Via the Raw Story, we learn that the heavily armed Bundy ranch deadbeats continue to hold sovereign citizen circle jerks out in the desert. Enough with these militia clowns already.
If I appropriated a federal preserve to run my business and told the tax man to fuck off, the authorities would toss my ass in jail faster than you could say, “Orange is the new cracker.” And if they had to shoot my dogs and drop a flash grenade in my kid’s bed to take me in, they wouldn’t hesitate to do so.
I get that the feds are trying to avoid another Ruby Ridge or Waco by treading lightly, but the only reason these militia kooks are getting away with thumbing their nose at the feds is because they are strutting around with a lot of big guns. Failing to confront them validates their crackpot narrative that they need guns to intimidate the government.
We — and by “we,” I mean the citizens of the United States and the federal government we elected — cannot allow that shit to stand. It’s past time to drop the hammer on those assholes.
Baud
I prefer the end of summer. Let them roast in the Nevada sun for a while.
OzarkHillbilly
I do wonder what is going on.
Baud
@OzarkHillbilly:
How does Bundy finance his Ranch? It could be they’re waiting for him to run out money.
Mustang Bobby
Sounds like it’s time for John McCain and Lindsay Graham to call in some airstrikes. After all, these are a bunch of insurgents in the desert; isn’t that what turns them on?
MattF
On the other hand, marching around in the desert surrounded by lunatics with big guns sounds like something Dante would have thought up for one of the Circles of Hell.
tybee
cut off their electricity. block the roads. swipe the cattle.
they’ll give up in a few weeks when the food runs out.
low-tech cyclist
It’s past time to round these loons up and toss them in jail. Either the government of the United States governs these lands or it doesn’t. If it does, it needs to assert that authority over those who refuse to acknowledge it. If it doesn’t, then there’s a small independent feifdom in Nevada that’s successfully seceded from the United States.
Baud
@tybee:
We can send in Thad Cochran to deal with the cattle.
Schlemizel
A lot of big talk. These are people who are beyond reason and heavily armed. The government does not want to have another Waco or Ruby Ridge to inflame other murderous assholes so it is not going to send armed forces into that shit hole. So lets stop with the mindless, domestic John McCain act.
So what are we going to do about it? Hopefully the BLM, BAFT and FBI or whatever have a plan that involves letting them peter out on their own, perhaps take assets like bank accounts from the Bundys and wait them out. Its not as satisfying as a blood drenched gun battle but it might prevent the next Timmy McVey from being motivated to kill a bunch of daycare kids in retaliation.
askew
I’m pretty baffled as to how Bundy got away with not paying taxes for years without repercussion. I agree that the Feds are worried it will turn into a Waco situation so are treading lightly. Not sure that sends a very good message though. It almost encourages other crazy people to follow in Bundy’s footsteps.
David Koch
unleash the drones, Mr President
OzarkHillbilly
@Baud: That is one of the many things I wonder about. They should have liens on everything he owns right down to his last paper clip. Sell a cow? Who’s going to buy it? Another is surveillance. Surely they know and are personally acquainted with each and every gun nut out there, their addresses, their employers, their nannies, etc. And of course they have infiltrated the place with informants, it is probably lousy with them and they should be sowing distrust left and right which should not be too terribly difficult in that bunch of paranoid schizophrenics.
So I wonder, and await the upcoming made for TV docudrama, “The Last Days of the Bundy Ranch.”
Baud
@OzarkHillbilly:
I think that’s all correct. And aside from operational planning, I bet there is a lot of coordination between federal, state, and local authorities and politicos, which adds to the delay. The fact that plans haven’t leaked yet suggests to me that everyone is taking this very seriously. (Or they could be doing nothing, but I think the fact that they are doing nothing would have leaked.)
WereBear
We think it’s stupid when SWAT goes in guns blazing. So if this is being handled in not-a-stupid manner, that’s an improvement, no?
They got Al Capone with accountants.
Betty Cracker
@Schlemizel: What a load of bullshit. A government that can be intimidated by a tiny group of armed kooks is a paper tiger. Did you know the BLM removed government markings from their vehicles so these assholes wouldn’t take potshots at them?
I don’t want a blood bath; I’d much prefer a peaceful surrender. But one way or another, these assholes need to be brought to heel, and pronto. That’s not McCain style belligerence; it’s Government 101.
Frankensteinbeck
It might be political. I dislike thinking of him playing these games, but Trollbama may want an example of what Confederate assholes conservatives are in everyone’s thoughts for the 2014 midterms. There is no one better at giving his enemies enough rope to hang themselves.
RosiesDad
I would send a couple of Army Apache helos and give them 90 seconds to stand down and disperse or become a large desert weenie roast. End of problem.
This might also disabuse militia morons that they can prevent the gubmint from coming for their guns.
Because Colin Powell was right. If you are going on the offensive, overwhelming force is the best card to play.
Betty Cracker
@WereBear: The militarization of local cops is a separate issue, IMHO. These militia clowns are openly intimidating US government agents with heavy weaponry.
cat
@Betty Cracker:
A minority can’t walk down the street in NYC without getting frisked, but a bunch of white guys in the desert can shoot at federal employees and the Feds are like, “My bad, let me take this emblem off my vehicle.”?
This is an armed revolt and America’s racism is the only thing keeping it from being called such.
Frankensteinbeck
After a few moments thought, I rescind even the suggestion this might be politics. Letting it drag out all the way to the midterms might get some BLM agents shot. The only thing I can recall Obama get really mad about was the suggestion he would let anyone working for him die if he could prevent it.
With that in mind, playing a confrontation like this slow and safe would be his style.
WereBear
@Betty Cracker: Yes, they are, and if we, the uninformed and untrained, cannot agree on the best course of action, I can only hope the experts have better arguing points.
And while I agree that “blowing them up real good” would be satisfying on some level, perp-walking would have much more of a deterrent effect.
This is a hostage situation, and it seems like it is being handled that way — perhaps properly, for once.
raven
@cat: Shoot when?
OzarkHillbilly
@Betty Cracker: Betty, I think it is safe to say that all of us here are a little frustrated with this situation. And yes, it does play into our anti Take-a-Gun-to-Work-Day movement, but it is a good thing, and I think you would agree, that we have a President who is mindful of the Laws of Unintended Consequences, unlike the last President.
Bobby Thomson
This is the president’s Fort Sumter moment and he is blowing it.
David Koch
Don’t worry. Sure, in 2013 800,000 minorities were stopped and frisked in NYC, some were brutally beaten, but thanks to yesterday’s Supreme Court ruling their cell phones are now off limits.
And in the end, isn’t that what really is important – not the vicious oppression of minorities, but the sanctity of white people’s sexting data.
Baud
@Bobby Thomson:
Hahaha. Obama needs to go all Lincoln and suspend habeas corpus.
David Koch
@OzarkHillbilly: I say “bring em on“
OzarkHillbilly
@David Koch: Perfect. :-)
Jeffro
@Mustang Bobby: “Like”
OzarkHillbilly
@David Koch: You forgot the sanctity of white people’s precious bodily fluids while flying.
Betty Cracker
@OzarkHillbilly: My point is there are unintended consequences involved in letting these kooks get away with armed insurrection for months on end too. The two dead cops in Vegas — ambushed and killed by Bundy ranch alums — are examples of unintended consequences.
JGabriel
Betty Cracker @ Top:
Seconded, Betty.
Quoted for truth, ’cause it bears repeating.
Patrick
Four things:
1) What’s the point of having laws that aren’t enforced? Either enforce it or change the law.
2) By not enforcing the law, the argument is to prevent another Waco or whatever. But, by not enforcing the law, you are also encouraging other people to copy Mr Bundy.
3) Can you imagine what the outcry would be on FoxNews if a black family were accused of defrauding our Welfare system? Yet, in this case, FoxNews with Sean Hannity referred to the white Bundy as a hero.
4) Republicans claim they are so very concerned about our deficit. Yet, here we have a perfect example of a guy who has refused to pay his legal share of fees for years. And the Republicans are defending him. Next time you hear a teabagger talk about our deficit, don’t believe them for a second.
raven
Yea kill the motherfuckers and let god sort it out. jesus
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@OzarkHillbilly: Agreed with you and Schlemizel.
The situation at the ranch hasn’t changed much since April (AFAIK). Yes, it is a bad situation and has encouraged kooks like the cop-killer couple. The people responsible must be held to account.
But a bad video by a LaRouchie is not a reason to drop the hammer now.
As Obama has been quoted as saying in response to his Iraq option plans – “And then what happens?” Swooping in with the National Guard, FBI, BLM, ATF and so forth and throwing all the militia kooks in jail might be satisfying, but it won’t end well even if there is no violence. It will feed the sickness.
There are smart ways to end this, and dangerous ways. Let’s see how the careful and slow plan goes. E.g. I wouldn’t be surprised if they were carefully cataloging the participants and watching them as they wander back home…
My $0.02.
Cheers,
Scott.
JGabriel
@Baud:
Or, it suggests that the local and/or state authorities and politicos aren’t in the loop. If I were in the planning stages of something like that, I wouldn’t trust anyone in the NV gov’t to keep it secret. The governor is a Republican and the NV GOP is riddled with Tea Party supporters.
OzarkHillbilly
@Betty Cracker: Yes, you are correct that the 2 dead policemen are consequences, but they are not unintended consequences of lack of action at the Bundy Ranch. They are the direct consequences (and I would argue intended) of the right wing rage machine.
I don’t know what the answer to that problem is. I am neither smart enough nor level headed enough, but I am certain that the inevitable feeding frenzy on the right which would ensue at the sight of bodies amid the desert scrub, especially if there were women and children among them, is not going to help.
WereBear
That’s what makes this situation so fraught; it has become, deliberately, politicized, and if it gets screwed up, all the fingers will be pointing at what is our only bulwark against being Ruled by Limbaugh, and I’m not risking that.
From what I’ve read about Hostage Theory, attrition is your friend. Yes, it’s perfectly legal to storm in there and arrest anyone still alive afterward, but it is exactly those kinds of situations which become rallying cries for more violence, just like the excuse for Oklahoma City was Ruby Ridge.
I know it doesn’t make sense and I know we’re dealing with idiots. That’s exactly the problem.
rk
I’m surprised they haven’t shot each other yet. They’re all crazy lunatics armed to the hilt. I really expected some kind of internal power struggle or a huge brawl with a good old fashioned western style shoot out. Pity it hasn’t happened yet.
El Caganer
So the cops break down my door, beat my ass into the ground, trash the place, kill my dog….then say, “Ooops. Wrong address. My bad.” And hey, you know, that’s really terrible, but shit happens and the Phillies are on at 7:05.
But if the Legion of Goober and I get strapped and get on the national teevee telling the Federal gummint to pound sand with a mallet, the response is for agents of said gummint to disguise their vehicles?
There’s a real disconnect here. Frankly, I think Bundy is right – show everybody you’re carrying, convince them you’re nuts, and you can get away with anything.
David Koch
While we’re at it – can’t we bomb the Russian for Crimea?
Sure, sanctions are actually working, laying siege and starving them out, as Putin is literally booed on the world stage while Obama receives deafening applause, but as Ambassador Veruca Salt said, “I want it now!“
Chris
I think cat @ 19 is closer to the truth. If the Occupy rallies had shown up packing this kind of heat, their protest areas would’ve become a free fire zone faster than you could say “Kent State,” and not with mace and flash bang grenades. Even more so the fast food worker rallies, and even more so any rally by nonwhite activists. Firepower alone has never deterred government action before.
No, it’s just the old “if they’re white and conservative, coddle the poor babies and wring your hands about how you must’ve offended them somehow, but if they’re nonwhite or race traitors, exterminate the brutes” double standard at play again. It’s always been this way.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@El Caganer: If you read the Wikipedia article (, and take it as accurate – I have no reason not to, myself), it doesn’t sound like he’s winning to me. E.g. his ranch is worthless as long as this goes on (any proceeds from a sale would be used to satisfy the judgements against him, etc.).
Let’s not go overboard. Bundy is losing. He’s a bitter old many with kooky beliefs. The fact that he isn’t in the news any more (it’s almost impossible to find a recent Las Vegas Sun story about him) is a good thing.
Cheers,
Scott.
Betty Cracker
@David Koch: That’s an apples-to-tire irons comparison. This isn’t about controlling what another country does to a third country, it’s about who governs a specific bit of territory within the US — the duly elected government or a bunch of militia kooks. Right now, it’s the militia kooks.
gene108
@Schlemizel:
So basically the fear of white right-wing terrorists is keeping the Feds from enforcing the law. Talk about white privilege.
Betty Cracker
@I’mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet: Here’s an excerpt from an NPR piece that was published less than 10 days ago:
Sounds like Bundy 1, US government 0 so far.
Patrick
@Betty Cracker:
I wonder when all the other rangers are going to stop paying their fees. Why should they have to when Bundy Bundy obviously doesn’t have to?
And what’s going to happen when some teabagger decides he doesn’t have to pay taxes anymore, gets other like-minded armed people to surround him and his area?
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@Betty Cracker: I think the important word is “still”. There isn’t any good reason to rush in now when there wasn’t in April. And rushing in in April (without planning for all contingencies) would have been a mistake.
Do you remember Waco? The wall-to-wall CNN coverage? The excuse to rush in at that particular time, without properly preparing for the various possibilities, was that children were at risk. Remember the Murrah Federal Building? McVeigh claimed he did it in response to Waco.
Letting our lizard brains push us into making rash decisions isn’t wise. Let’s let the experts work without being rushed because a LaRouchie makes our blood boil.
My $0.02.
Cheers,
Scott.
NotMax
@Betty Cracker
That’s more than a wee bit over the top.
Calling them “alums,” as if they were trained there to do what they did, is disingenuous. Evidence from all sides points to the two of them having been rejected and ejected.
The inherent presumption that an earlier resolution of the situation would have successfully stopped two clearly unbalanced people determined not only to act but to die while doing so is misguided. Those particular two cops might not have ended up being shot, and any shootings may not have happened on that particular day, but that an attack and shootings were planned, prepared and a goal remains true.
Did the Bundy situation push the two over the edge into lethal rampage? Possibly, but that they were a deluded pair yearning for that final push, indeed actively seeking it from any venue or source (whether real or imagined), seems undeniable.
@WereBear
Exactly so.
Shortstop
@David Koch: White — well, almost all. I did wonder yesterday just how much porn is on Nino’s and Clarence’s phones.
Cassidy
So who’s first? Breaching a door, perimeter, etc. sucks and is very uncomfortable; especially if you’re the first person in. So who volunteers?
Betty Cracker
@I’mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet: Maybe we should just wait until Bundy croaks of old age.
JGabriel
Shortstop:
Clarence Thomas’s cellphone porn collection consists of 179 fetish films of women in business suits carefully removing a pubic hair from a can of Coke(tm) and drinking it.
RobertDSC-Power Mac G5 Dual
Correct. A B-2 filled to capacity with 500 pound bombs should fly over the Bundy compound and drop them, Operation Arc Light style.
Betty Cracker
@NotMax: One of the two Vegas shooters appeared on a TV broadcast at the Bundy ranch threatening violence against the feds, weeks before they got kicked off the ranch and hatched their plot to kill the cops. Had the feds laid siege to that nest of kooks then, it’s a pretty good bet the shooter wouldn’t have been a position to ambush and kill the cops later.
NotMax
@Betty Cracker
Or have Sheldon Adelson pay the back fees and penalties owed?
/snark
Cervantes
Don’t just do something. Stand there.
gene108
@Chris:
Because McVeigh and Rudolph were not as much “loan wolf” types as they have been depicted. There are many potentially violent white supremacists in this country.
The USA also has a history of turning a blind eye to actively encouraging white supremacist terrorism. It is only in the last 50 years that the Federal government has gotten involved to root out the worst of the white supremacist groups.
Because of the history of condoning white supremacist terrorism, I think the U.S. has a much more tolerant, even a “boys will be boys”, attitude toward white right-wing terrorism. This can be seen in the media reaction to the Bundy ranch stand-off, the sympathy for the Weavers among most conservatives and the siege at of Koresh’s Waco, Texas compound.
It’s really ingrained in a lot of folks to accept that white people can do things beyond what the law says is legal, because white people need to maintain order in a society beset by Chinese, African-Americans, Native Americans and other inferior races.
Conversely the U.S. very little historical tolerance for left-wing terrorism, let alone left-wing mass demonstrations. There’s never been a government in the U.S. that turned a blind eye to the Left asserting themselves.
Until we acknowledge the deep, deep roots violent right-wing terrorism has had in U.S. history, we’re never going to be able to kill of the nut-jobs like those at the Bundy ranch. For 200+ years guys like that have often been portrayed as heros, who preserve the sacred Christian honor of the U.S.A.
We have not done enough to do away with centuries of conditioning to view violent acts of white conservatives as the same type of terrorism employed by any other group, with no higher meaning than any other group.
NotMax
@Betty Cracker
How that in any way would have prevented the others there from booting them out eludes me.
Betty Cracker
@Cervantes: I know you’re being snarky, but I think just standing there could work. When I say it’s time to drop the hammer, I don’t necessarily mean go in with guns a-blazing. Encircling the ranch and starving them out could work too. I’d leave those tactical decisions to the experts, but it seems to me that clearing the feds out of the area and allowing these militia kooks to come and go at will and hold seminars to further radicalize people is a mistake.
Cervantes
@Betty Cracker: I was being serious, actually.
NotMax
@Betty Cracker
Cutting off electricity (and concomitantly internet access) would be a start.
Slapping a lien on Bundy bank accounts as well. Someone is paying the utility bills.
MomSense
This may be taking too much time for some, but the courts are dealing with this. The guy is liened up the wazoo and he will not be able to sell his precious hoofed moochers. If he does sell them, he won’t get the proceeds.
I certainly don’t want to have to worry and deal with the repercussions of an armed confrontation in my little neck of the woods and I can’t imagine anyone else does. An armed confrontation or resolution would be avenged by all the militias and not just out in Nevada. We’ve already had some shootings at court houses and it would rapidly escalate.
NotMax
@MomSense
As well (within some sectors) serving to validate them as revolutionaries rather than as criminals.
Emma
I saw a picture of the Bundy folk recently (TPM?). It seems when they go out on their patrols, they load their vehicles with their kids. If any of you think that the visual of a black president killing white babies isn’t going to spark a disaster, y’all have been singing kumbaya a little too much.
OzarkHillbilly
@Betty Cracker: You have the score wrong Betty, it is Bundy 0 – 0 Feds. I think of it as a chess match, not eleventy dimensional or any of that bull, just simple straight forward chess.
Bundy is in the middle of the board (the king) and he is surrounded by pawns. Only pawns because that is all he has. All around there is space to move one of them, but to do so would open him to attack from the fed’s rooks, knights, bishops, and the many pawns too. And it is his move. but if he moves, it will be mate in 2. So he sits there in the middle of the dessert surrounded by pawns who are growing increasingly bored (sitting in the middle of a desert with a gun is supremely boring, just ask Cole) and falling ever further behind in their car payments, house payments, credit card payments, lives, loves, everything. And the whole time, they know they are being watched. “They’re out there. I know they are. I can feel their eyes. The drones, like a buzzing in my ears.” Whether true or not, that is in the back of each of their minds.
And so, the pawns grow fewer and fewer with each passing day. It started off as such a noble cause, with excitement and patriotism and news cameras and interviews and and and and….. and now? Now it is nothing.
It will not end in a glorious battle with patriots dying in a hail of bullets their names for ever being mentioned along side of Sam Houston, Davey Crockett, and Jim Bowie. It will end with a tired old man meekly walking out his front gates and turning himself in as his sons and daughters watch. They will be allowed go on about the business of raising their families, but they will be penniless due to the old man’s foolishness, and him? The last we will see of him is leaving a Federal court room in orange dungarrees and handcuffs.
That will be the end, Betty, and a better one is not possible.
El Caganer
I certainly don’t discount the idea of a violent reaction from wingnuttia if law enforcement stormed the ranch. But this is in some ways a no-win, since there’s no guarantee that wingnuttia won’t also have a violent reaction to teevee coverage of Bundy et al on trial somewhere down the road. So the only way to prevent said violent reaction is to do nothing. It appears to me here on the east coast that the Bundyswehr has at least checked, if not defeated, the U.S. government. I hope there is a solution that doesn’t involve violence (by government or sovereign citizens), but I’ll be damned if I have a clue what it is.
MomSense
@NotMax:
Yup.
MomSense
@El Caganer:
I really don’t think this is a no-win situation. At some point the IRS will win and Bundy will lose everything or come up with some way to pay the Feds. When it is finally time to either raise the money or sell everything off, he will find out who his true supporters are. I suspect that by the time this ends, most of his supporters will have run out of funds and be long gone.
Comrade Dread
Well, Washington rode at the head of an army to put down his version of these folks, so the modern equivalent would be to send in a column or two of tanks with air support to put down an armed rebellion.
That probably wouldn’t make for good optics, I admit. But I really hope the Feds aren’t simply ignoring this tantrum hoping it will go away. You shouldn’t be able to point weapons at Federal officers, threaten violence, set up your own road checkpoints, and tell the government to ‘fuck off’ without some sort of consequence.
El Caganer
@MomSense: I think it’s no-win as far as preventing the loonies from committing violent acts. Don’t you think Fox (and probably all the other networks) would give major coverage, at least for a day or two, to a Bundy trial? How could a true patriot see this good man and sovereign citizen being persecuted by a kangaroo court and not immediately be moved to retaliate by blowing up an abortion clinic?
currants
@askew:
Well, he’s been in court about it for more than a decade. This link is to a decision from last summer and if you scroll a short bit to the “Background” section you’ll see that he lost a case to keep his cattle in one grazing allotment back in 1998–the court found he owed lease fees as well as damages to the gov’t as I recall. Today he is still in that allotment and has expanded into other areas (NOTE: it may not be the most recent one, as I didn’t check for that).
It’s interesting that he kept the legal argument going, given that he doesn’t acknowledge the legitimacy of the gov’t. (And I mean “interesting” in the head-scratching, cognitive-dissonance kind of way.) From what I understand, he keeps losing the court cases, and now we’ve reached the part where, you know, the bank/sheriff shows up to reclaim possession.
I cannot imagine the agencies involved aren’t working with whoever handles domestic terrorism to develop a strategic, lower-profile, much-lower-risk way to resolve it. (Because it WILL be resolved.)
MomSense
@El Caganer:
Again, my sense is that his supporters will mostly be gone by then. He has lost FOX because he outed himself as a racist (I know that we were all shocked, shocked by this!!). He lost the tv trucks. I haven’t looked through the pleadings on his case, but I’m not even sure that this is scheduled for a trial. I think the Feds already have a Judgment against him and there are liens on his property. My sense is that he pulled the militias in out of desperation because his case was at the asset seizure stage.
Time is on the side of the Feds in this case. Also, too if you think seeing him in court will cause a violent reaction, imagine what would happen if the Feds went in guns a blazin’ (have no idea how to spell that) given that these Bundy a$$holes use women and children as human shields. Best to just wait it out.
NCSteve
Look up the Whiskey Rebellion on wikipedia. I have a feeling they’re just following Washington’s script.
And here’s the dilemma. Failing to confront them validates their crackpot narrative that their possession of guns gives them the power to resist the government, but sending in a squadron of Apaches to wipe them out would validate the narrative that they need guns because the Mau Mau gubbamint is makin’ war on Real Umerikinz.
Cassidy
So no volunteers from the “go get’em” crowd? That’s funny. That’s what we all say about republicans when they advocate for sending people to combat. They say war and we say you first, chicken hawk, so in and so forth. How is this different?
Secondly, how is that one day cops are the bad guy of choice, the bullies, the little dicked tyrants just looking to work out their daddy issues, but today they are Ubermen? Today, they should dress for battle and teach those guys a lesson?
TMLutas
The fix for a set of crazy ranchers who insist on sending money to Clark County for grazing fees instead of the federal government is not to play Rambo. It’s to go off to Clark County and to ask, politely, that Clark County (and any other relevant county) pass an ordinance that when that happens, Clark County will forward that money on to the proper government institution.
No testosterone fueled confrontations required for the feds to get paid.
I presume that Clark County both recognizes the existence of the Federal Government and the desirability of not having another Ruby Ridge. If a detour through the Clark County bank account is what is required to maintain peace and not get people hurt or killed, that’s just a justified sacrifice.
Of course, that doesn’t solve the problem because the money is a symptom, not the actual problem. The actual problem is that the government used to want a lot of ranchers and now they want fewer of them and they’re such big dogs in terms of western land ownership that what they say goes as a rule.
Citizen_X
@Bobby Thomson:
Jesus. Talk about inflating these assholes’ sense of self-importance.
Cervantes
@Baud:
You jest, but, in a similar situation, that’s what Sam Adams recommended.
230 years ago, impoverished people in Massachusetts — including veterans, including particularly one Daniel Shays — couldn’t and therefore refused to pay their taxes and other cash bills. Governor John Hancock (wisely?) declined to prosecute them re their taxes, thus averting bloodshed. As the rebellion spread, however, there was more pressure (from the wealthy) to Do Something re those cash payments (owed to you-know-who). Hancock (wisely?) resigned to spend more time with his family. The new governor, James Bowdoin, decided to be more aggressive. His allies, including Sam Adams, went so far as to recommend that the rebels be executed.
(You know the rest.)
feebog
Right now (7:00 am PDT) it is 80 degrees in Mesquite Nevada, with a predicted high of 103. Afternoon winds of up to 35mph. And it is only going to get hotter and windier as the summer months continue. Bundy’s supporters will continue to wilt and drop by the wayside. I don’t know why anyone thinks that storming the ranch and putting a bunch of law enforcement officers at risk is a good idea at this point. I get the argument that armed resistance by these yahoos sends the wrong message, but at this point there is no messenger. No news trucks, no Faux News breathlessly awaiting a bloodbath, no Alex Jones screaming insanity. Let ’em bake out in the desert for the next few months, see how many are still hanging around.
WaterGirl
@OzarkHillbilly: Maybe they are taking names, and the “kicking ass” part is going to happen later.
WaterGirl
@Frankensteinbeck:
Until he crushes them.
Higgs Boson's Mate
Part of the problem may be Nevada’s governor, Brian Sandoval.
Not having him on board may complicate matters. As for me, I’d prefer to see Bundy and his supporters effectively blockaded and starved out. The government’s inaction so far has vindicated the ammosexuals’ wildest fantasies. To me, the danger is that it may encourage more armed standoffs and at some point people will be killed.
shortstop
OT, I just realized I can now get the word “porn” through the filter. Porn, porn, porn, all the livelong day.
CONGRATULATIONS!
@low-tech cyclist: You ever been out there? Like the fucking surface of the moon. If they want to live there and deal with the inevitable heatstroke and cholera, I’m really kind of OK with that, they are welcome to it. Even better would be to simply fence off about a square mile or so, block the only road (that was bad planning on their part if they really wanted to start some shit) and simply demand an American passport if they want to re-enter the US.
Someone above mentioned the “domestic John McCain act”. That’s really what this is, Ms. Cracker. There is simply no need or reason to do anything. Let them sit in the blazing heat through the next four months. I bet 90% of them are gone by the end of July.
Waco was fucking stupid. We are not going to, and absolutely should not do that again, and every one of you demanding that “something be done now or we’ll look like pussies, OMG” are simply asking for Koresh Bloodbath Boogaloo, Part II.
To think that some of you are afraid that the GOP will think Democrats and the federal government are weak. Guess what. They already think that. Nothing changes if we do nothing.
JGabriel
@El Caganer:
Exactly. Right-wing insurrectionist terrorists don’t need a reason to attack. They hate Democratic government, and that’s reason enough for them. Beyond that, they’ll take/make up any excuse to justify their violence – no matter the real situation.
Zach
I think everyone of them who’re in photos pointing guns at a federal officer should be added to the terror watch list by DHS. They couldn’t fly on a plane, or have a bank account.
JGabriel
@El Caganer:
Which will also encourage more violence, or threats of it.
So, really, there’s no way to prevent violence except to get these right-wing insurrectionist fuckers behind bars.
Paul in KY
@Baud: Do you think he’ll leave if it gets foreclosed?
Paul in KY
@RosiesDad: Can’t do that. The optics would be very bad.
NonyNony
@TMLutas:
That may be a huge presumption to make, given some of their neighbors over in Utah:
Having lived out West (and I mean the Colorado/Utah/Nevada/Wyoming west – not your fancy-pants Texas/California west) you have to understand – we’re talking about a part of the country that is almost desert. Land that would be nearly uninhabitable without massive Federal assistance. So OF COURSE these people hate the Federal government with the white hot passion of a thousand firey suns. It just makes sense!
So don’t be surprised if the County government of Clark County Nevada passed a resolution saying that any land usage money given to them would be spent in the county as part of the county general fund because AMERICA FUCK YEAH! I mean, it would just be par for the course for a lot of the mindset you get out there.
muddy
I read this morning that apparently the feds are not renewing contracts with local sheriffs. Wheels turning I guess?
Xecky Gilchrist
When I say it’s time to drop the hammer, I don’t necessarily mean go in with guns a-blazing. Encircling the ranch and starving them out could work too.
You might mention this in the OP. I, too, had this ridiculous reaction that “drop the hammer” implied violence.
Paul in KY
@David Koch: I’m going to see the rock band Veruca Salt in a few weeks. They will be playing at Bunbury Music Fest in Cinn.
Citizen_X
@El Caganer: BTW: given your nym, you don’t happen to work at the EPA, do you?
Mnemosyne
@NonyNony:
Of course they do — it’s just like a teenager who hates his parents because they’re always putting these rules on him, man! He’s totally going to take that part-time job at McDonald’s and then they’ll see they can’t boss him around any more! Hey, Mom, can you drive me to the mall?
Cervantes
@JGabriel:
Well, there is that asinine “interpretation” of the Second Amendment that mysteriously converts disgruntlement into violence …
A Humble Lurker
Dead thread is probably dead, but I would just like to point out that it’s more dispiriting for the nuts if they give up on their own than if somebody stops them. If someone did, they could go into this whole mental narrative about how it was totally going to start another revolution if the jack booted thugs hadn’t interfered with their freedumbs. If it just fails on it’s own, they’ll still try to come up with a narrative like that, but it’ll be harder and less galvanizing for the next screwed up stunt.
El Caganer
@Citizen_X: So that’s what they mean by “shit just got real.”
CONGRATULATIONS!
@El Caganer: Not quite but almost the same thing: We had a “Online Day Trading” school (gotta be a scam from top to bottom) open in our building a few months ago. SOME psychopath in that office is urinating over the men’s bathroom floor daily. This isn’t “missing the urinal”, this is flat out “standing in the middle of the bathroom and spinning in a circle while peeing”. Building management can’t/won’t help. Really, not much they can do. Can’t put cameras in the bathrooms!
Our lease expires next year and we are not staying.
kindness
I say periodically discretely lob packs (or bricks) of firecrackers into their midst and let them shoot each other in the ensuing comotion.
Chris
@gene108:
I just want to say… a big “indeed” to all of this.
As well as a distinction: white supremacist violence against nonwhites is one thing (and historically a very tolerated one), white supremacist violence against the federal government is something else. We’ve gone back and forth on that one, because lynching poor nonwhites is one thing and challenging the establishment is something else, but on the other hand, “the establishment” contains many people sympathetic to these yahoos.
So you have things like Washington putting down the Whiskey Rebellion, Jackson (a Southerner himself) saying “oh FUCK no” to South Carolina’s secessionist tendencies, the Civil War, the Union Army busting up the First Klan during Reconstruction… but on the other hand you have the feds evacuating Union troops during Tilden Hayes and basically letting the KKK types rule the region unopposed, or even the current situation where quite a few wingnuts even in Washington are sympathetic to these pricks.
(I’ve said this before, but the schizophrenic relationship reminds me of the Saudi elites’ relation to their jihadis – they’re one of the jihadis’ most hated targets, but they also contain a fuckton of sympathizers and financiers).
Gus diZerega
@NotMax: If the government is handling this quietly and wisely why were the killers not picked up well before the time they got to Vegas? We assume they have surveillance. And these people then went walking around with weapons.
I would like to think the government is being intelligent in this case, but that they did what they did tells me that so far every responsible law enforcement official is more than a little responsible for the deaths of three innocent people.
El Caganer
@CONGRATULATIONS!: @CONGRATULATIONS!: Standing in the middle of the bathroom and spinning in a circle while peeing? Hmmm….sounds kinda like a 360-degree performance appraisal to me.
Cassidy
I never thought I’d ever have to ask what does Balloon Juice and Dick Cheney have in common.
Jebediah, RBG
@CONGRATULATIONS!:
Maybe somebody puts up a sign in the bathroom: “Your urine has been collected for DNA analysis. You will be identified.”
Jebediah, RBG
@Cassidy:
I don’t thin they are completely equivalent, though. I think wanting to see some law-enforcement action taken against an ongoing domestic crime is exactly the same as a foreign-adventure aggressive war of choice.
Cassidy
@Jebediah, RBG: I’d disagree. Going in heavy will turn into a gunfight. People will die. I’m all for rounding these people up and putting them in trial, but stating that others should engage in combat to satisfy our emotions isn’t that much different than the constant cacophony of “bomb some brown people”.
Jebediah, RBG
@Jebediah, RBG:
Should say “isn’t exactly the same.”
My proofreader went Galt on me.
Mnemosyne
I understand that people are frustrated that Bundy is basically thumbing his nose at the feds, but I’d rather let him do that than watch Waco II (now with more toddlers!) unfold on my teevee. I’m also guessing that long-standing tensions between BLM and the local authorities are probably not helping matters any and would only make an armed response go south.
schrodinger's cat
I have to agree with those who say that going in guns blazing may not be the best idea. You really don’t want to make this delusional tax evader and his sidekicks, martyrs. Breaking their resistance without much fuss would be the best.
The situations are not exactly the same but the standoff between the Indian Army and Sikh militants who had taken shelter in the Golden Temple complex in Amritsar almost 30 years ago comes to mind.
Indira Gandhi and her Army Chief of Staff went in guns blazing at the Golden Temple in Amritsar to break down the Sikh rebellion and get rid of the armed militants holed up in the Golden Temple complex. It was a very bad idea, despite its initial tactical success.
Mnemosyne
@Gus diZerega:
Contrary to what many people on the left seem to think, we don’t actually live in a police state and it actually is legal to wave your gun around and threaten non-specific action. The police are not allowed to arrest people because the police think they might do something stupid due to their associations.
And, please, like the Wal-Mart shooters wouldn’t have been even more pissed off if they had been arrested? “Scared Straight” doesn’t actually work, especially when you’re dealing with people who have constructed their own little fantasy world.
Bob In Portland
National guard units have been reported to have raped women in the village of Saurovka. It wasn’t mentioned in the NY Times, though.
Jebediah, RBG
@Cassidy:
Rationally, I’m not in favor of a gunfight either. I want them arrested and tried, preferably in a way that minimizes any “heroism” on their part. My id sort of wants them smacked down really hard – but there are many reasons my id isn’t even allowed to be in charge of me, let alone any part of the military or any law enforcement agency.
John M. Burt
I very much do not want Bundy and his useful peers to die. I want them to grow old in prison, seeing themselves become forgotten, watching as the world moves on without them, knowing that it was all for nothing.
Digital Amish
Maybe it’s time to string a 12′ fence around those assholes and call it a ‘FEMA Camp’. Give ’em something to get excited about.
Cervantes
@gene108: I assume you know what happened to MOVE’s house in Philadelphia in 1985. Those who are not familiar with that episode should look it up.
Mike G
@Digital Amish:
Do the gundamentalists know what summer is like in southern Nevada?
The Feds just have to sit back and wait, and the weather will drive away 90+% of these assclowns.
PIGL
@Cassidy: Don’t be a jackass. None of us have a duty to go all Rambo and enforce the laws of the land and the sovereign authority of the state. There are very large numbers of very well armed individuals duly authorised and financed to do this on our behalf. There was no issue in deploying them against non-violent non-criminal protestors like Occupy, but a bunch of pathetic reactionary racist neo-confederate gun-buggers have to be tolerated ad infinitum. When I say, with our collumnist, that au contraire the authorities should go in and arrest this lot, with ad overwhelming force, I am not putting myself in any moral conflict. I am simply asking that the authorities enforce the law.
Li
I think that this episode has revealed something very true, and very disturbing, about how our government currently works, frankly. The will of the people, the vast majority in many cases, is willfully ignored by the oligarchs in charge. They don’t care about our opinion, and they don’t care if we voice it, even in vast marches. We won’t even get covered on the evening news.
The NRA, and these kooks, on the other hand, even though in the minority, get what they want. Because they are heavily armed, and the government cannot simply ignore their will like they do with most of the population.
Frankly, if that’s the way this game is going to be played, then simply getting a sad because these kooks are getting their way is not gonna work. Those kooks will simply continue to get their way, and we will continue to be ignored. I hate to say it, but we might be well advised to adopt their tactics. Show up to pro-choice rallies with unloaded weaponry, carrying signs that say “Well armed and Pro-Choice”. Show up at anti-war rallies similarly equipped. It may well be distressful and distasteful to do this, but if the only thing our government cares to listen to is a threat of violence, then we can choose to speak in the language they listen to, or continue to whine as our country is given over to the tiny minority that is currently willing to do so.
And heck, if lefties start showing up open carrying even unloaded weaponry, that might finally get open carry in public spaces banned. Bonus.
Bill Arnold
@Cervantes:
In retrospect, what would have been the optimal approach to dealing with the Move compound in 1985? (I’ve often wondered.)
Cassidy
@PIGL: So you’re requesting a deferment? Got it. Another chicken hawk with such a brave stance.
johnny aquitard
@OzarkHillbilly:
I wish.
I think he’s in deep enough and he’s too full of himself to reject that ending. He’s talked a big, swaggering, violent talk. He could’ve walked meekly out before it became a media circus and he became a conservative celebrity.
Also, the right needs him to become an Ollie North and his ranch another Waco to turn out their base. The feds won’t have to push him to escalate; they will. And as people pointed out his bills must be piling up, he needs the wingnut welfare. None of that will happen if this quietly fades away.
Cervantes
@Bill Arnold: Did you ever read Alice Walker’s piece on the subject?
tybee
@PIGL:
you’re way too late for him with that advice.
pluky
@CONGRATULATIONS!: But they can put a camera up just outside the bathroom. One triggered when the door opens, and logs the date/time on the image. That plus regular inspection of the facility should pin down the culprit in less than a week.
Bill Arnold
@Cervantes:
Dead thread, but no, had not read it, thanks.
That’s the question in a nutshell. There were neighbors, who could reasonably expect something to be done. Probably (?) the neighbors were more respectful of the local laws.
Usually this sort of utopian community is set in a rural area. Land is cheaper, there is enough land to farm (a small-scale farm can be made productive with manual labor), there is more distance between neighbors.
Perhaps a peacemaker solution would have involved fundraising/buying such a small rural farm for MOVE. (Such places exist; I bought some items at a farm stand at what looked like a little commune (all black that I saw) in rural NJ or PA a couple of years ago.)
demit
@Bill Arnold: Yes, a dead thread but: MOVE harangued and harassed their neighbors for months. I had never read that Alice Walker piece but, unlike her, I lived right here in Phila through the two MOVE incidents & saw it all from a close vantage point & not from Paris France. The police & the mayor bungled & covered up the first incident & the police/mayor/fire department made horrible judgments in the second. But MOVE refused to send the children out, despite repeated pleas. They used those kids as a shield, daring the authorities to act against them. I respect Alice Walker but to wait till the last graf to concede that maybe living in a way that creates/attracts vermin & disease isn’t the optimal way to ‘respect’ either nature or your neighbors, well, that just made my eyes cross.
Cassidy
@tybee: You’re still not getting any sweetums.
Nathanael
Unfortunately, Nevada.
If the ranch were in Colorado, or New Mexico, or even Utah, it would have been evicted by now.
Nathanael
The right thing to do? Keep removing the cattle. The problem is that Bundy’s grazing his cattle illegally on government land. Keep sweeping the edges of the area where he lets the cattle graze and removing the cattle.
Eventually he’ll run out of cows, and then it’s all over. (Obviously, shut down his bank account too.)