‘WAVE OF TRANSPARENCY’: FBI director hints at agency’s move to rebuild Americans’ trust

The Director of the FBI, Kash Patel, is an Indian-American talking about working with tribal law enforcement on reservations.

We are not forgetting about Indian Country.

Sounds like he’s talking about everything west of the Mississippi.

I like Kash Patel.  He talks like a normal, smart guy, not like a sneaky political bastard.  He did not say “Indian Country” to be cute or provocative.  He just said it to explain his point.

There is nothing wrong with the word “indian”.  It was always phony virtue-signaling outrage.  The Bureau of Indian Affairs manages federal obligations on tribal land.

Thirty years ago, my younger brother, his friend Jim and I were on a backpacking trip at Canyon de Chelly National Monument.  The Canyon de Chelly is entirely within a Navajo reservation.

We rented a four-wheel drive Nissan Pathfinder.  To take a four-wheel drive vehicle through the canyon, an Indian guide was required.  The idea was to keep people from getting their vehicle stuck and to provide some employment for the locals.  Here is me and our Indian guide.

As we were driving, the conversation went like this:

Guide:  “You’re from Cleveland.  The Cleveland Indians, right?”

Me: “Yeah, right.  What do you guys think of being called ‘indians’?  Do you prefer ‘native American?'”

Guide:  “You took all our land, we don’t give a shit what you call us.”

He didn’t say it in a contentious way, but in a jokey way.  Like he sort of meant it, but didn’t hold it against anyone in particular.

That’s how I recall the conversation. 

He was a nice guy, and it was good to have a chance to talk to a local.  That’s how most of this stuff goes.  People on Indian reservations have real problems, and don’t care about labels that are not meant in a derogatory  way.

There was no reason to change the Cleveland Indians to the Cleveland Guardians, except to show some Progressive attention-seekers that they have the power to dominate the conversation.

If baseball management could have held out for a few years, they wouldn’t have had to change.