Under the control of the retrograde GOP Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald, and carrying out an agenda established for Scott Walker's benefit by the Tea Party and big donor financiers, the State Senate today is poised to strike blows against Wisconsin's Native American citizens:
* At a time when much of the country is finally embracing tolerance, equality and inclusion of minorities, the Senate wants to use state law and power to help school districts retain offensive Native American nicknames and mascots.
* And whether coincidental or not, the Senate on the same day is poised to close off substantial amounts of forest land in Northern Wisconsin - - land ceded by the Ojibwe in the 19th century by treaty to the state to create a forest industry and further populate the area - - to accelerate the destructive creation of a massive open pit iron ore mine in a pristine watershed just upstream from the Bad River Band's small reservation and water-based rice-growing culture.
What we have here is the state government identifying and manipulating a new/old scapegoat to benefit special interests and Republican ballot-box majorities.
The acidic and asbestos-laden run-off heading for forest land and Ojibwe water in Northern Wisconsin has a immoral parallel that pollutes the political environment in Wisconsin, and you can see it flow today in the Senate chambers.
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