Hot dog! The Federalis have granted official 'recognition' to the Wampanoag tribe here in Massachusetts. If you read your newcomer's manual closely upon arrival on these golden shores of America, you might remember they were the welcome wagon for the British Pilgrims that came in 1620.They populate Cape Cod, with a large settlement in Mashpee, MA; and all the Islands of Massachusetts (Martha's Vineyard, Nantucket and the Elizabeth Islands). They were also sea-going Native Americans, who probably met the Vikings when they showed up here in Newport. I do realize there is some debate on this subject, but there are two 'runestones' located in this area that I have seen with friendly Danes, and they agree it looks like Viking runes to them, though they did mention it looked like the Vikings were pretty hammered at the time. So were they, come to think of it!
BTW, the thing that really is great about this Wampanoags recognition is that they then get to fleece white people with games of chance. And this will go double for my buddy Tracy, a member of the Nation, and one hell of a card player.
We used to joke about it years ago; how he would open up a 5-Card Stud table in a cheezy fake tee-pee in his front yard (Wampanoags built their own version of the Wigwam, which they called a wetu.). Most of the time, we enjoyed torturing my old business partner, who could never figure out if Tracy was black or ... what? Tracy would never confirm or deny any potential racial background with him. Once, he even told him he was related to Ghandi.
It would seem that our newly minted Governor Deval Patrick has a commission 'studying' whether the Wampanoags should get a casino or not. I'm not exactly sure he has any say in that, since they have relatively extensive tribal lands on Martha's Vineyard (Gayhead). I think they could go ahead an build it, then set up a defensive perimeter, since the tribal lands are surrounded by water on three sides, and you have to go through a narrow pass, uphill, to get to them. Time to play a little "Yankees and Indians", right Tracy?
4 comments:
crushed, I am. simply crushed that you didn't let me know where you had gone. I clicked each day faithfully to check for bwana updates, only to get the "doesn't exist" message. thank heavens LX decided to put his links back up or I might have lost you forever.
sniff sniff sniff,
femme
I say more power to them. Any place where you can buy fireworks, discount smokes and gamble away your children's inheritance is ok by me!
A thousand apee-poly-ologies, Madomoiselle De La Sud... Blogger done et my blog. I decided to rebirth it wiht this here site. Thanks for clicking!
Sly and the family boots; interestingly, Madame Bwana was NOT pleased with the prospect of MORE gambling en masse in Mass. I have no problem with it, since the odds are much worse with legal gambling, which means more doe-rae-mee for arts councils, kids, schools, etc.
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