Wednesday, July 19, 2006

Fire Thunder In...Out...In...and Now Finally (?) Out Again

The sad and silly case of pro-abortion advocate Cecelia Fire Thunder just won't go away...until maybe now.

You know the course of events so far -- Fire Thunder, who was the tribal president of the Oglala Sioux, responded to the South Dakota legislature's move to ban abortion by promising to start an abortion clinic on the reservation. But the tribal council stepped in and, after a temporary ouster of Fire Thunder, made it a permanent move by a formal impeachment. At least they thought it was permanent. But, like elsewhere in America, a judge (Lisa Adams) stepped in and decided to overrule the decision of the Oglala's elected representatives and, with a resounding bang of her gavel, reinstalled Fire Thunder.

But catch this! Yesterday, Adams vacated her order after it was pointed out (gently, I'm sure) that she had no authority whatsoever to issue an injunction against the tribe or one of its officials. Wow. It turns out that the democratically-elected tribal council of the Oglala Sioux will not "suffer fools gladly" nor will they allow judges to willy-nilly rule them from the bench.

Shouldn't the rest of us learn a lesson here?