Sunday, January 05, 2014

Pick ‘em, choose ‘em, and destroy ‘em!



Horses, Apaches, and exclusionary sovereignty
America’s premier welfare State
Pick ‘em, choose ‘em, and destroy ‘em!
By Stephen L. Wilmeth

            A Canadian free market think tank, the Fraser Institute, released its annual “Economic Freedom of North America” report for 2013. Leaving Mexico out of the survey to deal with its corruption and drug war debacles, the report chronicles the best and worst places in North America to conduct business. The survey condenses the data and computes a value for economic freedom. The data is arranged into ten components. That array emphasizes size of government, takings and discriminatory taxation, and labor market freedom.
            New Mexico, O’ Fair New Mexico, ranks dead last in economic freedom. What a distinction that is. Aside from the computed results of the study, three current examples add to the substance of the findings. The examples can be termed ‘pick ‘em’, ‘choose ‘em’, and ‘destroy ‘em’. To those who face the onslaught, the understanding is complete.
            Pick ‘em
            Day after day, trucks loaded with horses leave Morton, Texas headed for Mexico. Those trucks aren’t hauling horses to a roping or to a sanctioned endurance ride. The endurance ride those horses are bound for is a one way trip to slaughter. Naïve Americans, including the Governor and the Attorney General of New Mexico, Susana Martinez and Gary King, respectively, have taken personal positions that commercial horse slaughter is at odds with their state’s traditions and values.
            Are you kidding?
            The values implicit in the responsibilities of horse care are surpassed only by those in the care of human beings. There is not a rancher alive who has not walked to a favored old horse simply emotionally pummeled knowing it is his and his only responsibility to end the suffering of that loyal friend. It is the fulfillment of an unwritten contract.
Furthermore, in the absence of direct personal responsibility, that person would universally defer only to the most humane method to accomplish the same end when that life ending circumstance becomes necessary.
I cringe at the reality of Mexican horse slaughter.
            The state, however, remains at war with Valley Meat Company in Roswell that has been forced to run a juggernaut of obstacles trying to become the only regional equine slaughter plant. In that role, they would operate under the guidelines of the USDA, on American soil, and under strictest rules and regulations.
            What a political, special interest debacle this has become!
            What is equally disgusting is to discuss this with the folks who buy and move horses to Mexico for slaughter. They support the governor and the A.G. in their efforts to disallow the business. They want the conditions of current stability. They don’t want the robbery emanating from fees and regulatory burdens New Mexico would pile on the process.
Today, every horse in the commercial slaughter channel is being killed. The system is working albeit it isn’t under the professed best practices, most humane approach. The buyers and facilitators are paying the fees including the mordida crossing the horses into Mexico. They know the game and control the outcome. Dealing with the state of New Mexico poses a moving target. They’d rather deal with the corruption of Mexico.
So, horses will likely continue to face the horrors of Mexican death while New Mexico upholds some imaginary tradition and … candidates posturing for future campaigns.
            Choose ‘Em
            I have a letter describing my great grandmother’s memory of her experience facing Geronimo. The year was 1885 and her family, the Shelleys, had been warned that Apaches were approaching. In preparation, they gathered two families and two other men who were in the district for the purpose of mineral exploration.
            Sure enough, Indians were observed up the creek stealing horses. The decision was made to make for the Gila River. At Cliff, there would be added protection with more numbers of defenders.
            Everyone, including children, was expected to carry a gun. In the retreat away from the war party sightings, they observed more Indians to their front taking cover for ambush along the trail. With no choice, the party backtracked to a one room log cabin and set about setting up a defense. They gathered wood, filled a door barrier with rocks, and broke chink out of the walls to form rifle ports.
They waited.
            By nightfall, no Indian had tested the cabin’s defenses. While the men stood watch, the women put the children under the bed and then squeezed together on top of it and tried to sleep. Hours later, a huge calamity arose. The children and women started screaming and attempted to escape from the bed. Indians must have dug their way through the roof and dropped on the bed where they were slaughtering the women and children!
            Somebody struck a match and the chaos was unraveled. The women collapsed the bed onto the sleeping children. No one was killed, but everybody was scared out of ten years of growth. Someone finally laughed. The story ended with the group making their way to Cliff where a cavalry unit from Ft. Bayard had arrived to bolster the defense.
            Geronimo and his band went on to string together one of the most epic life and death sagas in all of history. Ask any American who the most famous warrior was, and, arguably, Geronimo will be a leading candidate. The chase and the chapters of the story of his final surrender in Skeleton Canyon near the border are monumental.
            The outright fear of his ability as a war leader, as witnessed by the actual words of those who faced him, prompted further action. He would never again be allowed to escape incarceration and continue a reign of terror. The United States put him and his followers on a train and shipped them to Florida. Their remnants were eventually relocated to Oklahoma with a stop in Alabama.
The 700 or so legal descendents never returned to their homeland until they sought the purchase of 30 acres of land along I10 east of Deming in Luna County. It is there they now face an old nemesis … New Mexico. The location of their toehold of homeland is within a line of sight of two geographic features that remind passing motorist of their once dominance. One is the overhanging rock on the east slope of the Florida Mountains to the west and the other is the flat topped Massacre Peak to the northeast. In the former, they gathered to watch General Crooke and his cavalry pursue them in the Geronimo chase and in the latter they massacred a caravan of merchants from what is now Juarez. Good, bad or indifferent, both attach their permanence to this land of their ancestry.
They want to build a gambling casino on their ‘homeland’ where upwards of 15,000 vehicles pass daily. New Mexico stands steadfast against the move on the basis of horse trades that pose threatened termination of educational pledges if the casino is built. It doesn’t matter that Luna County is named among the 20 most at risk counties in the nation. The state is again caught in a game.
What is more, the state demonstrates no inclination to imagine what the return of the Chiricahuas would pose to national interest. The impact and allure that could be created in welcoming this band of mysterious, historical people home could be immense. Hollywood alone has built a mystique around these people that has world stage implications. Gambling aside, this act has star power beyond a casino.
But, New Mexico demonstrates the liberal propensity to choose who is allowed to succeed rather than allowing businesses to seek and create regional advantages. Taking handouts is a way of life for the state. Fostering a robust business environment is completely foreign.
Destroy ‘em
 In the backdrop of Luna County’s ‘Apacheria’, lays some 90,000 acres of state trust lands and private improvements and holdings that will become landlocked if Senator Udall’s (D-NM) wilderness legislation is passed. He is orchestrating another grand taking. When the Chiricahua verbal history is related, lessons should remind us of the wisdom of the great white fathers in Washington. The lessons the Tribe could pass to the 95 plus families that derive direct livelihood from the lands threatened can be drawn from history. It would be direct and simple.
The lesson would start with the expected blind eye from the state of New Mexico offering protection. Remember, the state depends on the federal government for 36% of its budget from federal revenue transfers. There is no appetite to jeopardize subsidies to stand for something constitutional. The statement would end in narration.
“Beware … sovereignty means nothing if you are caught on the wrong side of a liberal power play.”

Stephen L. Wilmeth is a rancher from southern New Mexico. “I have a whole lot more empathy for the Chiricahuas than I ever expected … both of us … the cowboy and the Indians can watch in unity this federal assault from the top of Massacre Peak.”

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