Post office closures in the Dakotas and Minnesota will impact many communitiesโ but the White Earth reservation villagesโ and other tribal towns of Squaw Lakeโ Ponemahโ Brookston in Minnesotaโ and Mandersonโ Wounded Knee and Wakpala (South Dakota) as well as Mandaree in North Dakota will mean hardships for a largely Native community.
Winona LaDukeWhat we all need to do is find the wellspring that keeps us going, that gives us the strength and patience to keep up this struggle for a long time.
Winona LaDukeAcross the continent, on the shores of small tributaries, in the shadows of sacred mountains, on the vast expanse of the prairies, or in the safety of the woods, prayers are being repeated, as they have for thousands of years, and common people with uncommon courage and the whispers of their ancestors in their ears continue their struggles to protect the land and water and trees on which their very existence is based. And like small tributaries joining together to form a mighty river, their force and power grows.
Winona LaDukePower is not brute force and money; power is in your spirit. Power is in your soul. It is what your ancestors, your old people gave you. Power is in the earth; it is in your relationship to the earth.
Winona LaDukeThe essence of the problem is about consumption, recognizing that a society that consumes one-third of the world's resources is unsustainable. This level of consumption requires constant intervention into other people's lands. That's what's going on.
Winona LaDukeThe military is the largest polluter in the country, and so you have a lot of military waste contaminating reservations - as, for example, on the Skull Valley Goshute Reservation, where 5,000 sheep died in some kind of experimental military nerve gas test 10 years ago. Many of our communities are dealing with that kind of waste, and an absence of political will to clean them up.
Winona LaDuke