I just read Glen Beck's haunting thriller, Agenda 21, written with Harriet Parke. I innocently picked it up at the grocery store bookstore. I'd been hearing about the United Nations Agenda 21 for a couple of years from concerned friends.
A friend who escaped communism with his family to come live in Canada told me years ago that the communists failure politically wouldn't stop their goal at world domination and control. They would just shift their agenda to the 'environment'.
"Agenda 21 is a comprehensive plan of action to be taken globally, nationally and locally by governments of the United Nations systems, Governments and Major Groups in every area in which human impacts on the environment. "
Everything a human does impacts on the environment.
"at it's core, Agenda 21, is all about control, control over land , natural resources, and ultimately entire populations. It seeks to control the air (via regulations on carbon emissions), ground (via regulations on 'sustainable develop"), and sea (via environmental regulations). In that way Agenda 21 is a lot like a war plan".
"Unsurprisingly, the language and objectives of Agenda 21 are the culmination of every Marxist/progressive fantasy developed over the last hundred years. From education to transportation to food and water, there is literally no area of human life that Agenda 21 does not attempt to regulate and control in some way.'
Developing countries will need to receive a 'substantial flow' of resources from the developed world, i.e. America, Canada, Western Europe and Australia.
Personally I've found the ones who like monetary flow best are bankers, lawyers and bureaucrats because then they can take their 'share'. Governments are clearly, if anything, especially today about 'institutionalized baksheesh'. The key factor to know about 'foreign aid' is that historically it rarely gets to who it was intended and the majority 'f hand outs' have served to 'enslave people' in comparison to the very programs that have been developed to enfranchise and locally develop self sufficiency and autonomy.
In the Downtown eastside, my local 'third world', the one I got involved with after I worked in the "third world' of Canada's northern Indian reserves. For every Indian of the so called 'Indian problem' 2 white collar bureaucrats were receiving $100,000 or more to maintain the problem. In the downtown eastside the principle thrust of government investment now is into 'onsite' a hopeless program to maintain drug addicts in drug addiction by providing 'safe' injection sites rather than offering abstinence based therapies which are indeed what the rich and the professional are receiving.
All Marxist countries maintained Lennin's central idea of " dictatorship of the proletariat'. Communist (big c ) is dictatorship with the leaders having dachas, mistresses, wealth beyond the average man's wildest dreams and the rest lving marginally.
A friend points out that Suzuki is a "privileged" and "elite' environmentalist whose agenda would be that he maintain his power and dominance while others have their wealth and power redistributed to himself. There is nothing new in this strategy. Just different names for the same old game.
What it means is that every Canadian, American, Australian and European will have their present assists halved or reduced even more by more taxation, more restriction and more redistrict ion. Apparently this will be for the benefit of other but by history those who take people's money to redistribute it must get their 'half' or 'more' first. Little of this 'redistribution' 'dribbles' down. In Canada this was most apparent with the multi millionaire Indian leaders while the majority of Indians went without.
The key word is 'equality'. This is defined that everyone will have the same regardless of work and goes completely against 'meritocracy' and against human nature or even animal nature since only 'gangsterism' results in these kinds of system where some animals are more important than others as the great novel "Animal Farm" so richly pointed out.
Political privilege is 'bought and sold' in Marxists countries with a vigour far greater than anything we know in western democracies. I found that Marxist bureaucrats figured they could 'extort' baksheesh for all actions that they did, not just those above and beyond. The corruption in centrally controlled countries is beyond anything we can imagine. We are innocent in comparison.
Now, if you have an apartment anywhere in the west consider that it will be halved and you will be required to pay 2 or 3 x what you are already paying for Agenda 21 to even begin. If you have a car you can soon expect to have only a bicycle, 2 cars then for sure only one car. There will be no sacrifice at the top just as the Indian leaders gladly took their million dollar salaries and the drug lords and pushers and government 'harm reduction' 'enablers' in the Downtown Eastside encourage others to reduce their 'share' while they amass more and more power and 'control'. It's all about control. it's all about you having 'control' taken from you by what ever means.
One day you're a farmer with a shot gun to protect you chickens from racoons and next day you are a 'criminal minded' gun owner. One day you are a student with the belief that education is a 'right' and next day you are indebted for life with a degree that has a shelf life of less than five years. You are promised health care in Canada but the rich go to private services or utilize the second 'tier' of health care going to the states while the rest are given the 'equality' of government health care 'wait lists' dying in hospital waiting rooms before even being able to see a doctor or nurse.
Das Kapital by Karl Marx has been around for a long time but few read it because it's as offensive and 'wrong' as a literal reading of the Koran, another book that has profound impact but that people don't read. More know who the Kardasians are than who said 'make them eat cake' and why this is all important economically now. The 'lies' are immense. The emperor has no clothes.
Mein Kampf was written by Hitler in 1925 long before the ideas there expoused were acted on.
Now we have Agenda 21 and it behooves everyone to read clearly what it states and translate it's flowery language into the reality for you personally. Everyone reads these 'tracts' as if they are about someone else and the bad stuff will happen to them not us. Well I've a dog. He's a little guy and his name is Gilbert. Agenda 21 would not allow me to have a pet. It wouldn't allow me to "own' my sailboat. Indeed it would suggest that I should 'give' my sailboat to the authorities so they could use it for themselves under the auspices of helping environmentally underprivileged folk.
When I studied 'social justice' legislation I was frankly concerned because the model it followed was one of anti-individualism and rabid utilitarianism. This meant that the mediocre and mainstream would be privileged while the marginal truly would be removed as Stalin and Mao solved their problems of 'deviation'.
Environmentalists argue that we need to kill off people by the millions so that their particular 'spotted insect' will survive. I don't want to die for their ideology and I've found over the years that those who want sacrifice expect others to do it, not themselves. The United Nations bureaucrats who penned Agenda 21 were the most privileged people in their social spheres and their nations. Having a position in the United Nations is even more lucrative and powerful and important than being an aid in Ottawa or Washington. I'm not sure I want any more of these people telling me how I should be their slave and do as they say. Historically, these 'kind' of people are all about 'control' because they are so out of control themselves.
Freud said, late, very late indeed, only as he was being rescued and his friends, all less important than him, went on to die in concentration camps, "maybe the paranoids are right'.
Check out Agenda 21 and see if you like working twice as hard for twice as long for a tenth of what you receive now having all your 'stuff' redistributed to others whose only fault really was they weren't born in Canada or the United states and were brought up in corrupt countries which imprison, kill, shame or restrict anyone but a very few. America was once the country with greatest potential of upward social mobility and the greatest social mobility in general i.e. FREEDOM. It's a moot point. Gangsters in Russia and China and Columbia drug lords are looking even better than Hollywood movie moguls.
But I may be wrong. Government especially big government, and especially World Government probably is thinking out for me and wants what's best for me and will take care of me, my family, my dog, my money and my assets better than I can. That's been the history of governments since the Roman Empire, the Nazis and the Communists and everywhere until the idea of 'laissez fare' came along and people generally developed a 'healthy' concern about 'government' . Indeed they actually had a 'magna carta' to question the 'divine right' of government and today it might be wise to consider Agenda 21 as it will cost you personally. It's written in almost as nice a way as Mein Kampf.
So lets just have a group hug and trust the environmentalist Marxists, alright. Especially you boys and girls. Maybe if you smoke enough marijuana too it will all be okay.
Democracy isn't as important as 'spotted owls' ,is it?
Thursday, August 8, 2013
Custer's Last Stand
We're all part of a family today. The world and everyone in it is interconnected. Once it wasn't like that. Everyone was a tribe and each tribe fought all strangers. My enemies' enemy is my friend was the by word of tribalism. Alliances only work so long as there is a threat. The history of western and eastern civilization has been the forming of alliances to defeat threats and expand one's hegemony.
Today the principal tribes are Christian American, Aetheist Chinese, Ecumencal European, and Moslem Meccan. The rest are subsets and being incorporated as once USSR and US took over regions as colonies or serf states. There have always been secular and religious ideologies for these formations. No one is 'necessarily' right. Might is right to some. Technological and scientific struggles have resulted in advances giving one side greater advantage over another. Hence, Leonardo da Vinci's day job, was with the Arms Industry of the day, as Einstein was funded by the military industrial complex later.
A fascinating history is the study of military medicine. At Custer's last stand, civilians and medics died. Individually Custer and Sitting Bull were outliers. A fascinating recent book of that title looks at the odd ones who by their very contrariness and difference often have speckled careers. Public figures are 'in or out' depending upon their usefulness to the powers behind the powers. General Patton and General McCarthur despite their military genius were shamed and humiliated by the political and financial forces of the day. In Rome, the fear of the Emperor and Senators was that a general's success would make him popular and a threat to those who lived off the work of others. It's always been such.
So in my genetic background, Scottish and Irish, the English, attacked our "tribes" at Culloden and many times and for many years we 'beat them' at their game. Lowlanders fighting us Highlanders. But eventually with only a Culloden and no 'Custer's Last Stand' but rather a Robert Bruce and a Wallace we became 'vassal states' of the empire of the day. The highlands were 'reserves' by a different name. In Ireland they wanted the potatoes and sheep and forced us all off 'our lands' to be 'relocated' in America. Compared to the Irish and Scottish, the Indians got it pretty easy. Some of us were even forced to go to that horrid place called Australia. We'd all have been glad to stay home rather than be shipped across an ocean. Ask the blacks of Africa who were exiled by their own tribe leaders, sold to Arabians who sold their slaves to the white folk who subsequently lost the American Civil War to the northerners who preferred mechanical labour to human labour.
If the wee state of America didn't take the West, Spain, England, Russia would have. There is always a tendency to think in either/or terms with 'win/or lose, 'my way or the highway' alternatives. Reality offers more tangible solutions. The Russians like the Chinese were more brutal in their dealing with minorities than even the Romans who routinely killed everyone when there was an uprising by a few. The history of Israel under the Empires of the day isn't about even letting them have their lands. After a final act of resistance these earlier empires 'dispersed' the Jews in what is called the 'diaspora'. Modern Day Israelis are finally having a little land back with self autonomy under the protectorate of the West and it's guidance and cooperation because Meccan Moslem threat is huge.
Russian Communism killed 80 million in a few years while Chinese Communism killed 120 million in record time. The Dalai Lama is still complaining about the Chinese solution to the Tibetan 'problem'. The Chinese machine guns decimated the Buddhist monks returning fire with WWI English rifles. To date Communist countries build walls, either Iron or Bamboo, to keep people in.
Of course Sitting Bull and everyone else in those days,( even before health care and Troudeau encouraging everyone to be stoned on government marijuana cake) wanted to come to Canada. But after 5 years even Sitting Bull had enough of the bad weather and maudlin politics. The American Draft dodgers were delighted to return to the States, sometimes to prison, with only a few remaining in Canada. Even now Gay couples, finally allowed to marry in the US are returning, having only tolerated tolerable Canada so long as their own country was intolerant. Even now United States is the principle country in the world desired for relocation and immigration. America has to have walls to keep people out and despite this they have millions of illegal aliens living there. Indians don't want to leave America.
The Indians of their day wanted things to remain the same. Nobody likes change. My Scottish forefathers would have gladly continued to hunt and fish in the highlands but the dastardly English wanted to use our lands for mining, fishing and farming hundreds of years ago. The Israelis had the same problem with the Romans thousands of years ago. The Spanish were enslaving their Indians as gold mining work force with an attitude not dissimilar to the Germans in WWII who used forced labour of Jews, Poles, Ukranians, effeminate gays and anyone else who wasn't of the German tribal consciousness.
I don't want the tax man to bother me in Canada today. I'd like people to leave me alone and let me do my thing on my land. The land is always 'my' to the person sitting on it at that moment. "Ownership" of "property' has always existed and even the Potlach ceremony was a gamble to gain more property in the form of material or personal. A poor leader may have the capacity to 'command' a million strong army while living in a cottage while a 'rich' leader may have a castle but only the popularity to 'command" a thousand troops.
The Indians today and then talked about a "way of life". It was essentially 'tribal' and no different from the Israeli or Mongol or Kurdish or Scottish MacDonald or Frazer way of life. These tribal 'ways of life' were predominantly 'patriarchal' , war and competition based, pre 'nation state' and loosely allied along kinship traditions with the women predominantly involved in child making raising and sexual satisfaction of the male. The Taliban are an attractive tribal group to 50's brylcream sliced back muscle car driving sorts of guys not known for saying "i'm sorry'".
These are decidedly 'pre feminist' times though in Scotland there was a matriarchy at times with female leaders and warriors whereas in the Plains Indian traditions despite Hollywood and rewriting of history to serve ideology, the fact is women were too busy making babies and cleaning up the camps and doing all the work after the kill of the animals. Indeed pre refrigeration, pre advanced agricultural techniques, herding, farming advances, the tribes indians were primitive and unhealthy. Today life expectancy is in the 70's and 80's for many whereas Sitting Bull was considered an old man of 45 who didn't actually fight Custer because 45 was too old for more than talk. The life expectancy for the normal folk was in the 50's. Life was harsh. In the Old Testament men lived long lives but they had many wives who fought among themselves and tried to serve and be the best for their man. Men didn't do a lot of work if they survived the younger years of slaughtering and had enough children to command.
War is a young man's game fought by old men usually wanting to win yesterdays lost battles. Women leaders are as quick to kill off young men as old men are so it's the lot of young men to die. In China today girls are merely aborted.
So Custer, a good soldier is sent off to subdue the Sieux in the Black Hills because there's an economic crisis, gold has been found and the government, as is the history of Governments all over ,has reneged on it's promises. Income tax was only a war measure and was to be stopped with the war over. Taxes have grown like promises and all leaders have broken their promises. Indian leaders break their promises as well as white leaders. Today in Canada Indian Leaders are millionaires and their people are still poor just like there are White Billionaires in Canada and white people, yellow people, black people, and brown people living poorer than red people. Corporate world is a world of 'individualism', post 'family' and 'post tribe' and individuals form alliances of wealth to keep other corporate individuals in check. Nations and tribes and individuals are probably all serving the new competitors called 'corporations'.
Historically families trumped individuals, tribes trumped families, nations trumped tribes, and now corporations are trumping nations.
Naturally we think there was a better time in the past. That's called being a Luddite. Also we think theres' a better future. That's called fantasy or science fiction. Those who can go inward and that's called spirituality. The best laugh.
In any case Custer rode out to 'police' the local 'gangs' who were not following the law of the land which was broken treaties and all the stuff we all take for granted with our own Tax Department. Americans today fear the IRA more than they fear the government. Custer was probably sent by the IRA.
Soldiers succeed by following their commands. Think too much in soldiering and you become a poet. or better, a dead poet. Alive you may become a politician. But the minute you lose track of the immediate problem you aren't soldiering well. Custer wasn't interested in policy. He was interested in getting the Indians back to the reserve. They'd gone antelope hunting on mass. They probably had pony bumper stickers that said a 'day hunting is better than any day working on the reserve." Bob Dylan didn't want to work on Maggie's Farm.
Now the Cheyenne were also fought by the Crow. The Crow didn't want the Cheyene on their land so they sent scouts to help Custer get the Sieux Indians back in their reservations. The Crow wanted the antelope too. And everyone wanted the buffalo. The trouble with the buffalo was they were over hunted by Indians and white alike. Once everyone had rifles the buffalo was toast.
It was the same with the Cod off Newfoundland. The Newfies of Canada for centuries fished cod and sang Newfie songs and told jokes about Toronto and Boston folk then the Japanese came along with the Norwegians with better and bigger nets and took all the cod for their people. The Canadian government in Ottawa didn't give a dam about the Newfies and offered them jobs in the Albertan oil fields instead, relocating tens of thousands of clean fisherman to become dirty oil men.
Custer was a policeman. Acting on the advice of the informants he found the Cheyenne but what he didn't know was that there were ten to one odds.
In all war and police actions 'information' is critical. Ruling the skies allows America today to have the greatest intelligence. When I was in Europe I was fascinated by the European wars of the 15th to 20th century because no one knew who they were up against. Wars were all about 'information.' It's only this last week that a British gay man who cracked the computer code for the Enigma that allowed British to know what Germans and Japanese were saying to each other, was absolved of being a condemned pervert , for his saving the British people. Having consensual sex with another man had got this fellow who saved the Western world pilloried. In absentia he's been exonerated despite being a dirty boy like Lawrence of Arabia who may not have been gay but did like being spanked liked the greatest historian of our day "Spanker" Johnson.
Looking at the battle site of Little Big Horn today you can tell Custer would have done a whole lot better if he'd had Satellite Imaging. Even better he'd have probably won hands down if his job was just 'war' but he was trying to stop the women and children from escaping, capturing them and holding them hostage, to force the Indian warriors to accept terms and return to the reserves.
This was not Sand Creek. If Custer had been simply interested in war and killing Indians he could have easily done a 'Sand Creek" and keeping his men together charged right into the camp and slaughtered the unsuspecting Indians en mass. Instead he divided his command to create a pincer attack , to capture the fleeing non combatants as hostages, with the hope of 'surrender'. He wanted 'prisoners'. His whole aim was to minimize the death toll and get it over fast. He'd been court martial led for being too harsh and reinstated on the understanding that he'd be a 'gentle' 'beaurocratically' acceptable warrior. This is indeed what he was doing when he got whacked. If anyone deserves to have been shamed for 'failure' it was the beurocrats who told him to be a 'nice boy' because he was being 'nice' when the Indians whacked him. He'd done far bette when he'd been a simple soldier.
Not Sitting Bull. He wasn't there. Crazy Horse was and he was as mean and weird as his name. But ironically 'Lame White Man" seems to have been the principle force behind the defeat as his attack was so strategically significant. Here he was the Judas. The significance of 'betrayal" is its never done by an enemy.
The Hell's Angels are a modern day tribe and their principle problem like the east coast Mafia was the 'witness protection program' and the 'betrayal' of members. Even Peter denied Christ three times before the Cock crowed. It's a weakness of humans. You threaten to hurt my mother, my sister, my penis, my testicle, my face, my dog and I'll quite possibly tell you what you want to know. The evidence of war is that everyone 'cracks' under torture except if one truly believes that giving up the information will bring about their death and they have a reason to live. The studies of Auschwitz by Logotherapy giant are particularly informative about human behaviour. Communism lives on 'betrayal' and children are taught in school to 'betray' their parents just as the Nazi Youth Movement attempted to instill 'gossip as a virtue, like 'crimestopper' anonymous phone lines today.
So Custer was trying to be a good boy and here he was all my life skewered as 'arrogant' and 'glory seeking'. He was no more 'arrogant' than Obama or Bush or Donald Trump , Gandhi or Bob Dylan when I look at his life. He was just a guy doing a job with a really cute wife, Libbie. He was a great success in the Civil War and then he was sent off to at the territories and it's pretty clear this was like a bad posting in the foreign services. This was like getting posted to Afghanistan when you really wanted London England and had hoped to go to the opera but instead were left dodging terrorist attacks.
Libbie and Custer were kind of nice folk. There's a book I read part of in the Custer Museum by Libbie in her own words and she seems like a grand gal and Custer like the amiable guy at a barbecue.
Indeed there are also books that describe Sitting Bull as a bit whacked as a medicine man, kind of like Jerry Farwell in religious circles , not at all a Dalai Lama or Bishop Tootoo kind of guy but a real loud, heavy weight , trancing out , trouble making, bad mouthing kind of Hockey Player for the Canucks enforcer sort. Lame White Guy comes across like Castros favourite Chez. Crazy Horse is a regular horse riding Mohammed. No one comes across in this dispute like Churchill when he rode a horse into battle except maybe Reno. He's definitely Conservative in his style. Gall is really by far the most fascinating Indian.
The whole battle only lasted less than a day. It carried on over a few miles with obviously a lot of galloping and crazy making all round. The battle ended in an hour and a half with the "last stand' looking like it was a horribly grizzly affair of minutes with horses shot for barricades and the Indians with their own rifles probably a hundred to one in the last effort. The archeological evidence and the stories and reports are amazing with the recreation of the battlefield now showing , with the greatest accuracy possible due to the genius of science mostly, where the deaths occurred. All the white guys would have been wounded early and the Indians were killed at a ratio of 1 in 5 or so of the white guys because not only superior numbers but it looked like the white guys were going 'oh shit," and trying to escape. In routs there's a lot of dead from back shooting and no doubt a lot of white were shot in the face begging for their lives ,their guns emptied. It was a mess like war is supposed to be.
The battle field is one of the most remarkable and informative places I've ever visited. Frankly I prefer churches and holy grounds but the history and archeology and all the mythology around this battle make it a fascinating experience. I loved the guide books, and the guides and the first nations and white folk working together to tell a story with all it's permutations and digressions. (Custer's Last Battle, Little Bighorn Battlefied -self guided Auto Tour (or Harley Davidson Motorcycle) with Archeologist Richard Fox, Fireside Productions, Livingson was great.)
America, which now included all the Indian, Jewish, Christian, Catholic, Irish, Italian, English, Chinese etc tribes got pissed off just like the Romans did when the Jews stood up to them a couple of thousand years ago when they crucified Jesus to 'send a message'. They whopped Indian ass for the next decades, took away the Black Hills from the Lakota and gave them a few little privy land areas not fit for pig farms.
Today I pay a fortune to 'play' at having the life my grandfather had when he was 'relocated' from Scotland , to uninhabitable northern Canada where he could hunt and fish like a Lord though the work or ranching and farming was near impossible. He went on to be a huge success, a leader among men, generous, sober, high minded, careful in his ways, elected REEVE. A lawyer stole all his land and fortune and years later I'd meet the German son of my grandfather's rich relocated neighbours whose fortune was also stolen by the same lawyer who took the money and ran off to hide in the legal wasteland of America. Dad went on to serve in the Royal Canadian Air Force that saved the world from Nazism and freed the Jews and Poles from German work camps. No one to date has taken credit for freeing the homosexuals from Auschwitz. Lincolns northern army freed the blacks from slavery.
It was a banking crisis that lead to the breaking of the Treaty with the Lakota and the miners flooding the black hills. After the banking crisis the new governments felt the old governments had been too generous with the money. Today in Canada every Canadian is getting 'less health care' , 'less old age pension', and less of most things because of a banking crisis. Indeed there are those conspiracy theorist who think Elvis was behind 9/11 having secretly converted to radical islam's "Peace Train'. That consider the Lakota Indians were the 'first' 'test case'. Now our government is promoting marijuana for the masses and euthanasia to add to it's abortion policy.
I couldn't help but think that it would have been fun to ride around on horse and have a 'love in' antelope barbecue with the girls doing all the chores then fighting the police and singing and drumming about it like Woodstock in leathers.
I had just been to the Motorcycle Rally in Sturges so I'd seen a whole lot of the modern wild men and women and the tribal society with it's patches and Harley "hoss'. I was a good time listening to Kid Rock from Detroit on his Rebel Tour and enjoying ZZ sing 'Sunglasses'. All that was needed was antelope burgers . I had Angus steak instead at the Saloon.
It's all not so different. It's blurry at the edges. In the Custer Museum I bought a Union Calvary sword but the first two I looked at were 'made in China'. I thought that was priceless. There's probably an American Indian chef making chop suet at the finest Chinese restaurant in Bejing where tourists go for 'authentic' Chinese experience.
We're a global society and we have to think locally. Still I loved Buffalo Springfield's song not because of the Buffalo but because of the line, "People carrying signs, mostly say, hooray for outside."
I rode away on my motorcycle as usual wondering whose side I'm on. I'm a citizen and for law and order today so I'd have to side with Custer doing his job for the Government which supposedly I've elected but then I'm Scottish Irish Canadian with a lot of tribal roots and the Government didn't help my grand dad when the lawyer stole the family farms and fortunes. Even today I wonder about who really killed Kennedy and was Marilyn Munroe just a pretty face.
I'm riding alone on my motorcycle across thousands of miles of US soil and thinking this is the greatest nation in the world. They're definitely #1. I've travelled around the world a bit and I'm still impressed with how well they treat everyone especially those who complain. Elsewhere everyone gets shot or banned or ostracized and the amount of freedom even in Europe compared to the US is marginal. Sturges was definitely tribal but so was the spiritual medical conference I attended earlier in Colorado.
I was just sad looking at all the graves of all the young soldiers of the Indians and the United States. Glory is a good word. It's been tarnished. There's been a lot of reductionism in the last hundreds of years. Corporations are ultimately primitive and tribal. There's a sense that advances are always made with two steps forward one step back. The Indians of Alberta are rich oil men. They were put on reserves which had oil on them. They are making the decision today in the major board rooms of the world. The Indians who were fighting Custer wouldn't have known he was just doing a 'police action'. They were probably thinking like the folks at Waco. I have trouble trusting men in uniforms with weapons but that goes back to my first bad childhood experience with a dentist. There weren't any counsellors or prozac in those days and women didn't have bras to burn or tampons. Sanitation was a problem. There wasn't even work for plumbers because everyone 'gathered at the river' even before the Christian song encouraged them to do what they already were doing of necessity.
The Little Bighorn River is a very pretty river today with the shady forest along it's sides and all around hot baked grassland. I think the ponies I saw there were probably descendants of the ones that survived the battle. At least the ponies were peaceful. People who know horses know they can be gnarly.
I really liked the plaques that laid out the first skirmish and retreat by Reno. I wondered if the great gambling city was named after him. You can see the battle at the Last Stand but it's more like a brawl where as the Remo fight actually moved.
The woman in the gift shop said, "Were it not for Custer dying, we'd not have jobs here in tourism". She was a white woman. The Indian woman who took my money for the tour was native. I was thankful I had money to give them. For a few hours out of my Harley Davidson Journey to and from the Sturges Motorcycle Rally I was able to take time out and learn about another 'war to end all wars'.
I liked driving away having a sword strapped across the pack on my Harley. I would have preferred a Glock 9 mm but Americans don't like Canadians bringing arms into their country. Despite all the best efforts of the Freedom Fighters for the National Riflearms Associations they won't sell a Canadian a firearm without an American government permit. While I mostly feel like I'm following Custer or Calhoun or Remi and don't know which, some folks think I'm too much like Lame White Man. The Indian chief who reall kicked ass was Gall. You had to have Gall to do what he did.
Soldiers describe various 'thirsts' in battle. This would have been a particularly thirsty battle, regardless of the glory.
Today the principal tribes are Christian American, Aetheist Chinese, Ecumencal European, and Moslem Meccan. The rest are subsets and being incorporated as once USSR and US took over regions as colonies or serf states. There have always been secular and religious ideologies for these formations. No one is 'necessarily' right. Might is right to some. Technological and scientific struggles have resulted in advances giving one side greater advantage over another. Hence, Leonardo da Vinci's day job, was with the Arms Industry of the day, as Einstein was funded by the military industrial complex later.
A fascinating history is the study of military medicine. At Custer's last stand, civilians and medics died. Individually Custer and Sitting Bull were outliers. A fascinating recent book of that title looks at the odd ones who by their very contrariness and difference often have speckled careers. Public figures are 'in or out' depending upon their usefulness to the powers behind the powers. General Patton and General McCarthur despite their military genius were shamed and humiliated by the political and financial forces of the day. In Rome, the fear of the Emperor and Senators was that a general's success would make him popular and a threat to those who lived off the work of others. It's always been such.
So in my genetic background, Scottish and Irish, the English, attacked our "tribes" at Culloden and many times and for many years we 'beat them' at their game. Lowlanders fighting us Highlanders. But eventually with only a Culloden and no 'Custer's Last Stand' but rather a Robert Bruce and a Wallace we became 'vassal states' of the empire of the day. The highlands were 'reserves' by a different name. In Ireland they wanted the potatoes and sheep and forced us all off 'our lands' to be 'relocated' in America. Compared to the Irish and Scottish, the Indians got it pretty easy. Some of us were even forced to go to that horrid place called Australia. We'd all have been glad to stay home rather than be shipped across an ocean. Ask the blacks of Africa who were exiled by their own tribe leaders, sold to Arabians who sold their slaves to the white folk who subsequently lost the American Civil War to the northerners who preferred mechanical labour to human labour.
If the wee state of America didn't take the West, Spain, England, Russia would have. There is always a tendency to think in either/or terms with 'win/or lose, 'my way or the highway' alternatives. Reality offers more tangible solutions. The Russians like the Chinese were more brutal in their dealing with minorities than even the Romans who routinely killed everyone when there was an uprising by a few. The history of Israel under the Empires of the day isn't about even letting them have their lands. After a final act of resistance these earlier empires 'dispersed' the Jews in what is called the 'diaspora'. Modern Day Israelis are finally having a little land back with self autonomy under the protectorate of the West and it's guidance and cooperation because Meccan Moslem threat is huge.
Russian Communism killed 80 million in a few years while Chinese Communism killed 120 million in record time. The Dalai Lama is still complaining about the Chinese solution to the Tibetan 'problem'. The Chinese machine guns decimated the Buddhist monks returning fire with WWI English rifles. To date Communist countries build walls, either Iron or Bamboo, to keep people in.
Of course Sitting Bull and everyone else in those days,( even before health care and Troudeau encouraging everyone to be stoned on government marijuana cake) wanted to come to Canada. But after 5 years even Sitting Bull had enough of the bad weather and maudlin politics. The American Draft dodgers were delighted to return to the States, sometimes to prison, with only a few remaining in Canada. Even now Gay couples, finally allowed to marry in the US are returning, having only tolerated tolerable Canada so long as their own country was intolerant. Even now United States is the principle country in the world desired for relocation and immigration. America has to have walls to keep people out and despite this they have millions of illegal aliens living there. Indians don't want to leave America.
The Indians of their day wanted things to remain the same. Nobody likes change. My Scottish forefathers would have gladly continued to hunt and fish in the highlands but the dastardly English wanted to use our lands for mining, fishing and farming hundreds of years ago. The Israelis had the same problem with the Romans thousands of years ago. The Spanish were enslaving their Indians as gold mining work force with an attitude not dissimilar to the Germans in WWII who used forced labour of Jews, Poles, Ukranians, effeminate gays and anyone else who wasn't of the German tribal consciousness.
I don't want the tax man to bother me in Canada today. I'd like people to leave me alone and let me do my thing on my land. The land is always 'my' to the person sitting on it at that moment. "Ownership" of "property' has always existed and even the Potlach ceremony was a gamble to gain more property in the form of material or personal. A poor leader may have the capacity to 'command' a million strong army while living in a cottage while a 'rich' leader may have a castle but only the popularity to 'command" a thousand troops.
The Indians today and then talked about a "way of life". It was essentially 'tribal' and no different from the Israeli or Mongol or Kurdish or Scottish MacDonald or Frazer way of life. These tribal 'ways of life' were predominantly 'patriarchal' , war and competition based, pre 'nation state' and loosely allied along kinship traditions with the women predominantly involved in child making raising and sexual satisfaction of the male. The Taliban are an attractive tribal group to 50's brylcream sliced back muscle car driving sorts of guys not known for saying "i'm sorry'".
These are decidedly 'pre feminist' times though in Scotland there was a matriarchy at times with female leaders and warriors whereas in the Plains Indian traditions despite Hollywood and rewriting of history to serve ideology, the fact is women were too busy making babies and cleaning up the camps and doing all the work after the kill of the animals. Indeed pre refrigeration, pre advanced agricultural techniques, herding, farming advances, the tribes indians were primitive and unhealthy. Today life expectancy is in the 70's and 80's for many whereas Sitting Bull was considered an old man of 45 who didn't actually fight Custer because 45 was too old for more than talk. The life expectancy for the normal folk was in the 50's. Life was harsh. In the Old Testament men lived long lives but they had many wives who fought among themselves and tried to serve and be the best for their man. Men didn't do a lot of work if they survived the younger years of slaughtering and had enough children to command.
War is a young man's game fought by old men usually wanting to win yesterdays lost battles. Women leaders are as quick to kill off young men as old men are so it's the lot of young men to die. In China today girls are merely aborted.
So Custer, a good soldier is sent off to subdue the Sieux in the Black Hills because there's an economic crisis, gold has been found and the government, as is the history of Governments all over ,has reneged on it's promises. Income tax was only a war measure and was to be stopped with the war over. Taxes have grown like promises and all leaders have broken their promises. Indian leaders break their promises as well as white leaders. Today in Canada Indian Leaders are millionaires and their people are still poor just like there are White Billionaires in Canada and white people, yellow people, black people, and brown people living poorer than red people. Corporate world is a world of 'individualism', post 'family' and 'post tribe' and individuals form alliances of wealth to keep other corporate individuals in check. Nations and tribes and individuals are probably all serving the new competitors called 'corporations'.
Historically families trumped individuals, tribes trumped families, nations trumped tribes, and now corporations are trumping nations.
Naturally we think there was a better time in the past. That's called being a Luddite. Also we think theres' a better future. That's called fantasy or science fiction. Those who can go inward and that's called spirituality. The best laugh.
In any case Custer rode out to 'police' the local 'gangs' who were not following the law of the land which was broken treaties and all the stuff we all take for granted with our own Tax Department. Americans today fear the IRA more than they fear the government. Custer was probably sent by the IRA.
Soldiers succeed by following their commands. Think too much in soldiering and you become a poet. or better, a dead poet. Alive you may become a politician. But the minute you lose track of the immediate problem you aren't soldiering well. Custer wasn't interested in policy. He was interested in getting the Indians back to the reserve. They'd gone antelope hunting on mass. They probably had pony bumper stickers that said a 'day hunting is better than any day working on the reserve." Bob Dylan didn't want to work on Maggie's Farm.
Now the Cheyenne were also fought by the Crow. The Crow didn't want the Cheyene on their land so they sent scouts to help Custer get the Sieux Indians back in their reservations. The Crow wanted the antelope too. And everyone wanted the buffalo. The trouble with the buffalo was they were over hunted by Indians and white alike. Once everyone had rifles the buffalo was toast.
It was the same with the Cod off Newfoundland. The Newfies of Canada for centuries fished cod and sang Newfie songs and told jokes about Toronto and Boston folk then the Japanese came along with the Norwegians with better and bigger nets and took all the cod for their people. The Canadian government in Ottawa didn't give a dam about the Newfies and offered them jobs in the Albertan oil fields instead, relocating tens of thousands of clean fisherman to become dirty oil men.
Custer was a policeman. Acting on the advice of the informants he found the Cheyenne but what he didn't know was that there were ten to one odds.
In all war and police actions 'information' is critical. Ruling the skies allows America today to have the greatest intelligence. When I was in Europe I was fascinated by the European wars of the 15th to 20th century because no one knew who they were up against. Wars were all about 'information.' It's only this last week that a British gay man who cracked the computer code for the Enigma that allowed British to know what Germans and Japanese were saying to each other, was absolved of being a condemned pervert , for his saving the British people. Having consensual sex with another man had got this fellow who saved the Western world pilloried. In absentia he's been exonerated despite being a dirty boy like Lawrence of Arabia who may not have been gay but did like being spanked liked the greatest historian of our day "Spanker" Johnson.
Looking at the battle site of Little Big Horn today you can tell Custer would have done a whole lot better if he'd had Satellite Imaging. Even better he'd have probably won hands down if his job was just 'war' but he was trying to stop the women and children from escaping, capturing them and holding them hostage, to force the Indian warriors to accept terms and return to the reserves.
This was not Sand Creek. If Custer had been simply interested in war and killing Indians he could have easily done a 'Sand Creek" and keeping his men together charged right into the camp and slaughtered the unsuspecting Indians en mass. Instead he divided his command to create a pincer attack , to capture the fleeing non combatants as hostages, with the hope of 'surrender'. He wanted 'prisoners'. His whole aim was to minimize the death toll and get it over fast. He'd been court martial led for being too harsh and reinstated on the understanding that he'd be a 'gentle' 'beaurocratically' acceptable warrior. This is indeed what he was doing when he got whacked. If anyone deserves to have been shamed for 'failure' it was the beurocrats who told him to be a 'nice boy' because he was being 'nice' when the Indians whacked him. He'd done far bette when he'd been a simple soldier.
Not Sitting Bull. He wasn't there. Crazy Horse was and he was as mean and weird as his name. But ironically 'Lame White Man" seems to have been the principle force behind the defeat as his attack was so strategically significant. Here he was the Judas. The significance of 'betrayal" is its never done by an enemy.
The Hell's Angels are a modern day tribe and their principle problem like the east coast Mafia was the 'witness protection program' and the 'betrayal' of members. Even Peter denied Christ three times before the Cock crowed. It's a weakness of humans. You threaten to hurt my mother, my sister, my penis, my testicle, my face, my dog and I'll quite possibly tell you what you want to know. The evidence of war is that everyone 'cracks' under torture except if one truly believes that giving up the information will bring about their death and they have a reason to live. The studies of Auschwitz by Logotherapy giant are particularly informative about human behaviour. Communism lives on 'betrayal' and children are taught in school to 'betray' their parents just as the Nazi Youth Movement attempted to instill 'gossip as a virtue, like 'crimestopper' anonymous phone lines today.
So Custer was trying to be a good boy and here he was all my life skewered as 'arrogant' and 'glory seeking'. He was no more 'arrogant' than Obama or Bush or Donald Trump , Gandhi or Bob Dylan when I look at his life. He was just a guy doing a job with a really cute wife, Libbie. He was a great success in the Civil War and then he was sent off to at the territories and it's pretty clear this was like a bad posting in the foreign services. This was like getting posted to Afghanistan when you really wanted London England and had hoped to go to the opera but instead were left dodging terrorist attacks.
Libbie and Custer were kind of nice folk. There's a book I read part of in the Custer Museum by Libbie in her own words and she seems like a grand gal and Custer like the amiable guy at a barbecue.
Indeed there are also books that describe Sitting Bull as a bit whacked as a medicine man, kind of like Jerry Farwell in religious circles , not at all a Dalai Lama or Bishop Tootoo kind of guy but a real loud, heavy weight , trancing out , trouble making, bad mouthing kind of Hockey Player for the Canucks enforcer sort. Lame White Guy comes across like Castros favourite Chez. Crazy Horse is a regular horse riding Mohammed. No one comes across in this dispute like Churchill when he rode a horse into battle except maybe Reno. He's definitely Conservative in his style. Gall is really by far the most fascinating Indian.
The whole battle only lasted less than a day. It carried on over a few miles with obviously a lot of galloping and crazy making all round. The battle ended in an hour and a half with the "last stand' looking like it was a horribly grizzly affair of minutes with horses shot for barricades and the Indians with their own rifles probably a hundred to one in the last effort. The archeological evidence and the stories and reports are amazing with the recreation of the battlefield now showing , with the greatest accuracy possible due to the genius of science mostly, where the deaths occurred. All the white guys would have been wounded early and the Indians were killed at a ratio of 1 in 5 or so of the white guys because not only superior numbers but it looked like the white guys were going 'oh shit," and trying to escape. In routs there's a lot of dead from back shooting and no doubt a lot of white were shot in the face begging for their lives ,their guns emptied. It was a mess like war is supposed to be.
The battle field is one of the most remarkable and informative places I've ever visited. Frankly I prefer churches and holy grounds but the history and archeology and all the mythology around this battle make it a fascinating experience. I loved the guide books, and the guides and the first nations and white folk working together to tell a story with all it's permutations and digressions. (Custer's Last Battle, Little Bighorn Battlefied -self guided Auto Tour (or Harley Davidson Motorcycle) with Archeologist Richard Fox, Fireside Productions, Livingson was great.)
America, which now included all the Indian, Jewish, Christian, Catholic, Irish, Italian, English, Chinese etc tribes got pissed off just like the Romans did when the Jews stood up to them a couple of thousand years ago when they crucified Jesus to 'send a message'. They whopped Indian ass for the next decades, took away the Black Hills from the Lakota and gave them a few little privy land areas not fit for pig farms.
Today I pay a fortune to 'play' at having the life my grandfather had when he was 'relocated' from Scotland , to uninhabitable northern Canada where he could hunt and fish like a Lord though the work or ranching and farming was near impossible. He went on to be a huge success, a leader among men, generous, sober, high minded, careful in his ways, elected REEVE. A lawyer stole all his land and fortune and years later I'd meet the German son of my grandfather's rich relocated neighbours whose fortune was also stolen by the same lawyer who took the money and ran off to hide in the legal wasteland of America. Dad went on to serve in the Royal Canadian Air Force that saved the world from Nazism and freed the Jews and Poles from German work camps. No one to date has taken credit for freeing the homosexuals from Auschwitz. Lincolns northern army freed the blacks from slavery.
It was a banking crisis that lead to the breaking of the Treaty with the Lakota and the miners flooding the black hills. After the banking crisis the new governments felt the old governments had been too generous with the money. Today in Canada every Canadian is getting 'less health care' , 'less old age pension', and less of most things because of a banking crisis. Indeed there are those conspiracy theorist who think Elvis was behind 9/11 having secretly converted to radical islam's "Peace Train'. That consider the Lakota Indians were the 'first' 'test case'. Now our government is promoting marijuana for the masses and euthanasia to add to it's abortion policy.
I couldn't help but think that it would have been fun to ride around on horse and have a 'love in' antelope barbecue with the girls doing all the chores then fighting the police and singing and drumming about it like Woodstock in leathers.
I had just been to the Motorcycle Rally in Sturges so I'd seen a whole lot of the modern wild men and women and the tribal society with it's patches and Harley "hoss'. I was a good time listening to Kid Rock from Detroit on his Rebel Tour and enjoying ZZ sing 'Sunglasses'. All that was needed was antelope burgers . I had Angus steak instead at the Saloon.
It's all not so different. It's blurry at the edges. In the Custer Museum I bought a Union Calvary sword but the first two I looked at were 'made in China'. I thought that was priceless. There's probably an American Indian chef making chop suet at the finest Chinese restaurant in Bejing where tourists go for 'authentic' Chinese experience.
We're a global society and we have to think locally. Still I loved Buffalo Springfield's song not because of the Buffalo but because of the line, "People carrying signs, mostly say, hooray for outside."
I rode away on my motorcycle as usual wondering whose side I'm on. I'm a citizen and for law and order today so I'd have to side with Custer doing his job for the Government which supposedly I've elected but then I'm Scottish Irish Canadian with a lot of tribal roots and the Government didn't help my grand dad when the lawyer stole the family farms and fortunes. Even today I wonder about who really killed Kennedy and was Marilyn Munroe just a pretty face.
I'm riding alone on my motorcycle across thousands of miles of US soil and thinking this is the greatest nation in the world. They're definitely #1. I've travelled around the world a bit and I'm still impressed with how well they treat everyone especially those who complain. Elsewhere everyone gets shot or banned or ostracized and the amount of freedom even in Europe compared to the US is marginal. Sturges was definitely tribal but so was the spiritual medical conference I attended earlier in Colorado.
I was just sad looking at all the graves of all the young soldiers of the Indians and the United States. Glory is a good word. It's been tarnished. There's been a lot of reductionism in the last hundreds of years. Corporations are ultimately primitive and tribal. There's a sense that advances are always made with two steps forward one step back. The Indians of Alberta are rich oil men. They were put on reserves which had oil on them. They are making the decision today in the major board rooms of the world. The Indians who were fighting Custer wouldn't have known he was just doing a 'police action'. They were probably thinking like the folks at Waco. I have trouble trusting men in uniforms with weapons but that goes back to my first bad childhood experience with a dentist. There weren't any counsellors or prozac in those days and women didn't have bras to burn or tampons. Sanitation was a problem. There wasn't even work for plumbers because everyone 'gathered at the river' even before the Christian song encouraged them to do what they already were doing of necessity.
The Little Bighorn River is a very pretty river today with the shady forest along it's sides and all around hot baked grassland. I think the ponies I saw there were probably descendants of the ones that survived the battle. At least the ponies were peaceful. People who know horses know they can be gnarly.
I really liked the plaques that laid out the first skirmish and retreat by Reno. I wondered if the great gambling city was named after him. You can see the battle at the Last Stand but it's more like a brawl where as the Remo fight actually moved.
The woman in the gift shop said, "Were it not for Custer dying, we'd not have jobs here in tourism". She was a white woman. The Indian woman who took my money for the tour was native. I was thankful I had money to give them. For a few hours out of my Harley Davidson Journey to and from the Sturges Motorcycle Rally I was able to take time out and learn about another 'war to end all wars'.
I liked driving away having a sword strapped across the pack on my Harley. I would have preferred a Glock 9 mm but Americans don't like Canadians bringing arms into their country. Despite all the best efforts of the Freedom Fighters for the National Riflearms Associations they won't sell a Canadian a firearm without an American government permit. While I mostly feel like I'm following Custer or Calhoun or Remi and don't know which, some folks think I'm too much like Lame White Man. The Indian chief who reall kicked ass was Gall. You had to have Gall to do what he did.
Soldiers describe various 'thirsts' in battle. This would have been a particularly thirsty battle, regardless of the glory.
Tuesday, August 6, 2013
Sturgis Motorcycle Rally, 2013
It was 17 years ago I was drinking and smoking dope with some biker friends on their couch with their grow op outside. None of the motorcycles worked. One of the guys borrowed the kids Honda 30 cc to make a beer run into town. He looked ridiculous but he brought back the beer.
They talked a lot about riding to Sturgis. It was a dream, but what with drugs and alcohol, and the couch, they'd never got round to taking the ride. We all listened to the Doobie Brothers and talked about riding to Sturgi, though. At the time it was just another pipe dream.
I'd crashed my Norton Motorcycle. I didn't think that drinking and drugging and riding too fast on a gravel road a while before had anything to do with it. I tried to blame the motorcycle. It didn't stop me drinking and smoking dope though. It did stop me riding motorcycles.
Later that year I stopped drinking and smoking dope altogether. I joined a group started by Bill and Bob where I met a Sober Rider who'd just got back from Sturgis. He'd ridden with some other sober guys the thousands of kms and miles there and back. We were sitting in a cafe where he showed us his gold ring he'd got to commemorate the ride. I figured then I'd like to ride to Sturgis myself.
Laura and I drove up to the first Sturgis North. I didn't take my Harley because I had the RV. I brought along the Honda 230 in the back of the Ford HD edition 350 truck. I enjoyed riding on the Veteran's ride, the smallest bike there. The guys called my bike was a 'trouble maker'. I kept up with them on that ride, somehow.
I'd had the IDAA conference to attend at Keystone Colorado so figured it wouldn't be that far out of the way, maybe 750 km, to swing by Sturgis on the way home. That's what I did.
I got away on Sunday afternoon and drove up to Wheatland seeing some of the world's most beautiful country. In the morning I talked to another biker because he was wearing a Friend of Bill patch. He told me there were lots of meetings in Sturgiss. I felt good about meeting him, talking with him, and learning that this bad biker rally was really good. I'd had some misgivings about the motives behind the motives.
That morning though, I'd put on my RCMP shirt my friend Art had bought. It seemed to make it clear which gang I was riding with.
From Wheatland the bikes began to appear individually and in groups. It was like an annual Harley Davidson migration.
By the time I was on the I90 at Gillette the roads were full of big bikes. I turned into the Gillette HD dealership. There I met a Black Sheep, from the Christian Biker Ministry. I'd been listening to Third Day on the stereo as I pulled in enjoying their song " Tell me If I'm going too fast". Invariably that tune came round when I was going too fast. Thanks, Third Day!
On the approach to Sturgis the road was chock full of bikes. Herds and herds of Harleys.The bikes were all colours, some really loaded up like they were coming along way like me. Lots of trikes and spiders to. Every shape and size. Heading for the famed motorcycle town of Sturgis, South Dakota.
At the last gas station I tanked up at, the biker ahead of me at the pump was wearing a vest with big insignia, Manitoba H.O.G. Winnipeg Chapter. We got to talking to as we filled up the bikes and I reminisced about years living in Fort Gary and Riverheights. He was from St. James. I told him I'd had a girlfriend there.
"Do you still have her number? I could look her up." he asked. We laughed. I was sixteen and she would be a grandmother today if she was still alive. Two old biker dudes laughing together about Winnipeg and the passage of time.
I didn't have a motel reservation for Sturgis, not knowing when or even if I'd get there. I pulled off at the full Best Western and didn't even know where the rally was. A White pick up truck with an "Easy Does It' bumper sticker was ahead of me so I took that as a sign and followed my Chevy angel. He took me right into the rally. It was loud and huge. A half dozen city blocks going off in both directions with thousands of bikes lined up on the streets. I saw a sign "tenting" as the truck turned off.
I'd brought my tent so I pulled into this driveway. For $20 a homeowner was letting folk tent on his lawn. He had a couple of porto potties out back too. He said there were showers at the Convention centre. I set up my old blue biker pup tent I'd used with Laura when we took the HD Roadster motorcycle up to Powell River. I'll never forget phoning my dad on the cell phone, talking to him from the tent just outside the town, waiting for the rain to let up. Dad was so happy to have that call. I reminded of all the camping we'd done as a family.
Now here I was putting the same tent up again after several years, my RV offering a cozier alternative. I still figured out how to erect it thanks to it being almost idiot proof though first try the I put the "fly" on backwards, as usual. I had the new Mountain Coop sleeping bag too. It turned out to be warm and cozy but it's main selling feature had been it's ability to reduce to the size of a mellon.
With the tent up and the bike locked up, I went off to explore the Sturgis rally. First thing I ran into was the "Music of the Soul" stage with various ministers playing the hottest rhythm and blues. The Reverend Jimmie Bratcher music was awesome. I loved the Tony Loeffler Band. So was the Glen Kaiser Band, (www.streetlevel.org). As I listened to their rocking music I thanked Jesus for bringing me here safe. It was a dream come true after so many years with so many twists and turns. I never know why my faith falters given how well God has cared for me all these years. I teared up listening to the music, looking around at bikers wearing crosses and glad to be a part of a spiritual revival. My Sturgis Rally was pure and holy!
Next thing I see are a couple of "Indians for Sobriety". Wow!. God's fingerprints were all over my experiences. After sharing with the Christian biker how I'd come into town blasting Third Day having heard them first when I attended West Coast Biker Church, here I was shaking hands and talking with a couple of incredible native guys. Dr. Carl Jung called the 4th dimension, sacred and synchronistic. I certainly felt I was rocketed into the 4th dimension here. It was loud enough. A thousands of bikes or more were playing their celestial pipes. It would be non stop for a day and a night..
I'd meet with Soldiers for Christ, Freedom Bikers and more Sober Riders. I'd been talking with Tommie at IDAA before I left. She was a member of Sober Riders United. I didn't see any of her chapter there or meet Sober Rider Guy I'd met in Bute on the way down. I did talk with some Vietnam Vet riders and enjoyed seeing a woman who was wearing a jacket saying she'd served in Iraq and Afghanistan. There were a few criminal biker gangs but the vast majority of people there were from regular biker chapters. The police were present but reserved and on guard. Really competent young men wanting to make sure this whole thing remained friendly. If wasn't quite a family affair, though there were some children there. Lots of single guys. Lots of hot looking women. Lots of old couples. Leather, tattoos and individuality. It seemed most of the people I met were in their 40's to 70's. Here and there I'd see a 20 year old but they stood out, looking s young and innocent. A lot of experience was gathered. A lot of life had been lived. I met Bikers from all over the US, Florida, California, New England, Tennessee, Missouri, all over. Every state must have been represented. Besides the Manitoba biker I met Albertans. Lots of creative engineering had gone into some of the bikes too. The guys from the California television chopper show were there too.
At the famous Easy Rider Saloon and Steakhouse I heard ZZ3, great band. The waitress was dressed in a pink bikini with a lovely fox tail and painted whiskers. She got a good tip from me for the Pepsi and I expect she got a lot of good tips with that creative costume. I got my temporary Sturgis tattoo at the H.O.G. tent.
When I had a steak at the Loud Saloon the guys next to me were speaking German. There were Harley Rentals at the surrounding Harley Dealers so I expected some Europeans and Asians had come in just for the rally, I saw the Indian and Victory exhibits and saw some big Goldwings there as well. By far the Harleys were the vast majority of bikes but there were even scooters and some Kawasaki and Suzuki crotch rockets.
I liked the girls outfits. Alot of bikinis on the street. There's a raw sexuality in biker world and lots of styling on the part of the girls making the most of their leathers and tank tops. No helmut laws locally, so some beautiful minimally dressed and elegantly tattooed babes were riding hair flying on the backs of bikes. At times the main street looked like the set Sons of Anarchy. There were Sons of Anarchy art exhibits there too. High end and low end Sturgis paraphernalia. I got my hats and tshirts and even some new biker luggage to carry my increasing hoard of travel t shirts home.
It was all I could do to resist getting a trailer. There were large dog pet trailers and trailers that turned into tents too. I just like the little black one with a bar I could put a little dog carrier one. They'd have had the hitch and harness installed while I waited. There were all sorts of bike accessorizing going on. Fancy exhausts and whole new loud state of the art speaker systems were available for installation while you waited. Harley Owners Group had a tent and I enjoyed the air conditioning and iced water there.
At night I was just lucky to learn that the Doobie Brothers were playing at the Buffalo Chip. It turned out that the Buffalo Chip was 3 miles out of two. It was a hell of a ride to get to the grounds with everyone else doing the same thing. Then parking the bike in the dirt and gravel, standing in line for tickets, being in line hearing the Doobie Brothers set begin. I made it into the grounds/ People and bikes were a hundred rows thick. Still I actually got close enough to enjoy the show. All the great songs I'd heard in my youth and then heard 16 years ago all over again. It came back. What memories. Wow!!
A powerfully concert. The roar of Harley pipes sounded with each applause every great song. It was a whole lot better than the couch experience. This was live and real in technicolor. What an incredible experience!
Kid Rock came on after that. He was younger, louder and brasher. All around me the younger crowd had moved in, many coming just for Kid Rock, I heard them say. He was slick and the crowd roared as he belted out his machine gun rapid Detroit Rebel Tour songs. The rain began then. I was quickly moving out of there though knowing the younger folk would stay on. Kid Rock was saying he wasn't bothered by a little rain and they were shouting their agreement. Meanwhile I was thinking of my big heavy motorcycle in a mud parking lot. I glad to get there while I still had some solid ground.
The lightning lit of the skies as many of us exited slipping and sliding. I remember the "as like" Canadian Woodstock concerts I'd attended the Woodstock year, how they'd be rained ou,t and how I mostly thought of outdoor concerts as mud slicks. It was good to get to the highway. All around me bikes were riding 4 side by side on two lanes. It was a feat of maneuvering and bikemanship, dark, down pouring rain, and everyone hustling. I was glad to get through the town were lots of folk who'd decided to attend the concerts , not having to drive, were already happily impaired. There was a potential for disaster but everyone amazingly respectful I was still certainly glad to get my motorcycle back to the yard where my tent was. I hauled my wet self and gear into the wonderful dry retreat of my little biker pup tent.
I couldn't sleep though. Too many thoughts of what a full day and tremendous evening I'd had . Praying and gratitude didn't do it. Bikes were roaring all night long. Eventually I fell asleep only to waking at 6 am light. I was up with a half dozen of the Vet bikers and enjoyed sharing with them. Good guys, comfortable with camping, comfortable around each other, pleasant with me. There's a mutual appreciation of competence. Shared tales of distances and journeys.
I could have stayed. If I'd had room, maybe. But I'd been to Sturgis, had an unbelievable experience and was now glad to pack up and head back. I've got a lot of miles to go and if I stayed longer I might get that tattoo the pretty girl had been offering. I liked her painted friend who said it was okay that people photographed her. The truth is I like the ride. Sturgis is a great destination but it's for me it was all about the journey. That and the people I meet.
Mostly it was the synchronicity, nostalgia and feeling of completing a sober dream. Another gift of sobriety. I'd been to Sturgis. It was worth it. What a world class biker experience. Maybe another year I'll get to the Daytona Bike Week. For now I'm thanking God for getting me to Sturgis. I feel really blessed by all the ministers and sober riders I met too.
They talked a lot about riding to Sturgis. It was a dream, but what with drugs and alcohol, and the couch, they'd never got round to taking the ride. We all listened to the Doobie Brothers and talked about riding to Sturgi, though. At the time it was just another pipe dream.
I'd crashed my Norton Motorcycle. I didn't think that drinking and drugging and riding too fast on a gravel road a while before had anything to do with it. I tried to blame the motorcycle. It didn't stop me drinking and smoking dope though. It did stop me riding motorcycles.
Later that year I stopped drinking and smoking dope altogether. I joined a group started by Bill and Bob where I met a Sober Rider who'd just got back from Sturgis. He'd ridden with some other sober guys the thousands of kms and miles there and back. We were sitting in a cafe where he showed us his gold ring he'd got to commemorate the ride. I figured then I'd like to ride to Sturgis myself.
Laura and I drove up to the first Sturgis North. I didn't take my Harley because I had the RV. I brought along the Honda 230 in the back of the Ford HD edition 350 truck. I enjoyed riding on the Veteran's ride, the smallest bike there. The guys called my bike was a 'trouble maker'. I kept up with them on that ride, somehow.
I'd had the IDAA conference to attend at Keystone Colorado so figured it wouldn't be that far out of the way, maybe 750 km, to swing by Sturgis on the way home. That's what I did.
I got away on Sunday afternoon and drove up to Wheatland seeing some of the world's most beautiful country. In the morning I talked to another biker because he was wearing a Friend of Bill patch. He told me there were lots of meetings in Sturgiss. I felt good about meeting him, talking with him, and learning that this bad biker rally was really good. I'd had some misgivings about the motives behind the motives.
That morning though, I'd put on my RCMP shirt my friend Art had bought. It seemed to make it clear which gang I was riding with.
From Wheatland the bikes began to appear individually and in groups. It was like an annual Harley Davidson migration.
By the time I was on the I90 at Gillette the roads were full of big bikes. I turned into the Gillette HD dealership. There I met a Black Sheep, from the Christian Biker Ministry. I'd been listening to Third Day on the stereo as I pulled in enjoying their song " Tell me If I'm going too fast". Invariably that tune came round when I was going too fast. Thanks, Third Day!
On the approach to Sturgis the road was chock full of bikes. Herds and herds of Harleys.The bikes were all colours, some really loaded up like they were coming along way like me. Lots of trikes and spiders to. Every shape and size. Heading for the famed motorcycle town of Sturgis, South Dakota.
At the last gas station I tanked up at, the biker ahead of me at the pump was wearing a vest with big insignia, Manitoba H.O.G. Winnipeg Chapter. We got to talking to as we filled up the bikes and I reminisced about years living in Fort Gary and Riverheights. He was from St. James. I told him I'd had a girlfriend there.
"Do you still have her number? I could look her up." he asked. We laughed. I was sixteen and she would be a grandmother today if she was still alive. Two old biker dudes laughing together about Winnipeg and the passage of time.
I didn't have a motel reservation for Sturgis, not knowing when or even if I'd get there. I pulled off at the full Best Western and didn't even know where the rally was. A White pick up truck with an "Easy Does It' bumper sticker was ahead of me so I took that as a sign and followed my Chevy angel. He took me right into the rally. It was loud and huge. A half dozen city blocks going off in both directions with thousands of bikes lined up on the streets. I saw a sign "tenting" as the truck turned off.
I'd brought my tent so I pulled into this driveway. For $20 a homeowner was letting folk tent on his lawn. He had a couple of porto potties out back too. He said there were showers at the Convention centre. I set up my old blue biker pup tent I'd used with Laura when we took the HD Roadster motorcycle up to Powell River. I'll never forget phoning my dad on the cell phone, talking to him from the tent just outside the town, waiting for the rain to let up. Dad was so happy to have that call. I reminded of all the camping we'd done as a family.
Now here I was putting the same tent up again after several years, my RV offering a cozier alternative. I still figured out how to erect it thanks to it being almost idiot proof though first try the I put the "fly" on backwards, as usual. I had the new Mountain Coop sleeping bag too. It turned out to be warm and cozy but it's main selling feature had been it's ability to reduce to the size of a mellon.
With the tent up and the bike locked up, I went off to explore the Sturgis rally. First thing I ran into was the "Music of the Soul" stage with various ministers playing the hottest rhythm and blues. The Reverend Jimmie Bratcher music was awesome. I loved the Tony Loeffler Band. So was the Glen Kaiser Band, (www.streetlevel.org). As I listened to their rocking music I thanked Jesus for bringing me here safe. It was a dream come true after so many years with so many twists and turns. I never know why my faith falters given how well God has cared for me all these years. I teared up listening to the music, looking around at bikers wearing crosses and glad to be a part of a spiritual revival. My Sturgis Rally was pure and holy!
Next thing I see are a couple of "Indians for Sobriety". Wow!. God's fingerprints were all over my experiences. After sharing with the Christian biker how I'd come into town blasting Third Day having heard them first when I attended West Coast Biker Church, here I was shaking hands and talking with a couple of incredible native guys. Dr. Carl Jung called the 4th dimension, sacred and synchronistic. I certainly felt I was rocketed into the 4th dimension here. It was loud enough. A thousands of bikes or more were playing their celestial pipes. It would be non stop for a day and a night..
I'd meet with Soldiers for Christ, Freedom Bikers and more Sober Riders. I'd been talking with Tommie at IDAA before I left. She was a member of Sober Riders United. I didn't see any of her chapter there or meet Sober Rider Guy I'd met in Bute on the way down. I did talk with some Vietnam Vet riders and enjoyed seeing a woman who was wearing a jacket saying she'd served in Iraq and Afghanistan. There were a few criminal biker gangs but the vast majority of people there were from regular biker chapters. The police were present but reserved and on guard. Really competent young men wanting to make sure this whole thing remained friendly. If wasn't quite a family affair, though there were some children there. Lots of single guys. Lots of hot looking women. Lots of old couples. Leather, tattoos and individuality. It seemed most of the people I met were in their 40's to 70's. Here and there I'd see a 20 year old but they stood out, looking s young and innocent. A lot of experience was gathered. A lot of life had been lived. I met Bikers from all over the US, Florida, California, New England, Tennessee, Missouri, all over. Every state must have been represented. Besides the Manitoba biker I met Albertans. Lots of creative engineering had gone into some of the bikes too. The guys from the California television chopper show were there too.
At the famous Easy Rider Saloon and Steakhouse I heard ZZ3, great band. The waitress was dressed in a pink bikini with a lovely fox tail and painted whiskers. She got a good tip from me for the Pepsi and I expect she got a lot of good tips with that creative costume. I got my temporary Sturgis tattoo at the H.O.G. tent.
When I had a steak at the Loud Saloon the guys next to me were speaking German. There were Harley Rentals at the surrounding Harley Dealers so I expected some Europeans and Asians had come in just for the rally, I saw the Indian and Victory exhibits and saw some big Goldwings there as well. By far the Harleys were the vast majority of bikes but there were even scooters and some Kawasaki and Suzuki crotch rockets.
I liked the girls outfits. Alot of bikinis on the street. There's a raw sexuality in biker world and lots of styling on the part of the girls making the most of their leathers and tank tops. No helmut laws locally, so some beautiful minimally dressed and elegantly tattooed babes were riding hair flying on the backs of bikes. At times the main street looked like the set Sons of Anarchy. There were Sons of Anarchy art exhibits there too. High end and low end Sturgis paraphernalia. I got my hats and tshirts and even some new biker luggage to carry my increasing hoard of travel t shirts home.
It was all I could do to resist getting a trailer. There were large dog pet trailers and trailers that turned into tents too. I just like the little black one with a bar I could put a little dog carrier one. They'd have had the hitch and harness installed while I waited. There were all sorts of bike accessorizing going on. Fancy exhausts and whole new loud state of the art speaker systems were available for installation while you waited. Harley Owners Group had a tent and I enjoyed the air conditioning and iced water there.
At night I was just lucky to learn that the Doobie Brothers were playing at the Buffalo Chip. It turned out that the Buffalo Chip was 3 miles out of two. It was a hell of a ride to get to the grounds with everyone else doing the same thing. Then parking the bike in the dirt and gravel, standing in line for tickets, being in line hearing the Doobie Brothers set begin. I made it into the grounds/ People and bikes were a hundred rows thick. Still I actually got close enough to enjoy the show. All the great songs I'd heard in my youth and then heard 16 years ago all over again. It came back. What memories. Wow!!
A powerfully concert. The roar of Harley pipes sounded with each applause every great song. It was a whole lot better than the couch experience. This was live and real in technicolor. What an incredible experience!
Kid Rock came on after that. He was younger, louder and brasher. All around me the younger crowd had moved in, many coming just for Kid Rock, I heard them say. He was slick and the crowd roared as he belted out his machine gun rapid Detroit Rebel Tour songs. The rain began then. I was quickly moving out of there though knowing the younger folk would stay on. Kid Rock was saying he wasn't bothered by a little rain and they were shouting their agreement. Meanwhile I was thinking of my big heavy motorcycle in a mud parking lot. I glad to get there while I still had some solid ground.
The lightning lit of the skies as many of us exited slipping and sliding. I remember the "as like" Canadian Woodstock concerts I'd attended the Woodstock year, how they'd be rained ou,t and how I mostly thought of outdoor concerts as mud slicks. It was good to get to the highway. All around me bikes were riding 4 side by side on two lanes. It was a feat of maneuvering and bikemanship, dark, down pouring rain, and everyone hustling. I was glad to get through the town were lots of folk who'd decided to attend the concerts , not having to drive, were already happily impaired. There was a potential for disaster but everyone amazingly respectful I was still certainly glad to get my motorcycle back to the yard where my tent was. I hauled my wet self and gear into the wonderful dry retreat of my little biker pup tent.
I couldn't sleep though. Too many thoughts of what a full day and tremendous evening I'd had . Praying and gratitude didn't do it. Bikes were roaring all night long. Eventually I fell asleep only to waking at 6 am light. I was up with a half dozen of the Vet bikers and enjoyed sharing with them. Good guys, comfortable with camping, comfortable around each other, pleasant with me. There's a mutual appreciation of competence. Shared tales of distances and journeys.
I could have stayed. If I'd had room, maybe. But I'd been to Sturgis, had an unbelievable experience and was now glad to pack up and head back. I've got a lot of miles to go and if I stayed longer I might get that tattoo the pretty girl had been offering. I liked her painted friend who said it was okay that people photographed her. The truth is I like the ride. Sturgis is a great destination but it's for me it was all about the journey. That and the people I meet.
Mostly it was the synchronicity, nostalgia and feeling of completing a sober dream. Another gift of sobriety. I'd been to Sturgis. It was worth it. What a world class biker experience. Maybe another year I'll get to the Daytona Bike Week. For now I'm thanking God for getting me to Sturgis. I feel really blessed by all the ministers and sober riders I met too.
Sunday, August 4, 2013
Keystone, Colorado to Wheatland, Wyoming, Motorcycling
The conference finished with lots of hugs. Chuck was an amazing inspirational speaker.
It was a great drive. I enjoyed immensely returning through the Eisenhower Tunnel on I70. Amazing feat of engineering.
Then I turned off at the sign for Buffalo Bill's grave. I was raised on Buffalo Bill Cody. He was a cowboy kids hero. He lived to 1921 but his life as a young man has been shown in movies, extraordinary life of the wild west.
The Humminbirds were playing and singing. I listened to them enjoying this group immensely, sad they didn't have a cd I could have taken and listened to on the road.
There were a half dozen hangliders floating about Look out Mountain. I enjoyed looking up at them and remembering my dad did this in his 80's.
Driving down the highway I saw the Avalanche Harley Davidson dealership. Naturally I stopped and because I needed a tank top with the heat bought a Denver HD tank top tshirt. I did get a picture of the beautiful gold doored tower. Lots of sports complexes.
I drove about downtown Denver but didn't see anything I wanted to stop for. The street has been turned into a mall. Consequently I'd have had to park my Harley and walk about downtown to see it. Decided against that then got lost trying to find 25 north. I was using the gps on my iPhone and got headed in the opposite direction.
After a half an hour driving in the wrong direction I figured I was going wrong and got turned around.
At Cheyenne I took pictures of the government building with a gold tower. Pretty country town.
The drive north was really exciting for wind and rain. I succeeded in threading the needle, running high speed between two storms pouring rain on either side of the road. It was great getting past them.
Because of the winds gusts to 40 mph I decided to turn in early. I'd just passed a herd of antelope beside the road. Now I've had pizza and chocolate and downloaded my film of the Eisenhower
Tunnel.
It was a great drive. I enjoyed immensely returning through the Eisenhower Tunnel on I70. Amazing feat of engineering.
Then I turned off at the sign for Buffalo Bill's grave. I was raised on Buffalo Bill Cody. He was a cowboy kids hero. He lived to 1921 but his life as a young man has been shown in movies, extraordinary life of the wild west.
The Humminbirds were playing and singing. I listened to them enjoying this group immensely, sad they didn't have a cd I could have taken and listened to on the road.
There were a half dozen hangliders floating about Look out Mountain. I enjoyed looking up at them and remembering my dad did this in his 80's.
Driving down the highway I saw the Avalanche Harley Davidson dealership. Naturally I stopped and because I needed a tank top with the heat bought a Denver HD tank top tshirt. I did get a picture of the beautiful gold doored tower. Lots of sports complexes.
I drove about downtown Denver but didn't see anything I wanted to stop for. The street has been turned into a mall. Consequently I'd have had to park my Harley and walk about downtown to see it. Decided against that then got lost trying to find 25 north. I was using the gps on my iPhone and got headed in the opposite direction.
After a half an hour driving in the wrong direction I figured I was going wrong and got turned around.
At Cheyenne I took pictures of the government building with a gold tower. Pretty country town.
The drive north was really exciting for wind and rain. I succeeded in threading the needle, running high speed between two storms pouring rain on either side of the road. It was great getting past them.
Because of the winds gusts to 40 mph I decided to turn in early. I'd just passed a herd of antelope beside the road. Now I've had pizza and chocolate and downloaded my film of the Eisenhower
Tunnel.
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