August 2013 - Page 24 of 30

Are You a Chief? And 11 Other Zany Questions Posed at the Montreal First Peoples Festival Info Kiosk

Source: ICTMN

Plant someone behind a sign labeled “Information,” and people pose questions as if it’s the repository of all the knowledge in the universe. But station staffers at the Montreal First Peoples Festival information kiosk, and passersby jump at the chance to showcase the stereotypes they grew up believing. Below is a sampling of the whackiest queries that came the way of an anonymous dispenser of aboriginal trivia during the past week. The festival wound up on August 5 after a run that started on July 30.

1) I found dream catchers in the basement of my new house. Am I an Indian?

Sorry “Justin,” finding these in your new basement does not make you Indian. (Photo: Thinkstock)

“One guy came up to our information kiosk, and he brought over his camera [with photographs on it], and there were just regular dream catchers, and he was like, ‘What is this, what does this mean for me, does that mean that I’m an adopted Indian now, do I have rights? Do I get free tobacco?’ ”

Sorry dude, you’re no more eligible for free gas than Justin Beiber is.

2) What tribe are you from?

“It’s not the politically correct term. Here [in Canada] you’d say, ‘What First Nation?’ ”

3) Are you an Indian?

“Again, not totally correct but close enough. I’ll give you credit for trying.”

4) Can I take a picture of you?

“I just look like any old Jack. My skin’s a little darker, my hair’s black and my eyes are brown. That’s it. That’s the only difference.”

5) Do you dance?

“Which is appropriate, but not everybody dances.”

6) Do you have a medicine pouch?

“One guy specifically asked me that, and he said, and I quote: ‘You are not Native unless you have a medicine pouch.’ ”

7) A parade including Indigenous Peoples from Europe isn’t authentic.

“We had a parade, Nuestra Americana, and it was just a friendly meeting of all the Nations, and one lady was super offended. She was like, ‘These people aren’t Native, this isn’t what the First Peoples festival is all about, this doesn’t make sense, you guys are racist.’

“Lady, you’re white, you don’t know anything about anything, just stop talking and appreciate. She was a quite special lady.”

8) Where are your feathers and moccasins?

“One guy was kind of upset that at the information kiosk we didn’t have feathers, and we didn’t have moccasins, and a leather suit and a bow and arrow in the kiosk.

“We’re not in the 1800s any more. We appreciate that you read up on your history, clearly, but that was a couple of hundred years ago.”

9) Where are the feathers in your hair?

“It wasn’t me, but my colleague told me that one lady said, ‘Where are your feathers in your hair?’ And he was kinda like, ‘Well they grow back after a couple of days, I cut them to be proper for the festival.’ And she was looking at his head like, ‘Oh wow, really? Can I maybe meet you sometime for coffee and we can discuss your feathers in your hair?’ ”

9) You seem sober. How did you cure your abuse problem?

“Some people come up to us with genuinely thoughtful questions, just phrased wrongly. One lady came up to us, she was a sweet old lady, I’m sure she didn’t mean to be not politically correct, and she was like, So how did you—you seem sober, how did you [achieve] your sobriety?”

Okay, okay, so there was a canoe at the Place des Festivals during the Montreal First Peoples Festival. But that was just for show. (Photo: Theresa Braine)

11) Do you go hunting? Do you own a canoe? What kind of wood do you use for your bow and arrow?

“Not even asking if you own a bow and arrow—what kind of wood do you use for your bow and arrow?”

12) Are you a chief?

Guards with Automatic Weapons Are Back to Intimidate in Mining Country

Mary Annette Pember, ICTMN

Bulletproof Securities, the company whose paramilitary guards were pulled from the Gogebic Taconite (GTAC) proposed iron ore mine site in the Penokee Hills is now licensed to operate in the state of Wisconsin according to a story in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel on August 5.

A spokeswoman for the Wisconsin Department of Safety and Professional Services announced that the company is now licensed in the state and will not face any charges for operating without a license in Wisconsin.

Bob Seitz, spokesman for GTAC told WiscNews.com that the company plans to use Bulletproof Securities to guard mine sites in the future but would not divulge a date.

“They’re one of the options we have and we’ll use. The violent protesters didn’t announce to me their plans and I’m not going to announce to them mine,” Sietz said.

Bulletproof’s paramilitary style guards were hired by GTAC after a June 11 incident in which several masked protesters verbally threatened mine workers and damaged property. One female protester wrestled a cell phone away from a female mineworker. Katie Kloth of Stevens Point was charged with felony robbery by force, misdemeanor theft and two misdemeanor counts of damage to property in the incident.

GTAC was criticized for using out-of-state guards armed with automatic rifles as a means to intimidate mining opponents like the occupants of the Penokee Hills Harvest Camp. The Lac Courte Oreilles Ojibwe tribe created the Harvest Camp to draw attention to the natural resources under threat from the mine as well as underscore Ojibwe treaty rights in the area.

Sen. Bob Jauch, (D-Poplar) and Rep. Janet Bewley, D-Ashland publicly criticized GTAC for using the guards and wrote a letter to the company requesting that they withdraw them. Both voted against changing mining regulations that have allowed GTAC to begin mining efforts in the Penokees.

Paul DeMain, spokesman for the Penokee Harvest Camp decried GTAC’s decision to reinstate the BulletProof guards describing it as a “third world response to citizen actions.”

He further noted that the decision does not change discussions that need to take place about the land, treaty harvest, the quality or cleanliness of the resources or the future of Iron County vis-à-vis the Chippewa tribes.

Mining opponents remain concerned about the environmental danger presented by the proposed GTAC mine and disapprove of the dearth of information provided by the mining company regarding its plans and the chemical composition of the rocks in the area.

Joseph Skulan, a research professor at Arizona State University who works out of Wisconsin, says that GTAC is circulating deceptive information about both the content of the minerals at the site as well as their plans for mining.

Skulan currently conducts medical research in geochemistry and biology and has done postdoctoral work on iron chemistry.

GTAC representatives maintain that the proposed mining operation would not release sulphuric acid because most of the taconite they seek is contained within the region’s Ironwood Formation that contains little pyrite. Pyrite, (iron disulfide) creates sulfuric acid when exposed to water and air. Skulan, however, maintains that much of the proposed mine is actually located under the Tyler Slate, a pyrite bearing rock unit.

There is serious potential for acid rock drainage to reduce water quality and leach toxic metals from mining waste rock. The overburden would be dumped into huge piles and could generate acid-rock drainage directly into the Bad River watershed. Sedimentation-filling and hydrological disruption of streams and wetlands in the immediate vicinity of the mine may have indirect effects on wild rice and fish. The massive dewatering process associated with open-pit mining could lower the water table around the mine, seriously affecting the fragile wild rice beds of the Bad River slough, according to Bad River Tribal chairman Mike Wiggins Jr.

Similar mining operations in Minnesota’s Mesabi Iron Range have created high levels of mercury and sulfate levels downstream in the St. Louis River and resulted in fish-consumption advisories.

RELATED: Wisconsin Mining War

Would you eat a burger grown in a laboratory?

A Dutch scientist has created ‘meat’ from stem cells – and wants Heston Blumenthal to cook the first batch. Steve Connor reports on the ultimate in culinary experimentation

Steve Connor, The Independent

The world’s first hamburger made with a synthetic meat protein derived from bovine stem cells will be publicly consumed this October after being prepared by a celebrity chef, according to the inventor of the artificial mince.

Heston Blumenthal is the favourite to be asked to cook the €250,000 (£207,000) hamburger, which will be made from 3,000 strips of synthetic meat protein grown in fermentation vats. Dr Mark Post, of Maastricht University in the Netherlands, said the anonymous backer of his research project had not yet decided who would get to eat the world’s most expensive hamburger, which will unveiled at a ceremony in Maastricht.

Dr Post told the American Association for the Advancement of Science that a hamburger made from artificial beef protein was a milestone in the development of novel ways to meet the global demand for meat, which is expected to double by 2050.

“In October we’re going to provide a ‘proof of concept’ showing that with in vitro culture methods that are pretty classical we can make a product out of stem cells that looks like, and hopefully taste like, meat,” Dr Post said.

“The target goal is to make a hamburger and for that we need to grow 3,000 pieces of this muscle and a couple of hundred pieces of fat tissue. As long as it’s a patty the size of a regular hamburger, I’m happy with it,” he said.

A handful of researchers has been working for the past six years on the technical problem of extracting stem cells from bovine muscle, culturing them in the laboratory and turning them into strips of muscle fibres that can be minced together with synthetic fat cells into an edible product.

The technical challenges have included giving the meat a pinkish colour and the right texture for cooking and eating, as well as ensuring that it feels and tastes like real meat.

Dr Post admitted to being nervous about the final result. “I am a little worried, but seeing and tasting is believing,” he said.

Although some animals still have to be slaughtered to provide the bovine stem cells, scientists estimate that a million times more meat could be made from the carcass of a single cow, compared with conventional cattle rearing. As well as reducing the number of beef cattle, it would save the land, water and oil currently need to raise cattle for the meat trade, Dr Post said.

“Eventually, my vision is that you have a limited herd of donor animals that you keep in stock in the world. You basically kill animals and take all the stem cells from them, so you would still need animals for this technology.”

One of the economic incentives behind the research is the increasing cost of the grain used to feed much of the world’s cattle. This is helping to drive up the cost of meat.

“It comes down to the fact that animals are very inefficient at converting vegetable protein [either grass or grain] into animal protein. Yet meat demand is also going to double in the next 40 years,” he said.

“Right now we are using about 70 per cent of all our agricultural capacity to grow meat through livestock. You are going to need alternatives. If we don’t do anything, meat will become a luxury food and will become very expensive.

“Livestock also contribute a lot to greenhouse gas emissions, more so than our entire transport system. Livestock produces 39 per cent of the methane, 5 per cent of CO2 and 40 per cent of all the nitrous oxide. Eventually we’ll have an ‘eco-tax’ on meat.”

Growing meat in fermentation vats might be better for the environment. And it might be more acceptable to vegetarians and people concerned about the welfare of domestic livestock, Dr Post said. “There are many reasons why people are vegetarian. I’ve talked to the Dutch vegetarian society, which has said that probably half of its members will eat this meat if it has cost fewer animal lives and requires less intensive farming,” Dr Post said. Growing artificial meat would also allow greater control over its makeup. It will be possible, for example, to alter the fat content, or the amount of polyunsaturated fats vs saturated fats, according to Dr Post.

“You can probably make meat healthier,” he said. “You can probably trigger these cells to make more polyunsaturated fatty acids, just like grass-fed beef has more polyunsaturates than grain-fed beef. You could make any type of meat, you could make mixed meats. I’m pretty sure you could even make panda meat.”

Dr Post declined to reveal who his backer was, except to say that he was well known but not a celebrity – and not British. “It’s a very reputable source of money,” he said. “He’s an individual. There may be two reasons why he wants to remain anonymous: as soon as his name is associated with this technology he will draw the attention to himself and he doesn’t really want to do that.”

Dr Post added: “And the second reason is that he has the image of whatever he does turns into gold and he is not sure that may be the case here so he doesn’t want to be associated with a potential failure.”

LAB-GROWN MEAT THE CASE FOR AND AGAINST

Pros

– Billions of animals would be spared from suffering in factory farms and slaughterhouses

– Would reduce the environmental impacts of livestock production, which the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation estimates account for 18 per cent of greenhouse-gas emissions

– Could reduce by 90 per cent the land- and water-use footprint of meat production, according to Oxford University research, freeing those resources for more efficient forms of food production

– Would provide a more sustainable way to meet demand from China and India, whose growing appetite for meat is expected to double global meat consumption by 2040

– Lab-grown meat could be healthier – free of hormones, antibiotics, bacteria such as salmonella and E.coli, and engineered to contain a lower fat content

– Would reduce the threat of swine and avian flu outbreaks associated with factory farming

Cons

– Consumers may find the notion of lab-grown meat creepy or unnatural – a “Frankenstein food” reminiscent of the Soylent Green at the heart of the 1973 sci-fi film of the same name

– For some vegetarians, in vitro meat will be unsatisfactory as it perpetuates “meat addiction” – rather than focusing on promoting non-meat alternatives, and changing our meat-heavy diet

– Although the fat content can be tinkered with, other risks of eating red meat, such as an increased threat of bowel cancer, remain

– It’s not cruelty-free – animals will still have to be slaughtered to provide the bovine stem cells

– There could be unforeseen health consequences to eating lab-grown meat

– As a highly processed, “unnatural” foodstuff, lab-grown meat is a step in the wrong direction for “slow-food” advocates, and others who believe the problems in our food system have their origins in the distance between food production and the consumer

Native American Vote-Suppression Scandal Escalates

By Stephanie Woodard, Huffington Post

South Dakota has devised an ingenious new way to curb minority voting. For decades, suppressing the Native American vote here has involved activities that might not surprise those who follow enfranchisement issues: last-minute changes to Indian-reservation polling places, asking Native voters for ID that isn’t required, confronting them in precinct parking lots and tailing them from the polls and recording their license-plate numbers. The state and jurisdictions within it have fought and lost some 20 Native voting-rights lawsuits; a major suit is still before the courts. Two South Dakota counties were subject to U.S. Department of Justice oversight until June of this year.

That’s when the Supreme Court struck down a portion of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, saying, “Today, our Nation has changed.”

Yes, it has. The VRA decision provided an opening for those who are uncomfortable when minorities, the poor and other marginalized citizens vote. Since the decision, new measures to limit enfranchisement have swept the country — mostly gerrymandering and restrictions on allowable voter IDs.

South Dakota’s secretary of state and top elections official Jason Gant is a step ahead of the pack. He will ask the federal Election Assistance Commission if it’s okay to use Help America Vote Act funds to pay for early-voting polling places on three Indian reservations. Such facilities, which the state has already spent HAVA funds on for two other reservations, cost about $15,000 per election. If the new ones are approved, the money would come from the $9 million in HAVA appropriations the state has in interest-bearing accounts earning hundreds of thousands of dollars per year.

Voting-rights group Four Directions made the early-voting request on behalf of three South Dakota Sioux tribes during the July 31 meeting of the state’s Board of Elections. With the polling places, tribal members would cast ballots closer to home during the 46-day period when South Dakota allows voting ahead of Election Day. Shown above is a portion of a 50-plus-mile round trip some Sioux currently make to early-vote off their reservation–if impoverished tribal members can find transport or gas money. Other Sioux may travel 100 miles or more.

“Right now, most Indians in South Dakota get one day to vote, Election Day, when precincts are set up on reservations; meanwhile, other voters have several weeks,” said civil-rights leader OJ Semans, a Rosebud Sioux who co-directs Four Directions. “That’s not equal access.” Semans is shown below, second from right, discussing early voting with county officials.

At this point, you are probably wondering why asking a federal agency for advice is so very clever. It’s because the Election Assistance Commission no longer has any staff whatsoever tasked to respond to such a query, according to EAC spokesperson Bryan Whitener. He wrote in an email, “Questions that require advisory opinions regarding HAVA funds are decided by a vote of the commissioners. At this point, EAC is without commissioners.” A look at the EAC’s website reveals a several-year backlog of unanswered questions.

Better yet, Gant knows — and may have long known — that a query to the EAC would disappear into the void. Soon after the July 31 meeting, the national American Indian news source, Indian Country Today Media Network, the AP and several South Dakota media outlets reported that Gant is an officer of the National Association of Secretaries of State, which voted in 2011 to support disbanding the EAC.

As the scandal accelerates with articles, blog posts and radio and television talk shows on the subject appearing in South Dakota and around the country, Gant insists that the moribund EAC is the arbiter of the Native early-voting question. In an August 2 statement, he said, “The EAC can either say yes, no, or they may issue no response… I will not use HAVA funds unless it is clearly defined that I can do so.”

Four Directions consultant Bret Healy called Gant’s reliance on the EAC “troubling,” given the secretary of state’s involvement with the commission’s demise. Healy added that any request for advice sent to the EAC was a “dead letter.”

Linda Lea Viken, a Rapid City attorney and elections board member since 1999, said she was startled by the turn of events, especially since board members had pressed Gant during the July 31 meeting about when the EAC might reply and he gave no indication that the answer was, in all likelihood, never.

In an email to Secretary Gant, Viken asked, “May I ask, when did you first become aware that the EAC is not fully staffed and hasn’t issued a decision for several years?”

At another point, Viken queried Gant, “In light of the information the board has now [received] about the futility of such a request, what do you propose? We certainly don’t want these folks to be in limbo for years. They have been seeking this decision for a long time, and we should not be dismissive of their request.”

County elections official and elections board member Patty McGee saw things differently. McGee, who has served on the EAC’s federal Standards Board, told the state group on July 31, “We’ve given them several opportunities to vote.” Later, she told this reporter for an Indian Country Today Media Network article, “A person has to make an effort.”

Healy noted that having some — but not all — ways to vote does not constitute equality. He also referred to Natives as a “protected class” of voters, as defined by the permanent sections of the Voting Rights Act, which were not struck down and remain in effect. Because Native Americans have historically had less opportunity to participate in the electoral process and have been subject to official discrimination, any abridgment of their rights draws special scrutiny.

Separately, at the request of U.S. Senator Tim Johnson (D-S.D.), the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service has analyzed the relevant regulations and opined that it appears South Dakota’s HAVA funds can properly be used for early voting, also called in-person absentee voting. Gant and the state elections board had this information for the July 31 meeting.

Gant is sticking to his guns: “We need to see what the EAC response is and proceed with the next step at that time.”

According to Viken, the state elections board acts as an appeals panel for HAVA issues within South Dakota and can clarify the state’s HAVA plan when necessary. She wants the state board to revisit the Indian-reservation early-voting issue. Said Viken, “It’s always good for us to be refreshed on our responsibilities under the law.”

Photograph by Stephanie Woodard. This article was produced with support from the George Polk Center for Investigative Reporting. c. Stephanie Woodard.

Lace up your running shoes for Stilly 5K

Source: The Herald

Add this to your weekend list: A light-hearted family footrace through a park by the river.

The Stilly Fun Run 5K Footrace starts at 9 a.m. Saturday at River Meadows Park, 20416 Jordan Road, Arlington. Race check-in and registration is from 7:30 to 8:30 a.m.

Registration is $15 for adults and $10 for children under age 18. Fee includes socks. You can fill out an application, available online, and send it by email or mail in advance.

Families can stick around for the Festival of the River afterwards, which includes a pow-wow, live entertainment and more. Festival parking is $4 before 4 p.m. and $10 after.

For more information, call 360-631-2620, email fperez@stillaguamish.com or visit [URL]www.festivaloftheriver.com;http://www.festivaloftheriver.com[URL].

Watching Fox News makes you distrust climate scientists

ff-20110127-globalwarming630pix — Media Matters/Fox News

By Chris Mooney, Grist

In the past several years, a number of polls have documented the huge gap between liberals and conservatives when it comes to their acceptance of the science of climate change. Naturally, then, researchers have increasingly turned their attention to trying to explain this dramatic divide over what is factually true. And it wasn’t long before they homed in on the role of conservative media in particular — thus, a number of studies (e.g., here [PDF]) show that watching Fox News increases your risk of holding incorrect beliefs about the science of climate change.

Now, a new paper [PDF] just out in the journal Public Understanding of Science takes this line of inquiry further, beginning to unpack precisely how conservative media work to undermine the public’s acceptance of science. The paper shows that a distrust of climate scientists is a significant factor underlying the modern denial of global warming, and moreover, that watching Fox News and listening to Rush Limbaugh both increase one’s level of distrust of these scientific experts. Or as the paper puts it, “[C]onservative media use decreases trust in scientists which, in turn, decreases certainty that global warming is happening.”

The study, conducted by Jay Hmielowski of the University of Arizona and colleagues at several other universities, relied on a large polling sample of Americans in two phases: 2,497 individuals were interviewed in 2008, and then a smaller sample of 1,036 were reinterviewed in 2011. The respondents were asked about what kind of media they consumed — conservative choices included Fox News and the Rush Limbaugh Show; “non-conservative” media outlets included CNN, MSNBC, National Public Radio, and network news — as well as about how much they trusted or distrusted climate scientists. They were also asked about their belief that global warming is happening. (The study controlled for variables like political ideology, religiosity, and other demographic factors.)

The results showed that conservative media consumption led to less trust in climate scientists, even as consuming nonconservative media had the opposite effect (leading to an increased trust in climate scientists). Between people who said they don’t consume any conservative media and people who said they consume a large amount, “we see a 13 percent difference in the amount of trust in scientists,” according to study coauthor Lauren Feldman of American University.

The authors then proposed that distrust of scientists is a key link in the chain between watching Fox (or listening to Rush) and coming to doubt climate science. The idea is that because most people don’t know a great deal about the science of global warming, they rely on “heuristics” — or mental shortcuts — to make up their minds about what to believe. “Trust” (or the lack thereof) is a classic shortcut, allowing one to quickly determine who’s right and who’s wrong in a seemingly complex and data-laden debate. Or as the paper put it: “The public’s low level of knowledge and the media’s conflicting, often value-laden messages about global warming lead people to use heuristics to make sense of this complex issue.”

Evidence of Fox and Rush Limbaugh raising doubts about climate scientists — in a way that could generate distrust — isn’t hard to come by. Limbaugh includes scientists in his “four corners of deceit … government, academia, science, and the media.” As for Fox, there are myriad examples of coverage that could be said to cast doubt on climate science. For instance, there’s the 2009 memo, exposed by Media Matters, in which Fox Washington editor Bill Sammon instructed staff to cast doubt on climate research in their coverage.

It seems unlikely, however, that conservative media alone can account for the distrust of science on the right. In a major 2012 study [PDF], the sociologist Gordon Gauchat showed that conservatives have lost trust in scientists across the board over a period of many decades, dating all the way back to 1974. Fox News only launched in 1996, however; Rush Limbaugh started national broadcasts in 1988.

Clearly, then, other factors must be involved in sowing distrust as well — including a long history of left-right policy fights in which scientists seemed to be on the “liberal” side, with a canonical example being the battle over Ronald Reagan’s “Star Wars” program in the 1980s.

As a result of these conflicts, politically attuned conservatives today are well aware that scientists and academics rarely seem to come out on their side. Perhaps Fox News and the Rush Limbaugh Show are, in the end, simply the media reflection of that long-standing conservative perception.

This story was produced as part of the Climate Desk collaboration.

Chris Mooney is host of the Point of Inquiry podcast and the author of four books, including The Republican War on Science and The Republican Brain: The Science of Why They Deny Science and Reality.

Video: Upper Skagit youth learn traditional cedar gathering

Source: Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission

Elders and tribal leaders from the Upper Skagit Indian Tribe teach a group of children in the summer youth enrichment program to gather cedar and prepare it for use in traditional crafts such as headbands and baskets.

Upper Skagit Tribe youth gather cedar from NW Indian Fisheries Commission on Vimeo.

Video: Treaty tribes honor first salmon, bless fishermen

Source: Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission

In the Pacific Northwest, many treaty Indian tribes hold First Salmon Ceremonies and Blessings of the Fleet to honor the salmon that sustain them, and protect the fishermen who procure it. This video shows some of the traditions practiced by the Swinomish, Lummi, Upper Skagit, Tulalip and Stillaguamish tribes.

First Salmon Ceremonies and Blessings of the Fleet from NW Indian Fisheries Commission on Vimeo.

Denise Juneau Says No to US Senate Run in Montana

Rob Capriccioso, Indian Country Today Media Network

Indians and Democrats have joined forces in being disappointed that Denise Juneau, current Montana State Superintendent of Public Instruction, has decided against running for U.S. Senate.

Juneau, a citizen of the Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara Nation, announced August 5 that now is not the right time for her to seek higher office.

“It is not very often that you are presented with an opportunity to change what Congressional representation looks like in our state,” Juneau said in a statement posted on her Facebook page. “It is the kind of opportunity that warrants serious consideration.

“After much deliberation, I have decided not to seek the U.S. House or Senate seats in 2014. I sincerely appreciate the outpouring of support and encouragement I have received from people all across Montana and the country. It has been very humbling to be considered for such a leadership role representing our great state; however, my decision not to run for Congress is the right one for me at this time.

“I love serving as the Superintendent of Public Instruction for the state of Montana and am proud of the progress I have made over the last four years.”

Some Juneau supporters, wanting to see an unabashed American Indian woman get elected to the U.S. Congress, thought the time was ripe now. They will have to wait and see if she will run for higher office in the future.

“An Indian woman in Congress would bring an invaluable perspective to D.C.,” said Holly Cook Macarro, a tribal lobbyist with Ietan Consulting. “To get there, we need more Native women in the electoral political pipeline: running for school boards, city council, county supervisors, state legislatures, and active in their local political infrastructure. We seem to see a lot of Indian candidates who want to immediately make a run for Congress without having held previous elected office, but we need to earn it and lay down the groundwork, just like everyone else.”

It’s easy to see what would have made Juneau an attractive contender in a state with a considerable tribal constituency. She was the first American Indian woman elected to statewide executive office in Montana when she won her current position in 2008, and she has been one of a small number of successful Native Americans nationwide to win elected office on the state level. In other words, she knows how to win, and she has already built a pathway of support.

If Juneau, who was raised on the Blackfeet Indian Reservation in the state, would have run, many votes and campaign finance donations would have been likely from the 12 state- and federally-recognized tribes in Montana. Her support for education and youth initiatives has also made her attractive beyond Indian country over her past four years in office.

National Democrats have been eyeing Juneau for a possible run for Senate since Democrat Max Baucus announced his retirement this spring. His decision leaves a seat open in the Senate that has been spoken for since the 1970s, and few Democrats in the conservative-leaning state have signaled a desire to try to replace him.

Former Gov. Brian Schweitzer, EMILY’s List President Stephanie Schriock, and state Insurance Commissioner Monica Lindeen have also recently announced their decisions not to run on the Democratic ticket. Lt. Gov. John Walsh is reportedly still considering.

Republican U.S. Rep. Steve Daines is likely to run, according to local media.

After Schweitzer – whom many political observers considered the Democratic frontrunner – announced in July that he was not running, Juneau seriously considered it, telling the local press that she felt “obligated to think about it,” and saying that she had queried her friends and family on whether she should.

Some supporters told her behind the scenes that it was going to be a difficult race to win, and they predicted she would spend most of her time fundraising, rather than focusing on the issues.

After her close election in 2008, where she prevailed by just 2,231 votes, it was probably wise to sit this one out, building support for the future, according to some informal advisers.

“While disappointing to the many of us who supported a run, it is not a total surprise to see Denise stay out of the Montana Senate race,” Cook Macarro added. “Montana is a tough state for Democrats, and our victories there have been hard won over the years.”

Even though Juneau decided against running for now, Democrats note that her star is still on the rise, which can only help in the future. They note that she was tapped by the Democratic National Committee to give a speech about education at the 2012 Democratic National Convention, and she was well received in that effort.

“Teachers are sometimes the only ones who tell our children they can go from an Indian reservation to the Ivy League, from the home of a struggling single mom to the White House,” Juneau said in one widely quoted part of that speech.

Her mom, Carol Juneau, helped pave the way for her daughter in politics, having served as a member of the Montana House of Representatives from 1998 through 2007, and then serving as a Democratic Party member of the Montana Senate since 2007.

The elder Juneau told Indian Country Today in 2008 that she wants more women – especially American Indian women – to succeed in U.S. politics.

“My daughter is running this year,” Carol Juneau told ICT in 2008, before her daughter won her current post. “I am very proud of her. She’s going to do great things.”

Pop Goes the Waistline! A Daily Soda Puts Kids On the Obesity Train

Source: Indian Country Today Media Network

Obesity among children barely of kindergarten age is on the rise, and researchers have linked their development of the disease to regular consumption of sugary drinks, reported CBS News.

While it’s widely known that childhood obesity has tripled in the past three decades in the U.S.—an estimated 17 percent of kids and adolescents aged 2 to 19 are obese, evidence that drinking sugary beverages daily can lead to obesity in toddlers and younger children has only recently emerged.

“Even though sugar-sweetened beverages are relatively a small percentage of the calories that children take in, that additional amount of calories did contribute to more weight gain over time,” Dr. Mark DeBoer, a pediatrician at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, told Reuters.

The study was published August 5 in Pediatrics. Researchers tracked 9,600 kids between the ages of 2 and 5 years old and their consumption of sugary drinks, including sodas, sports drinks and fruit drinks that were not 100 percent juice. The children’s body mass index (BMI) was measured. Kids in the 95th percentile or greater for their gender and age are considered obese; those in the 85th to 95th percentile are classified as overweight.

There was an obvious correlation between drinking sugary drinks and a higher BMI for children at ages 4 and 5. Five-year-olds who drank sweet beverages were about 1.5 times more likely to be obese than their peers who didn’t.

For kids 2 years of age who also drank sugary beverages, a BMI increase was observed over the following two years, suggesting the gradual weight gain overtime could lead to obesity.

“As a means of protecting against excess weight gain, parents and caregivers should be discouraged from providing their children with [sugar-sweetened beverages] and consuming instead calorie-free beverages and milk,” wrote DeBoer and the researchers. “Such steps may help mitigate a small but important contribution to the current epidemic of childhood obesity.”

The researchers also noted that policy changes should be considered to help curb kids’ consumption of sugary drinks.