Imagine for a moment: New York Governor David Paterson finds himself in the 11th hour of a controversy involving an African-American group exerting its fundamental rights against the State of New York. He turns to Mayor Bloomberg for advice, thinking the mayor may have a promising diplomatic strategy to suggest. Instead, the mayor quips, “Get a white robe and piece of rope, and show them who’s boss – now that would be a great video!” Shock. Outrage from all corners. Marching in the streets. Political heads roll.

The real shock and outrage is that Bloomberg recently made essentially the same statements about Native Americans, and no one raised an eyebrow. Last week, in response to the governor’s request for guidance on how to deal with the sensitive issue of the sale of tax-free cigarettes on sovereign Indian lands within New York state, the mayor suggested he cowboy up. With the diplomatic grace of a wrangler hunting Indian scalps, his government-to-government negotiation advice was: “You know, get yourself a cowboy hat and a shotgun. If there’s ever a great video, it’s you standing in the middle of the New York State Thruway saying, you know, ‘Read my lips – the law of the land is this, and we’re going to enforce the law.’” Brilliant.

via Indianz.Com:

One of the most iconic images of the transition between traditional Pueblo life and the drumbeat of modern times was snapped by a young fellow delivering groceries here in 1954.

Lee Marmon was helping his father, Hank, run the Laguna Trading Post in the 1940s and ’50s while he taught himself photography with a boxy Graflex Speed Graphic and a book on film developing. He shot a lot of weddings on the weekends and grabbed his camera and ran whenever news happened — a car wreck on Route 66, Hollywood producer Mike Todd’s plane crash in the Zuni Mountains.

And at the urging of his dad, who anticipated that the railroad, the paved highway and the worldly veterans returning from World War II would alter Pueblo life, Marmon took his camera along as he made his grocery deliveries to Laguna’s elders.

“Get their pictures,” his dad told him, “before they’re gone.” So he asked his customers and the elders he spotted sunning on adobe walls whether he could make a portrait.”