Cliven Bundy Victorious? - Politics Forum.org | PoFo

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#14877977
Here is the article I read this morning in the LA Times:

http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-bun ... story.html

It started four years ago, when Cliven Bundy and his sons refused to pay federal grazing fees and stared down government agents in an armed standoff outside their Nevada ranch.

The Bundys dared the federal government to arrest them. The government did, charging them with a range of felonies.

On Monday, a federal judge in Las Vegas set them free.

The decision left federal prosecutors swallowing another defeat at the hands of a family whose defiance has become a rallying cry for Westerners who believe the federal government has no business managing public land. Four times now — in high-profile cases in Nevada and Oregon — the Bundy family and its allies have beaten the federal government in court.


I don't really have a dog in this fight, so I don't particularly care for the outcomes of this event per se; however, it does seem that the Bundy family has shown itself to be a force to be reckoned with. The last American cowboys with brass balls. They stood up to Federal forces by an armed show of force and later made an armed take over of a federal facility, all based on their belief that their inalienable rights as ranchers were infringed, and then they win a string of victories in courts.

Where does this go from here PoFo?
#14878004
It's interesting (well, actually it isn't) how having an armed standoff with the government and then engaging in an armed takeover of a federal facility is seen as the act of an honest patriot, but peacefully protesting against an oil pipeline on Native American land is treated like a terrorist insurrection, complete with attack dogs, pepper spray and the National Guard. :|
#14878006
They were traitors and should have been treated as such.
#14878009
What about the court rulings though? It seems interesting that this last case was thrown out on the grounds that the due process rights of the bundy family had been violated and it does seem like the Feds were engaged in some shady shit....

Heisenberg wrote:It's interesting (well, actually it isn't) how having an armed standoff with the government and then engaging in an armed takeover of a federal facility is seen as the act of an honest patriot, but peacefully protesting against an oil pipeline on Native American land is treated like a terrorist insurrection, complete with attack dogs, pepper spray and the National Guard.


I've only seen this sentiment on the part of tea-party types, not on the part of almost any MM outlet (or anyone on here so far for that matter). I don't think Clive Bundy is viewed by most Americans as the next Paul Revere. That seems like a bit of an overstated double-standard......besides they were encountered with armed federal agents, snipers, and the whole sha-bang, so we can talk about the "degree" of response to each incident, but both were responded to with shows of force by the federal government, so to act as if one didn't and one did is a bit deceptive. Both "protests" were treated seriously by Federal agents.

I am curious about the whys in all of this.

Why have the Bundy boys succeeded in court and in their armed confrontations?

Is it because the Federal government was actually in the wrong?

Or is it because they slipped through the cracks because of federal sloppiness?

Did the courts bend under political pressure from right-wingers (which seems doubtful to me),

or is there some sort of Constitutional precedent, whether correct or not, that the bundys have been able to hide behind for protection?

I am genuinely curious cause this case and on-going drama is just so.......odd, and whether you like it or not....its about as uncanny of an American and wild wild west story as we could hope for in 2018. Its amazing really.
#14878012
As mentioned in the thread about this, the outcome was written before the action was taken.

The laws of the market are more important than the facade of the public good.

When some millionaire ranchers go on to public land and demand it be distributed to the extremely wealthy, who is going to object?

The Republicans fell all over themselves to endorse the idea, and the Democrats gave a silent and tacit support to their masters's interests.

The extremely wealthy licked their chops, and though the local community in Oregon was overwhelmingly against them, they were safely discarded and the big interests moved in to save the Bundys.

In Oregon the only charges brought up were whether the Bundys intimidated Federal workers, and Federal workers were not allowed to testify about having been intimidated. No other charges were allowed to be brought forward.

It was obvious, to me, months before that this would be the result.
#14878016
The Immortal Goon wrote:When some millionaire ranchers go on to public land and demand it be distributed to the extremely wealthy, who is going to object?


Wasn't the objection to the federal ownership an aside to the actual reason for the protest which was paying federal grazing fees and later with the charge of arson because of an unauthorized controlled burn?

Sure, these guys oppose federal ownership of lands, so what? There are plenty of non-millionaries that also don't like public ownership like this, but the actual complaints seem a bit more specific on the part of the Bundy clan.

Likewise, its not like all of those one-percenter cowboys got anything out of this, the federal lands are still federal lands, you almost write as if this land ended up being given to the bundy boys and their buddies. It hasn't.

Undoubtedly, a large rancher will have a net worth in the millions soley on the basis of how many heads of cattle he has and how much acreage he owns, but this is a bit deceptive. My father-in-law owns 500 acres and a large grain farm and lives quite poorly even though based on property and equipment value he would be considered a net-worth millionaire. Despite this net worth, he lives in a double-wide mobile home and can't rub two pennies together on a given Sunday....I'm not saying the bundies are a 1-to-1 correlation to my father-in-law on this, but you seem to unqualifiedly put them in a category with Koch brothers. It doesn't seem to be the same thing and I don't think most Americans would quantify it in that manner either, especially if it is a multi-generation farming family.

The Immortal Goon wrote:In Oregon the only charges brought up were whether the Bundys intimidated Federal workers, and Federal workers were not allowed to testify about having been intimidated. No other charges were allowed to be brought forward.


Why was this?

The Immortal Goon wrote:It was obvious, to me, months before that this would be the result.


This is an odd claim, though this whole thing seems a tad conspiratorial and is drenched in your dialectic, it seems that labeling this a foregone conclusion was a bit presumptuous and even a blind squirrel will find a nut every once in awhile. The Federal government, like any rancher or business, has a payroll to meet and has a vested interested in maintaining power structures as they exist. Why would it be in their interests to merely concede in this battle? Perhaps you can explain this to me.
#14878030
Victoribus Spolia wrote:Wasn't the objection to the federal ownership an aside to the actual reason for the protest which was paying federal grazing fees and later with the charge of arson because of an unauthorized controlled burn?


Sure, the Bundys wanted to functionally own the land rather than pay the public for use of the public's land. And so far as the arson charges, the Hammonds wanted nothing to do with the Bundys and publically denounced them. Also, so far as the Hammonds are concerned, the charges were for starting fires to assist in poaching.

Sure, these guys oppose federal ownership of lands, so what? There are plenty of non-millionaries that also don't like public ownership like this, but the actual complaints seem a bit more specific on the part of the Bundy clan.


The complaints basically all boil down to the idea that they, and other wealthy interests (mining interests come up often) should be able to have public lands for free.

Likewise, its not like all of those one-percenter cowboys got anything out of this, the federal lands are still federal lands, you almost write as if this land ended up being given to the bundy boys and their buddies. It hasn't.


They got a walk after taking over a federal facility with force of arms. And their buddies are getting what they want.

It's, perhaps, also worth noting the company that the Bundys kept before the Oregon incident, is probably well different than that of your father:

SPLC wrote:as was widely publicized, Jerad and Amanda Miller, a couple who had spent time at the Bundy ranch during the standoff, executed two police officers inside a Las Vegas pizza parlor in early June. Leaving a Gadsden “Don’t Tread on Me” flag, a note saying the revolution had begun and a swastika on the officers’ bodies, the Millers went on to murder another man before dying in a shootout with police. Months earlier, Jerad Miller was photographed with former Arizona Sheriff Richard Mack, a prominent antigovernment activist who also visited the Bundy ranch.


Undoubtedly, a large rancher will have a net worth in the millions soley on the basis of how many heads of cattle he has and how much acreage he owns, but this is a bit deceptive. My father-in-law owns 500 acres and a large grain farm and lives quite poorly even though based on property and equipment value he would be considered a net-worth millionaire. Despite this net worth, he lives in a double-wide mobile home and can't rub two pennies together on a given Sunday....I'm not saying the bundies are a 1-to-1 correlation to my father-in-law on this, but you seem to unqualifiedly put them in a category with Koch brothers. It doesn't seem to be the same thing and I don't think most Americans would quantify it in that manner either, especially if it is a multi-generation farming family.


The Bundys (allegedly) do.

And, as reported, the big swamp businesses took a bug chunk out of public land for themselves. Here's an article with citations.

This is an odd claim, though this whole thing seems a tad conspiratorial and is drenched in your dialectic, it seems that labeling this a foregone conclusion was a bit presumptuous and even a blind squirrel will find a nut every once in awhile.


It is hardly a conspiracy to recognize that the general point of capitalism is to make as much money as possible by spending as little as possible in able to get as large of a profit as possible.

And it was hardly a stretch of an analysis when politicians were falling over themselves to say as much:

Marco Rubio wrote:And I agree that there is too much federal control over land, especially out in the western part of the United States,” the Florida senator told Iowa radio station KBUR. “There are states, for example, like Nevada that are dominated by the federal government in terms of land holding, and we should fix it, but no one should be doing it in a way that’s outside the law.


Rand Paul wrote:I’m sympathetic to the idea that the large collection of federal lands ought to be turned back to the states and the people, but I think the best way to bring about change is through politics,” Paul told The Washington Post. “That’s why I entered the electoral arena. I don’t support any violence or suggestion of violence toward changing policy.


Ted Cruz wrote:Eight-five percent of Nevada is owned and regulated by the federal government,” Cruz says in a new TV ad, with tense, thriller-movie music playing in the background. “And Donald Trump wants to keep big government in charge. That is ridiculous. You, the people of Nevada, not Washington bureaucrats, should be in charge of your own land. If you trust me with your vote, I will fight day and night to return full control of Nevada’s lands to its rightful owners, its citizens. Count on it.” (Watch the ad below.)

Cruz’s appeal comes directly from Bundy’s playbook, which presents the U.S. government as the scourge of Western ranchers and a monolithic authority that has no right to the vast lands it controls. Bundy, a Nevada rancher whose sons Ammon and Ryan led the takeover early this year of Oregon’s Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, is part of the Sovereign Movement. These militant activists, writes Forbes magazine, consider the U.S. government “an illegitimate sham.” In 2014, during an armed showdown with the U.S. Bureau of Land Management over grazing rights on federal land in Nevada, Bundy claimed to have had “a revelation from God that his supporters are to disarm the BLM and National Park Service, and to tear down the toll booth at Lake Mead.”


Donald Trump wrote:I think what I’d do, as president, is I would make a phone call to whoever, to the group,” he said, adding later, “I’d talk to the leader. I would talk to him and I would say, ‘You gotta get out — come see me, but you gotta get out.


And more specifically, his campaign:

[url]Trump's campain[/url] wrote:The head of veterans’ group founded by Donald Trump’s presidential campaign voiced hearty support for the armed militia currently occupying an Oregon wildfire refuge, a fight the billionaire Republican has said has gone on too long.

Jerry DeLemus, co-chair of Veterans for Trump in New Hampshire, said in a Tuesday interview with Reuters that Bundy and his allies have already seen “great success” in their fight against the “thug-like, terroristic” efforts of the federal government to wrest control of public lands from local ranchers.

DeLemus traveled to visit the occupation in Burns, Oregon earlier this month, and concluded the self-styled militia’s cause is “peaceful” and “constitutionally just.” According to Reuters, DeLemus also spent a month in 2014 at the Nevada ranch of Cliven Bundy, who staged his own armed showdown with the federal government over public grazing lands.

Despite Trump’s earlier remarks that “you have to maintain law and order, no matter what” and “you cannot let people take over federal property,” DeLemus said he wants the GOP frontrunner to know “the whole story.”

“It’s my intention to ensure that he has the whole story,” he said. “I think it’ll really arouse him, and once he understands, I wouldn’t be surprised to see him heading out West.”


Among others.

The Democrats were less vocal, but muzzled the state of Oregon from doing anything about being invaded by a milita from another state.

And it's not difficult to guess the reason why a bunch of politicians would line up behind their pay masters at the expense of the American people's property. Is it?

The Federal government, like any rancher or business, has a payroll to meet and has a vested interested in maintaining power structures as they exist. Why would it be in their interests to merely concede in this battle? Perhaps you can explain this to me.


You imagine that there is a difference, a tension between the Federal government and the people that created, fund, and run the Federal government. Most BLM land was only in the government's hands because nobody else wanted it at the time. For the most part, the Roosevelts and others ended up putting it to use--almost entirely as military and research, though also as Indian lands. Recreation became a a big part of it, and this was generally pushed by the senators from these areas (that run the feds) as it helped conjure up tourist dollars for local businesses.

But now that there are more people in the West, the big companies are just as happy to crush the local businesses, end the research, and grab what they can from the public (and the Indians).

We can go ahead and debate whether this is an okay thing or not, whether land that you collectively own with everyone else should be given to the richest guy in the room for free, but let's not pretend that this isn't what's happening.
User avatar
By Ter
#14878037
The case got thrown out by the judge because the prosecution did not share some of the evidence with the defence.
As such it was a technicality, not anything to do with the guilt or innocence of those ranchers.
User avatar
By 4cal
#14878316
Victoribus Spolia wrote:Here is the article I read this morning in the LA Times:

http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-bun ... story.html



I don't really have a dog in this fight, so I don't particularly care for the outcomes of this event per se; however, it does seem that the Bundy family has shown itself to be a force to be reckoned with. The last American cowboys with brass balls. They stood up to Federal forces by an armed show of force and later made an armed take over of a federal facility, all based on their belief that their inalienable rights as ranchers were infringed, and then they win a string of victories in courts.

Where does this go from here PoFo?



I don't know much about the case but this struck me in your link:

"The four defendants were charged with threatening a federal officer, carrying and using a firearm, and engaging in conspiracy. "

Not sure why the feds would bring charges on to something that would be so cut-and-dried...either there was a threat or not; a firearm was used or not....proving a conspiracy is a bit more tricky of course. I imagine this will be an outlier in terms of the struggle between ranchers and the authorities. The Bundys are the types of people who support Trump so there won't be any more shade thrown at them until we get a serious person back in office.
#14878331
Ter wrote:The case got thrown out by the judge because the prosecution did not share some of the evidence with the defence.
As such it was a technicality, not anything to do with the guilt or innocence of those ranchers.


The justice system is corrupt!
#14878341
Decky wrote:Terrorist scum, should have got the electric chair.


Agreed. That family are terrorist scum. That federal land he freeloaded on is owed and maintained by MY tax dollars.

fuck you Cliven, and your dirty Moron ways (yea, i went there)


Edit: I meant to type Mormon, not Moron. :lol:

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