I immediately went to our KSOO 1140 web site and read the story. Faster than Todd Epp could say, “HUH?” I took the story down. I need to apologize and take responsibility for the story being posted. I’m Don Jacobs, the Market Manager/VP of the Eight Results Radio/Townsquare Media Radio Stations in Sioux Falls. [I Wish Had Eight Sets of Eyes & Eight Sets of Ears.]

No, not this Larry.

While Todd and I disagree on many things he is a lawyer with integrity, I am not; but, we're singing the same tune to his libretto narrating another Sturgis Rally as a bacchanal contradicting South Dakota's purported wholesomeness.

Epp's previous post on the Rally still survives linked here.

South Dakota's mainstream media are flooded with assurances that law enforcement have plans to keep a million drunken bikers well-corralled and to pay no attention to the rocket launchers behind the curtain.

The Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, a known criminal enterprise living in the Black Hills, and the Sturgis Rally, a gun-toting, alcohol-frenzied, drug-induced, sex-trafficking white supremacist's wet dream, both enjoy the blessings of South Dakota's law enforcement industry.

Bikers are domestic terrorists.

My inbox is on the media list for the Strong Heart Warrior Society along with some fifty other news outlets and journalists.

A delegation of the Traditional Lakota Oyate in collaboration with supportive Rainbow Family members will move to evict the Black Hills "Occupy Rainbow" Gathering on Thursday. This follows twelve days of intense action to encourage the Rainbow gathering to leave the unceded Lakota Territory. [press release, Cante Tenza]

There is no reason to copy and paste the entire letter since you can read it here.

According to Capt. Jay Evenson with the Pennington County Sheriff’s Department, deputies have been assigned to patrols every day into the evening near the gathering spot. “To ensure public and employee safety, and cultural and natural resource protection, Forest Service personnel are on-site daily,” said BHNF supervisor Craig Bobzien. [Hill City Prevailer-News]

As hypocrisy reigns supreme at the highest levels of power in South Dakota residents will endure another Sturgis Rally where this year up to a million attendees will spend an average of a thousand dollars each so the sitting governor can crow about his leadership and self-reliance while moral hazards pay the bills.

Crimes are what the other guy does but in South Dakota during the Rally nobody cares.

Harney Peak one bar on South Dakota's Confederate battle flag

Reading comments under some of the Rapid City Journal's articles can be horrifying and cringeworthy. Such is the case under Jim Kent's most recent op/ed.

There “may” be some tensions between Native Americans and white folks. Still, at least we’re not fighting over the Confederate flag. The only symbol on the table here is the proposed re-designation of Harney Peak to Hinhan Kaga — with one of two primary objections from state legislators being that the new name would be too hard to pronounce. Guess that leaves racism conveniently out of our lexicon. [KENT: Racism beat drives on across country]

The Journal has censored Kent, also a free-lance producer for South Dakota Public Broadcasting.

Even GOP squish Jon Lauck is saying the American genocide is not being taught sufficiently in South Dakota schools.

White South Dakota bureaupublicans should know better than to live on the wrong side of history.

Two members of Gov. Dennis Daugaard’s cabinet have submitted letters to the state Board on Geographic Names opposing the board’s recommended renaming of Harney Peak to “Hinhan Kaga (Making of Owls)." [Seth Tupper]

This blogger has been arguing for Lakota names on South Dakota's geological features for at least twenty years.

It's time for the State of South Dakota to abandon Bear Butte State Park that it claimed through colonization and remand it to the tribes for governance so they can restore its name to Mato Paha and for the US Park Service to add the name Mahto Tipila to Devils Tower National Monument.

BREAKING: Obama: removing Confederate flag would acknowledge wrongs of slavery, violating civil rights.

— The Associated Press (@AP) June 26, 2015

This cartoon nails today so perfectly: Confederate flag down, rainbows up http://t.co/DYtYMxdAsI [HT: @bendreyfuss] pic.twitter.com/A4d9bJUVBq

— Boing Boing (@BoingBoing) June 26, 2015

Nanny state spying on Rainbow Family in Occupied Black Hills

This blogger may have inadvertently help select the seed camp for the Rainbow Family of Living Light.

According to Capt. Jay Evenson with the Pennington County Sheriff’s Department, deputies have been assigned to patrols every day into the evening near the gathering spot. “To ensure public and employee safety, and cultural and natural resource protection, Forest Service personnel are on-site daily,” said BHNF supervisor Craig Bobzien. [Hill City Prevailer-News]

My inbox is on the media list for the Strong Heart Warrior Society along with some fifty other news outlets and journalists.

A delegation of the Traditional Lakota Oyate in collaboration with supportive Rainbow Family members will move to evict the Black Hills "Occupy Rainbow" Gathering on Thursday. This follows twelve days of intense action to encourage the Rainbow gathering to leave the unceded Lakota Territory. [press release, Cante Tenza]

There is no reason to copy and paste the entire letter since you can read it here.

News aggregator Indianz used a photo taken by this blogger in stories about Pe 'Sla which is just a few miles from the Rainbow Gathering as the eagle flies.

interested party is widely read in Montana where many Rainbow Family members live or pass through.

The Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints is a known criminal enterprise living in the Black Hills; and, the Sturgis Rally, a gun-toting, alcohol-frenzied, drug-induced, sex-trafficking white supremacist's wet dream, endure with the blessings of South Dakota's law enforcement industry.

Reefer madness: white people freaked by weed growing in Moody County

Drive down nearly any other road in Moody, Minnehaha, Union or Lincoln Counties and you can see the volunteer cannabis growing wild in the ditches and pastures: remnants of South Dakota's history. In 1970 we picked it, dried it, rolled it and, during the Vietnam nightly news reality show, we dreamed about the future.

Now the chickens come home unloosed.

The situation continues to evolve day to day, which has people wondering what comes next.

Read it here.

I had to laugh like Hell.

South Dakota in eye of truth and reconciliation hurricane

South Dakota's long history of racism is again under the media microscope.

And in an ongoing class action suit in South Dakota, a federal court recently ordered state officials to stop violating the due process rights of Indian parents and tribes in state child custody proceedings. In some cases, children were taken from their parents in hearings that lasted less than 5 minutes, without any opportunity to present evidence. Forcible removal of indigenous children from their families dates back to colonial times, when missionaries set out to “Christianize” and “civilize” Indian children under the guise of educating them. Rather than legal challenges, perhaps what we need in the United States is our own national Truth and Reconciliation Commission (using the UN Declaration as a guiding document). [If truth be told]

The Lakota People's Law Project is seeking funding for foster families and homes after SD Department of Social Services employees in Rapid City committed abuses of the Indian Child Welfare Act. The state seizes about 750 American Indian kids every year reaping nearly a billion federal dollars since ICWA was enacted.

From South Dakota Public Broadcasting:

In the early 20th century, hundreds of Native Americans from tribes around the country were sent the Hiawatha Asylum for Insane Indians. Located in Canton, South Dakota, the institution wasn’t so much a place to treat people with mental health problems as a place for Native Americans who refused to assimilate in white society. [Karl Gehrke]

The Guardian published a long piece on the thousands of American Indian children who haved been seized by South Dakota's Department of Social Services especially in Pennington County:

Janice Howe’s tiny home, nested in a sparse enclave of houses, is a warm haven against the winter chill. “They take children away [from families] because there’s no food in the house so I find a way to help them get food, keep their lights on, get their rent paid,” she says. “I remember that heartache. I don’t want any other families to go through that.” n South Dakota, where Howe lives, 51% of children in foster care are Native American. A majority of them were removed from their families on charges of neglect. It is hard for the families to keep fighting. Often it takes years to get children back once the state takes custody. [excerpt, Laura Rena Murray]

Pennington County's behavior has been called shocking. With state officials sitting in the audience and not on the dais, former US Senator James Abourezk urged the federal government to sue the State of South Dakota.

The court finds that Judge Davis, States Attorney Vargo, Secretary Valenti and Ms. Van Hunnick developed and implemented policies and procedures for the removal of Indian children from their parents’ custody in violation of the mandates of the Indian Child Welfare Act and in violation of the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. [ILPC Turtle Talk]

This blogger has direct knowledge of abuses visited upon families by employees of the state from 1994 to 2000 and is all too close to this story.

South Dakota's experiment with a GOP-dominated congressional delegation and Statehouse has failed so many generations that suicide looks like the only way out of lives twisted by a special kind of torture.

Nothing gay about Monsanto, Syngenta marriage

Bayer could be Monsanto's next target if the Syngenta deal fizzles according to the St. Louis Biz Journal.

National Farmers Union President Roger Johnson noted that agriculture has faced a concentration of economic power over the past 30 years and such a merger would be another step in that direction. The new entity created by this merger would dwarf other agribusinesses and eliminate a competitor in the marketplace, potentially resulting in an increase in price for seeds and other inputs. [press release]

As South Dakota's GOP congressional delegation rail against federal oversight pollution, dead soils, habitat destruction and a regressive tax structure are wreaking havoc on cropland values in the chemical toilet. Republicans in farm states are stumbling all over themselves trying to protect donors like Monsanto and Syngenta from their accountability for impaired watersheds.

Soils are worn out from decades of pesticides, poor farming practices and manufactured fertilizers. Shallow wells and waterways suffer impairment from nitrate pollution making water less available especially where aquifer levels are dwindling.

The US Environmental Protection Agency has taken steps to reverse the effects of nitrogen pollution in the Prairie Pothole Region; but, South Dakota's Republican At-large US Representative Kristi Noem says to hell with that:

Small ditches that flow through our backyards, prairie potholes, and streams that only run during heavy rains could now be subject to Clean Water Act regulations, meaning everyday tasks like spraying your lawn for mosquitos or your crops for disease could potentially require new federal permits. [Noem staffer release]

Monsanto's flagship product, Roundup® has recently been cited as containing a compound that is incompatible with life and is known to cause birth defects and spontaneous abortions. The company that owns a strain of Franken-maize, the only genetically modified product approved for cultivation in the European Union, is looking to acquire rival Syngenta.

The International Agency for Research on Cancer recently re-classified glyphosate as a carcinogen. The National Corn Grower’s Association is disappointed with that decision. NCGA Board member and South Dakota Corn Grower’s President Keith Alverson says IARC ignored the findings of more than four decades of credible scientific research and needs to reconsider studies that back the products safety. Alverson says glyphosate has been an important tool for producers who’ve been trying to do the right thing with their control of weeds, especially those corn and soybean growers who use no till or limited tillage in their operations. [WNAX]

Virtually every ag producer in South Dakota uses glyphosate, now the compound inculcates every point in the water cycle including in falling rainwater.

Roundup, or the same glyphosate herbicide now available from a host of other brands other than Monsanto, is used on most acres farmed in South Dakota every year, Sharon Clay, a professor of weed science at South Dakota State University in Brookings, told the Capital Journal on Friday. In the past two years or so in South Dakota, farmers are seeing kochia and ragweed and other weeds that can't be killed by glyphosates, she said. [Pierre Capital Journal]

In 2010, after another GOP governor gutted environmental protection in South Dakota, the Big Sioux River was named the thirteenth most polluted river in the US and nearly every waterway in the state suffers impairment.

South Dakota deserves a US Representative who would stand up to a chief executive who cares more about the state's residents than about his out of state campaign donors like his party's congressional comrades are.

Even the Supreme Leader of the Roman Catholic Church is calling on his American flock to turn out Republicans for their belligerence on human-caused climate disruptions.

Dr. Vandana Shiva is the author of Ecofeminism and Stolen Harvest. The internationally known advocate for sustainable agriculture and opponent of genetically engineered crops brought her message to South Dakota State University's Harding Lecture Series.

The university's chair sits on the board of Monsanto.

Monsanto says it still wants Syngenta; profit beats estimates http://t.co/MDwlFFsEeX

— Reuters Top News (@Reuters) June 24, 2015

NFU Calls Rhetoric to Repeal COOL in Senate Hearing “Overkill;” Urges Senate to Find a Solution: http://t.co/Q4V8PKeZmC #keepCOOL

— National Farmers Uni (@NFUDC) June 25, 2015

Studies: South Dakota lousy place for road trips, teachers

South Dakota comes in at #46 in WalletHub's 2015’s Best and Worst States for Summer Road Trips.

A company representative told WNAX the state's attractions, road conditions, nightlife options, scenic byways, tourist attractions, cost of traveling, hotel affordability, gas prices and camping all suck.

Read more here.

Democratic former legislator, Kathy Tyler had this assessment of the Republican education task force:

Will something come of this taskforce to help our education system in South Dakota? The optimist in me says ‘yes,’ but there are a lot of people who have been around the block who aren’t putting a lot of faith in the process. To be a bit catty, it’s an election year next year, and any change would look good on campaign postcards. The governor doesn’t need to worry about re-election, so a tax increase might be in the works. [Kathy's Corner]

South Dakota is struggling to recruit teachers, too. Little wonder why.

Lower Brule growing cannabis plan

The Kul Wicasa Oyate could be the next tribe trapped inside South Dakota to legalize cannabis.

Vice-Chairman Kevin Wright says it's a matter that's crossed the minds of members in the community. “What I gathered from a small group of people is that they want it legalized and they're asking us what we're going to do about it,” said Wright.

Read it here.

The Lower Brule Nation has off-reservation property in Fort Pierre where they could test their sovereignty.

The Flandreau Santee Sioux Tribe has entered a compact with a Colorado firm to assist its cannabis initiative.

Tribes are the 51st State to the US Environmental Protection Agency. It just awarded the Lower Brule $200,000 to clean up contamination in their community.

Standing Rock, Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe, and the Oglala Lakota Nation are also mulling cannabis projects.

Legislators and other stakeholders should use my model as a roadmap to legalization.

Decorum Forum founder remaindered in Rapid City runoff

Update, 25 June, 0522 MDT: never mind. After this post Sanborn blew off the recount: Rapid City Journal.

......................

Michael Sanborn has requested a recount in Rapid City's Ward 3 runoff election that kept incumbent Jerry Wright on the City Council.

According to Pennington County Auditor Julie Pearson, the recount cannot take place until the votes have been canvassed, which is scheduled for Tuesday, June 30. [KOTA teevee]

Sanborn began The Decorum Forum in 2009 which enjoyed a significant following for several years. He is a Republican and is responsible for some of the most sexist and misogynistic Deadwood and Sturgis Rally billboards littering I-90.

Other local notables, Bill Fleming, a Democrat and Bob Newland, a Libertarian have been authors there.

A marijuana legalization activist from South Dakota has filed paperwork for two ballot initiatives to ban alcohol and tobacco to make state policies “consistent” with marijuana penalties Bob Newland, of the group Consistent South Dakota, filed the two initiatives with the secretary of state’s office earlier this year, and last week Attorney General Marty Jackley’s office released explanations of the measures as required by law.

Read that here.

Speaking of runoff: Rapid City is getting pounded by climate disruptions as the state's climate denier GOP governor prepares another federal disaster request.

Hey, Governor Daugaard: it's time for you to pardon Bob Newland.

As the map shows, more than 30% of adults in North Dakota and South Dakota admitted to binge drinking during the previous month. Those in surrounding states had high rates of binge drinking, as well.

Read that here.

Tribe announces partnership with Colorado cannabis group

Today on Bill Janklow's idea of public radio the Wednesday Political Junkies talked about the inevitability of legal cannabis in my home state.

Wednesday, leaders of the Flandreau Santee Sioux Tribe announced they will work with Monarch America to grow and distribute marijuana on the reservation. It says Monarch America will be responsible designing a growing facility on the Flandreau Reservation. Monarch America is based in Denver, Colorado and has set up similar operations in Colorado.

Read it here.

Legislators and other stakeholders should use my model as a roadmap to legalization.

Report: white right wingers greatest US terror threat

Surprise! Since the alleged jihadist attacks on September 11, 2001 homegrown terrorists have killed nearly twice as many people in the United States than foreign-influenced militants have.

In 2014 among 382 law enforcement agencies 74 percent reported anti-government extremism as one of the top three terrorist threats in their jurisdictions, according to the New York Times.

Let's review:

Adam Lanza was 20, James Holmes was 25, Anders Breivik was 32, Timothy McVeigh was 27, Eric Robert Rudolph was 30, Jared Loughner, 22, Wade Michael Page, 40.

All these men were victims of bullying, isolation, and ostracism. All had histories of extensive video game exposure and easy access to firearms. Distrust of government was a factor in most, if not all of the episodes for which they are infamous.

Eric Frein is 31: his right wing views led him to assassinate a state trooper and the attempted murder of another.

Tamerlan Tsarnaev, one of the brothers who carried out the Boston bombing, subscribed to right-wing American publications that espouse white supremacy and government conspiracy fantasies.

Bombs, wildfires, and mass shootings are just some of the tools of terror. It's likely that the FBI is stretched too thin to get ahead of the curve and it is hiding the scope of its findings to mask the extent of the hatred.

The sovereigns are overwhelmingly white christians using a maladapted interpretation of the Fourteenth Amendment to rationalize its commitment to a pending race war using links to the federal storming of the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas and culminating in the Oklahoma City bombing. Many are either convicted felons no longer able to vote or have been marginalized by those who believe that the democratic process is ineffective especially since a person of color is President of the United States.

The American Left poses no violent threat to the United States while the hate-filled right wing of the Republican Party always will.

Dylann Storm Roof is 21: he just killed nine people in a state where guns are god.

Westboro Baptist Church makes most of its money by suing municipalities that forbid them from picketing.

Sanders, O'Malley follow Clinton to Iowa

Democratic presidential candidates Lincoln Chafee, Bernie Sanders and Martin O'Malley are planning public events in Northwest Iowa. O'Malley's team reported he will speak at noon Sunday in Sioux City before moving on to Carroll.

Additionally, Sanders will hold an event on July 3 in Sheldon. He has spent considerable time campaigning in eastern Iowa since becoming a candidate on May 26. U.S. Sen. Sanders has drawn big crowds of 700 in Des Moines and 500 in Iowa City. Jim Webb, a former Democratic U.S. senator from Virginia, made a Sioux City stop a few weeks ago, but he has not officially entered the race.

Read it here.

Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders is a self-confirmed "Democratic Socialist."

The 73-year-old is considered a long shot but if elected, he would be the oldest person and first Jewish person to serve as commander-in-chief. He was the butt of an Obama joke at this year's White House Correspondents' dinner. "Apparently people really want to see a pot-smoking socialist in the White House," the president said. "We could get a third Obama term after all." [NPR]

A ticket with Hillary Clinton and Minnesota's Al Franken as her veep pick would be formidable against whichever clowns the GOP nominate.

On Tuesday, Secretary Clinton spoke with voters at a church near Ferguson, Missouri.

Webb just bumbled a Facebook post where it appears he defended the flag of slavery.

Rep. Steve King: Who cares about a few massacres when you have all this freedom? http://t.co/MxlQ8HfDIG pic.twitter.com/j825e2CMFQ

— Wonkette (@Wonkette) June 23, 2015

Conservatives lash out over AP image showing gun pointed at Ted Cruz’s head http://t.co/1C3i6fhVSk pic.twitter.com/SM2kUJK5W1

— Salon.com (@Salon) June 22, 2015

VA replaces Black Hills director after contractor botched EIS

The Veterans Administration is undergoing a nationwide shakeup and South Dakota is getting rattled.

The Department of Veterans Affairs appointed of [sic] Sandra L. Horsman as the new director of the VA Black Hills Health Care System. She most recently served as chief human resources officer, VA Midwest Health Care Network, Eagan, Minn. [KOTA teevee]

And:

Labat Environmental, Inc., the independent contractor hired by the VA Black Hills Health Care System (BHHCS) to conduct a federally required Environment Impact Statement (EIS) regarding the Hot Springs VA campus has announced the draft EIS that was expected this spring will be delayed 90 days. Time required for detailed analysis of the alternatives and the potential environmental effects of the alternatives were underestimated in the contractor’s original project plan. In addition, as initial analyses were completed, it was found more detailed information and analysis was required to draw conclusions regarding potential environmental effects. [Hot Springs Star]

As South Dakota's GOP congressional delegation bangs the drums of war veterans are being ignored.

The most recent survey estimated that 467 veterans in South Dakota are homeless, defined as living on the streets, in a car, with friends and family or in a motel, says Chuck Albrecht, a Vietnam veteran who volunteers with the Sioux Falls Vet Center. [Sioux Falls Argus Leader]

Hot Springs is taking advantage of press from the success of the Cold Brook Fire to expand its tourism reach.

Nancy Suprenant, the State DOT Bicycle and Pedestrian Program Coordinator agreed. “It’s a unique situation, where all of the interested parties are in one place at the same time to brainstorm ideas. It doesn’t always happen like this.” [Hot Springs Star]

Extremist GOP legislator, Betty Olson seemed shocked by the healing effects of fire on the mal-named Custer National Forest in her weekly sermon, the Grand River Roundup.

In the SDGOP one hand has no idea what the other hand does.

The VA and Indian Health Service should be merged.

Want to help save the Battle Mountain Sanitarium in #HotSprings? Tell the National Trust for Historic Preservation: http://t.co/EkRhvukx6q

— SouthDakotaMagazine (@SDMagazine) June 23, 2015

Sibson: Cabela's taking taxpayers for a ride

Cabela's has always extorted cities throughout the United States by exploiting tax increment financing.

Cabela's was what began the development along Mitchell's I-90 corridor. Then came Walmart and Main Street business, the north-side mall, and Kmart all took major hits. We no longer have elected governmental entities at the local, state, and federal levels that represent the people. Instead we have oligarchies that form informal public/private partnerships on Chamber and Development boards that end up moving public dollars into the pockets of private entities. The general public benefit little, if at all. The big winners are the crony capitalists.

Read it here.

The Aberdeen American News put its content behind aSteve Sibson wants control.

Sibson has lived in Mitchell most of his life, attending Mitchell schools from the seventh grade through high school. He earned his master's in accounting from the University of South Dakota in Vermillion in 1983, then started working in Mitchell. He is now the vision controller—aka head accountant—at Toshiba. "I'm just putting my hand up saying, I'm willing to lead the process. But a leader is not a leader if there's no followers."

Read that here at no charge while you still can. paywall.

Toshiba has recently been exposed for "accounting irregularities."

Sibson is a christianic militant, a creationist and, after an episode of temporal lobe epilepsy, he is tortured by dissociative personality disorder presenting as delusions of divine guidance.

Smaller government in South Dakota would mean about thirty fewer county seats than 65 and Dakota State University in Madison would become a community college instead of a four-year regental university.

Fact is: patients like Steve Sibson, who is suffering from an acute mental illness and Pat Powers, plagued with food addictions, should be banned from owning firearms. With the wave of domestic terrorism attacks sweeping the US law enforcement should have their eyes on those two.

Thank Gaia, Sibson lost his school board run.

FSST cannabis plan beginning to bud

The Flandreau Santee Sioux Tribe is continuing to develop their plan to begin cultivating and distributing cannabis according to President Tony Reider.

If all goes as planned, FSST will become the first tribe in the state to legalize the sale of cannabis across its whole territory. FSST, which already operates a casino on its land, is looking at this business operation as a source of revenue that would allow the community to develop housing, build an addiction treatment center and improve the local clinic, among other projects. Tribal leaders estimate a monthly profit of up to $2 million a month. Reider said the tribe is working with a company that has growing facilities in Colorado and California that will develop the cultivation site on the reservation and advise the tribe on the operation. FSST plans to make an announcement soon on who that growing partner will be. [Moody County Enterprise]

The tribe recently severed its relationship with the Flandreau's police department.

US tribes are considered the 51st State by federal agencies including by the Department of the Interior.

Tribes can do this: the South Dakota Legislature should be kept out of the cannabis loop completely unless Deadwood chooses to be the test bed off-reservation.

If the South Dakota Democratic Party is too timid to tackle legal cannabis the task should fall to the fledgling South Dakota Progress.

Walsenburg, Colorado is driving a cannabis mega-grow operation to begin revitalizing part of its historic downtown.

Not only is South Dakota 51st in enforcing Driving Under the Influence laws the state's GOP-owned Supreme Court has ruled its implied consent statute is impaired; yet, Marty Jackley, another GOP operative in the state's Reichstag, is marching toward a blockage of the FSST's cannabis project.

I swear.

Mahto Tipila: proposal could rename Devils Tower

Update, 24 June, 1110 MDT: this post has been edited after further readings.

The Canadian corporation that wants to start mining 15 miles southeast of Mahto Tipila (Bear’s Lodge also known as Devil’s Tower) announced June 11 that it has named a high-profile, world-class advocate of nuclear power and its raw material, uranium, to chair the board of directors. The National Environmental Protection Act (NEPA) and the National Historic Preservation Act (NHPA) dictate that project approval can be granted only after government-to-government consultation between federal and tribal officials to avoid or mitigate destruction of cultural assets posed by mining. [Talli Nauman, Native Sun News]

Runoff from mining in the Belle Fourche watershed threatens communities in South Dakota, too.

...................

Imagine pulling a clan up the Little Missouri River in dugout canoes 12,000 years ago.

Exploiting the gap between the Cordilleran and Laurentide ice sheets during the Wisconsin Glacial Episode those Clovis People were the first humans to see the Missouri Buttes and Devils Tower. They settled Paradise only to have their descendants watch it be destroyed by colonization.

With the Oglala Lakota Nation as an interested party Chief Arvol Looking Horse has submitted a request to the U.S. Board on Geographic Names saying the words “Devils Tower” are a malapropism.

The tower, a remnant of an intrusive laccolith, has been called Mahto Tipila or Bear Lodge for centuries by the Lakota.

Sen. Ogden Driskill, R-Devils Tower, has a family ranch at the base of the tower. “If they want to find something offensive, they ought to look at Custer, South Dakota,” he said. “Custer obviously had a problem with the Sioux, and I’ve heard nothing about renaming of Custer, South Dakota.” [Laura Hancock]

In the occupied Black Hills of South Dakota descendants of European colonizers are apoplectic over the proposal to restore the state's highest point to its Lakota name, Hinhan Kaga or A Making of Owls.

The ancestors of all American Indians living east of the Rocky Mountains saw that peak when the Clovis Culture crossed into the Cheyenne/Belle Fourche drainage then into the Missouri/Mississippi River system. Lakota is an Algonquin-based tongue and is spoken by a majority of South Dakota’s tribal nations. After migrating into present-day North Carolina and forced westward by manifest destiny then acquiring horses from Spanish exploiters the Lakota reclaimed the Black Hills.

Senator Lisa Murkowski and the US Park Service are doing what Alaskans are asking of Congress urging the body to approve a name change for North America's highest peak.

The Athabascan name, meaning “the high one,” has been a bone of contention between Alaska’s congressional delegation and Ohio’s, which has sought to preserve the current name honoring assassinated U.S. president William McKinley. “At home in Alaska, we just call it Denali because it’s part of our history,” Murkowski said, according to the statement. “Officially changing the name from Mount McKinley to Mount Denali will show the long-standing significance that the name Denali holds for Alaskans.” [KTUU teevee]

The ancestors of all American Indians living east of the Rocky Mountains saw that peak about 12,000 years ago after coming up the Little Missouri then crossing into the Cheyenne/Belle Fourche drainage. Lakota is spoken by a majority of South Dakota’s tribal nations.

Restoring the dignity of endangered cultures is one tiny part of eliminating suicides and despair in South Dakota and Wyoming.

ip photo: Missouri Buttes and Devils Tower at sunset. Click on the image for a better look.

Climate denier Daugaard wants more disaster cash

“Mother nature is only warming up.”

Climate disruptions are raking South Dakota over and over again.

South Dakota's GOP governor has been called "incompetent" and "uninterested in governing."

'Thank God I'm alive': 9 injured, no fatalities in Delmont tornado.

Candidate Dennis Daugaard drew gasps from a State Fair audience in 2010 when he said: “I am skeptical about the science that suggests global warming is man-caused or can be corrected by man-made efforts."

Daugaard leadership voids have left emergency responders and fire departments in the lurch.

As South Dakota's GOP governor, whose party voted to impeach President Obama, begins the process of begging the White House for more money to mitigate red state failure the lone US Representative retreats into obscurity and the state falls further into the abyss.

Finally, yes, we need to improve housing for those in tornado alley. That’s a great thing for blogs that don’t focus on climate to write about. Just as obviously we need an aggressive strategy for reducing carbon pollution that also supports real adaptation. [Climate Progress]

A trustworthy or competent US Representative would call out the failures of the Daugaard regime but making South Dakota a perpetual federal disaster area is the only way Republicans know how to pay the bills.

The state just adopted education curricula that dumbs down climate science and avoids sensitive history like its own legacy of apartheid and genocide.

Sorry, Jeb, Scientists Know Humans Caused All Our Recent Warming: Climate Progress.

As the Rapid City area gets pounded again and again by unusually strong hail-producing summer thunderstorms Senator John Thune wants to kill funding for local National Weather Service forecasting and the earth sciences.

122 mph wind gust in Hayes, SD @ 1:31MDT. Hayes is in Stanley Co., 35 miles west of Pierre. #sdwx pic.twitter.com/c1oSoJ06ZG

— Shawn Cable (@shawncable) June 22, 2015

White supremacist wants to bring Common Core into task force

Florence Thompson of Caputa is a nutcase.

Climate deniers, anti-vaxxers, creationists, genocide advocates and other GOPers want to bring their venom to the education task force.

Common Core might be contentious, but task force organizers, including some of the state's top lawmakers, say it has no place in the ongoing school funding talks with teachers, business leaders and community members. Lawmakers vowed this spring to re-assess the state's 18-year-old per-student funding formula as schools struggle with low teacher pay and a shortage of qualified candidates. Gov. Dennis Daugaard formed the task force and asked members to gather information and submit potential reforms in time for next year's legislative session. Some blame the standards for what they say are harmful changes to math and English language arts learning, and others suspect the Common Core, adopted by a consortium of states, represent a federal takeover.

Read it here.

Even critics like GOP squish Jon Lauck are saying the American genocide is not being taught sufficiently in South Dakota schools.

The Sioux Falls Argus Leader's Patrick Anderson has been covering the education task force sessions ordered by South Dakota's Republican governor.

Several SDGOP legislators, including Fred Deutsch, are learning from delegates that a state income tax is the best way to fund education in a state last among neighboring states in teachers' salaries.

In 2013, South Dakota ranked 49th among the 50 states for per-pupil spending from the state level, which was $3,131 per student. At the same time, local property taxpayers ponied up $5,461 per student, ranking South Dakota 18th for public-school support from local taxpayers. [Local taxpayers foot majority of public school bill in South Dakota]

Anderson has tweeted:

"This one gets applause: 'Policymakers making education a priority instead of waiting until the end of the session.'"

"At least two groups say they want income tax/corporate tax for k-12 funding."

"Place education on a higher priority than roads, says one group of teachers. "

"'We are in a crisis with no real solution in sight' says another group."

Democratic state senator, Bernie Hunhoff believes much more work needs to be done on funding education in South Dakota and that South Dakota should institute a corporate income tax in order to raise funds for education.

The tens of millions in the unsustainable costs of administrating 66 county seats and six four-year regental universities serve as part of pay-to-play political cronyism in a state that purports to be conservative.