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A quick synopsis. British actor / present / wit is staring in a show at the moment that involves him driving around the US in a London Black Cab.

So I was watching last nights epsiode and he was in the Badlands, where he met and had a chat with a Native American elder. Part of the conversation was about his fears for his tribes culture as he felt that their language was dying out, which therefore meant that the tribe would ultimately die out once they lost their sense of being. Stephan was then seen visiting a local school where he found that the kids were actually learning the language, they were taking pride in it and also it was cool to talk and not be understood by others . There was also tradtional songs being sung at break times in the corriders, which to my mind was awesome.

Just out of interest could somebody explain to me why you never hear media commentators say that are after 'the native American vote'? You hear about candidates wooing the Jewish vote, the Black vote, the Hispanic vote, the Irish vote, but nothing about the vote of the people whose should really matter, the native Amerrican vote. It's odd that the US will spend millions supporting Israel's right to exsist, but does nothing about the rights of native Americans. Give the time line in the bible, the Jewish people have been around for 3-4000 years? Last time I looked, the native Americans have been around for 50,000+ years.

Simple and very sad - the jews have lots of cash, the irish have lots of cops, the black and hispanic have lots of voters.

The indigenous peoples have none of this political clout

So what are you asking exactly?

The foundation of the United States of America, no matter its substance, was built upon the desecrated graves of the Native Americans.

You are surprised that the US government does nothing to support the rights of the remaining Natives?

Simply put, there are very few native americans per capita. They're not crucial for that reason. It's horribly mercenary, but you have put money into things that will swing the election for you.

Valhallan42nd wrote:Simply put, there are very few native americans per capita. They're not crucial for that reason. It's horribly mercenary, but you have put money into things that will swing the election for you.

It's a sad state of affairs but really true. Politicians concentrate on those that give them the biggest amount of votes. Large populations of Native Americans tend to be on reservations which tend to be in less than desirable areas. Most reservations are known for being economically depressed....having large amounts of drug/alcoholism problems....depression...casinos if they are lucky...bingo halls if they aren't. It's not a large matter of importance for politicians. Only local pols tend to worry about the Native American vote if they have constituents who are from that minority.