Boy’s Dream: Build a Better Playground, Become First Native American President

I’m waiting to watch the entire episode tonight to see if Diane discloses how much money each and every tribe member get from the government each and every month, on top of their welfare check; how they get completely free healthcare and dental care; how the government provides all of their housing, and how because they know they get another one for nothing, they don’t take care of them (that’s why they live in the horrible conditions she described in the trailer). She said on GMA how they don’t want more of a hand-out, that they want a hand up in how to get out of their current welfare system of living off the government, but how are the next generation ever supposed to learn how to go out and get a job and be self-sustaining, when like 20% of their parents even hold down a job. I live in Northeastern Wyoming between the Lakota and Cheyenne (to the east), Crow and Northern Cheyenne (to the north), and Shoshone (to the west) Reservations, so I have personal experience with these Northern Indian Tribes and Reservations.

Diane I believe that Dartmouth College still has the mandate to educate qualified Native Americans for free.

How do we help Robert’s family?? I do not want to go thru an organizition, I just dont trust those things. I would love to send clothing, housing items and i would also like to find out how much does it cost to fix their roof. I too am a grandmother raising my grandkids and the person I want to help is her, is there anyways I could get a address or some kind of direction to head for???
@Morgan, I cant believe you said those horrid things..The government stoe their land and butchered their people and us as “Americans” should do everything we can to try to provide them with decent homes…those homes are far from decent and they never were, for God’s sake they aren’t even big enough to house their familes!!!! We need to embrace these people and help in any way shape or form

My mother and I went with our church on a mission trip to Pine Ridge Indian Reservation during the summer of 2009. We were able to meet Robert and eat some of his grandmother’s fry bread! It was wonderful to see you do the story on the children of Pine Ridge. We went there to do Bible school for the children at the Wounded Knee School and we also worked on repairing homes. It was truly a blessing! We took clothing, blankets, and toys for the children. Americans do not realize the poverty that occurs right here in the U.S. Please support the organizations for Pine Ridge Indian Reservation.

I find it so very sad that WE or in my case SOME others consider ANY NATIVE AMERICAN, as ANYTHING BUT the main part of our country! WE would be NOWHERE without the kindness given to us by the roots of our existence here in AMERICA! Fine if you see the need of others all over the world BUT why can’t the need here in America be seen too? We all are floating on a sinking ship here but it seems to me that no ones doing anything to plug the leak! I am poor,unemployed and alone! I WISH I HAD half the moxie that is apparently in the bloodline of our Native Americans! Our future would be better off to have these STRONG people in charge of more in this country since it’s OBVIOUS WE don’t have the core reasoning for FAMILY! AND by the way we are ALL family in this country people! LOOK AT THE TREE!

John Mac: “we would be better served to look at the native Americans as a treasured asset rather than a lower race class.” Thank you John Mac.
Morgan: doesn’t really matter one way or the other how things got to be they way there are. What does matter now is what can compassionate people do to help those less fortunate.

Contacting the schools and churches can help put you in touch with families that are in need.
@ John Mac…. Many people are helping to keep their culture alive. A proud nation does not lose it’s culture. No government cannot take away what lives indie our hearts.
Thank you all for caring and wanting to help. Please share whatever information you receive with other kind hearted people, that that may understand and help.

How can I help Robert and Louise Clifford? Is their any way to help them directly? I do not want to go thru an organization. Please give us details.

These people are bright, intelligent and thirsting for more. Why must we, after all these years later hold them back? Are they that much a threat to our way of living? We may never be able to repay these people for the way they were treated all those years ago, but we can give them the tools they need to help themselves. After all, isn’t that what any self respecting person wants?

Hi Diane,
Great job. I’m glad you cared and did this piece, but don’t let the awareness drift away. How can we get people involved, work on the ideas you brought up to help the Lakota people see a future for themselves? I know Tye Pennington did some building on a reservation recently. But he can’t be the only one to get builders & volunteers together to help. Who out there is wanting to take on this great opportunity to really make a difference. Who can donate some scholarship money? Where are the celebrities/business people who start up businesses – these are the places we should look to. We talk about starting jobs in the USA, well Ralph Lauren, the American Flag is on many of your clothes, but where are they made, Jennifer Lopez, beautiful line of clothing, you say you remember where you came from, that roots are important, who makes your clothes? The Lakota were once sustained from the earth, now food that is given to them is making them unhealthy, yet Pres. Obama talks about fitness, & they have a garden at the White House, how about giving the Lakota supplies to start their own gardens/green house. Couldn’t seed/farm supply companies, John Deere, etc donate supplies, what about the Heifer program- to give chickens,cows,sheep etc, for food and to sell and to make things!! All you chefs out there, the next great chef – how about a scholarship for some of the kids to become a chef, start a restaurant, become a nutritionist? Dr.Oz!! (Be on the show) The possibilities are endless, don’t let our caring and giving end with the show. Think about the next item you purchase, do you really need it, could that money be donated. Every dollar really does count and there are reliable organizations that do give and provide for the people they represent. So let’s get creative folks, contact people who can help, let’s help change some lives. Cynthia

I am so sadden by what I ve have seen…@Morgan there is no amount of money the government can give to replace the oppression and despair of these people…. who live on American soil. I started a FB group Cloud of Dreams: Native Americans to educate as many people I can….I plan to contribute immensely…I want to see these children excel….we should rid old laws that prohibit financial growth for the people living on reservations.

I too would like to help the Lakota Sioux, I lived in Montana for awhile and visited the St. Labre School in Ashland, it too needs help. There are children there that cannot go home in the winter because they lack jackets and warm socks and boots and their homes are too far away.
I wish you could post an address to where the donations would go directly to the schools there at Pine Ridge instead of to some organization where it goes other places and not where needed.
Also, it is time we Americans start helping our own and stop sending all of this foreign aid to other countries, let’s help those who are the true Americans…………………..

Just for the comment………both Dakota and Montana always run an over abundant deer and elk heard population throughout the states…….if the federal government / Game Fish and Parks Dept. established harvested meat contracts between the big game hunters>local Indian owned butcher shops>to the reservation meat lockers>free food / meat pick up by the locals..it would go a very long way through the wintering months.

I am so glad that Diane did this program. Thanks Diane! I’m just a typical, ordinary gal from a little town in Illinois who has been facinated by the American Indian culture for most of my life. I am so ashamed and heartbroken for what has happened to the Indians. I truly wish I were a rich person so I could help establish business’ on the reservation to help them get things rolling. I hope that Diane is able to read all of these comments that people have left and with the clout that she has is able to apply some of these great ideas to the more fortunate as well as President Obama. And Morgan….your an idiot!

I watched this and then cried. The changes have to come within and the ones to do it are the Roberts. This has been going on for so long, the people seem to know no other way. I live in Canada and it is the same shameful situstion on our reserves. I’ve known about Pine Ridge since Wounded Knee. Here, there is plenty of government funding and discussions about what to do. This goes on and on and no changes ever seem to trickle down to these children. Why ? Are we going to discuss the past forever or should / could we turn the page and make life better for thsee children TODAY ?

It is important to know that all reservation life is controlled by the U.S. government. The system was set up in the late 1800′s and unfortunately has changed very little. Because of the antiquated legal structure that governs every aspect of reservation life, these people are like refugees. Think of the disorder and uncertainty of life on refugee camps in Europe following World War II – now extend that out since the late 1800′s and think of how many generations of people have grown up like that. If your ancestor was in one of those European refugee camps, think of what their lives and yours would have been like if they had been stuck there indefinitely.

And speaking from personal experience having grown up around the Nebraska/South Dakota border, when the Indians ventured off the reservation the neighboring white towns aren’t exactly hospitable towards them. For most of that history, Indians were not just treated “impolitely” they were beaten up, raped, stolen from, forbidden access to public accommodations like libraries, and local law enforcement seldom listened to them let alone prosecuted crimes perpetrated by whites against them – so it was not just the “refugee camp” life on the rez, it was also the very real threats of physical harm or worse if they traveled off the rez. What we see on these reservations today is a result of this history – stuck in isolation without progress, without prospects, and with a strong sense based on experience, that the outside world may be even more threatening…. try living this way for generations….

These people were once totally self-sufficient. U.S. government policies have made the reservations extremely difficult for private industry or businesses either to locate there or to start up there, and decades of attempts by tribal governments to get the U.S. to change its policies have fallen on deaf ears, so economically nothing changes. U.S. policy has made them beggars with little hope for anything better. If things are to change, the history of U.S. policies over the reservations and the relations with neighboring towns since the late 1800′s has to change.

Americans as a whole need to know and understand this history and update their perspectives on it if they truly want to help the situation.

Thank you Hanyetu Wanbli, I kept thinking how can this be????? I have heard in the past that the government controls to a large degree what the Native Americans are allowed to do on their own land. How can this be changed? What can we do?

A lot of good ideas to help were listed by Christi above. My thanks to Diane Sawyer and
20/20 for the program. If we don’t know about a situation we can’t help. I think Diane you should go back a couple times a year and up date us on 20/20 about how things are going for Robert and Louise and the school and that precious Principal who can’t leave the children and the whole community. Brad and Angie, Mr. Gates, Lady Gaga, Bono can you help????

I too was very touched by the 20/20 story of the Lakota children. It is a wonderful thing to feel compassion. To all of you who have responded, I say that you join me in writing our state Representatives to let them know we want change. Pass the word along. Not everyone has money or the skills to help these beautiful children, but we all have a voice. We need to stand up and be the voices for Robert and Louise and all the other children you face life with no hope. Get all your friends and family members to do the same. We can make a difference together. I am a school teacher from Florida and I am starting a book drive for Marnee White Wolf’s school.

MORGAN IS STUPID!! SHE DOESN’T HAVE THE BRAINS FOR COMPASSION OR HELPING OUT!!
SHE BRAGS THAT SHE LIVES BY ALL “THESE PEOPLE” BUT IT’S SO OBVIOUS THAT SHE’S JEALOUS!! RACIAL PREJUDICE AGAINST AMERICAN INDIANS IS ALIVE & WELL IN MORGAN’S HOUSE!!

Morgan, it is ridiculous to see someone post such stupidity. I honestly would like to know where we Native Americans get these government checks and free everything else. I’m Native American and so is my husband, we work hard as hell to get ahead but somehow manage to barely scrape by, and that is without having a drinking problem.If you weren’t so ignorant maybe someone would explain that we do not recieve checks from the government. Do your research, before speaking on something you have no idea about! We don’t want our children to grow up in poverty, or attend schools that do not have high education standards so we spend the gas money and time to take them to a different school yet try to teach them our Native American ways which aren’t offered in the school they attend. Perhaps you should spend time in the life of someone else and see how hard it is before you judge. This makes me sick that someone who claims to have “experience” makes such ignorant comments. Way to go! Your stupidity and ignorance has been made public.

robert, i hope yu reach your dreams oh and your really cute

As one woman said…we are more regulated than a nuclear facility….

most reservations look just like this….

just the other day went to our local post office and there was someone that had died by the road….most likely from hypothermia and alcoholism….

does that happen near your post office?

A few points lest anyone arrive at wrong conclusions based on this story:
1. Most Indian reservations are not like this. Pine Ridge is the one of the worst; it does not typify reservations or Indian tribes.
2. Indian people as a whole are not largely dysfunctional drunks/addicts. Most do not live on reservations.
3. Indians do not get handouts. Look at the economy of Pine Ridge: are they getting rich on handouts?
4. “How” is never a proper way for a non-tribal person to hail a Native American: it is an insult. We are not all Lakotas.

Thank you to ABC for this ABSOLUTELY WONDERFUL SPECIAL — PLEASE do many more on this same topic — and about all the different tribes and peoples — PLEASE keep this information flowing to the American people — there are SO many of us who TRULY CARE about Native Americans and want to see them and their lives COMPLETELY restored. I am ALWAYS amazed by the sheer strength of Native Americans — with all they have been through, the fact that they are still alive is a testament to their inner strength and beauty. And I am greatly heartened to see the resurgence of pride in the Native youth — and I so hope to see, in my lifetime, their GREAT IMPACT on this country and in this world!

I was so moved by this story that I sent $200 hard earned dollars to the kiddos at Pine Ridge through the link on 20/20. Today I found that my credit card was charged by Urban Ministries, I assume for the children of Camden, N.J. How disheartening. No wonder all the folks on the blog asked for a direct route thru which to donate because they don’t trust organizations. Point made. I know 20/20 meant well and wanted to assist the efforts to help but this certainly didn’t turn out well. I would like to buy a new trailer for Robert’s family to live in. Sure hope I can make a trusted contact to do so. Thanks for the wonderful story, Diane. Please follow up at some point in the future so we can know what has happened with these precious children.

There is another organization that truly has made an impact on the lives of so many people on the Pine Ridge Reservation. Giving back to Wounded Knee is a non-profit and you will find it if you google or bing it. I would love to give more information, anpo_wicahpi2u at yahoo dot com.

what about us

I’ve been thinking about responding to this TV show ever since it first aired. Like many other viewers, I cried through most of the show. My tears were not only for the children who live under those conditions, but also for the knowing that that type of poverty is now generational & often simply tolerated because, in the words of a Navajo friend, Dennis, “we have lost hope that anything will ever change.” I had the opportunity to live & work on the Navajo reservation for three years. I was not a teacher working for the Bureau of Indian Education or a doctor working for Indian Health Services. I worked for the Bureau of Indian Affairs in Fire Management, with the Navajo Scouts & the Navajo Hotshots. I was gratefully accepted by my co-workers as an Anglo with a good heart. Although I arrived there with a romanticized vision of what it would be like to live & work on the rez, I left with a wiser & heavier heart. I didn’t feel like I could ever do enough to help the Native Americans. Once when I made a comment to another Navajo friend, Teresa, how I wished I had enough money to bring electricity & plumbing to her sheepherder aunt’s remote home, Teresa & her aunt looked at each other & then back at me as though to ask “why”? In that case, the aunt was perfectly content to haul water & have a gas lantern light up her nights. In that moment, I realized I had a LOT to learn about reservation life.

But I also learned there is often just as much corruption (and nepotism) within the Tribal governments as there is within the federal government. When my friend told me he’d given up, he meant he’d lost hope that any agency would take care of them & make things better. “Walk in Beauty” to him had become “Walk Without Hope.” There was also a huge dichotomy on the Navajo rez between holding the land sacred & using it as a dumping ground. I can’t tell you how much broken glass (usually liquor bottles) I picked up or how many times we found old appliances & furniture, once even a mobile home, abandoned out in the beautiful woods. Another Navajo friend, Darryl, told me he didn’t realize that kind of dumping was wrong until he was in his teens.

I believe the thinking should shift from “who can we blame” to “who will take responsibility.” Although it is up to each individual to take responsibility for their own life, the children need healthy guidance & role models. They need to know that violence, gang life or suicide is not the answer. I applaud those Native Americans who take in all of those children and try to do just that, or who find the courage to leave the rez for a time to get a higher education to bring back to the rez, or who want to carry on cultural traditions even amid a fast-changing, ever-encroaching world. That is proof that not everyone gives up or gives in to alcohol, and that, yes, the warrior spirit is still very much alive.

There is so much more to this story, as on all reservations, & I would love to see ABC News investigate why the BIA, the BIE, & IHS aren’t doing more for the Native Americans as they are supposed to be (the school s, housing, health care, food, business opportunities). Someone needs to hold those agencies, as well as the Tribal governments who are failing their own people, accountable. I would also love to see you do a piece on the Native American firefighters, some who have done it for decades. That firefighting work is often the only work some of those folks get all year. And as for those college graduates you also featured recently who have a lot of student loan debt? The feds will forgive some of that if you go to the rez & work at the schools or the hospitals. If the feds expanded that program to include other career paths, perhaps both the Native Americans & those debt-burdened college grads could benefit. Just saying…

What they need is infrastructure! The U.S. government doesn’t allow this. How can they work without it. They need a purpose. The U.S. government took this from them. They are told what they can and cannot do. They are given food that is unhealthy and causes diabetes. Trust me- the government is doing nothing good for these beautiful people. It is a sad, sad situation.