ROSEMONT, Ill. -- Vice presidential hopeful Paul Ryan told supporters in President Barack Obama's home state their contributions will help Republicans define the "very clear choice" for voters in the final weeks before Election Day.
Dennis Banks, the legendary Native American activist and co-founder of
the American Indian Movement, was in New York City this weekend to serve
as a jurist at the Russell Tribunal on Palestine, an international
people’s tribunal created in 2009 to bring attention to the
responsibility other states bear for Israel’s violations of
international law. Banks says, "What is happening to [Palestinians] is
what we went through during the last century. It is, unfortunately, the
same people [backing it]: it is the U.S. government which funnels money
to Israel, and then it goes to hurt the Palestinian people." 
On “Columbus Day” — known to many as Indigenous Peoples Day — we’re
joined by Dennis Banks, a legendary Native American activist from the
Ojibwa Tribe. In 1968, he co-founded the American Indian Movement. A
year later he took part in the occupation of Alcatraz Island in
California. In 1972 he assisted in AIM’s "Trail of Broken Treaties," a
caravan of numerous activist groups across the United States to
Washington, D.C., to call attention to the plight of Native Americans.
That same year AIM took over the Bureau of Indian Affairs building in Washington, D.C. In early 1973, AIM
members took over and occupied Wounded Knee on the Pine Ridge Indian
Reservation for 71 days, which some have come to call Wounded Knee II.
Earlier this year, he led a cross country walk from Alcatraz to
Washington calling for the release of imprisoned Native American
activist Leonard Peltier. Banks share his thoughts about “Columbus Day",
the U.S. treatment of American Indians, and his own story of growing up
in the BIA boarding school system.
As the nation commemorates the arrival of Christopher Columbus to the
so-called "New World" in 1492, indigenous activists at Fort Lewis
College in Durango, Colorado, are pushing for schools to teach the "real
history of the Americas" and to celebrate indigenous culture. "Columbus
Day" has long evoked sadness and anger amongst people of color,
especially Native Americans, who object to honoring a man who opened the
door to European colonization, the exploitation of native peoples and
the slave trade. We’re joined by three guests involved with "The Real
History of the Americas" day: Esther Belin, a writing instructor at Fort
Lewis College and a member of the Navajo Nation; Shirena Trujillo Long,
coordinator of El Centro de Muchos Colores at Fort Lewis College and
chair of the “The Real History of the Americas” Committee; and student
activist Noel Alla-Ta-Ha, a member of the White Mountain Apache tribe
and Fort Lewis College senior.
