(From the 8-25-10 Glacier Reporter) 

To the Editor

I like the debates that swirl around these pages and the reservation:  A lively, constructive balance of half-full versus half-empty, never-say-die versus always-say-die, cheerleading versus the crab barrel, big picture versus personal agenda, vision versus myopia. 

So let’s take the debate to the ultimate question:  Do you want the Blackfeet to survive as a tribe?  We owe it to our ancestors to survive, but that is a sacred duty, not a right or a certainty.  We may well fail at our duty, as have countless tribes and societies before us.  And if we fail, it will be our own fault.

For the Blackfeet to survive as a tribe, we all have to think on two parallel tracks.  The first track concerns the well being of the Blackfeet inside our own world, and the watchwords are Pride, Prosperity, and Progress.  The second track concerns our place in Indian Country and in America, and the watchword is Purpose.

The second track is the key to our survival because no tribe exists, or can exist, in a vacuum.  There are 564 tribes in America and every one of them fights amongst themselves and fights with other tribes.  But it is the fact that there are so many tribes that gives all tribes the best chance for survival.  That’s because in the end our fate is in the hands of Congress and the court of public opinion.  When the time comes that either one wants to see completed the termination of tribes, after so many false starts in the last 150 years, they will not come after one or two tribes, they will come after all of us at once.  It might for starters be a flank attack such as elimination of IGRA (Indian Gaming Regulatory Act) or it might be a frontal assault such as another Termination Act.

So there is a temporary strength in numbers, but in the end it is Purpose that matters.  In other words, in the eyes of most Americans, what purpose do tribes serve in America today?  If the answer in is “no purpose” then all tribes are near the end of the trail.  But if the answer is "a great and important purpose” then we can outlive the United States. 

Over the last 200 years, the Creator allowed us to be driven to the brink of extinction, but also gave us everything we need to save ourselves and fight our way back to greatness.  As a people, we teeter at the cliff’s edge of the highest buffalo jump, knowing that an ill wind –political or social— will send us plummeting, adding our bones to those long forgotten.  The Blackfeet then become a memory and our children cease to be Indian.  An unthinkable and ignoble end to a 10,000 year legacy, but a very real possibility nonetheless. 

Today the vast majority of the 564 tribes are too small or fragile to stand up to ill winds.  So it is up to the bigger, stronger tribes like the Blackfeet to show the way, to ensure survival for Indian Country by demonstrating that we do serve a purpose in modern day America, that we are worth saving, that we are an asset not a liability, that we contribute something to larger society that is valuable, important, and irreplaceable, that we embody, protect, and preserve something most Americans don’t want to lose. 

Forget about treaties protecting us in the long run:  As tribes, we will survive only if most Americans want us to survive. 

Americans must see our purpose, and therein lies the problem because tribes fall into three groups:  1) Tribes too small or weak to have an impact on public perception, e.g. the several hundred tribes that most people have never heard of. 

2) Tribes that loom large in the public minds, but for the wrong reasons –for reasons the public dislikes– such as tribes with enormous casinos.  In the public’s mind, many of these tribes are more about profiteering than being Indian, look no different than any soulless opportunistic corporation, and have questionable connections to any real Indian heritage.  The Pequots, for example, are the poster child for what the public dislikes about gaming tribes.  Frankly I believe tribes like the Pequots stir up powerful ill winds that threaten to blow us all into the abyss. 

3) Tribes like the Blackfeet that loom large in the public mind for the right reasons, the right purpose  –big, old, traditional tribes that still embody what Americans value most about Indian culture and heritage.  Tribes that have kept the flame alive for thousands of years despite every attempt by outsiders to extinguish it.  There is no better example of what fascinates, inspires, and touches the spirit and ideals of Americans than the Blackfeet.  We are one of only six tribes still on their ancestral lands and perhaps the oldest living culture in America.  We are the one tribe whose incomparably vast wealth of traditions, beliefs, and knowledge of the spirit and natural world trace a vivid unbroken line back through the distant mists of time to the place where we began. 

My point is this:  As we rapidly drive forward social and economic progress on numerous fronts at home, the time has come for us to look at the role the Blackfeet must play in Indian Country and in America as a leader –perhaps the leader– in changing and building public perceptions, in demonstrating the positive purpose of Indian tribes in the modern world.  

Otherwise, all the efforts and the successes of the BTBC and our 16,500 members to make a better life for all of us will not be enough to save the thing we all value most:  our continued existence and unique place in larger society as an Indian tribe. 

Gregg Paisley
Babb

None of us is as smart as all of us

(From the Glacier Reporter 8-11-10)

The Blackfeet have come a long way in a short period of time.  The last Council made tremendous social, economic, and governance progress in the last two years, and I have even higher hopes for the new Council just sworn in.

But our tribe’s future does not lie solely in the hands of nine men or of a few hundred tribal employees.   No, we will prosper or perish by the collective outlook and actions of you, me, and thousands of Blackfeet, on and off the reservation.  

Blackfeet dug themselves into a hole and only Blackfeet can dig themselves out.  It’s that simple.  Nothing we fix today will stay fixed unless we do it ourselves.  No progress we make will endure unless we make it ourselves.

That is at the heart of our various business plans and projects: we need Blackfeet, and only Blackfeet, involved from day one.  That’s how we all learn, that’s how we all get good at our jobs.  For my part, on the reservation I will not hire outside consultants or non-Blackfeet employees.  Instead we will find the best local workers we can and train them and mentor them.  At first they may be in over their heads or lack certain skills so they may make mistakes.  That’s OK, we’ll get there together. 

Off the reservation, I will hire only non-Blackfeet if customer requirements make it necessary.  Even then we will be training Blackfeet to take over those jobs as soon as they are ready.

A collective effort requires a collective mindset.  Not that we all have to agree about everything, on the contrary the independent thinking Blackfeet are known for is the very reason we will win at whatever we do.  But there are, I think, certain things we should all have in our minds as we move forwards.  Things that will help us all understand plans and decisions that might otherwise not make sense to you, things that may also help you refine and focus any new ideas you may have.  Here’s seven things I hope we will all think about:

1.  We are putting together a jigsaw puzzle, consisting of a great many critical pieces.  Like all jigsaw puzzles, you won’t be able to see what it looks like until all the pieces are in place.   A big tribe like ours has big and diverse needs and launching one or two enterprises or fixing a handful of problems isn’t going to get us there.  In other words, overemphasizing or focusing too much on one or two pieces of the puzzle will lose sight of the big picture and ensure overall failure. 

The big picture is this:  We need to reengineer our local economy, create several hundred new jobs, generate strong, reliable new revenue streams for the general fund, enable a wide range of new business opportunities for members, all while revitalizing our social culture.  We must make the Blackfeet Tribe a model of entrepreneurship, business leadership, excellence in governance, and social and economic progress. 

Dozens and dozens of pieces –each equally important-- are needed to create the big picture and, aside from the Tribal Council, very few people will have a hand in many, let alone all, of the pieces.  So a certain amount of faith is needed in the vision that guides us and the execution that moves us forward.  I have great faith in the vision the BTBC has for the Blackfeet and am glad to play a small role in the execution.  I encourage you to have faith too.  

2.  It’s all about career paths.  We desperately need to create new jobs on the reservation, but dead end jobs cannot be the end game.  No, every entry level job must provide a path to better and better jobs, better and better pay.  All the new enterprises we are creating are chosen in part because they provide a career path for members.   For example, today we are training five Blackfeet for travel and tourist services, and this will provide good steady employment. 

But these initial employees were selected in part because they have other skills and interests (accounting, journalism, technical) –positions we can move them up into later, probably with additional training.   When they move up, that opens up entry level jobs for the next group.  The federal contracting work we are pursuing will eventually require engineers, programmers, architects, doctors, lawyers, accountants, writers, researchers, managers, and professional people of every description.   On the other hand, as one example, casinos create mainly dead end jobs –card dealers, waitresses, etc.  

3.  To understand where our money must come from in the future, we must understand where it came from in the past.  The old ways of generating income isn't going to lead to a prosperous and proud future.  Here’s two examples:  First, even though we sit on huge oil and gas reserves, the pie gets cut into 16,500 slices, one for each member.  So most households will never get much benefit from this income.  Paying out the two recent $200 per capitas (for a total of $400) took $6.6 million from the general fund.  

Second, our casino is a cannibalistic machine that eats up several hundred member paychecks and welfare payments and spits out about a hundred casino paychecks.  Does anyone think making several hundred Blackfeet households poorer just to make a hundred or so households richer is a good thing?  Maybe no one else wants to say it, but I will: The Casino is a big part of the cancer that has sucked the economic life out of Browning.  Yes, it makes money, but that profit comes directly out of Blackfeet households.  Everyone knows about homes where the parents gambled away money that should have gone for children’s food and clothing.   Whenever there is a per capita or income tax returns arrive, the Casino take goes up.   So we either need to find a way to bring off-reservation gamblers to the Casino or rethink what having a casino patronized largely by members is doing to us. 

These two examples help explain why we are focused on outside dollars, such as pursuing federal contracts, capturing tourist dollars, and making products here and shipping them out to global customers.

4.  Every one of us must make our own way and operate on our own initiative.   If you are sitting around waiting for your ship to come in or for pennies to fall from heaven, you are going to be left behind.  It is the job of the BTBC and others such as myself to create opportunities and reach out a helping hand.  It’s not our job to go to your house, drag you away from the TV, and carry you to the promised land.   To date the folks we have hired have all been those that showed up after seeing an ad or hearing about job openings, followed up, and just in general demonstrated they were ready, willing, and able to work.

I heard from one person we hired that they mentioned to friends that they were going to put in an application with us.  The friends were skeptical saying: “Naw, the Tribe never hires me or succeeds in business ventures so I’ll stay home.”  I told the person we hired: “Now, go back and tell your friends you have a job and they don’t.  Maybe next time they will get off the couch and come meet us like you did.”  I have faith in my fellow Blackfeet, so I believe next time they will come meet us, it just took a little prod.

5.  We all need to understand that $1 put in a tribal pocket, either as an employee or a vendor, is as good or better than $1 put in the general fund.  Similarly, $1 that a tribal member saves on a purchase (groceries, gas, household items) is no different than putting $1 in their pocket.

If the BTBC can put $1 into a tribal pocket through enterprise, that’s $1 less that needs to be paid out in the form of welfare payments or social services.  Better yet, the tribal member is working for the $1 which means they are on the path to making more dollars:  $10,000 or $100,000.  A handout often just leads to another handout and creates a welfare mentality.  Giving someone a job or vendor opportunity leads to a better life. 

And saving members money helps them reach that better life sooner.  That’s why a grocery store and other on-reservation enterprises are in the works to enable Blackfeet to buy major and everyday items at big city prices. 

6. (And here’s something you may not have seen coming)  For most of the “customer facing” jobs we are hiring for –i.e. the jobs where Blackfeet interact with outsiders, it will be a job requirement to learn our language, our culture, our history.  Each and every one of us that meets or talks to visitors, tourists, and outside customers is an ambassador of sorts, each of us is responsible for making a positive impression and conveying a sense of who we are as a people. 

So we will be having mandatory Pikuni language classes as well as history and culture seminars, starting later this year.   Eventually, most of us will, once again, speak our language.  And this time there is an economic motivation to learning, which when coupled with Blackfeet pride and the high value we place on our heritage and our ways, is a powerful motivator.  

7.  We are, in essence, creating a tribal business hub in the old Faught’s Building, soon to be renamed the Chief Mountain building.  Here’s why: tribal governments are set up to plan new enterprises but are not set up to build businesses or operate them.  

So one of the reasons we took over a large building was to convert it to a business hub for the tribe, a place that serves many purposes at once.  Besides being home to Chief Mountain Technologies and various travel, tourist, and merchandise operations (all put in one place to require fewer managers, thus freeing up budgets to hire more employees), the facility will also be a new business incubator where Blackfeet can come in and access all the training, office equipment, office space, mentoring, and support (technical, peer, educational, and other resources) needed to pursue their own business ideas or ready themselves for new jobs. 

Moreover, it will be a community center, open in the evenings, with an internet café, play areas and snacks for kids, and a range of features designed to promote and improve everyday interaction and communication between Blackfeet.  That way we are all thinking together, exchanging ideas, and we all feel we are part of moving our tribe forward in leaps and bounds with economic and social progress that will soon reach every household.

Years ago, when I was an executive at an enormous Fortune 500 technology company, somebody said something that stuck with me:  "None of us is as smart as all of us."  Yes, Blackfeet dug themselves into a hole over the last century, but fortunately we have a large Blackfeet army smart enough, strong enough, and capable enough to dig ourselves out.  Working together, we can and we will.  Watch. 

Gregg Paisley
CEO, Chief Mountain Technologies

With Four Aces, It’s Time To Play Our Cards

(From the 7-21-10 Glacier Reporter)

Elsewhere in this Glacier Reporter you will find advertisements for several newly-created jobs at Chief Mountain Technologies, Blackfeet Travel, and for merchandise manufacturing.  A small but solid start, and big things spring from small beginnings.  If we all do our part, the Blackfeet are destined for big things: big things that will touch every household and breathe life back into our community.

To keep our tribe marching forward in meaningful, measurable economic and social strides, each of us has a role to play.

Let’s start with the BTBC.  Their role is to set the vision, to aim us at the point on the horizon we must travel to, and then get us there through strategic planning, policymaking, high level decision-making, and fiduciary oversight.        

But over decades, endless pandering to members has made the BTBC something it shouldn’t be.  So the current BTBC inherited a mountain of wasteful, productivity-killing practices I think should be eliminated, and soon.

The ways things are now, our nine Councilmen are forced to spend perhaps 40% of their time on matters of relevance and value to less than 1/10^th of 1% of the Tribe, for example personnel matters.  And when they do get down to important business, often there is no staff around to carry out directives.  I used to borrow an office in Legal near the BTBC meeting room, and I quickly lost count of the days the Tribe closed.  The BTBC invariably worked a full day anyway while everyone else got the day off. 

In my view, the BTBC should never deal with personnel issues.  Period.  The BTBC should not have any direct reports except two: a general manager that oversees all staff and the Tribal Attorney.  Period.  The BTBC should not handle Hardship directly but should have it managed by a central office.  Period.   The BTBC should never permit dozens and dozens of Tribal Office closures each year.  Period.  Every day we close, we pay out over $80,000 in payroll for no work performed –that’s millions of wasted dollars every year.   Aside from the awful work ethic that results from paying people to not work, think about this:  We have thousands of members who cannot find work, and then we rub their noses in it by paying millions to other members for skipping work. 

Previous Councils handed down these mind-bogglingly bad practices.  In my opinion the current Council needs to end them now so they can concentrate on important business.  The Blackfeet can’t afford to lose opportunities and have progress slowed as the result of Council getting bogged down on matters that should be handled by staff and committees.  A large electorate hires these guys to get the job done, but then as individuals we expect them to drop everything to handle our narrow, personal problems, thereby making it next to impossible for the BTBC to do the big, critical jobs we hired them to do. 

Imagine how much faster and better the BTBC could get done what needs to be done if it dealt solely with the people’s business  --matters that serve the entire tribe-- not routine policy or operational procedures or the business of individuals and small groups.

Above all, the BTBC’s job is to create opportunities, safeguards, and a conducive environment for the financial and social betterment of 16,500 members.   How can they do that when we bury them under a mountain of individual demands and bad practices?  Free them up to do their job and we will all benefit.

Next, what’s our role, the role you and I play in moving the tribe forward?  Simple: Our role is to seize the jobs, vendor, and money making opportunities created by the BTBC and its business entities.  Our role is to take the fullest possible advantage of these opportunities to make as much money as possible for our families, because financial prosperity cures a world of ills.  Our role is to encourage laggard members to follow our lead and make as much money as they possibly can too, because the more money captured and recirculated on the reservation, the bigger and healthier our local economy.

Here’s one example among many of why we need a lot of Blackfeet working together and making money:  About 2 million tourists come to Glacier each year, which works out to about 20,000 tourists a day running up and down Highway 89 and sometimes coming to Browning.   They leave behind about $250 million every year.   At present most of this money is spent on our reservation but virtually none of it goes in Blackfeet pockets. 

Now, let’s say we create a vendor market at Chewing Blackbones or in Browning with 15 vendors, run by individual members.  We might get 200 visitors a day, because 15 vendors isn’t very exciting, isn’t much of a draw.   But if we had 60 vendors, now you’re talkin’  --we might get 2,000 visitors a day.  In other words, 4 times the vendors might draw 10 times the customers because in the competition to capture tourist dollars the Pareto principle kicks in and 20% of the destinations attract 80% of the customers.  Like buffalo going over a jump, humans are driven by herd instinct:  everyone wants to go where everyone else is going.

So we need a lot of Blackfeet to become part of the draw  --a handful of us isn’t enough.  It takes hundreds, eventually thousands, of us working together to make our reservation a business hub and tourist magnet.   We need to create a Can Do culture of entrepreneurial spirit, where making a lot of money is looked on as an admirable endeavor, not a crass machination.

Individuals and societies are dealt certain cards, and success or failure depends on how those cards are played.  The Blackfeet have been holding three aces for some time and now have a fourth.  So it is time to play our cards.

Our first ace is that folks everywhere are fascinated by Indians in general, and Blackfeet in particular.  We are the old ones, the strong ones, the tough ones, the ones most connected to the land, the spirit world, and the ways of our ancestors.  We are the Real People who for 10,000 years in our remote domain at the end of the earth never lost our fight against the worst that man and nature can unleash.   Other Indians may be shepherds, gatherers, fishermen, or small game hunters.  But the Blackfeet are fearless fighters, ferocious raiders, and hunters of the largest, most dangerous animals on earth.   People want to know us –and want to do business with us-- because they are awed by us, because we are enigmatic and incomprehensible to them.

Here’s an example.  When Hollywood writers, working on the script for the blockbuster movie X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009), invented a back story for the superhero Wolverine, they wanted him to come from the most deeply mysterious, impenetrable, forbidding, secretive, mystical, wild, rugged, and isolated place in America.  They chose the Blackfeet Reservation.

That is how the rest of the world sees us and our home, and there are countless ways to monetize and capitalize on the world’s fascination with us.  When we share our culture with outsiders, we do not diminish it.  On the contrary, when we share our culture, we live our culture, we preserve our culture, we revitalize our culture.

Our second ace is our land and natural resources.  Our home is the most beautiful and scenic place on earth, our oil and gas reserves are enormous, and we can lay legitimate claim to Glacier Park.  No tribe, except the Navajo with Grand Canyon / Monument Valley / Canyon de Chelly, can lay claim to such a tourist attraction.  (btw, There is about $600 million in tourist spending around the Navajo reservation but only an estimated 7% goes into Navajo pockets.  The Blackfeet goal is to eventually capture over 50% of the Glacier tourist spend.)

Our third ace is our sovereignty and unique standing in the federal structure.  That’s what Chief Mountain Technologies is all about: using our preferential status to secure large federal (and state) contracts.  We are also able to assess tourist taxes, et al, as appropriate.

Our fourth ace, which has been dealt us in the last couple years, is a new attitude among members: a new optimism and determination to bring progress, prosperity, and pride to our households and our home.  A new willingness to work with each other, not against each other, from the BTBC to the member on the street, to return our tribe to greatness.

This new thinking showed itself in the last election where, for the first time in a long time, members voted for something, instead of against everything.

I said in an opinion piece I wrote before the election that I felt like the Blackfeet had stepped into the sunlight after 200 years of darkness.   I now feel that we are well clear of the darkness, and we now stand on our high plains heaven, sun on our face, wind at our back, arms raised in gratitude to the Creator, and the future we want is ours for the taking.

 America has spent the last two years beaten down by a recession it cannot shake.  In that same period, the Blackfeet Nation has made great economic and social progress, and we are just getting started.   This irony is not lost on me:  It shows that with the right leadership, vision, and execution, when Blackfeet work together, nothing can hold us down.

What a glorious gift to be Blackfeet at the moment we are shaking off a troubled past and seizing the future we deserve.  I will say it again:  These are exciting times to be Blackfeet.

Gregg Paisley
Babb

(From the 7-7-2010 Glacier Reporter)

To the Editor,

The home page of the Blackfeet Nation website, right up front where no one can miss it, says: “The Blackfeet are, perhaps, the most powerful tribe of Indians on the continent…George Catlin 1866.”

Shortly after the website was launched last year, Rusty Tatsey said: “Why can’t we be the most powerful tribe again, only this time with business and technology as our weapons, rather than arrows and war clubs?” 

The answer is that we can, we must, and we will be powerful and prosperous again.  There is no other option for us except the eventual fade to nothingness of the Blackfeet as a tribe.  And Rusty is right, the wars we must fight and win today require different weapons than before.

Blackfeet are today ferociously fighting our way back to power, prosperity, and pride.  But after years of losing, we start from a position of weakness, though we grow stronger every day.  As we fight we must somehow retain our cultural identity, preserve our traditions, and honor our heritage. 

There is nothing new under the sun, and answers to today’s problems are scattered along the paths of history.  So let me tell you a story.  The Japanese are a society based on a warrior culture and is very homogeneous culturally and ethnically, much like an Indian tribe.   After WWII, Japan was flat on its face, demoralized as a people, with an economy in ruins, much like most Indian tribes today. 

So the Japanese learned English, the language of their conquerors, shed their traditional garb and bought business suits to dress like Westerners. Then they left their little island and came to America to fight.  Their weapons were business and technology.  They started by making cheap trinkets and ridiculous little machines.  When I was growing up “Made in Japan” meant cheap low-quality stuff, like “Made in China” means today.  But they quickly and relentlessly forged ahead in high tech R&D, precision manufacturing, and progressive business models.

Within a few years the Japanese were global leaders in consumer electronics, automobiles, heavy equipment, shipping, and other industries.  This was accomplished by leveraging technologies and business practices developed elsewhere and then concentrating on continuous improvements in productivity, efficiency, quality, and customer satisfaction.  They left low-volume technology such as medical equipment and scientific apparatus and high-entry-barrier products like aircraft and aerospace to Western nations and instead concentrated on high-volume products, where the big money is.

In other words, they copied what competitors were doing, and did it better.  They entered a broad range of industries to hedge their bets, but limited themselves to the most lucrative, low-entry-barrier industries to limit risk.  They did all this as a unified society with government playing a key role in enterprise.  Every citizen knew what the national objectives were, knew the plan, and knew their role in helping get there. 

In sum, America beat Japan in military warfare, but then the Japanese picked themselves up, dusted themselves off, came together as a society, and beat America in economic warfare.  As the Japanese became powerful again, they gave up nothing of their culture and traditions.  On the contrary, they used their mounting wealth to preserve and revitalize their culture.  Today, Japan is essentially a closed society (much like the Blackfeet) with the power, prosperity, and pride to live as they like, bow to no one, and control their destiny.

The Blackfeet mindset is very different from the Japanese. We are individualists who think for ourselves and follow our leaders by choice, not custom.  Our spirituality, ethics, and moral compass is in my view preferable to any other society. And nobody is tougher, stronger, smarter, better fighters than the Blackfeet. 

So our societies are different, but the lessons are the same:  Beat your opponent at their own game.  Take the battle to the enemy but carefully choose the battlefield.  Only fight on fields skewed in your favor.  Fight on multiple fronts to hedge your bets, but only fight when the risk is manageable and the reward is high.  Attack, but when your enemy has more experience, at first mimic them, do what they do.  Then figure out how to do it better.   Always charge, never fall back.   After you win, change the game.

That last paragraph pretty well sums up why the BTBC has chosen certain business endeavors and rejected others:  We must only fight wars we can win, win big, and that result in durable success.   We can win big in the multi-billion dollar federal contracting arena, so we are furiously pursuing it.  We can win big in capturing and owning the $250 million dollar Glacier Park tourist pie, and we will have it, slice by slice.  We can win big by creating large-scale Blackfeet-branded merchandise manufacturing here at Home to sell all over all the world year ‘round, which will within a few years generate several million dollars in local payroll.

Notice that for all these battles the weapons needed to win are better business models, better business practices, and better technologies.  The BTBC knows what it takes to win, our strategies and tactics are honed, we have acquired the first batch of weapons with more being added constantly, and we now take the battle to the enemy.  

As our Chairman said recently: When We Fight, We Win.   We have an army of 16,500, and each of us has a role and a stake in this fight.  Over the next few years, we will remind the world who the Blackfeet are and what we can do.  By using the right weapons for today’s battles, we will again prosper, we will again be powerful, and all of us will be prouder than ever to be Blackfeet. 

Everyone reading this is asking: “Of course I want my tribe to become powerful again, so what’s my role and how do I bring prosperity to my household?”  In the coming months, as the various new Tribal enterprises ramp up, everyone will see brought into focus their personal role and the economic opportunities it brings.  Stay tuned, these are exciting times to be Blackfeet!

Gregg Paisley (www.chiefmountaintechnologies.com)

Babb

Three Things Needed

I want to tell you a story that has direct and immediate relevance to the upcoming Blackfeet election.  The moral of the story is this:  On June 29, if we see the big picture and vote with our rational minds for what is best for our own household finances and personal financial prospects, we’ll be all right.

But if we vote based on family ties or a small picture or whipped-up emotional hot buttons, we won’t be all right.  On June 30 we’ll be right back where we don’t want to be.

In the 2000 and 2004 U.S. elections, something amazing happened and it led to eight years of non-stop disaster.  What happened was that millions of American voters voted AGAINST their own economic interests and put George Bush in the White House.

But why would so many people vote against their own economic interests?  It is the oldest political trick in the book:  Republican strategists scared voters so badly with highly emotional (but completely fake) hot buttons that voters forgot they were poor and downtrodden and voted out of fear.   These gullible voters were fooled into believing Bush was somehow “one of them” and was their protector and benefactor.

Here’s an example, Historically, Democrats are far better at helping and lifting up low income folks than Republicans, so why on earth did so many southern low income people vote for Bush, rather than Gore or Kerry?  Simple, Republicans convinced gullible voters that Democrats were godless heathens that would take their guns away and would not protect them from terrorists.   All nonsense, of course, but it worked at the polls, didn’t it?  If poor voters had instead voted out of personal economic interest, Bush would have lost.  Predictably, the poor that voted for Bush got much poorer, and the rich got richer.

Something similar happens all over Indian Country come election time.  Indian voters too often get hung up on one or two narrow personal or emotional issues and forget the big picture and forget their own economic realities.  Sometimes they get so angry and frustrated that they take a flame thrower to the entire Council with the false hope that something better will spring up from the ashes.

Focusing on the small picture or narrow issues usually leads to disaster.  The only way the Blackfeet can continue to make progress is if three things happen at the same time:

First, everyone needs a decent paycheck they can be proud of.  We have had too much poverty for too long and it is a cancer that shows everywhere you turn on the reservation.  The current Council has pulled us out of our decades-long death spiral and every day we move higher and higher.  But we are just getting started and have a long, tough climb ahead of us.  Improving our local economy and increasing household incomes is not by itself enough if we want prosperity and pride to last far into the future.

Second, we do need some sort of constitutional reform because individuals need their rights protected and business interests need a safe, reliable environment in which to operate.   But America has a good Constitution and it didn’t prevent the Great Depression any more than it caused boom periods.  So a good Constitution by itself will not lead us to the land of milk and honey.

Third, we Indians are sometimes our own worst enemies:  We waste time and energy fighting and demonizing each other when we should be fighting our true enemies.  We need to stop thinking of ourselves like crabs in a barrel that would rather hurt each other than help ourselves.  Instead, we need to start thinking of ourselves as part of an army of Blackfeet, as the unconquerable warriors we are.  We need to fight alongside each other, not with each other.  For too many of us, our work ethic is poor, we lack the education and experience we need to compete, and yet we have a sense of entitlement.  A philosopher once said that “Great civilizations are not destroyed by outside enemies, but are destroyed from within.”  We are a great civilization, and we are guilty of destroying ourselves from within.  We need to change these self-destructive habits and attitudes before it is too late.   But without money and the clout and power it brings, and a government that works well and protects its citizens, we aren’t going anywhere, except down.

So it takes all three things to return to greatness:  Economic prosperity, good government, and pride in who we are.

Please think about these things when you vote.  Please take the long view and think about the big picture.  If we continue to choose our leaders out of old habit or because they are friends or family, if we punish rather than reward merit and achievement on the Council, if we vote on emotional red herring issues, if we continue to cut off our nose to spite our face, we will soon be gone.

Our incredible 10,000 year legacy deserves many glorious new chapters, written far into the future.  We owe it to our ancestors to not be the generation that writes one final bitter epilogue.

Gregg Paisley

Babb

(I wrote a Letter to the Editor that appeared in a recent Glacier Reporter.  It appears below.  It so angered some folks that they showed up at Tribal headquarters within a few hours demanding I be fired.  That didn't work (apparently they didn't realize I am a business partner, not an employee of the Tribe), but getting arrows in your back is part of living and working in Indian Country.  The point is, people either speak up for what they believe  --say what needs to be said, when it needs to be said--  or they are part of the problem, not part of the solution.

So I encourage Blackfeet to use this new website to speak their minds and not to worry about the arrows they may get in their backs.  Constructive, respectful debate leads to progress.  Progress is painful.  But for the Blackfeet, lack of progress is slow and certain death for us as a tribe.)

*   *   *   *   *   *   *

From the Glacier Reporter, Wednesday May 26, 2010

Choose Candidates Who Will Keep

Tribe Moving Forward

To the Editor,

More than any election in Blackfeet history, this one is about whether the Blackfeet move forward or backwards.  Put bluntly, the question is simply this: “Do we continue the rapid and remarkable economic and social progress of the last two years, or do we go back to the old ways that gave us decades of poverty and despair?”

               Today, after so many years of losing, the Blackfeet are winning.  And when you are winning the war, you don’t change generals.  You keep marching forward, you don’t fall back. 

               In my view, the reason the Blackfeet are suddenly doing everything right after decades of doing everything wrong is because we finally have leadership that is honest, visionary, gets things done, and bases their decisions on what is good for the tribe, not what is good for themselves or their families.   For perhaps the first time in Blackfeet history the BTBC is hitting on all cylinders and has the right strategies, plans, staff, and partners to return prosperity and pride to our home. 

Let me tell you a story.  I met the BTBC for the first time last summer when I presented a proposal for Chief Mountain Technologies.  They didn’t know me and I didn’t know them.  Most likely I insulted them a little when I told them this:  “In every recent election, voters have thrown out every incumbent.  That means the Blackfeet have no leaders, because by definition, if no one is following, no one is leading.”  I told them that, for any tribe, constant turnover on the Tribal Council is proof positive of a dysfunctional society in decline and of a deeply dispirited and unhappy membership.  Tribes with those troubles virtually always fail in their business ventures and pretty much everything else, too.

Today things look completely different to me.  I am astonished at the recent progress made and optimistic and excited about where we as a people are going.  I feel like 16,500 Blackfeet have stepped into the sunlight after 200 years of darkness.

             I give credit where credit is due: of 9 BTBC members, a clear majority have proven themselves to be the right leaders at the right time to seize the opportunities at hand and tackle the problems they were hired to fix.  And with any luck, this election will rid us permanently of the last remnants of do nothing, self serving Councilmen that ruled for so long and hurt us so badly.

             Here is an important point:  The current BTBC members most responsible for our recent successes were never a part of the old ways that got us into so much trouble.  They weren’t perennial politicians, but instead were successful in a wide range of fields before they were elected.  They brought in new ethics and a wealth of experience and expertise.  That turned out to be the winning formula for the Blackfeet.

Two and four years ago the voters finally got it right, so I think we need to do more of the same.  That’s why I am going to vote for the incumbents that brought in new thinking and have been very successful across the board, namely Willie and Paul.  For the other districts, I will vote for candidates that have never been on Council before, but who have proven themselves in other walks of life such as law enforcement, the ministry, and business and will bring energetic, capable new leadership.

But I am not asking you to vote for anyone in particular.  I just hope that every voter will take the time to examine why the Blackfeet are now winning and pick candidates that will keep us moving forward.  As the saying goes: “People get the government they deserve” and that means if we make bad choices we deserve bad consequences.  If any people on earth deserve a proud and prosperous future it is the Blackfeet, so let’s secure and seize our future with good, well-considered choices on June 1 and June 29. 

                                                                           Gregg Paisley,  Babb, MT

Hello,

Blackfeet Community Members are free to create their own blogs and share their stories.

Among the features currently implemented are:

• Dashboard

• Quick search and linking of previous posts while writing a blog entry
• Tags / Tagclouds
• Easy image upload and browsing using  the blog's own image browser
• Browse blogs by keyword, blogger, or tags

Thank you!