Plagiarism at Indian Country Today: Depp and Wounded Knee

In the rush for glory, news reporters and newspapers rely on plagiarism, theft and deceit

By Brenda Norrell
Censored News, July 10, 2013

Plagiarism has become the accepted form of journalism at Indian Country Today Media Network. The most obvious example of this collapse in journalism and ethics is ICT's coverage of Johnny Depp's offer to purchase Wounded Knee in South Dakota and return it to the Lakota people.

Even newspapers that should have known better were quickly quoting the plagiarizer Indian Country Today, rather than the source, the Daily Mail.

In a second example of plagiarism, Indian Country Today plagiarized an article on horses dying of drought on the Navajo Nation. The article is plagiarized from Navajo Times, but has an Indian Country Today byline on it. It appeared on Google News under the name of Indian Country Today, rather than Navajo Times.

Martyn Palmer at the UK's Daily Mail actually wrote the Depp interview:

Palmer wrote, "Such is Depp’s commitment to the Native American cause, he is planning to spend millions of his own money to return land, Wounded Knee, in South Dakota, to their ownership. 

"The site, the scene of an 1890 massacre, is up for sale for $3.9 million. Local Native Americans say they cannot afford to buy it. Depp is outraged."

Read more of Depp's interview at the Daily Mail: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/event/article-2356133/Johnny-Depp-life-Vanessa-Paradis--cheating-death-The-Lone-Ranger.html
 
In South Dakota, Last Real Indians has an update on Depp's offer to buy Wounded Knee. Read it here:
http://lastrealindians.com/explosive-white-clay-walking-out-on-nebraskas-gov-johnny-depp-buying-wounded-knee-oglala-president-bryan-brewer/

Brandon Ecoffey at Native Sun News first reported the news of the sale of the Wounded Knee site. Ecoffey reported that talks were underway to purchase the 40 acre tract of land at the national historic site of Wounded Knee and another 40 acre lot at Porcupine Butte. The two sites were put up for sale by land owner Jim Czywczysnki for a total of $4.9 million on Pine Ridge Oglala land.

Read Ecoffey's articles: http://www.indianz.com/News/2013/009888.asp

http://www.indianz.com/News/2013/010063.asp

Meanwhile, the Rapid City Journal's article on Depp and the Wounded Knee sale is not written by Rapid City Journal. In tiny letters at the top is the real author and credit: Kevin Abourezk at Lincoln Star Journal.

The Lincoln Star Journal reported the land owner has greatly inflated the price. “We just hate to see that guy get rich off us,” Oglala President Bryan Brewer told the Lincoln Star Journal. Read it here: http://journalstar.com/news/state-and-regional/tribe-johnny-depp-wants-to-buy-wounded-knee/article_5d823cc8-d972-5198-8ecd-4ceefa477317.html

There are actually Lakota reporters in South Dakota who are present and cover the news. Among those newspapers is Native Sun News, which is often plagiarized online.

Meanwhile, writers who sit home and plagiarize the hard work of others for money are not reporters. They are opportunists and profiteers. Indian Country Today is still using a reporter/editor in the west that I haven't seen out on a news story in the past 30 years. I have seen her plagiarize.

Real reporters sacrifice huge amounts of time doing research, and actually showing up on news stories. These days reporters are often using their own money to travel to do real news. Then someone comes along like the 'reporters' at Indian Country Today, and either totally plagiarizes their work, or does a rewrite with a quick phone call in a few minutes time and collects a big paycheck for it.

Don't fall for plagiarism and the theft of others work. Since yesterday when the plagiarism was exposed, Indian Country Today has been busy having their armchair journalists do phone call interviews to cover their tracks on the plagiarism.

First Nation Terrance Nelson 'Dakota Unity Ride'

By First Nation Terrance Nelson

Roseau River Anishinabe

Censored News

Abas,

Fars News

Once again thank you for posting my article on Fars News Agency on June 23, 2013
http://english.farsnews.com/newstext.aspx?nn=13920401000971

Please find attached poster on the Dakota Unity Ride. Chief Gus Higheagle is a traditional spiritual elder. He leads the Dakota Unity Riders and he is undertaking an immense effort to go to New York City and Washington D.C. The United States Government does not acknowledge the Dakota people in Canada. The Dakota in Canada have lost all their lands in the United States and Canada refers to them as refugees from the United States. This is absurd, these are original peoples of North America. They are not refugees.

In the past the American Government has always ignored the history of the Dakota. The Massacres of Dakota people in the late 18th century is a part of the history of terrorism and genocide against the indigenous people that was carried out by the United States army. See Attached pictures from Wounded Knee South Dakota 1890.

In Canada, the Dakota face severe poverty. Chief Frank Brown, one of the Chiefs who attended the Iranian Embassy in Ottawa in our delegation in 2012 now faces jail time after they sold untaxed Mohawk cigarettes to gain some income for their people. In Canada the system is stacked against the indigenous people. Chief Brown will face the same court system as I did. Canadian National Railway won a court case against us. We didn't expect anything from the Canadian court but we wanted to ensure that the court will not get away with making a decision without us being there to tell them our side.

Wounded Knee

Americans killed indigenous people outright but the British in Canada were masters of colonization and they led indigenous people to believe that they were allies, not the enemy. Today reservation lands in Canada are 60 times smaller overall than reservation lands in USA.

Before anyone believes that the Canadians are a gentler nation, see attached information on how they can and will use police and the Army if the indigenous people resist.

http://warriorpublications.wordpress.com/2011/02/11/oka-crisis-1990/

We thank Iran for taking our human rights in Canada seriously. Can you post the Warrior Publications information regarding the 1990 Oka Crisis, then perhaps many of the 120 non aligned nations can see how Canada really treats our people. They used 4,500 soldiers in 1990 to suppress a Mohawk protest. To think of Canada as a gentle nation is simply not true.

I attach for you a copy of the court decision released on June 28, 2013 that denies us a right to blockade the theft of our natural resource wealth. Many of our people are in jail or will be in jail for defying court injunctions.

The laws of Canada are backed up by armed police and the army. Indigenous people are not allowed to protest in any meaningful or effective way. The Thieves can continue to steal our lands and resources and armed whites will enforce their theft.

In the Treaty 1-11 meeting in Onion Lake July 14 to 18, the people will make the decision of what actions if any the indigenous people will take to protect their fundamental human right to property.

The Dakotas need $50,000 to complete the ride to New York and Washington. We are putting out a request to all people to help the Dakota so that they can take their cause directly to President Obama. Regardless of whether or not Obama acknowledges the Dakota and the American history of genocide, remains to be seen. I will be taking the Dakota request directly to the Grand Governing Council of American Indian Movement in the next two days and I will take their information next week to Onion Lake for support. Anyone else who can support the Dakota Riders can contact Gus Higheagle at the phone number on the attached poster or contact the supporters in the United States at the website address, which is also on the poster.

Again thank you Abas for your continued support of our people here in Canada. I understand that due to the sanctions, Iranians cannot contribute financially to the Dakota, however if you can post this information and send it to some of the 120 Non Aligned Countries, perhaps some will respond. The Dakotas will leave on the Unity Ride within two weeks on July 24, 2013.

In the near future AIM Manitoba will be erecting a statue of the famous war chief Sitting Bull near Winnipeg with information on the Genocide in North America. It will be the first step on our drive to build a museum. I will send you the Museum Concept within two weeks. If you can help us distribute that information to other countries, it would help the Dakota people even if the United States continues to ignore its history.

Terrance Nelson

Vice Chair American Indian Movement

THE DAKOTA NATION UNITY RIDE:

5000 MILES ON HORSEBACK FROM MANITOBA TO NEW YORK CITY JULY 27 - AUG 17TH 2013

"A RIDE FOR HEALING...FOR EVERY NATION...FOR ALL MANKIND"

5-25-13

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=606995129330203&set=o.260785240626231&type=1&theater

BY Deborah LaVallie The Dakota Nation Unity ride will begin a 5,000 mile trek on horseback on July 27th in Manitoba, ending their ride in New York City on August 17th.  The purpose of the ride is for healing every nation of mankind. Gus High Eagle and his well known horse Rudy, along with family and friends started the annual 'unity' rides traveling to areas such as Wounded Knee (SD), the Black Hills, and last summer in the 'Many Sitting Eagles Ride', riding from his home in Pipestone, Manitoba to the Turtle Mountains and Fort Berthold reservations in North Dakota, commemorating the War of 1812.  Gus and his wife Emily who crafted their traditional beaded regalia, are Canupawakpa Dakota and began the annual rides as a way to get young people involved and is all about tribal nations getting together in 'unity'...for the future. 

Their ‘Unity’ ride last summer was a Memorial, commemorating 200 years since the War of 1812, when ‘Seven Nations’, the Dakota, Ojibway/Chippewa, Assiniboine, Cree, Hidatsa and Mandan Nations defended and held the ‘line’ of American expansion and aggression holding the ‘Mandan Trail’ open from what is now Canada, all the way south to the Mandan lodges, in what is now the Fort Berthold reservation.  The ‘Many Sitting Eagle’ Chiefs’ traditional leadership of the seven tribal nations, defended their camps and people in 'unity' while their warriors were away fighting the War of 1812, allied with the British troops. The war ended in the eventual loss of their Homelands.  The ride was to honor the memory and 'unity' of the seven tribes at that time.

For further information about the Unity Ride, contact Gus High Eagle:  204-854-2584

Mohawk Nation News 'Murder at Megantic'

MURDER AT MEGANTIC

Posted on July 9, 2013

MNN. 8 July 2013. On Saturday morning, July 6^th, a bomb wiped out the center of the town of Lac-Megantic [Quebec] on Mohawk Territory. Over 60 of the French settlers for whom we are responsible were murdered and ‘disappeared”.

Bomb blast on Indigenous land.

  
According to the Great Peace of Montreal 1701 is under the protection of the Constitution of the Council of the Great Peace. We have a duty to protect all living things. We demand a full investigation of this criminal act of the multinational corporations. Montreal, Mine & Atlantic Railway Ltd., was hauling 73 substandard tankers and locomotives carrying toxic crude to Irving Oil in Saint Johns New Brunswick for the US market. Every train that goes through our towns and villages is loaded with enough ammunition to create a “war zone”. 
The train was parked in Nantes. Nobody was in the locomotive. The engineer had locked up and gone to sleep at a nearby hotel. At 11:30 the brakes of one locomotive was mysteriously released. It caught fire and billowed smoke. The fire department was called to put it out. The remaining cars were not checked. At 1:00 am. the remaining cars started moving directly downhill into the Lac-Megantic town center, about 11 kilometers away. A a social gathering was taking place. The train sped toward them, careened off the track, came to a stop near the middle of town and blew up like an atom bomb. The people and town centre were incinerated. The poisons ran into the lake. 

War on Mother Earth in Quebec and elsewhere!

Canada ships $73 billion in oil to the US every year, passing them through our towns and villages. Environmental regulations are constantly being removed and/or sidestepped. More shipping of crude oil is planned for the east and west coasts. 
The railroad tankers used in US and Canada are old and dangerous. By deregulation they don’t have to be replaced. Even more unsafe pipelines are being planned. Someone would have a strong motive for releasing those brakes. We Indigenous people should oversee any investigation of such criminal acts on our land. 
Foreign corporations normally cover their criminality by paying off all the corrupt politicians and law makers. They look for perpetrators before picking their “patsy”. The victims are forgotten. We will stop the destruction of Mother Earth caused by their toxic economy. These railroads, pipelines, roads and waterways are creating ecological destruction on our land. We are all at risk.   
There must be an immediate ban on transporting all war materials across Onowaregeh/Great Turtle Island. It violates the Council of the Great Peace, the law of the land. As Jimi sang in “House Burning Down”: “Look at the sky/turn a hellfire red. Somebody’s house in burning/down, down, down, down. I say, O, baby, why’d you burn your brother’s house down?” House burning down 
Terrence Nelson on Warrior societies
MNN Mohawk Nation News kahentinetha2@yahoo.com Thahoketoteh@hotmail.com For more news, books, workshops, to donate and sign up for MNN newsletters, go to www.mohawknationnews.com  More stories at MNN Archives.  Address:  Box 991, Kahnawake [Quebec, Canada] J0L 1B0  For free download of Mohawk music thahoketoteh.ws

Tarsands Solutions: Walking for healing, stories from ground zero

Walking for healing: stories from ground zero of the tar sands disaster

Feature

Jason Mogus | Tar Sands Solution Network - July 8th 2013

Photo: Approaching the Syncrude mine. Photo by Mike Hudema 

http://tarsandssolutions.org/member-blogs/walking-for-healing-stories-from-ground-zero-of-the-tar-sands-disaster?fb_comment_id=fbc_133280653547290_76618_133519496856739

This past weekend in northern Alberta, hundreds of activists from across North America, led by the First Nations who live at ground zero of the world's largest industrial project, held a gathering and ceremony to pray for healing of the land, water, air, and ourselves from out of control tar sands expansion. We've curated some of the best tweets, photos, and stories from this powerful event. If the stories here move you, please share with your networks the human rights disaster the lies at the heart of reckless tar sands expansion.
Read more:  http://tarsandssolutions.org/member-blogs/walking-for-healing-stories-from-ground-zero-of-the-tar-sands-disaster?fb_comment_id=fbc_133280653547290_76618_133519496856739