Facebook Twitter Email
In The Hoop
APRIL 20, 2001

Welcome to In The Hoop, Indianz.Com's occasional column about assorted Indian issues.

Tim Martin
Was Tim Martin, executive director of United South and Eastern Tribes and a widely admired candidate to run the Bureau of Indian Affairs, shafted?

Kevin Gover thinks so.

"Tim was the victim of a dirty trick," the former Assistant Secretary told Indianz.Com this week. "I'm sure that he had no idea that Donald Trump supported him."

Gover, of course, was referring to an April 6 Washington Post column which reported Mr. "They Don't Look Like Indians To Me" Trump as having written a letter to Secretary of Interior Gale Norton in support of Martin.

Auspiciously, early April was about the time, other Beltway sources added, when Martin's name dropped out of the ever-churning rumor mill about the identity of Gover's successor.

Gover attributed the column to "anti-gaming interests" who are trying to "intimidate" the new administration into shying away from the kinds of pro-tribal decisions he made during his tenure.

The kinds for which he is now now being criticized in the press. And by certain folks in Connecticut whom Senator Ben Nighthorse Campbell on Native America Calling said were angry that Indians are making money.

Tricks aside, Gover wasn't the only one who felt Martin didn't receive a fair shake. A number of tribal leaders, including Ron Allen, Chairman of the Jamestown S'Klallam Tribe of Washington and a vice-president of the National Congress of American Indians, told Indianz.Com that President Bush picked Neal McCaleb over someone who has far more experience related to the position for which he has been tapped.

In The Hoop isn't surprised. The complaint was common about Bush's other appointees.

Blast from the Past
Speaking of complaints, In The Hoop is having a contest today! The first astute reader who emails In The Hoop and correctly identifies the writer of this 1997 gem gets a free Indianz.Com t-shirt.

(Yes, the t-shirts which are the envy of Department of Interior employees and which were eagerly snapped up at last year's Indian Market.)

Here goes:

Two of the candidates suggested for the useless and thankless job of assistant secretary of Indian affairs are attorneys Kevin Gover and Dick Trudell.

Do we really need a lawyer to fill [Ada Deer's] shoes? Seems to me there are too many lawyers hanging around Washington already.

If President Clinton really wanted to put some teeth into the job of assistant secretary he would appoint a Wendell Chino or a Roger Jourdain.

So get to it, sleuths. (Hint: It wasn't a writer for The Boston Globe. It was a Native journalist.)

Native Radio
In the Hoop was going to give a shout out to Michael Kicking Bear, the host of Native Opinion, the most intriguing Indian radio program on the Internet today.

But we went to his site yesterday and his radio programs were gone! Where did Native Opinion go? In The Hoop misses the rustling of newspapers for which the program was so famous.

In Your Hoop
Got a tip? Have some insight? You might be published here. Email In the Hoop.