I have to go to my mothers house in Utah County today to get together for a sunday Thanksgiving dinner since I wasn't able to go down there on Thursday. I think my brother and his family went down to Las Vegas to visit with his wife's family on Thanksgiving day and he wasn't able to make it either, that is why we thought sunday would make a better day for all of us. It should be an interesting visit. I am sure some interesting conversations will come up, they always do.
Utah County doesn't like me very well, wish me luck!
Native Blood: The Myth of Thanksgiving
Thursday, November 27, 2008
As we gather today with family and friends and stuff our faces with turkey (or tofurkey) lets take a minute to remember the truth about this day.
Thanksgiving: A Native American View
This is probably one of the most well written articles regarding the truth behind Thanksgiving, it is quite lengthy so if you would rather listen to the audio format it you can listened to here.
Native Blood: The Myth of Thanksgiving
Help circulate this widely for Thanksgiving.
by Mike Ely
It is a deep thing that people still celebrate the survival of the early colonists at Plymouth — by giving thanks to the Christian God who supposedly protected and championed the European invasion. The real meaning of all that, then and now, needs to be continually excavated. The myths and lies that surround the past are constantly draped over the horrors and tortures of our present.
I originally wrote this article a decade ago, and it has showed up in different places and publications usually around the holiday. Pass it on.
Every schoolchild in the U.S. has been taught that the Pilgrims of the Plymouth Colony invited the local Indians to a major harvest feast after surviving their first bitter year in New England. But the real history of Thanksgiving is a story of the murder of indigenous people and the theft of their land by European colonialists–and of the ruthless ways of capitalism.
* * * * *
In mid-winter 1620 the English ship Mayflower landed on the North American coast, delivering 102 exiles. The original Native people of this stretch of shoreline had already been killed off. In 1614 a British expedition had landed there. When they left they took 24 Indians as slaves and left smallpox behind. Three years of plague wiped out between 90 and 96 percent of the inhabitants of the coast, destroying most villages completely.
The Europeans landed and built their colony called “the Plymouth Plantation” near the deserted ruins of the Indian village of Pawtuxet. They ate from abandoned cornfields grown wild. Only one Pawtuxet named Squanto had survived–he had spent the last years as a slave to the English and Spanish in Europe. Squanto spoke the colonists’ language and taught them how to plant corn and how to catch fish until the first harvest. Squanto also helped the colonists negotiate a peace treaty with the nearby Wampanoag tribe, led by the chief Massasoit.
These were very lucky breaks for the colonists. The first Virginia settlement had been wiped out before they could establish themselves. Thanks to the good will of the Wampanoag, the settlers not only survived their first year but had an alliance with the Wampanoags that would give them almost two decades of peace.
John Winthrop, a founder of the Massachusetts Bay colony considered this wave of illness and death to be a divine miracle. He wrote to a friend in England, “But for the natives in these parts, God hath so pursued them, as for 300 miles space the greatest part of them are swept away by smallpox which still continues among them. So as God hath thereby cleared our title to this place, those who remain in these parts, being in all not 50, have put themselves under our protection.”
The deadly impact of European diseases and the good will of the Wampanoag allowed the settlers to survive their first year.
In celebration of their good fortune, the colony’s governor, William Bradford, declared a three-day feast of thanksgiving after that first harvest of 1621.
How the Puritans Stole the Land
Early North America as Native peoples and Europe settlers collide
But the peace that produced the Thanksgiving Feast of 1621 meant that the Puritans would have 15 years to establish a firm foothold on the coast. Until 1629 there were no more than 300 settlers in New England, scattered in small and isolated settlements. But their survival inspired a wave of Puritan invasion that soon established growing Massachusetts towns north of Plymouth: Boston and Salem. For 10 years, boatloads of new settlers came.
And as the number of Europeans increased, they proved not nearly so generous as the Wampanoags.
On arrival, the Puritans and other religious sects discussed “who legally owns all this land.” They had to decide this, not just because of Anglo-Saxon traditions, but because their particular way of farming was based on individual–not communal or tribal–ownership. This debate over land ownership reveals that bourgeois “rule of law” does not mean “protect the rights of the masses of people.”
Some settlers argued that the land belonged to the Indians. These forces were excommunicated and expelled. Massachusetts Governor Winthrop declared the Indians had not “subdued” the land, and therefore all uncultivated lands should, according to English Common Law, be considered “public domain.” This meant they belonged to the king. In short, the colonists decided they did not need to consult the Indians when they seized new lands, they only had to consult the representative of the crown (meaning the local governor).
The colonists embraced a line from Psalms 2:8. “Ask of me, and I shall give thee, the heathen for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession.” Since then, European settler states have similarly declared god their real estate agent: from the Boers seizing South Africa to the Zionists seizing Palestine.
The European immigrants took land and enslaved Indians to help them farm it. By 1637 there were about 2,000 British settlers. They pushed out from the coast and decided to remove the inhabitants.
The Shining City on the Hill
Where did the Plymouth and Massachusetts colonies of Puritan and “separatist” pilgrims come from and what were they really all about?
Governor Winthrop, a founder of the Massachusetts colony, said, “We shall be as a City upon a Hill, the eyes of all people are upon us.” The Mayflower Puritans had been driven out of England as subversives. The Puritans saw this religious colony as a model of a social and political order that they believed all of Europe should adopt.
The Puritan movement was part of a sweeping revolt within English society against the ruling feudal order of wealthy lords. Only a few decades after the establishment of Plymouth, the Puritan Revolution came to power in England. They killed the king, won a civil war, set up a short-lived republic, and brutally conquered the neighboring people of Ireland to create a larger national market.
The famous Puritan intolerance was part of a determined attempt to challenge the decadence and wastefulness of the rich aristocratic landlords of England. The Puritans wanted to use the power of state punishment to uproot old and still dominant ways of thinking and behaving.
The new ideas of the Puritans served the needs of merchant capitalist accumulation. The extreme discipline, thrift and modesty the Puritans demanded of each other corresponded to a new and emerging form of ownership and production. Their so-called “Protestant Ethic” was an early form of the capitalist ethic. From the beginning, the Puritan colonies intended to grow through capitalist trade–trading fish and fur with England while they traded pots, knives, axes, alcohol and other English goods with the Indians.
The New England were ruled by a government in which only the male heads of families had a voice. Women, Indians, slaves, servants, youth were neither heard nor represented. In the Puritan schoolbooks, the old law “honor thy father and thy mother” was interpreted to mean honoring “All our Superiors, whether in Family, School, Church, and Commonwealth.” And, the real truth was that the colonies were fundamentally controlled by the most powerful merchants.
The Puritan fathers believed they were the Chosen People of an infinite god and that this justified anything they did. They were Calvinists who believed that the vast majority of humanity was predestined to damnation. This meant that while they were firm in fighting for their own capitalist right to accumulate and prosper, they were quick to oppress the masses of people in Ireland, Scotland and North America, once they seized the power to set up their new bourgeois order. Those who rejected the narrow religious rules of the colonies were often simply expelled “out into the wilderness.”
The Massachusetts colony (north of Plymouth) was founded when Puritan stockholders had gotten control of an English trading company. The king had given this company the right to govern its own internal affairs, and in 1629 the stockholders simply voted to transfer the company to North American shores–making this colony literally a self-governing company of stockholders!
In U.S. schools, students are taught that the Mayflower compact of Plymouth contained the seeds of “modern democracy” and “rule of law.” But by looking at the actual history of the Puritans, we can see that this so-called “modern democracy” was (and still is) a capitalist democracy based on all kinds of oppression and serving the class interests of the ruling capitalists.
In short, the Puritan movement developed as an early revolutionary challenge to the old feudal order in England. They were the soul of primitive capitalist accumulation. And transferred to the shores of North America, they immediately revealed how heartless and oppressive that capitalist soul is.
The Birth of “The American Way of War”
European colonists attack the Pequot village
In the Connecticut Valley, the powerful Pequot tribe had not entered an alliance with the British (as had the Narragansett, the Wampanoag, and the Massachusetts peoples). At first they were far from the centers of colonization. Then, in 1633, the British stole the land where the city of Hartford now sits–land which the Pequot had recently conquered from another tribe. That same year two British slave raiders were killed. The colonists demanded that the Indians who killed the slavers be turned over. The Pequot refused.
The Puritan preachers said, from Romans 13:2, “Whosoever therefore resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God: and they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation.” The colonial governments gathered an armed force of 240 under the command of John Mason. They were joined by a thousand Narragansett warriors. The historian Francis Jennings writes: “Mason proposed to avoid attacking Pequot warriors which would have overtaxed his unseasoned, unreliable troops. Battle, as such, was not his purpose. Battle is only one of the ways to destroy an enemy’s will to fight. Massacre can accomplish the same end with less risk, and Mason had determined that massacre would be his objective.”
The colonist army surrounded a fortified Pequot village on the Mystic River. At sunrise, as the inhabitants slept, the Puritan soldiers set the village on fire.
William Bradford, Governor of Plymouth, wrote: “Those that escaped the fire were slain with the sword; some hewed to pieces, others run through with their rapiers, so that they were quickly dispatched and very few escaped. It was conceived they thus destroyed about 400 at this time. It was a fearful sight to see them thus frying in the fire…horrible was the stink and scent thereof, but the victory seemed a sweet sacrifice, and they gave the prayers thereof to God, who had wrought so wonderfully for them.”
Mason himself wrote: “It may be demanded…Should not Christians have more mercy and compassion? But…sometimes the Scripture declareth women and children must perish with their parents…. We had sufficient light from the word of God for our proceedings.”
Three hundred and fifty years later the Puritan phrase “a shining city on the hill” became a favorite quote of conservative speechwriters.
Discovering the Profits of Slavery
This so-called “Pequot war” was a one-sided murder and slaving expedition. Over 180 captives were taken. After consulting the bible again, in Leviticus 24:44, the colonial authorities found justification to kill most of the Pequot men and enslave the captured women and their children. Only 500 Pequot remained alive and free. In 1975 the official number of Pequot living in Connecticut was 21.
Some of the war captives were given to the Narragansett and Massachusetts allies of the British. Even before the arrival of Europeans, Native peoples of North America had widely practiced taking war captives from other tribes as hostages and slaves.
The remaining captives were sold to British plantation colonies in the West Indies to be worked to death in a new form of slavery that served the emerging capitalist world market. And with that, the merchants of Boston made a historic discovery: the profits they made from the sale of human beings virtually paid for the cost of seizing them.
One account says that enslaving Indians quickly became a “mania with speculators.” These early merchant capitalists of Massachusetts started to make genocide pay for itself. The slave trade, first in captured Indians and soon in kidnapped Africans, quickly became a backbone of New England merchant capitalism.
Thanksgiving in the Manhattan Colony
In 1641 the Dutch governor Kieft of Manhattan offered the first “scalp bounty”–his government paid money for the scalp of each Indian brought to them. A couple years later, Kieft ordered the massacre of the Wappingers, a friendly tribe. Eighty were killed and their severed heads were kicked like soccer balls down the streets of Manhattan. One captive was castrated, skinned alive and forced to eat his own flesh while the Dutch governor watched and laughed. Then Kieft hired the notorious Underhill who had commanded in the Pequot war to carry out a similar massacre near Stamford, Connecticut. The village was set fire, and 500 Indian residents were put to the sword.
A day of thanksgiving was proclaimed in the churches of Manhattan. As we will see, the European colonists declared Thanksgiving Days to celebrate mass murder more often than they did for harvest and friendship.
The Conquest of New England
By the 1670s there were about 30,000 to 40,000 white inhabitants in the United New England Colonies–6,000 to 8,000 able to bear arms. With the Pequot destroyed, the Massachusetts and Plymouth colonists turned on the Wampanoag, the tribe that had saved them in 1620 and probably joined them for the original Thanksgiving Day.
In 1675 a Christian Wampanoag was killed while spying for the Puritans. The Plymouth authorities arrested and executed three Wampanoag without consulting the tribal chief, King Philip.
As Mao Zedong says: “Where there is oppression there is resistance.” The Wampanoag went to war.
The Indians applied some military lessons they had learned: they waged a guerrilla war which overran isolated European settlements and were often able to inflict casualties on the Puritan soldiers. The colonists again attacked and massacred the main Indian populations.
When this war ended, 600 European men, one-eleventh of the adult men of the New England Colonies, had been killed in battle. Hundreds of homes and 13 settlements had been wiped out. But the colonists won.
In their victory, the settlers launched an all-out genocide against the remaining Native people. The Massachusetts government offered 20 shillings bounty for every Indian scalp, and 40 shillings for every prisoner who could be sold into slavery. Soldiers were allowed to enslave any Indian woman or child under 14 they could capture. The “Praying Indians” who had converted to Christianity and fought on the side of the European troops were accused of shooting into the treetops during battles with “hostiles.” They were enslaved or killed. Other “peaceful” Indians of Dartmouth and Dover were invited to negotiate or seek refuge at trading posts–and were sold onto slave ships.
It is not known how many Indians were sold into slavery, but in this campaign, 500 enslaved Indians were shipped from Plymouth alone. Of the 12,000 Indians in the surrounding tribes, probably about half died from battle, massacre and starvation.
After King Philip’s War, there were almost no Indians left free in the northern British colonies. A colonist wrote from Manhattan’s New York colony: “There is now but few Indians upon the island and those few no ways hurtful. It is to be admired how strangely they have decreased by the hand of God, since the English first settled in these parts.”
In Massachusetts, the colonists declared a “day of public thanksgiving” in 1676, saying, “there now scarce remains a name or family of them [the Indians] but are either slain, captivated or fled.”
Fifty-five years after the original Thanksgiving Day, the Puritans had destroyed the generous Wampanoag and all other neighboring tribes. The Wampanoag chief King Philip was beheaded. His head was stuck on a pole in Plymouth, where the skull still hung on display 24 years later.
The descendants of these Native peoples are found wherever the Puritan merchant capitalists found markets for slaves: the West Indies, the Azures, Algiers, Spain and England. The grandson of Massasoit, the Pilgrim’s original protector, was sold into slavery in Bermuda.
Runaways and Rebels
But even the destruction of Indian tribal life and the enslavement of survivors brought no peace. Indians continued to resist in every available way. Their oppressors lived in terror of a revolt. And they searched for ways to end the resistance. The historian MacLeod writes: “The first `reservations’ were designed for the `wild’ Irish of Ulster in 1609. And the first Indian reservation agent in America, Gookin of Massachusetts, like many other American immigrants had seen service in Ireland under Cromwell.”
The enslaved Indians refused to work and ran away. The Massachusetts government tried to control runaways by marking enslaved Indians: brands were burnt into their skin, and symbols were tattooed into their foreheads and cheeks.
A Massachusetts law of 1695 gave colonists permission to kill Indians at will, declaring it was “lawful for any person, whether English or Indian, that shall find any Indians traveling or skulking in any of the towns or roads (within specified limits), to command them under their guard and examination, or to kill them as they may or can.”
The northern colonists enacted more and more laws for controlling the people. A law in Albany forbade any African or Indian slave from driving a cart within the city. Curfews were set up; Africans and Indians were forbidden to have evening get-togethers. On Block Island, Indians were given 10 lashes for being out after nine o’clock. In 1692 Massachusetts made it a serious crime for any white person to marry an African, an Indian or a mulatto. In 1706 they tried to stop the importation of Indian slaves from other colonies, fearing a slave revolt.
Celebrate?
Looking at this history raises a question: Why should anyone celebrate the survival of the earliest Puritans with a Thanksgiving Day? Certainly the Native peoples of those times had no reason to celebrate.
The ruling powers of the United States organized people to celebrate Thanksgiving Day because it is in their interest. That’s why they created it. The first national celebration of Thanksgiving was called for by George Washington. And the celebration was made a regular legal holiday later by Abraham Lincoln during the civil war (right as he sent troops to suppress the Sioux of Minnesota).
Washington and Lincoln were two presidents deeply involved in trying to forge a unified bourgeois nation-state out of the European settlers in the United States. And the Thanksgiving story was a useful myth in their efforts at U.S. nation-building. It celebrates the “bounty of the American way of life,” while covering up the brutal nature of this society.
***
Available online at kasamaproject.org. Send comments to: m1keely (at) yahoo.com
Published: December 2007. Feel free to reprint, distribute or quote this with attribution.
Thanksgiving: A Native American View
This is probably one of the most well written articles regarding the truth behind Thanksgiving, it is quite lengthy so if you would rather listen to the audio format it you can listened to here.
Native Blood: The Myth of Thanksgiving
Help circulate this widely for Thanksgiving.
by Mike Ely
It is a deep thing that people still celebrate the survival of the early colonists at Plymouth — by giving thanks to the Christian God who supposedly protected and championed the European invasion. The real meaning of all that, then and now, needs to be continually excavated. The myths and lies that surround the past are constantly draped over the horrors and tortures of our present.
I originally wrote this article a decade ago, and it has showed up in different places and publications usually around the holiday. Pass it on.
Every schoolchild in the U.S. has been taught that the Pilgrims of the Plymouth Colony invited the local Indians to a major harvest feast after surviving their first bitter year in New England. But the real history of Thanksgiving is a story of the murder of indigenous people and the theft of their land by European colonialists–and of the ruthless ways of capitalism.
* * * * *
In mid-winter 1620 the English ship Mayflower landed on the North American coast, delivering 102 exiles. The original Native people of this stretch of shoreline had already been killed off. In 1614 a British expedition had landed there. When they left they took 24 Indians as slaves and left smallpox behind. Three years of plague wiped out between 90 and 96 percent of the inhabitants of the coast, destroying most villages completely.
The Europeans landed and built their colony called “the Plymouth Plantation” near the deserted ruins of the Indian village of Pawtuxet. They ate from abandoned cornfields grown wild. Only one Pawtuxet named Squanto had survived–he had spent the last years as a slave to the English and Spanish in Europe. Squanto spoke the colonists’ language and taught them how to plant corn and how to catch fish until the first harvest. Squanto also helped the colonists negotiate a peace treaty with the nearby Wampanoag tribe, led by the chief Massasoit.
These were very lucky breaks for the colonists. The first Virginia settlement had been wiped out before they could establish themselves. Thanks to the good will of the Wampanoag, the settlers not only survived their first year but had an alliance with the Wampanoags that would give them almost two decades of peace.
John Winthrop, a founder of the Massachusetts Bay colony considered this wave of illness and death to be a divine miracle. He wrote to a friend in England, “But for the natives in these parts, God hath so pursued them, as for 300 miles space the greatest part of them are swept away by smallpox which still continues among them. So as God hath thereby cleared our title to this place, those who remain in these parts, being in all not 50, have put themselves under our protection.”
The deadly impact of European diseases and the good will of the Wampanoag allowed the settlers to survive their first year.
In celebration of their good fortune, the colony’s governor, William Bradford, declared a three-day feast of thanksgiving after that first harvest of 1621.
How the Puritans Stole the Land
Early North America as Native peoples and Europe settlers collide
But the peace that produced the Thanksgiving Feast of 1621 meant that the Puritans would have 15 years to establish a firm foothold on the coast. Until 1629 there were no more than 300 settlers in New England, scattered in small and isolated settlements. But their survival inspired a wave of Puritan invasion that soon established growing Massachusetts towns north of Plymouth: Boston and Salem. For 10 years, boatloads of new settlers came.
And as the number of Europeans increased, they proved not nearly so generous as the Wampanoags.
On arrival, the Puritans and other religious sects discussed “who legally owns all this land.” They had to decide this, not just because of Anglo-Saxon traditions, but because their particular way of farming was based on individual–not communal or tribal–ownership. This debate over land ownership reveals that bourgeois “rule of law” does not mean “protect the rights of the masses of people.”
Some settlers argued that the land belonged to the Indians. These forces were excommunicated and expelled. Massachusetts Governor Winthrop declared the Indians had not “subdued” the land, and therefore all uncultivated lands should, according to English Common Law, be considered “public domain.” This meant they belonged to the king. In short, the colonists decided they did not need to consult the Indians when they seized new lands, they only had to consult the representative of the crown (meaning the local governor).
The colonists embraced a line from Psalms 2:8. “Ask of me, and I shall give thee, the heathen for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession.” Since then, European settler states have similarly declared god their real estate agent: from the Boers seizing South Africa to the Zionists seizing Palestine.
The European immigrants took land and enslaved Indians to help them farm it. By 1637 there were about 2,000 British settlers. They pushed out from the coast and decided to remove the inhabitants.
The Shining City on the Hill
Where did the Plymouth and Massachusetts colonies of Puritan and “separatist” pilgrims come from and what were they really all about?
Governor Winthrop, a founder of the Massachusetts colony, said, “We shall be as a City upon a Hill, the eyes of all people are upon us.” The Mayflower Puritans had been driven out of England as subversives. The Puritans saw this religious colony as a model of a social and political order that they believed all of Europe should adopt.
The Puritan movement was part of a sweeping revolt within English society against the ruling feudal order of wealthy lords. Only a few decades after the establishment of Plymouth, the Puritan Revolution came to power in England. They killed the king, won a civil war, set up a short-lived republic, and brutally conquered the neighboring people of Ireland to create a larger national market.
The famous Puritan intolerance was part of a determined attempt to challenge the decadence and wastefulness of the rich aristocratic landlords of England. The Puritans wanted to use the power of state punishment to uproot old and still dominant ways of thinking and behaving.
The new ideas of the Puritans served the needs of merchant capitalist accumulation. The extreme discipline, thrift and modesty the Puritans demanded of each other corresponded to a new and emerging form of ownership and production. Their so-called “Protestant Ethic” was an early form of the capitalist ethic. From the beginning, the Puritan colonies intended to grow through capitalist trade–trading fish and fur with England while they traded pots, knives, axes, alcohol and other English goods with the Indians.
The New England were ruled by a government in which only the male heads of families had a voice. Women, Indians, slaves, servants, youth were neither heard nor represented. In the Puritan schoolbooks, the old law “honor thy father and thy mother” was interpreted to mean honoring “All our Superiors, whether in Family, School, Church, and Commonwealth.” And, the real truth was that the colonies were fundamentally controlled by the most powerful merchants.
The Puritan fathers believed they were the Chosen People of an infinite god and that this justified anything they did. They were Calvinists who believed that the vast majority of humanity was predestined to damnation. This meant that while they were firm in fighting for their own capitalist right to accumulate and prosper, they were quick to oppress the masses of people in Ireland, Scotland and North America, once they seized the power to set up their new bourgeois order. Those who rejected the narrow religious rules of the colonies were often simply expelled “out into the wilderness.”
The Massachusetts colony (north of Plymouth) was founded when Puritan stockholders had gotten control of an English trading company. The king had given this company the right to govern its own internal affairs, and in 1629 the stockholders simply voted to transfer the company to North American shores–making this colony literally a self-governing company of stockholders!
In U.S. schools, students are taught that the Mayflower compact of Plymouth contained the seeds of “modern democracy” and “rule of law.” But by looking at the actual history of the Puritans, we can see that this so-called “modern democracy” was (and still is) a capitalist democracy based on all kinds of oppression and serving the class interests of the ruling capitalists.
In short, the Puritan movement developed as an early revolutionary challenge to the old feudal order in England. They were the soul of primitive capitalist accumulation. And transferred to the shores of North America, they immediately revealed how heartless and oppressive that capitalist soul is.
The Birth of “The American Way of War”
European colonists attack the Pequot village
In the Connecticut Valley, the powerful Pequot tribe had not entered an alliance with the British (as had the Narragansett, the Wampanoag, and the Massachusetts peoples). At first they were far from the centers of colonization. Then, in 1633, the British stole the land where the city of Hartford now sits–land which the Pequot had recently conquered from another tribe. That same year two British slave raiders were killed. The colonists demanded that the Indians who killed the slavers be turned over. The Pequot refused.
The Puritan preachers said, from Romans 13:2, “Whosoever therefore resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God: and they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation.” The colonial governments gathered an armed force of 240 under the command of John Mason. They were joined by a thousand Narragansett warriors. The historian Francis Jennings writes: “Mason proposed to avoid attacking Pequot warriors which would have overtaxed his unseasoned, unreliable troops. Battle, as such, was not his purpose. Battle is only one of the ways to destroy an enemy’s will to fight. Massacre can accomplish the same end with less risk, and Mason had determined that massacre would be his objective.”
The colonist army surrounded a fortified Pequot village on the Mystic River. At sunrise, as the inhabitants slept, the Puritan soldiers set the village on fire.
William Bradford, Governor of Plymouth, wrote: “Those that escaped the fire were slain with the sword; some hewed to pieces, others run through with their rapiers, so that they were quickly dispatched and very few escaped. It was conceived they thus destroyed about 400 at this time. It was a fearful sight to see them thus frying in the fire…horrible was the stink and scent thereof, but the victory seemed a sweet sacrifice, and they gave the prayers thereof to God, who had wrought so wonderfully for them.”
Mason himself wrote: “It may be demanded…Should not Christians have more mercy and compassion? But…sometimes the Scripture declareth women and children must perish with their parents…. We had sufficient light from the word of God for our proceedings.”
Three hundred and fifty years later the Puritan phrase “a shining city on the hill” became a favorite quote of conservative speechwriters.
Discovering the Profits of Slavery
This so-called “Pequot war” was a one-sided murder and slaving expedition. Over 180 captives were taken. After consulting the bible again, in Leviticus 24:44, the colonial authorities found justification to kill most of the Pequot men and enslave the captured women and their children. Only 500 Pequot remained alive and free. In 1975 the official number of Pequot living in Connecticut was 21.
Some of the war captives were given to the Narragansett and Massachusetts allies of the British. Even before the arrival of Europeans, Native peoples of North America had widely practiced taking war captives from other tribes as hostages and slaves.
The remaining captives were sold to British plantation colonies in the West Indies to be worked to death in a new form of slavery that served the emerging capitalist world market. And with that, the merchants of Boston made a historic discovery: the profits they made from the sale of human beings virtually paid for the cost of seizing them.
One account says that enslaving Indians quickly became a “mania with speculators.” These early merchant capitalists of Massachusetts started to make genocide pay for itself. The slave trade, first in captured Indians and soon in kidnapped Africans, quickly became a backbone of New England merchant capitalism.
Thanksgiving in the Manhattan Colony
In 1641 the Dutch governor Kieft of Manhattan offered the first “scalp bounty”–his government paid money for the scalp of each Indian brought to them. A couple years later, Kieft ordered the massacre of the Wappingers, a friendly tribe. Eighty were killed and their severed heads were kicked like soccer balls down the streets of Manhattan. One captive was castrated, skinned alive and forced to eat his own flesh while the Dutch governor watched and laughed. Then Kieft hired the notorious Underhill who had commanded in the Pequot war to carry out a similar massacre near Stamford, Connecticut. The village was set fire, and 500 Indian residents were put to the sword.
A day of thanksgiving was proclaimed in the churches of Manhattan. As we will see, the European colonists declared Thanksgiving Days to celebrate mass murder more often than they did for harvest and friendship.
The Conquest of New England
By the 1670s there were about 30,000 to 40,000 white inhabitants in the United New England Colonies–6,000 to 8,000 able to bear arms. With the Pequot destroyed, the Massachusetts and Plymouth colonists turned on the Wampanoag, the tribe that had saved them in 1620 and probably joined them for the original Thanksgiving Day.
In 1675 a Christian Wampanoag was killed while spying for the Puritans. The Plymouth authorities arrested and executed three Wampanoag without consulting the tribal chief, King Philip.
As Mao Zedong says: “Where there is oppression there is resistance.” The Wampanoag went to war.
The Indians applied some military lessons they had learned: they waged a guerrilla war which overran isolated European settlements and were often able to inflict casualties on the Puritan soldiers. The colonists again attacked and massacred the main Indian populations.
When this war ended, 600 European men, one-eleventh of the adult men of the New England Colonies, had been killed in battle. Hundreds of homes and 13 settlements had been wiped out. But the colonists won.
In their victory, the settlers launched an all-out genocide against the remaining Native people. The Massachusetts government offered 20 shillings bounty for every Indian scalp, and 40 shillings for every prisoner who could be sold into slavery. Soldiers were allowed to enslave any Indian woman or child under 14 they could capture. The “Praying Indians” who had converted to Christianity and fought on the side of the European troops were accused of shooting into the treetops during battles with “hostiles.” They were enslaved or killed. Other “peaceful” Indians of Dartmouth and Dover were invited to negotiate or seek refuge at trading posts–and were sold onto slave ships.
It is not known how many Indians were sold into slavery, but in this campaign, 500 enslaved Indians were shipped from Plymouth alone. Of the 12,000 Indians in the surrounding tribes, probably about half died from battle, massacre and starvation.
After King Philip’s War, there were almost no Indians left free in the northern British colonies. A colonist wrote from Manhattan’s New York colony: “There is now but few Indians upon the island and those few no ways hurtful. It is to be admired how strangely they have decreased by the hand of God, since the English first settled in these parts.”
In Massachusetts, the colonists declared a “day of public thanksgiving” in 1676, saying, “there now scarce remains a name or family of them [the Indians] but are either slain, captivated or fled.”
Fifty-five years after the original Thanksgiving Day, the Puritans had destroyed the generous Wampanoag and all other neighboring tribes. The Wampanoag chief King Philip was beheaded. His head was stuck on a pole in Plymouth, where the skull still hung on display 24 years later.
The descendants of these Native peoples are found wherever the Puritan merchant capitalists found markets for slaves: the West Indies, the Azures, Algiers, Spain and England. The grandson of Massasoit, the Pilgrim’s original protector, was sold into slavery in Bermuda.
Runaways and Rebels
But even the destruction of Indian tribal life and the enslavement of survivors brought no peace. Indians continued to resist in every available way. Their oppressors lived in terror of a revolt. And they searched for ways to end the resistance. The historian MacLeod writes: “The first `reservations’ were designed for the `wild’ Irish of Ulster in 1609. And the first Indian reservation agent in America, Gookin of Massachusetts, like many other American immigrants had seen service in Ireland under Cromwell.”
The enslaved Indians refused to work and ran away. The Massachusetts government tried to control runaways by marking enslaved Indians: brands were burnt into their skin, and symbols were tattooed into their foreheads and cheeks.
A Massachusetts law of 1695 gave colonists permission to kill Indians at will, declaring it was “lawful for any person, whether English or Indian, that shall find any Indians traveling or skulking in any of the towns or roads (within specified limits), to command them under their guard and examination, or to kill them as they may or can.”
The northern colonists enacted more and more laws for controlling the people. A law in Albany forbade any African or Indian slave from driving a cart within the city. Curfews were set up; Africans and Indians were forbidden to have evening get-togethers. On Block Island, Indians were given 10 lashes for being out after nine o’clock. In 1692 Massachusetts made it a serious crime for any white person to marry an African, an Indian or a mulatto. In 1706 they tried to stop the importation of Indian slaves from other colonies, fearing a slave revolt.
Celebrate?
Looking at this history raises a question: Why should anyone celebrate the survival of the earliest Puritans with a Thanksgiving Day? Certainly the Native peoples of those times had no reason to celebrate.
The ruling powers of the United States organized people to celebrate Thanksgiving Day because it is in their interest. That’s why they created it. The first national celebration of Thanksgiving was called for by George Washington. And the celebration was made a regular legal holiday later by Abraham Lincoln during the civil war (right as he sent troops to suppress the Sioux of Minnesota).
Washington and Lincoln were two presidents deeply involved in trying to forge a unified bourgeois nation-state out of the European settlers in the United States. And the Thanksgiving story was a useful myth in their efforts at U.S. nation-building. It celebrates the “bounty of the American way of life,” while covering up the brutal nature of this society.
***
Available online at kasamaproject.org. Send comments to: m1keely (at) yahoo.com
Published: December 2007. Feel free to reprint, distribute or quote this with attribution.
I Am Thankful for Cheech & Chong
Wednesday, November 26, 2008
For some reason it doesn't feel like tomorrow is thanksgiving. I don't know why it doesn't feel like it, it probably has to do with the fact that Utah has had some odd weather and it has been a bit warmer than it should be this time of year. Either way, I know I will be stuffing my face with food and hanging out with people that I truly love and care about. I know I have alot to be thankful for this year and hopefully all of you have things you are thankful for as well! It has been a rough year on all of us.
I found this video on TMZ. They asked Tommy Chong what he is thankful for this thanksgiving. Check it out
Also, speaking of Tommy Chong, don't forget that the Cheech & Chong Roast is this Sunday on TBS. I know it is at 8pm here in Utah, as my DVR is all set up and ready to go.
I wanted to post this video the other day but I just didn't get to it. This was taped right after the Roast in Las Vegas the other night. The Comics Comic talk to Cheech & Chong about reuniting after all these years apart.
I found this video on TMZ. They asked Tommy Chong what he is thankful for this thanksgiving. Check it out
Also, speaking of Tommy Chong, don't forget that the Cheech & Chong Roast is this Sunday on TBS. I know it is at 8pm here in Utah, as my DVR is all set up and ready to go.
I wanted to post this video the other day but I just didn't get to it. This was taped right after the Roast in Las Vegas the other night. The Comics Comic talk to Cheech & Chong about reuniting after all these years apart.
The Cartoons on the TV are Making Me a SINNER!!!
Monday, November 24, 2008
Have any of you seen the website Christians Against Cartoons? At first glance you would probably think it is a "joke" website, possibly to get a few chuckles out of you and your friends. Upon closer inspection and further reading it, I have come to the personal conclusion that it is not a joke at all. I know first hand there are people that truly believe this way.
This site hasn't been updated from the looks of it since December 4th, 2007 but it is still very unbelievable that someone could even think this way! Check it out.... it is saying the Bee Movie promotes BEASTIALITY!? What the hell? And the Dora the Explorer: Dance to the Rescue DVD promotes Paganism and Satanism? You have to read the whole site, im serious, if you think those two examples of the insanity of the site is a bit much just read the whole damn site.
Why do these people try to ruin anything of any fun? Are the fanatical Christians that miserable with their own life that they need to try to ruin everyone elses in the process? It is like they try to make shit up about something a little fun and entertaining or even a little bit positive, put this fucked up twist on it and say it is of the devil.
I guess I just couldn't imagine living such a life as this. Locked up in a little box, so afraid of the world that I would make up shit about little kids cartoons and even stoop to a new level by calling Clifford the Big Red Dog a Graven Image. Amazing.
Question EVERYTHING. It Won't Make You a Bad Person if You Do.
Saturday, November 22, 2008
I don't know if any of you had a chance to read the news article about how a New York man is linking the suicide of his 22-year-old son to the book The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins after a college professor challenged his son to read it.If you haven't had a chance to read about this than go here to read it.
First, I want to say that I am truly sorry and send out my condolences to this family having to deal with this tragedy happening. Death is a hard thing to deal with, and dealing with a suicide, I could only imagine how difficult this must be for them right now. I am truly sorry for their loss.
After reading this article it put alot of things in perspective about my life and the direction that I was going with it. I could have easily been this kid. Very easily.
For those of you that don't know, I am an atheist. I grew up in a very VERY religious household. My mother was always pushing religion down my throat one way or another. I was home schooled my entire life, and of course all of my studies had to be religious based or having some sort of teaching about god in it. I wasn't allowed to watch most television or movies due to their "evil" content. My family was mormon up until I was about 15 or 16 years old, and than my mother decided that the mormon teachings were built upon false principles and wasn't "the truth" as she would tell us. So as you can see, I have had about every religious thoughts and ideas shoved down my throat.
She has been since attending probably every bible based church in Utah (and still to this day is).
My whole life growing up I wanted to so badly make my mother proud. I wanted to be the perfect son for her. I so badly wanted to call myself a christian as I thought being able to call myself this would bring me true happiness. I truly wanted to believe that there was a god. I went to loads upon loads of different bible churches with my mother and always struggled inside with what these people were saying. I saw these people that claimed to be "christian" and "good people" but yet they were so full of hate that I couldn't' believe it. They always seemed so quick to judge and see the bad in someone, instead of trying to see the good in someone. They were so quick in saying someone would go to hell because of this sin or that sin they are committing. It just never sat right with me, it was always this huge internal battle inside of me. It just never made sense. I was struggling so badly wanting to "find god" as the christian faith would tell me and "let him into my heart".
I just wanted to be happy. I was sick of being sad and thinking that because I questioned christianity I was this horrible and terrible person. I think that is why this suicide of this 22 year old boy hits so close to home for me. He probably had a similar type household that I personally grew up in where you can't go to your father or mother and tell them that you are questioning god's existence. You just had to believe it. You didn't ask questions. When you do finally start questioning you feel like you are stuck and alone because you feel like you can't tell your family what you are going through or they will disown you. That is how I felt at least and maybe that is how this boy felt. It appears to me that there is a much bigger problem here. I am assuming his father wasn't the most approachable person, especially by the way he has reacted to the situation by being so quick to blame something upon a book.
Still to this day I haven't told my mother about me being an atheist. It is a hard situation and I am trying to figure out the best way to talk to her about it. Luckily I am almost 31 years old and I realize that there is more to live for than if I believe the ways of a christian.
I know it isn't this easy for alot of people. Figuring out what you believe and who you are, this isn't easy. Especially for someone in their early twenties, it is hard as hell, I know as I was once there.
My one request to parents is to listen to your children and let them question EVERYTHING.... even god.
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Guitar Hero on a Bike
Wednesday, November 19, 2008
This has to be one of the most bad ass things I have seen probably EVER in my life. We have all probably played Guitar Hero or have watched someone play it, but have you seen Guitar Hero on a bike?? Seriously watch the video, you will thank me later. This deserves so much more credit than it is probably getting.
Be Glad You Don't Live in Wayne County
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
I found this video to be a little heartbreaking and saddening at the same time. 137 pages of foreclosures in the Detroit Free Press for Wayne County Michigan. Amazing. As with every other person out there right now.... if you have a job, be grateful..... if you have a roof over your head, consider yourself king.
Cheech & Chong: Roasted
Monday, November 17, 2008
IToday has been long. I don't feel top notch as my shoulder has the worst pinched nerve in the world and is making me want to vomit. When I read about how Cheech & Chong are going to be roasted on November 21st at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas by some close friends and fellow comedians, well this brought a smile to my face and for a few seconds made me forget about the excruciating pain in my left shoulder.
The roast will than air on TBS on Sunday, November 30th at 10pm.
The lineup is as follows-
The Host is Brad Garett
Roasters are Tom Arnold, Geraldo Rivera, Penn & Teller, Wilmer Valderrama, Greg Giraldo, Rev. Al Sharpton, and Shelby Chong.
With appearances by Steve Carell and Andy Dick.
This will be good, forget that, it will be fucking amazing.
If you want to buy some tickets and take me with you to see the roast in Vegas than here is a link for that. Come on, my birthday is in a few weeks!
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Boycotting Utah Will Not Fix the Problem
Sunday, November 16, 2008
This past Tuesday I made a post about how we shouldn't just be targeting the Mormon Church regarding this whole Proposition 8 passing in California. So, with this in mind you have to understand my anger with reading a post on PerezHilton.com talking about boycotting the Sundance Film Festival because it happens to take place in the state of Utah. What the hell? Actually as im sure you are already aware there are quite a few blogs talking about a boycott of the Sundance Film Festival or boycotting Utah in general.Wake up people.
Just because a few Mormons live in Utah doesn't mean that the whole state is Mormon. You would be surprised on how small the percentage of Utah is actually Mormon. Wake the fuck up. I live in Utah, I am not Mormon, and I am a gay rights activist... so why should I suffer because there are Mormons here that did donate money. Where is the logic in that? I am totally in support with boycotting certain businesses and individuals, but to boycott a whole state? This makes no sense. Especially right now while the economy is as bad as it is, why make the whole state suffer? There are thousands of us here in Utah that oppose this Prop 8 passing, hell we are protesting in the streets right along with you. Do you not realize that by boycotting Utah would only hurt us as well?
Here is a list (or the dishonor roll as they are calling it) of PEOPLE that we SHOULD BE boycotting. The funny thing about this list is I see alot of California people that donated to "Yes on 8", so why aren't we boycotting the state of California? Wake up and lets realize who the real enemy is.
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The Weekly Address Debut on YouTube
Here is President-elect Obama's first debut YouTube video for the weekly address. Of course they will also be posting these on the change.gov website, as well as radio.
I am just happy that I will be looking forward to each weeks video instead of cringing at every thought of it. I don't know about you but I did that every time I was expected to listen to monkey man GW speak. I think I would rather have done repetitive paper cuts on the underside of each fingernail than listen to that jerk offs voice even utter two words.
I am just happy that I will be looking forward to each weeks video instead of cringing at every thought of it. I don't know about you but I did that every time I was expected to listen to monkey man GW speak. I think I would rather have done repetitive paper cuts on the underside of each fingernail than listen to that jerk offs voice even utter two words.
No Communion for Obama Supporters
Thursday, November 13, 2008
Is this shit for real? Is it me or is this really fucked up?
COLUMBIA, S.C. – A South Carolina Roman Catholic priest has told his parishioners that they should refrain from receiving Holy Communion if they voted for Barack Obama because the Democratic president-elect supports abortion, and supporting him "constitutes material cooperation with intrinsic evil."
The Rev. Jay Scott Newman said in a letter distributed Sunday to parishioners at St. Mary's Catholic Church in Greenville that they are putting their souls at risk if they take Holy Communion before doing penance for their vote.
read the whole article here
COLUMBIA, S.C. – A South Carolina Roman Catholic priest has told his parishioners that they should refrain from receiving Holy Communion if they voted for Barack Obama because the Democratic president-elect supports abortion, and supporting him "constitutes material cooperation with intrinsic evil."
The Rev. Jay Scott Newman said in a letter distributed Sunday to parishioners at St. Mary's Catholic Church in Greenville that they are putting their souls at risk if they take Holy Communion before doing penance for their vote.
read the whole article here
At Least I Can Buy Chicken Feet
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
Since I have moved to West Valley from Sugarhouse there has been alot of things I have had to get used to. One of those things that I still haven't gotten used to are the store circulars that come in the mail showing that weeks grocery sales. Of course I am used to the ones from Smiths or Harmons, but some of them.... they just are a bit out there, even to me. One in particular that came this week is from a store that goes by the name TENOCHTITLAN. I have never even heard of this store until I received this circular in the mailbox.
At first glance the store seemed just like any other. Just your regular sales on regular things like beef, yams, and apples. Than I look at it a few more seconds and I notice the picture of a man carrying a women up in the left hand corner. It appears to possibly be a Spanish warrior of some sort with a fancy headdress, but honestly I am starting to wonder if it might be a Mormon Lamanite. I still am curious what this has to do with groceries?
There is quite the selection of items for sale, but what caught my eyes were the Chicken Feet as it is on sale for only $1.39/1b. You all know how I go through Chicken Feet, like it is going out of style. Oh, they also have Pork Skins in Vinegar for only $3.99! What a steal!
Oh look at how yummy those Gala Apples look!
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At first glance the store seemed just like any other. Just your regular sales on regular things like beef, yams, and apples. Than I look at it a few more seconds and I notice the picture of a man carrying a women up in the left hand corner. It appears to possibly be a Spanish warrior of some sort with a fancy headdress, but honestly I am starting to wonder if it might be a Mormon Lamanite. I still am curious what this has to do with groceries?
There is quite the selection of items for sale, but what caught my eyes were the Chicken Feet as it is on sale for only $1.39/1b. You all know how I go through Chicken Feet, like it is going out of style. Oh, they also have Pork Skins in Vinegar for only $3.99! What a steal!
Oh look at how yummy those Gala Apples look!
Lets Not Just Target the Mormons
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
A lot of people are asking "why are we just targeting the Mormon church regarding this whole Prop 8 passing in California?" It probably has the fact to do with the large amounts of money that DID come from the church and also the fact that Bishops would talk about it in sacrament meetings "Honor the Prophet and vote yes on Prop 8". What the hell? What place does this have in church?
This is why I say we need to look a bit deeper into this and realize that it wasn't just the Mormon church that had involvement with this. Here is a link of churches that did take part in endorsing Prop 8. I guess this list was published on the "Yes on 8" website, but it has since been removed. Lets stand up against ALL churches that support hate and breed bigots, NOT just the Mormons.
I want you to now take a few minutes and watch this video. Keith Olbermann disagrees with the passing of Proposition 8 in California. Everything he says, I couldn't have said it all better myself.
What are your thoughts after watching this?
This is why I say we need to look a bit deeper into this and realize that it wasn't just the Mormon church that had involvement with this. Here is a link of churches that did take part in endorsing Prop 8. I guess this list was published on the "Yes on 8" website, but it has since been removed. Lets stand up against ALL churches that support hate and breed bigots, NOT just the Mormons.
I want you to now take a few minutes and watch this video. Keith Olbermann disagrees with the passing of Proposition 8 in California. Everything he says, I couldn't have said it all better myself.
What are your thoughts after watching this?
In-N-Out? No, that is Chadders
Last night as I was leaving work a co-worker of mine started telling a few of us about Chadders and how they are pretty much exactly like the ever so famous In-N-Out Burger. He was telling us how similar they were that even In-N-Out went as far as to try to sue them! Since a few of us that I work with are from southern California we of course hold a special place in our hearts for In-N-Out and instantly became eager to try this place out.
I would see this place everyday on my drive to work as they recently opened a location right on 5600 West here in West Valley. I just never knew what it was all about or even what type of food eatery it was.
I had today off from work so I figured it would be the perfect chance to try it out.
Suzanne and myself went hit it up for lunch today and honestly I was blown away on how similar to In-N-Out it was. Now Remember, it has been a few years since I have sunk my teeth into a Double Double, so unless I had an In-N-Out burger and a Chadders burger side by side I probably wouldn't be able to tell the difference. The menu is VERY similar to In-N-Out's with just a slight tweak in the name changes. I was a bit disappointed in the quality of the Fries though as they say they are "fresh cut" or whatever, but they were soggy as hell and a bit to salty. Maybe I need to give the fries another chance.
Overall it was a great experience and honestly I could see why In N Out would try to go after them and try to sue them. I would for sure eat there again, no doubt about that. But for now if I want amazing fries I will stick with Abs Drive In.
If you are the least bit curious than I say check them out. Right now there are only two locations here in Utah.
American Fork, Utah
599 West Pacific Drive
84003
West Valley, Utah - Now Open!
2843 South 5600 West
84120
SOOO My President!
I think over the course of the last 8 years we than you or one of your friends owned one of the famous "Not My President" T-shirts proudly showing off your love for the worst presidents ever.
So you have to understand how I had a bit of excitement when I stumbled across this shirt displaying Obama and the shirt saying "Sooo My President". So awesome. I need to put this on my "must buy" list.
So you have to understand how I had a bit of excitement when I stumbled across this shirt displaying Obama and the shirt saying "Sooo My President". So awesome. I need to put this on my "must buy" list.
Strip the Mormon Church of their Tax Exempt Status
Monday, November 10, 2008
Yesterday I spoke breifly about the Mormon churches involvement with Prop 8. Since the largest contributor to the yes on 8 side was the Mormon church I am going to talk about how we as people need to join together to strip the LDS church on its tax exempt status. If you would like to join the cause than follow along with the instructions listed here. Download this form and then print, fill out, and mail the form.
http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/f3949a.pdf
List the taxpayer as:
Thomas S. Monson, et al
50 East North Temple
Salt Lake City, Utah 84150
List his occupation as President and the business as The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.
Check the boxes for False Exemption and Public/Political Corruption.
Then in the Comments section demand that the LDS Church be fined and their tax-exempt status revoked for repeated and blatant violations of the IRS’s separate of church and state rules, and for conspiring to interfere with a state’s political process.
Check Yes under “Are books/records available?” and write in “campaign finance records.”
You don’t have to provide any of your own personal info. Mail the form and the printed articles to:
Internal Revenue Service
Fresno, CA 93888
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Liberty and Justice for ALL?
Sunday, November 9, 2008
Here is video footage from this past Friday nights protest outside of the Mormon church offices in downtown Salt Lake City. I guess there was about 3,000 or so people that came out for the protest for the involvement that the Mormon church had to do with Proposition 8 passing in California. The Mormon church has poured $20,000,000 into California in an effort to ban same-sex marriage in that state. Think of what that money could have been used for other than telling someone that they can't legally be married to the person they love and care for regardless of sexual orientation. How about donating it to a soup kitchen, a women shelter, or helping those in need during this economic crisis? I am glad I left the Mormon church when I did, I don't think I could be part of a religion that is full of bigots and hate.
Salt Lake City No on Prop 8 Rally from Reid on Vimeo.
If you are part of Facebook than be sure to check out 50 States Against H8, March on Salt Lake City. It is a huge march/demonstration planned to take place March 21, 2009. It should really be interesting if they pull this off.
I also posted this link a few days back on my twitter account about looking up to see who the bigots were in your neighborhood and who donated to Prop 8. Here is that link again if you missed it.
Salt Lake City No on Prop 8 Rally from Reid on Vimeo.
If you are part of Facebook than be sure to check out 50 States Against H8, March on Salt Lake City. It is a huge march/demonstration planned to take place March 21, 2009. It should really be interesting if they pull this off.
I also posted this link a few days back on my twitter account about looking up to see who the bigots were in your neighborhood and who donated to Prop 8. Here is that link again if you missed it.
Palin Didn't Know Africa was a Continent
Friday, November 7, 2008
Watching this video amazes me. It amazes me that a person like John McCain would have even kept a person this ignorant as his running mate. I remember when McCain was on Letterman and Dave asked him if Palin was ready to run the country, he answered (with a straight face mind you) that he truly believed she was ready.
SNOW!
I woke up to a shit load of snow yesterday which really didn't help my drive into work. I am sure that living as close to the Salt Lake that we do than this doesn't help since we get hit with that lake effect snow. The Mazda needs better tires as I was slipping a bit more than I would have liked to have done. There is still to much snow outside, but it seems to be melting, but not quick enough. The crazy thing is that we will be back in the 50's starting on Saturday. You have to love Utah weather.
We Made History Last Night
Wednesday, November 5, 2008
I am still on cloud nine after finding out last night who will be our next President of the United States, Barack Obama. This is probably the first election that I have voted in that I was more excited than ever to cast my vote, and yes I voted for Barack Obama! Finally a President that the United States can be proud of, or better yet, that I can be proud of. January 20th can't come soon enough.
Here is a video from his speech last night, if you didn't watch it than please watch it. If you watched it already than watch it again, I know I will be watching it many more times.
I want to thank everyone that did get out and vote for Obama. Thank you for helping make this change possible.
Here is a video from his speech last night, if you didn't watch it than please watch it. If you watched it already than watch it again, I know I will be watching it many more times.
I want to thank everyone that did get out and vote for Obama. Thank you for helping make this change possible.
Family Time is Special Time
Monday, November 3, 2008
This picture was taken yesterday at our house while the Clements were having a little family get together here since they had a few of the family members visiting from out of state for the wedding this past Friday and like all family's they want to take advantage of every second they have together. This picture has all 7 Clements kids, the mom, and the Clements kid's partners. If you are playing along at home and still can't find me, look to the right and I'm rocking the striped polo shirt.
I am lucky to be part of this family for the past 6 1/2 years. I look at each person in the photo and I have some sort of memories to share about each, most are very fond memories. Each one has taught me so much and I am grateful for that. Thank you guys for letting me be part of your family!
I am lucky to be part of this family for the past 6 1/2 years. I look at each person in the photo and I have some sort of memories to share about each, most are very fond memories. Each one has taught me so much and I am grateful for that. Thank you guys for letting me be part of your family!
A Few Pictures & Video of the Wedding
Sunday, November 2, 2008
After I posted my last blog post about not having pictures or video of the wedding to show anyone I was quickly notified of pictures that had been posted on Wendy's myspace page. A bit later I was than informed that our good friend Aaron had posted a blog post with photos as well as a tiny bit of video footage of the vows & rings that he had shot. After watching the video I am thinking I really didn't do bad for officiating my first wedding. What do you think?
Helping Two People Become One
I have been waiting to post anything about the wedding this past Friday night in hopes that I would have some pictures to post along with it. Sadly I don't have any pictures of myself performing the ceremony or any of the ceremony in general. Suzanne was in the actual ceremony so she wasn't able to take any pictures. I was actually hoping that someone would have videoed it so I would have been able to post that. Nothing has popped up yet online. I want to believe that someone out there got some footage of the whole thing. As soon as and of course if I find any, I will be posting it here of course. Oh, there is this photo that was taken with the web cam by one of the computers that was stationed in the building were the wedding took place. But that photo is just a bunch of us being silly while we were consuming alcoholic beverages later on that evening.Besides all that, the wedding itself was awesome. It was the most incredible experience I have ever been part of as I was able to join Chris & Wendy together in marriage as I performed my first wedding ceremony. I got alot of good feedback from the guests and I guess the words I picked to say during the ceremony were perfect. It was truly an honor to be able to unite those two in marriage. The fact that I have been able to see the two of them grow together and grow in individually throughout the last few years I think only made the fact that I was the wedding officiant that much more awesome and special for me to do.
I wish the two of them the best in the journey they have started together. I also again want to publicly thank them for letting me officiate the wedding for them and hopefully making it a bit more special.
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