Thursday, April 21, 2011

The Moral Dance Between The Pechanga Tribe,The City of Temecula & The Media

We posted on the recent editorial in the North County Times (The Pechanga Band of Luiseno Indians Have Moral...) and earlier about the City of Temecula's lawsuit against the Pechanga Tribe ( City of Temecula lawsuit dismissed ).   But part of the story that's been missed is the dance of morality here.   The NC Times thinks the issue is an agreement and then Pechanga looking for a loophole out of it:

That doesn't excuse the fact, though, that the Pechanga Tribe agreed to pay the city about $2 million per year to help counter the impact of thousands of slot machines on its neighbor, then sought refuge in a loophole to keep from paying it.


The real moral issue is WHY a city would not exercise their outrage at the way the Pechanga Tribe has treated its own people, some of whom are Temecula citizens, too.   We wrote about that back in March 2010 ( ..Temecula taking Money from Nation that violates Civil Rights )   At the time we wondered why in that story, the Press Enterprise never brought up the issues:
 
Pechanga has violated their members civil and human rights, which will be discussed at the New Mexico hearings on indigenous people in Albuquerque next week.

Pechanga has stolen $200 million in per capita payments from members via unlawful disenrollments (now much higher)
Pechanga has taken health care benefits to the tune of $12 million dollars from members

It leads one to wonder how the city can look to benefit off the stolen money from 25% of Pechanga people?   Is that good moral judgement?   Doing the right thing can sometimes be difficult, but getting into bed with a tribe they now know is untrustworthy is not the right move.

As Dr. Martin Luther King Jr said: "Never, never be afraid to do what's right, especially if the well-being of a person or animal is at stake. Society's punishments are small compared to the wounds we inflict on our soul when we look the other way."    (h/t: Carolyn Lowe Schuyler)


We know the morals at Pechanga, led by Mark Macarro are lacking, we'd hope the City of Temecula would be better, and we'd like to see the media take off their blinders.  They've spent DAYS on a story of a little known person passing a horrible email about the President, but no time on a tribe that has harmed so many of it's people. (equal to 8 million Californians)

The City of Temecula should exercise it's moral outrage on an unethical partner in a manner we discussed here.  They should cease all business with the tribal business entities, not attend functions at the casino, tell their employees to do the same.   And let all their friends know what has happened.    While $2 million seems like a lot of money, it pales in comparison, as one of our commenters noted, to what is lost by the eliminated membership.   The tribe can rectify this immediately, by simply following tribal law.  And they know it.  

14 comments:

Anonymous said...

A little off the note, but I just wanted to post a Happy Birthday to my grandfather Michael Salinas!!!

Anonymous said...

Isn't he the oldest surviving Apis Descendent?

Anonymous said...

I thought the losses to those disenrolled was over $300 MILLION already?

Anonymous said...

The city whored itself out to Pechanga for a couple of million. Now they have nothing.

Retaliate with a few well timed drunk driving checks.

smokeybear said...

SORRY STATE OF AFFAIRS. THE CITY OF TEMECULA IS LIKE ALL OTHER CITYS' IN CALIFORNIA, OR ACROSS THE NATION, THEY'VE MISS MANAGED THEIR MONEY SO BADLY THAT ANY PORT IN A STORM WILL DO. THIS MEANS WHORING THEMSELVES TO THE "MACARRO CARTEL" FOR "30" PIECES OF SILVER. YOU WATCH TEMECULA GROVEL AT MARK MACARROS'S FEET. THEY DON'T CARE ABOUT WHAT'S MORALLY RIGHT, JUST THEIR OUT STRETCH HAND FOR THEIR BREAD AND WATER. ALL ABOUT "GREED", AND WHAT THEY CAN GET. NEVER MIND ABOUT DISENROLLMENTS. THAT HAS HAD TO HAVE A BIG IMPACT ON THE CITIES FINANCIAL STRUCTURE. BUT, ALAS, THE CITY DOESN"T REALLY GIVE A RATS A..,TEMECULA WILL END UP KISSING THE "MARCARRO CARTELS'" A.. FOR "MONEY". HOW MORAL IS THAT? SO WHY WOULD THEY "EVER" CONSIDER SPEAKING OUT ON MORAL GROUNDS ABOUT "PECHANGA" AND ALL THE ETHNIC CLEANSING THE "MACARRO CARTEL" HAS DONE IN DISENROLLING LEGITIMATE INDIANS WITHOUT DUE PROCESS. "HERITAGE" IS A TERRIBLE THING TO LOSE FOR THE SAKE OF "GREED". WE NEED TO BE "WARRIORS", IT'S NOT TO LATE. THINK "RALLY".

smokeybear said...

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MICHAEL. BEST WISHES.

smokeybear said...

CAN ANYONE ENLIGHTEN ME ON "ROBERT FORMAN"? HE DIED IN 2008 AND WAS SUPPOSED HAVE BEEN GOOD FOR OUR CAUSE. I'VE JUST RECENTLY HEARD HIS NAME.

Anonymous said...

Smokey, OP has a link to Mr. Foreman on the right.

Tribalcorruption.com also has a very nice video tribute to him that describes the family and what happened to him.

Anonymous said...

The city of Temecula turned a blind eye to the atrocities that the tribal council perpetrated on their own people.

And Macarro was happy to dangle the money in front of them. How you like Macarro NOW, Temec?

'aamokat said...

Smokey, Robert Foreman was the first chairman of the Redding Rancheria tribe in Nothern California when they were recognized again as a tribe by the federal government. His tribe claimed his family were adopted and when they proved with DNA evidence that they are blood members of their tribe, their tribe disenrolled them anyway.

They proved, with 2 different DNA tests, that the probability of them being of the blood of their tribe is over 99.9 percent and if I was thought of being the father of a child with that high of a test saying I was the father, guess who would be liable for child support of that child?

Of course that would prove I was the biological father of said child and also, of course, I would owe child support.

But the Redding tribe just ignored the test results because the tests disagreed with their plans to get rid of the Formans.

'aamokat said...

Smokey, one more thing, does it surprise any of us that the Redding tribe has a casino and the rest of the tribe got a raise in their per capita when the Foremans were disenrolled?

Luiseno said...

One other thing is that it was the Tribe itself that asked for the DNA tests to be done. Then they ignored the results of there own requested test.

Hmmmm sound familiar?

smokeybear said...

CORRUPTION, AND GREED, WHAT A CONCEPT. WE WATCH IT HAPPEN ON A DAILY BASIS THROUGHOUT INDIAN COUNTRY, AND THROUGHOUT, WHAT USE TO BE, OUR GREAT NATION. WE ALL TURN A BLIND EYE BECAUSE WE THINK WE ARE JUST ONE. WHAT THE HELL CAN I DO TO RIGHT THE EVER GROWING WRONGS THAT SEEM TO BE TO OVERWELMING FOR ALL OF US IN INDIAN COUNTRY, AND OUR QUEST TO DO BATTLE FOR OUR RIGHT TO HAVE THE ILLEGAL DISENROLLMENTS REVERSED AND TO TO HAVE THE PECHANGA MEMBERSHIP JUST FOLLOW THEIR OWN CONSTITUTION AND BY LAWS TO THE GREATER END; BRING US ALL BACK INTO THE FOLD. IT IS THE RIGHT, AND MORAL THING TO DO. IT WOULD BE SO EASY TO DO. WHY IS THE "MACARRO CARTEL" ALLOWED TO SPREAD THEIR "CANCER" THROUGHOUT PECHANGA AGAINST THEIR OWN PEOPLE, WITHOUT DUE PROCESS, AND THE MEMBERSHIP IS SO AFRAID THAT ANYONE OF THEM COULD BE NEXT IF THEY SPEAK UP. THE MIDDLE EAST PROOVES HAT CHANGE CAN HAPPEN, IT COULD AGAIN IN INDIAN COUNTRY. LET US MAKE IT HAPPEN.

Anonymous said...

Shame on the local news media for not working harder to tell the story of what a poor neighbor Pechanga really is.

Advertising revenue is more important for a newspaper than..NEWS.