So I wrote on facebook yesterday the following messages…PLEASE READ TO END ESPECIALLY AT THE END ABOUT WHAT I CONSIDER OUR GREATEST WEAPON
“I haven’t talked about the bundy ranch issue at all since it started. Here are my thoughts…. 1) Cleven does owe fees for the use of the land. I do not agree with fed control of “public lands” within any state, those lands should be made common use BY each state through the consent of said state citizens, however he does owe the fees, but closer to 300k and not a million.
Cont. I understand why he stopped paying those fees for lands the govt said he could no longer use. 2) Public lands are not public lands, they are in essence federal government lands, due to the fact the government and not the voting citizens make decisions on what can be used on them, etc
Cont. 3) Environmental policy within the govt is dictated to by extremists. There is a concerted effort to push out family ranches who have grazed these lands for generations in favor of “no cattle at all”. The govt cannot just say no cattle so they collude with environmental organizations to bring lawsuits and then settle with with them so that the policy is court ordered and they can hide behind judges.
Cont. Most of those who claim cattle destroy the habitat forget that millions of bison roamed those areas for tens of thousands of years. Hoofed animals devouring everything, trodding every square inch of ground and filling those valleys with manure were and are a natural part of the environment, vital to growth and sustainability
Cont. It is laughable that many of these environ groups are small, comprised of people who are paid 6 figures a year, but claim non profit status because they get donations from portland and seattle, but own massive houses and have the gall to claim they are doing it all for the protection of the earth. They sow fear and say cattle are bringing the apocalypse In conclusion I stand with the bundy’s however those going down there from the militia movement, oathkeepers and individual patriots should be careful. Having weapons is fine but if I was there I would keep my AR unloaded with a barrel block in it. If the govt wanted to fire on me then they would be guilty of murder, and the govt couldn’t claim self defense but would be seen for what they are, thugs”
I want to clarify as I feel that I was not able to properly elaborate on my thoughts within the text limits of facebook…I also know I will be pissing some people off, but out of respect and intellectual honesty read the whole piece. If you still don’t agree that is fine, you can even argue with me in the comments and I will answer your questions, etc.
Cliven is right and wrong
Mr. Bundy is right in that his family has worked and grazed that land long before the BLM ever existed, he claims that his prior usage rights exempt him from federal law and give him near ownership over those lands because his family grazed them over 100+ years. He Is wrong in these ways…
1) Prior usage rights are not well established and as far as i can tell are more in the realm of patent/trademark law and in some instances Water Rights, however these prior usage water rights issues regard private property and patented water rights claims, not grazing on non private land.
2) The BLM is relatively new, but prior to that the Land was administered by the GENERAL LAND OFFICE, officially established in 1812, and Bundy’s Family has only been there since 1870, which would not predate the GLO which was succeeded by the BLM. The GLO dealt with the Homestead Act and the Preemption act that dealt specifically among other things the collection of taxes and fees for grazing on public lands, which is the heart of this case.
3) Mr. Bundy says he owes the money to the State of Nevada not the BLM, while I am a believer in States rights and that the states SHOULD take the land back from the Federal Government, and the Feds should have NO jurisdiction over land within a state (i.e. public lands), the issue here in that regard is with the STATE OF NEVADA and not the Federal Government. The State of Nevada did not step in and say we want to administer this land, they are Nevadan lands and Not the Federal Governments business, they have been silent. The Nevada Constitution specifically states that they “forever disclaim all right and title to the unappropriated public lands lying within said territory, and that the same shall be and remain at the sole and entire disposition of the United States.” That means all public lands are within the Federal Jurisdiction. People should be marching on Carson City to make the State leaders grow a pair and take back the rightful land of the people of Nevada.
4) Mr. Bundy is right and wrong about the overreaction of the BLM, they did make a big show of force, they wanted to send a message, however it was not as if he lost his case on friday and they showed up Saturday morning, this had been going on for 20+ years, sooner or later he had to know they would show up, it just so happened it was this month.
WHY ARE PEOPLE SHOWING UP IN SUPPORT?
People are showing up in support for one main reason, It is not because this is a clear cut and dry case of a man being bullied by the Feds, that they asked him to not have his cattle on the land last week and he just found out about it and they sent in the goon squads, this has been LONG ongoing and it was not unlikely this day would come, frankly im surprised it took 20 years. People are showing up because frankly the are sick and tired of the BS from the Federal Government. They are sick of being taxed to death, being force to buy things they don’t want, watching their dollar buy less and less every year because the government wants it to, fighting endless wars, being spied on, being treated like criminals and children.
They are just sick and tired. This resentment has been boiling for decades now and is now coming to a head. They heard partial truths and even if they were aware of the whole story all that mattered was that the same people that have been stealing from them and their children’s future were trying to take this mans cattle; whether he was right or wrong, many just wanted to show up and say (pardon the language) FUCK YOU FEDERAL GOVERNMENT! YOU CAN TAKE AND TAKE AND TAKE, BUT TODAY YOU WILL NOT! I cant take credit this insight, I felt that this resentment was a driving factor, but Jack Spirko of the Survival Podcast really crystallized it for me in his latest podcast.
WHY IS THIS NOT THE RIGHT FIGHT?
This is not a cut and dry situation, and in many ways Mr. Bundy is as much to blame as the Feds for this escalation. Personally as wrong as Mr. Bundy might be, I dont think the Feds have the right to administer land within a state, and that if the Desert Tortoise is so important than why are companies that Senators sons represent somehow ‘finding’ that the habitat of that tortoise no longer extends into their areas planned for development, even though prior to that they had? Does it just take a few million dollars and good connections that a rancher doesn’t have to ‘find’ that the tortoise doesn’t live there anymore?
With that being said, yes there is corruption within the political system, but if the disparate patriot movement wants to plant its flag for a cause, we need to do it smart, we need to think politically, not everything WE think that is the next Lexington and Concorde, will or would be seen by the public as such. Most people are turned off by politics or pissed off that i would mention we shouldn’t help Mr. Bundy purely because its not a PR win, well folks you may not like politics, but that is what wins wars and more importantly hearts and minds of our fellow citizens… IT DOESNT MATTER WHAT WE THINK, IT MATTERS WHAT THE PUBLIC VIEWS IT AS.
Personally I would wait for a better opportunity, the equivalent of stealing candy from a sick baby. A better cause would be to stop a drug raid on someone growing pot for their terminally ill kid, something that would make people say “I always thought those militia guys were wackos, but shit, this kid cant survive without this and they are defending him against a government that wants him to spend the little time he has left in pain and agony.”
THE MOST POWERFUL TOOL WE HAVE
A second course of action would be, and one that i talked about in the facebook post. You see that little yellow thing above? That could be THE MOST POWERFUL WEAPON ANYONE COULD HAVE AT THE BUNDY RANCH
WHY? If everyone there had one in their weapon, it would be visible to all, and render the weapon completely unfireable as long as it was inserted, this prevents a round from being chambered and is used at ranges and in the military to publicly show your weapon is unloaded. If the feds come back and everyone is standing there with their weapons, a symbolic act of defiance, and the Feds shot, well that would be splattered all over the news that the feds killed people who had weapons that could not be fired. Sure there would be many in the Mainstream media that would say “well they still had weapons that could have fired, and they were menacing militia guys”…Sure that will happen.
However here are the three scenarios that will play out if the Feds show back up…
1) The militia and supporters back off and say they don’t want to fight. I doubt that, all it will take is one guy to raise his weapon, the feds shoot him and everyone else starts shooting in defense. A bloodbath.
2) The feds show up and there is a battle. The Main Stream Media and the Obama/Bloomberg Machine will use it as a reason NO civilian should have an assault weapon and get EVERYONE who supported the Bundy Ranch, said they are a “Patriot”, on watch lists. Every facebook post where you said “I’m a Patriot” would be looked at and you would end up on a terrorist watch list. This is the real danger of this, and don’t think the Feds WOULDN’T push a confrontation knowing this would make the outcome of an outright ban a near cinch. The Patriot, small government movement would be cast back 20 years into the realm of Montana Freemen and pipe bomb whacko’s Folks we do not have 20 years to make up any lost ground, this is why i don’t think the Bundy ranch is a good first “line in the sand” for us, its not cut and dry and for the little bit of satisfaction we got from seeing the BLM drive off, we could lose much much more.
3) Everyone does what i mentioned above, they have their rifles, they look “scary” and the media uses the “militia” moniker to scare all those good people in Portland. However if they fire and kill and injure 10-20 people all of whom were captured on camera with chamber blocks in their rifles, it would be a win. Those dead would not have gone out in the glory that novels speak of, firing the first shots heard round the world, etc. But they would do more for the cause than anything. They would show the country that the Feds are what we know they are, bullies, thugs, no better than mafia family enforcers. They would be shown as murderers, they would show the country that those “Militia” gun nuts that they were so scared of, took the high road, they had no way to defend themselves, they took the path of peaceful resistance, and were shot by our own government.
I want to also say I am not denigrating the honor of those men and women who showed up, I am an Oathkeeper myself, and i consider all of them their my political brothers and sisters, i have a high degree of respect for them to drop everything and show up to fight for what they think is right, and they are not wrong to thing the Feds are wrong. I believe we have long crossed any line in the sand that the government should have ever been able to step over, so i understand the need and want to draw a new one right here right now and say “You have been stepping over every constitutional line for decades since this countries inception, it stops now!”
But damn’t why draw that line at the wrong time and lose, when we can make the right decision at the right time in the right place and do it right? Those are just my two cents. let me know what you think.
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