Fake an Indian for Senate

Yesterday President Trump called Senator Elizabeth Warren 'Pocahontas' at a ceremony honoring Navajo code talkers.

Good for him.

Senator Warren (S-Managua) long claimed to be Native American, an idea that the quickest google image search will dispel. She even once pointed to her high cheek bones as evidence.

This is like saying, 'I'm good with money, must mean I'm a Jew.'

The Cherokee Nation, to which she claims membership, rejects Warren utterly.

Last summer we did one of those DNA tests. As we've had family in America since the mid 17th century we were convinced that there is an Indian in the fuel supply somewhere. Sadly no. We demanded a retest which only showed that we were even more not Native American than previously thought.

Anyhoo, this imbroglio reminded us of our Have an Indian for Thanksgiving post. We've been thinking a lot about identity lately, triggered, so to speak, by our 2nd Grader. You see, she has a culture fair coming up, where students do a presentation of their culture. This is presented in the form of national origin, and she asked us what country we come from.

This presents two problems for the Stroocks. First our mother comes from Scotland and England, while our father from the Netherlands and Germany. There's some Frog in there some place, we're sorry to say. At least a hundred millions Americans must have this problem now, we're all getting mixed together, aren't we? So we talked about various nations and the 2nd Grader said, 'I want to do Germany' as Mrs. Stroock's father is of German extraction.

'Uhhh...' was our reply.

Of course the Stroock's are Jewish.  But there are contradictions. We don't suppose we need to re-post the pic of our great grandfather in the Luftwaffe during the Great War. In the family tree are plenty of people with the most Germanic sounding German names, like Neuberger. Still we've never felt German in the slightest, never had the urge to don lederhosen or invade a neighboring country.

We suspect many Native Americans (we prefer that term because we live in an area nicknamed (Chindia) have similar issues.  It's understandable, really. A Native American our age heard stories from his grandfather, told by his grandfather, about reservations, Indian agents, even the US Cavalry.

So we understand if a Native American is reluctant to embrace Thanksgiving.

But we should also consider this. America is a melting pot after all, and when a culture gets assimilated its gets Americanized. But the American over-culture changes a bit too. This is certainly the case with Native Americans. 

Our elementary school education was filled with Native American culture and lore. In the northeast Native American names are everywhere, Manhattan, for example. A zillion sports teams have Native American nicknames, from the Redskins, to the Chiefs to the Black Hawks, to the Seminoles. Morrison's and Commager's Rise of the American Republic begins with a chapter titled, 'What we owe the Indians.'

Our point is America has absorbed, embraced and honored Native Americans.

We certainly haven't done that with der Krauts. Though we admit a Football team named the Chicago Obengrubfuherers would be kinda cool.

Me white man, trade big wampum