Yesterday a sovereign citizen grand jury superior court judge arrived in Burns. What is a sovereign citizen grand jury superior court judge you ask? Basically its someone without any legal training, who is not admitted to the legal bar anywhere, is not a recognized judge by any official authority, and in this case sells electronics in Denver. He’s also big into what’s called paper terrorism – having placed a trillion dollar plus lien on a Federal property.
I’ve written about the Posse Comitatus movement here several times. The concept that the highest legal and constitutional authority in the US was the county sheriff, was started in California in the 1950s and was then basically stolen, appropriated, and plagiarized by Henry Beach of Oregon in the late 1960s. William Potter Gale then merged it with his understanding of Christian Identity* in the 1970s and it has become one of the key, foundational concepts of the American extreme right. In addition to the idea about the county sheriff being the highest law enforcement and constitutional authority, the Posse Comitatus concept also includes the belief about a sheriff’s posse of white, Christian (male) citizens who would band together, form citizen’s grand juries, and present indictments, trials, and sentences for violations of (their interpretation of) the Constitution. The concern is that the Ammon Bundy created, unelected and unrepresentative Harney County Committee of Safety or some other group of locals unhappy with just about anything will convene as a citizen’s grand jury, indict Sheriff Ward or Judge Gratsy or the US Attorney responsible for the Hammond case, try them, and try to carry out the sentence – usually death by hanging.
As we all wait to see how the standoff, this new citizen’s grand jury wrinkle, and any potential Federal response plays out, the people of Burns and Harney county are a bit on edge. Local residents are now filing reports and making accusations with law enforcement that they have been intimidated, followed, and stalked. One local policewoman’s wife indicated that every gun in the house is loaded and that she had never before felt the need to carry a gun for personal protection. What we now know is that all of this actually started weeks before Bundy and company took over the refuge and continues through today. If anyone would like to know what a sustained and directed terrorism campaign looks like, this is it. People being terrorized through the sheer presence of others doing subtle, creepy, and intimidating things. This disrupts routines, makes children afraid to go to school or out to play, and causes the targets and victims to feel the need to either flee or arm themselves in case the worst should happen.
And before anyone accuses me of hyperbole, one of the measures or benchmarks of stability that my teammates and I used with our brigade in Iraq, and I’ve worked into the measures of effectiveness for gauging security effects and stability in several Army echelons above and below brigade (from Army Service Component Command to Corps to Division to Battalion to Company to Platoon) is: are people outside conducting their daily lives? Are children going to school or out playing? Do people go shopping? Are couples out and about doing social things? If the answers to these questions are yes, then the area is secure and its residents feel secure. If the answers are no, then the opposite is the case – the area is insecure and its residents feel insecure.** Make no mistake, what is going on in Harney County is the same type of terrorism campaign that we’ve seen local insurrectionists conduct in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Algeria, Northern Mali, Northern Nigeria, parts of Somalia, parts of Peru and Columbia, and other places around the world. Campaigns of terror conducted by groups that run the gauntlet of religious, right wing, and left wing motivations.
So the standoff and a purposeful campaign of intimidation continues in Harney County. Bundy and company have announced that they will come to town on Friday for a community meeting to announce their plans and when they’ll leave. While Federal law enforcement has not announced what they will and won’t do, they have mobilized to the area and are conducting surveillance. Former FBI special agents have suggested that the slow, methodical, wait and see approach is the appropriate way to proceed so as not to give Bundy and company what they want: a confrontation. While this is true, it is doing very little to end the terrorism through intimidation campaign directed at the citizens of Harney County. Of course, one of the problems that law enforcement and the citizens of Harney County face, is that there are significant numbers of Harney County residents that support Bundy’s goals, even if they will no longer support Bundy explicitly. The Harney County Committee of Safety comes to mind. As does the soon to be created Harney County Citizen’s Grand Jury. Right now the people of Harney County are caught in a vise between Bundy and his occupiers, their fellow citizens who are sympathetic to the call for local control, and law enforcement that is concerned that the situation could quickly escalate into violence. This entire series of events is, perhaps, one of the best examples refuting the oft repeated nostrum that an armed society is a polite society. What we’re seeing in Harney County is actually evidence that an armed society is one part an intimidating society and one part a scared society responding to the intimidation. Neither of these are healthy conditions for a self governing society. They are the conditions that need to be set in order to achieve one’s goals through force or the threat of force and an application of the might makes right principle.
* Christian Identity fuses the concepts of British Israelitism with charismatic evangelical Christianity.
** This section has been edited for clarity at 4:10 PM.
JPL
If the FBI won’t arrest them, the local police should. The Bundy gang should not be allowed to terrorize the town.
Waspuppet
Call me a flip-flopper, but over these 10 days I’ve returned to Team This Is Nothing An Air Strike Or Two Wouldn’t Fix.
JPL
@Waspuppet: The have drones for that.
Paul in KY
Is this ‘sovereign citizen’ stuff like re-enactments, etc. If I have the correct robe (I am white), can I then be the Sovereign Citizen Grand Circuit Supreme Sherriff/Judge? That would (to my understanding) trump the mere Sovereign Citizen Grand Jury Superior Court Judge and I could then overrule his (cause I’m sure it’s a his) rulings?
2 can play this ‘make up nutty rules/powers’ game.
kc
It really is good to be white. Especially if you have a few assault rifles.
SFAW
@Waspuppet:
Beat me to it.
I was going to wonder aloud where Rafael “Let’s Carpet Bomb the Terrists” Cruz would stand on this. No doubt he’d relish the chance for a practice run, before the full-on killing of brown men, wimmins, and children.
Botsplainer
Time to pop the zit. Dead militia guys are going to result anyway, may as well do it now.
scav
@kc: Indeed, That’s why this whole thing is a reign of patriotic ‘merkan politeness instead of terror or jackbooted PC.
AliceBlue
Bruce Doucette identifies himself as a “U.S. Superior Court Judge.” There is no such thing as a “U.S. Superior Court.”
Botsplainer
@JPL:
If the sheriff weren’t a pansy, he’d have dealt with Bundy and the rest of the out of towners days ago. What would John Wayne, Randolph Scott or Wyatt Earp do?
Oatler.
Just tell the DEA the Bundybunch is making hash oil. THEN you’ll see DEA Take Interest toot sweet.
Roger Moore
I always say that an armed society is only a polite society if you consider death threats- implicit or explicit- to be polite, because that’s exactly what being armed at all times is.
@JPL:
A huge part of the problem is that the local police are outnumbered and outgunned. In a previous post, Adam pointed out that there are fewer than 10 law enforcement personnel in the whole county, and that includes people who may not be sworn officers. They simply don’t have the resources to deal with a gang this size. ETA: And a big chunk of the intimidation has been aimed at the families of local law enforcement; it’s not easy for them to stand up to these thugs when it’s their family members who are likely to be the first targets if they don’t get them all.
jharp
So go arrest the fuckers. Today.
This has gone on for far too long.
Helmut Monotreme
From where I sit, it looks like the Feds are waiting until shit gets egregious. They don’t want to roll up these losers and let them get out on bail, try them in a year, and end up with 2 year or 5 year sentences or probation. And every day until they go to jail they would be loudly fundraising, recruiting and inspiring copycats. They want an excuse at the very least to arrest them for something serious enough that 10 or 20 of the ringleaders would be denied bail. They want the court of public opinion to be howling for blood before they move, because in that part of the country, the feds are always the bad guy. From The BLM, DEA, TSA, and IRS every interaction they have with the feds is one they perceive as an infringement on the impunity with which they would prefer to conduct their own affairs. When people in the reddest, ruralest parts of the US are howling with outrage (and the next hundred or so most radical (anti federalists?) (insurrectionists?)), the feds will move in.
Doug R
I suggest carpet bombing with big bags of candy dicks.
Botsplainer
One other thing – where are the Oregon State Police and National Guard? I get that the refuge occupation is federal and thus out of jurisdiction, but surely to god this feckless local sheriff has failed to protect the citizens of Rock Ridge, er, Burns, and can be shoved aside while heads are thumps. The governor is failing here.
Mnemosyne
I know that people here like to make mordant jokes about guillotines and tumbrels, but these events in Oregon are an actual real-life modern example of that thinking. The Committee of Public Safety drove the Terror in France. Committees of Safety before and during the American Revolution terrorized people that didn’t agree with them.
This IS NOT a good development.
Botsplainer
@Roger Moore:
This is where the governor of Oregon has failed. They’ve had plenty of days to send up a battalion of National Guard and a bunch of state cops – the locals needn’t be so overmatched.
Steve in the ATL
@Helmut Monotreme:
Yes, the intellectual part of my brain agrees with you, but the visceral, lizard part of my brain wants the drone strikes like yesterday.
Bill
While I’ve generally been ok with the wait and see approach with these petulant children, I’m starting to worry about the competence of the federal authorities in charge of dealing with this. (I am not pointing at anyone in particular, as I don’t actually know who calls the shots on this, but there must be someone in charge.) The optics of this situation are horrible, but to allow multiple felons to roam free when you know exactly where they are seems to run counter to the term “law enforcement.”
Gindy51
They’re going into town on Friday, retake the range as soon as they are gone. Let the idiot sheriff (who agrees with these morons but not their methods) deal with it. If he can’t, remove his sorry excuse of an LEO and send in the guard.
The Ancient Randonneur
Evidently some of them are very upset about ‘bags of dicks’ being mailed to them.
Amanda in the South Bay
@Botsplainer: Yes, these modern day Sagebrush Rebellion types need to be crushed before they turn into a full fledged freikorps like organization. A part of me worries about the loyalties of more rural parts of the National Guard, but at this point, something needs to be done to restore the rule of law. Its fairly obvious from Adam’s post that the locals are being terrorized.
Scott S.
If they wait around long enough, the violence won’t be directed solely at the feds or the cops — they’ll roll into town and shoot all the locals on their enemies list.
Better to drop bunker-busters on their compound now, rather than wait for a civilian body count.
Davis X. Machina
@Botsplainer:
Is there any local support for such a move? Helmut Monotreme is right — in that part of the country, the feds are always the bad guy.
How many of the residents of Burns would be loud-and-proud supporters of this sort of activity if it happened somewhere else? How much of their problem is that this time it’s their ox being gored?
elmo
@Oatler.: Exactly my thought. I’m nervous about putting my seedling tomatoes under grow lights in the basement, lest the Feds get the wrong idea, kick in my door and shoot my dogs. These guys break into a Federal installation, rifle through personnel files, destroy Federal property, and we have to have “meetings” to ask them politely to leave?
I get “don’t do stupid shit.” I get that Waco was a bloody disaster and Ruby Ridge was criminally insane (shoot-to-kill orders? Seriously?) I also get that the Montana Freemen and the Brown standoff in NH are considered so successful precisely because so few people even remember them, there’s no bloody shirt to wave, and so on.
But the Browns went to prison. The Montana Freemen went to prison. Fucking Clive Bundy’s merry band of misfits is out there recruiting. It’s all very well to maintain a waiting game, as long as you don’t cede the entire area to the bad guys in the meantime.
Amanda in the South Bay
@Davis X. Machina: Have the governor call up the National Guard without the Feds. If guard members don’t like it, chapter their asses. At some point something has to be done.
Paul in KY
@Bill: I would assume they are following broad directives laid down by Pres. Obama.
rikyrah
THEY NEED TO GO TO JAIL.
IT WAS A CRIMINAL ENTERPRISE, FROM TOP TO BOTTOM!
Nancy Osborne @NancyOsborne180
Snyder’s people changed data to hide #FlintWater poisoning
Kay
I remain baffled by why he doesn’t do anything. He has plenty of tools to put in a whole variety of court orders. That way, if they’re followed again the militia member is violating an order to stay away from these people. This approach isn’t draconian or over the top in any way. It’s ordinary. Is he saying there’s no possible way to identify the people who are doing this? He’s the sheriff. All he needs is a license plate.
rikyrah
UH HUH
UH HUH
City hall office containing water documents broken into, officials say
FLINT, MI – Officials say a recent city hall break-in occurred in an office containing documents related to the city’s water system.
Flint police previously reported a break-in at City Hall, 1101 S. Saginaw St. over the holiday break, but information released Monday, Jan. 11, confirmed the break-in happened at a vacant executive office in the mayor’s suite that contained documents related to the city’s water system.
“The office that was broken into is where some water files are kept,” Flint Mayor Karen Weaver said. “However, at this point it’s hard to tell if any files were taken. The only thing we know for sure was stolen is a TV.”
Flint Police Chief James Tolbert said investigators were working to discover if any documents connected to the city’s water system were taken.
The break-in was discovered Dec. 28 by an employee when they returned from work following the holiday break. No other offices were disturbed.
“The video doesn’t show anything,” Tolbert said. “Officers are now doing a security survey.”…
Davis X. Machina
@Kay:
Fundamentally in sympathy with the occupiers? Sagebrush rebellion for me, but not for thee?
JPL
@rikyrah: The Governor needs to visit a nice bird sanctuary in Oregon, before action is taken.
Felonious Monk
Ghost of Gordon Kahl.
ruemara
This is proof that an armed society is a moronic society. And no one who should learn a lesson from this will.
muddy
This is really some bullshit.
How does he get to decide who can and cannot be on federal land? The 9 year old preparing the snack trays was also precious. They should be up on child endangerment charges.
Adam L Silverman
@Paul in KY: Actually, if I’m recalling correctly, this has happened. One group got fed up with another group on one of these citizen’s grand juries and split off and formed their own, which promptly indicted the members of the original group. Fun times.
Heliopause
@Roger Moore:
Exactly. If someone here thinks this is simple to deal with then by all means grab your six-shooter, give Grace Kelly a good-bye kiss, and go deal with it.
This is a federal problem and sooner or later they’ve got to deal with it.
Kay
@Davis X. Machina:
I guess.
“Driving by my house, following me in their car, confronting me in public places”- one or all of those things is in every civil protection order I have ever seen. This stuff is STANDARD. Ohio has a form. The petitioner can fill it out themselves and file it any county court. I’m baffled why this is so cloak and dagger- “we’re coming up with a secret plan“. It’s bizarre. I would think the very ordinariness of the legal process would deflate a lot of the delusions of grandeur these guys have. Let them shuffle thru the process like everyone else.
Adam L Silverman
I just did a quick update to put the footnote in about Christian Identity that I forgot to put in while editing. Sorry.
Heliopause
I’m not looking for the feds’ secret plans. I’m not looking for an incendiary statement or dramatic escalation. I just want a signal from them that the far right in this country doesn’t get to do whatever the fuck they want.
Sherparick
@Roger Moore: As Al Swearengen would say, “Bullshit, fucking Bullshit!” reference an armed society is a polite society.
P.S. It would be great if the writers could somehow channel Al Swearengen into Ian McShane’s upcoming role in Game of Thrones. I would love to see McShane and Dinklage explode my TV with a verbal profanity and wit duel.
SFAW
@The Ancient Randonneur:
“Dagnabit! They’re not salted!”
Soylent Green
The FBI has been leaving clues that they intend to allow the Malheur malcontents to depart at their leisure, and to make no attempt to take them into custody. They will be charged later, but my sense now is that most or all will be fined but not imprisoned. Law enforcement wants to avoid a costly and risky siege of the compound, and I think the deal has been struck, with the announcement to be made on Friday.
The Bundys are millionaires, so I expect Ammon Bundy to buy his way out of jail, and to get his fines paid by donations from the rubes. Then he will make a bundle selling his story to Hollywood (Director Eastwood will hire him as a consultant) and on the wingnut welfare circuit.
I view the handling of Cliven Bundy and his wayward boys to be the administration’s one big blunder. They have enabled these clowns to get their message out and have made no attempt to counter it. Their theme is one of government overreach, mismanagement, and waste ruthlessly destroying the lives and freedoms of hard-working citizens.
Those who work in federal land management, as I do, know this theme to be a steaming load of horseshit. We know that the reality is that ranching the semi-arid lands of the West cannot succeed without numerous subsidies, and that most ranchers understand this and are more or less happy with the collaborative arrangements they have made with the BLM and other agencies. These agreements serve to integrate a number of conflicting interests, enabling ranchers with grazing permits to make a living while protecting watersheds, riparian areas, rangeland health, and endangered species.
But the anti-government militia crazies are calling the shots now, successfully adding their lies to the right-wing bubble. Your local GOP congress critter will be carrying their water shortly.
RoonieRoo
I find this very frustrating that none of the feds, state or local law enforcement appear to be doing anything at all. Considering the ease our LEO’s have for murdering unarmed blacks this whole fiasco is particularly sickening.
MomSense
@Kay:
Yes, but heaven help you if you do fill out a civil protection order and don’t have your own cavalry to back you up.
They do not recognize civil protection orders. It just makes them more aggressive.
This stalking, harassment, and video taping, happens all the time to people who speak out in any way about
g uns, especially women.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
I’ve given up trying to understand all this shit above my pay grade. It gives me a headache. I need to go futz with the bean soup simmering in Mr. Q’s late brother’s soup pot. That’s no pressure, really.
kindness
That no one has gotten shot yet is a miracle. It’s only a matter of time before someone does. When that happens, all hell is gonna break loose. If it’s a local, it won’t be so telling. If it’s a Bundy guy….well then I will eagerly listen to what Trump & Cruz say. It won’t end well.
Paul in KY
@Adam L Silverman: Good, still sewing the stripes & lightning bolts to my robe…Want a lot of them, so they will respect my authority.
Peale
@rikyrah: So they broke into an office building filled wilth offices and said, hey, let’s take the TV, because that’s what’s valuable in this entire building?
Kay
@MomSense:
Well, that’s true in some cases but that doesn’t mean you just throw your hands up and allow it to continue. They can enforce a CPO. They do it all the time. If they violate they have to appear in front of a municipal court judge. If they’re poor people they’re almost always incarcerated for at least a short period of time. Often they’re ankle-bracleted when when they’re released.
a different chris
The only way to defeat them is to surrender. Look, it’s complicated, ok?
J
@The Ancient Randonneur: Oddly your link takes me to a page that says the video is age restricted, but I assume it’s the clip of Ritzheimer which can be seen at TPM among other places. ‘Hatred’ seems the wrong word for the dominant attitude in most of us, which is scathing contempt.
catclub
@Soylent Green:
are there ANY private landowners that provide grazing permits to ranchers at all similar to the ones on Federal lands?
Zinsky
I believe that it was Ronald Reagan who admonished us all NOT to negotiate with terrorists.
Mary G
I never did find this all that funny, because really stupid people with enough guns for ten times their number (and more than most if not all law enforcement, including the FBI, probably, what are we going to do, bring in a Special Forces team?) frighten me badly. Now they seem to be escalating.
What is really beginning to disturb me is the lack of any pushback from any politicians. A couple of Republicans have made the “while I understand the frustration with our evil tyrannical dictator, taking over a bird sanctuary isn’t the way to express it” sort of disclaimer, but no one on our side (Joe Biden, maybe?) has come out to denounce this in a whole-hearted red meat kind of way.
It seems like it has almost become acceptable to a large percentage of our citizens to take the law into their own hands and it is scary as shit.
Anoniminous
Well surely the locals don’t want the evil federal gub’mint coming into their state, into their town, tramplin’ all over the Constitutional Rights, telling folks what to do. If the locals don’t like what is happening they need to pull themselves up by their bootstraps, jockstraps, and bras, arm themselves, and take care of bizniss.
IT’S THE AMURIKEN WAY!!!
Kay
@Soylent Green:
The secrecy it ITSELF a kind of special treatment. The FBI is assisting the Cleveland police in looking for the person or persons who (allegedly) threatened a prosecutor. They announced this investigation, which is ordinary. No one in law enforcement bothered with “leaving clues”.
I would just like some explanation for why they’re getting special treatment. Even talking about it might upset them? OMFG, who else merits this extreme deference? No one.
dexwood
@Paul in KY:
Don’t forget to add a cross or two.
Soylent Green
Sure, but the deal isn’t as sweet. The grazing fee on state lands is generally four or five times higher than the federal rate, and private landowners charge even more.
Soylent Green
The base assumption appears to be that any SOP police action in this case will trigger some nutcase into opening fire somewhere else.
Paul in KY
@dexwood: Way ahead of you, dexwood. The whole robe, when standing with arms out, is a cross!
Peale
@Kay: Yep. I really do think we need to keep asking questions and hopefully direct those questions at the heads of the various bureaus and agencies who are doing this “secret” planning. These Bundy’s and their militia are useful to someone or they wouldn’t be protected.
GregB
It is kind of funny that one of the pejoratives used against the government is that it is enforcing out of state values on a local population by men with guns.
The exact thing The Bundy Panthers are doing.
jl
@Soylent Green: Agreed. there is enough of a private market in most places that it is quite easy to compare prices for a rancher to make an informed choice and work up a business plan.
And agreed that in most places the private fees are far higher, because the private owner has to pay for all the costs of maintaining the grazing land in decent condition, at least decent enough that it remains usable as grazing land.
And looking at a map of federally managed grazing on public land, it looks like where there is no private market, it is because the land is so dry and barren, and weather so severe, that the land is just too costly to maintain for a private owner to make a profit.
sigaba
@Amanda in the South Bay: “Yes, these modern day Sagebrush Rebellion types need to be crushed before they turn into a full fledged freikorps like organization.”
It’s too late for that, years and years too late.
kc
Does anyone here work for the federal government? If so, I would really appreciate an explanation as to why the Bundys have been permitted to flout the law for years, and why these Oregon squatters are being allowed to seize and vandalize federal property.
I mean, if the laws aren’t for everyone, then they aren’t for anyone.
rikyrah
Just in case………
LOL
Dear Powerball Winner: Take Our Advice and Take the Annuity
So let us suppose, reader, that you have won Wednesday’s $1.5 billion Powerball jackpot. Congratulations! You have some important decisions to make, such as what ailing magazine to acquire and what congressional seat your spouse should run for. But first, you must choose whether to take the prize as an annuity paid over 30 years, or a lump-sum payment right now.
If I’m reading you right, you should probably take the annuity.
First, some background: You might not realize this, but the top prize in the $1.5 billion Powerball is not actually $1.5 billion. (Nor is it $999 million, as many of the three-digit-readout lottery signs around the country say it is.) If you take the prize as a one-time cash payment, you will get a mere $930 million, before taxes.
If you want $1.5 billion, you’ll have to take it in installments over the next 30 years. That’s a long time, and so most people take the cash, according to Kelly Cripe, a Powerball spokeswoman. But I think most of them are making a mistake, for the following reasons.
First, while people associate the term “annuity” with payment streams that end when you die, the Powerball prize is actually what actuaries call an annuity certain: a stream of annual payments, every year from now until 2045, regardless of what happens to you. If you die before 2045, the future payments become part of your estate, like any other asset.
Second, there are big tax advantages to the annuity. The main one is that taking the annuity is basically like letting the government hold onto part of your prize for a while and invest it for you — and the government does not pay tax on investment income. Of course, once you get the annuity checks, you’ll have to pay income tax on them. But if you take the lump-sum cash prize, you’ll pay tax twice: on the prize when you win it, and on the income you get by investing it.
This adds up. If you invested all your prize money in the same way Powerball does (essentially by putting it in government bonds), you’d end up with 20 percent more cash in 2045 if you took the annuity option rather than the cash option, thanks to the tax savings. You could shave that difference by picking a different investment strategy with better tax management, but you’ll never beat the effective tax rate of zero on the investment income earned inside the Powerball annuity.
Taxes aside, you’ll probably quibble with the pretax rate of return on the Powerball annuity. Effectively, it’s like investing in bonds that pay 2.843 percent interest. But that’s actually a good deal for an ultrasafe investment in today’s ultralow interest rate environment, said Allison Schrager, a financial economist with expertise in annuities.
jl
@GregB: Well, it is funny and seems crazy, until you remember that the Bundy Gang wants to decide who the land should go to, people who are presumably their buddies.
dexwood
@Paul in KY:
I bow before your superior design skills. Surely, no one will question your authority.
kc
By the way, I am boycotting beef (and I love steak). Fuck these motherfucking far-right thugs.
currants
@The Ancient Randonneur: LOL. LOVE that people are sending them … errr … treats.
gelfling545
@The Ancient Randonneur: Feeling perhaps that there enough d**ks already on the premises?
Mj_Oregon
I live on the west side of the Oregon Cascades and offer this little anecdote for you.
On Saturday, I had the opportunity to attend a public Town Hall meeting with Senator Merkley, D-OR. It was in stark contrast to the one we had in my (very small) town LAST year. Few people came to the one last year and the questions were about Social Security and a problem a veteran was having with his health claims. Very laid back, very calm. One law enforcement officer stood at the very back of the room, smiling and enjoying the meeting along with the rest of us.
This year, though, the crowd that appeared for this gathering – again in a very small town – was full of loud, belligerent, threatening mannered, and VERY angry types from other parts of the county. Four of the six questions the Senator was able to take were from men demanding to know what he intended to do to return the country to following the Constitution – the way they were interpreting it. And none of this socialist crap was to be allowed ever again, only unfettered Capitalism. And oh, yeah. Second Amendment forever.
The room was very crowded and the last person to ask a question came right up front and got uncomfortably close to the Senator, who, by the way, handled the crowd extremely well. By that time, I was very happy that we had two no-nonsense Sheriff deputies off to one side. I know that many of the audience were packing. I was appalled and very saddened to find myself in a situation where the very air felt menacing. I know that the situation over in Burns was part of the impetus that brought these RWNJ’s to this Town Hall, the other being Trump. I was relieved when it was over and they took their indignant, arrogant bluster outside.
I never thought I’d need to think about what I would do if a gun toting idiot came to one of my city council meetings but I’ve had to run through that in my head in order to have some idea of how to handle it. It just sickens me.
chopper
@kc:
i do, but not in any area of law or land enforcement.
they’re white?
leeleeFL
@The Ancient Randonneur: saw that and wondered if one of us sent those. Laughed myself silly.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@leeleeFL: If I’d sent them, they would have included two varieties – sea salt with rosemary and pink Himalayan salt.
lgerard
The august U.S.Superior Court Judge Bruce Doucette has an email address:
iq175bruce(at)gmail
just in case you had any uncertainties about his vast intellect.
WJS
I found my gig. Get your own.
Davebo
I read the Oregonian story on intimidation and stalking reports and honestly they seemed pretty weak to me but I can see how, given everything else that’s going on it would be unnerving.
Early on I was all on board with seal it off, cut power, give them a few days then go arrest them whatever it takes but now I’m not so sure. And as satisfying as a drone strike would be that’s just crazy talk.
That said, I still think it’s ludicrous that they are allowed to come and go as they please and still have electricity.
I’m very disappointed in the federal response here. These guys believe after the Nevada incident in 2014 that they can literally get away with anything and it appears they are right.
Comrade Colette Collaboratrice
Holy crap, awesome: Dicks for dicks.
Sande in St Louis
Adam, pretty sure you have a yes that should be edited to no: the second “if the answer is yes”, should be, IMHO, “if the answer is no”.
Doesn’t detract from the great analysis, but just in case you wish to fix it, thought I might mention it.
Miss Bianca
I have friends who are ranchers, and I got into quite a FB argument with them over their support for the Hammond family. They got upset with me for calling the Hammonds “losers”. And while I sort of get where they are coming from, thinking that liberal elitist types like me are attacking ranching as a way of life, all I can think of is this (and I wish I had the guts to say it to them):
The Federal government has been working ever since the Lewis and Clark expedition to make the Western states safe and habitable for white people, AND their livestock. From kicking out and exterminating the original inhabitants of the land, to the Homestead Act, to railroads, rural electrification, highway systems, massive irrigation projects without which nothing would be able to grow, ranching and farm subsidies, ditto, subsidies for mineral, oil, and coal extraction, predator extermination and compensation programs, and grazing rights on federal land – you name it, if you live and work in the West you suck on the Federal teat. So did your ancestors.
But no, some of us say. We’re bootstrappers out here. Rugged individualists. And we know what’s best for us! The Government just gets in our way, what with their guidelines for federal land use, which includes habitat for non-bovine, non-human species. Bottom line: if government helps, and keeps helping, white people whose ancestors were lucky enough to be on hand to cash in on The Homestead Act, then Government is OK. The minute the government decides to recognize the interests of any other group, be it wolves or spotted owls or Native American fishermen or quiet-use hikers, the Government Sucks.
We’re not rugged individualists. We are people who are profoundly dependent on massive amounts of Federal subsidy and tax money redistribution in order to continue to live in a desert that does not, without this massive amount of Federal subsidy and tax money redistribution, allow for as many people (and cattle) to live here as do. That makes us welfare recipients, people. Moochers, in other words. And we lie to ourselves about it, which makes us hypocrites. We are people who have the great good fortune to live and work off, around, and on Federal land. This does not make the land our own.
Your indignation about an “assault on your lifestyle?” ALL our lifestyles out here in the Western states are an assault on the land itself. All our lifestyles here are profoundly unsustainable, in the long run. They wouldn’t exist AT ALL without the dreaded Federal Government propping them up. So, paying grazing fees? Abiding by federal regulations for the use of federal lands? Can we just do it? Obey the law, and stop telling ourselves that the law is just SO oppressive the minute it doesn’t accommodate our interests above everyone, and everything, else’s? We are welfare queens one and all, we white people who live in the West. Please, let’s just accept it. And please, let’s just accept that maybe a lot of what we consider “rights” with respect to our public land use looks an awful lot like “privilege” to the rest of the country.
Keith G
@kc:
Well, the DOJ and the West Wing would be places to start. If only the administration would treat them as if they were immigrants from Central America not here legally, they would have been rounded up “pronto”.
Doesn’t the Prez usually do a few interviews after the SOTU?
What is the latest from the White House? Not much since Jan 4th.
The WH is being a bit disingenuous it seems. This is an action against the property of the federal government and federal laws are being violated. I understand and support the logic in keeping this from going violent due to the probably inevitable spin-off effects. Still, publicly pushing this off onto the plate of the locals is too clever by half and disappointing behavior from the leadership of the federal government.
Soylent Green
Here’s how much respect the Bundy gang has for private property:
bemused
@Mj_Oregon:
Not good. You are several counties away. It would appear that angry locals in Oregon are feeling inspired and riled up by the Refuge takeover morons and most likely other states too. Very disturbing.
trollhattan
@Mj_Oregon:
Rural Oregon seems like a hot mess. Can’t even begin to describe how appalled I was the Douglas County sheriff in charge of the Medford massacre is at the least “Sandy Hook truther-curious” and that the state allows guns on campus.
These folks are so far out of their element a new one may be named after them.
a different chris
There needs to be a hunting season for cattle on federal lands. Call it a ‘free market solution’ or something, a way to raise the funds not being paid by the freeloading ranchers.
glory b
@kc: Yeah, I’m sure the Crips and Bloods stand in awe.
trollhattan
@Miss Bianca:
Great summary! As an urban westerner who nevertheless spends a lot of time in the sticks, I’ve been following these issues since the Reagan-fueled first go of the Sagebrush Rebellion and the story line simply doesn’t change: we want “our” stuff, no strings, and while we’ll claim to be good stewards we’re actually going to fuck it the hell up and nobody is going to stop us.”
And, oh, “Congress created this ‘drought.'”
rikyrah
Winning at SOTU: Miss Edith Childs. Losing: Kim Davis’ Mullet
The 2016 State of the Union Address (and last of the Obama Administration) was full of entertainment. Y’all know I watch some of these shows to be the lady on the stoop roasting everyone. This is why people miss me sometimes when I don’t live-tweet shows and events. You’re basically missing Miss Benita.
ANTYWAY, in the one hour that President Obama spoke, he commanded my attention fully. Unless he didn’t because certain people almost stole his shine. Let me take that back. Someone DID steal Barack’s shine and her name is Edith Childs, a councilmember from Greenwood, South Carolina.
Please get these eye riches and behold Miss Edith in her glory.
Now you know good and damb well you gotta call her Miss Edith. Don’t walk around calling her “Edith” like she’s your age mate. WHO RAISED YOU? WOLVES?
Please get into this woman and get your life. The moment I saw her on my screen looking like her outfit was sponsored by God’s favor, I HOLLERED. The sequins hat was what got my attention first, sitting on her scalp perched like a crown because she is a QUEEN. Miss Edith is my patronus. If dementors ever came around me, she’d just stop them with the shine of being saved, then the shine from her outfit. I know she got a glitter brooch that says “Jesus” like my Granny did.
She is everything I aspire to be. Cranky, bedazzled and judging everyone. She’s sitting there like she wants to take a switch to Paul Ryan’s non-clapping ass. You know he spent most of the speech looking like someone didn’t cut the crust off his peanut butter and jelly sammich like he asked. Miss Edith might have been staring him down, wondering why he can’t respect the office of the President by putting his palms together two good times.
Miss Edith will be my mentor, if it’s God’s will because she got things to teach me, like how to let people know how unbothered I am with one look. Is she looking for mentees? Where do I apply? Am I worthy? These are just a few questions I have for Miss Edith. I am but a humble millennial looking to get cantankerous before I even qualify for AARP. Can she lead me to the light?
I know she can, because she just seems like a good church mother. You know the one who’s been on the Usher Board for 25 years, and she is the one who calls the #alphet colors every Sunday. And you know if you do not own a lavender blouse, it is up to you to look up and down to find one. Pray about it, chile. The Lord will make a way. She won’t lead you astray. These color schemes were fasted on and she touched and agreed upon them with the co-Head Usher, therefore they must come to pass.
Mother Childs is the Matron Saint of Not Giving a Damb and she is my everything. Now, her scowl is not to be confused with another’s.
On the other end of the spectrum of life-giving resplendence is the human tofu, Kim Davis. Somehow, she managed to be in the building, and I’m mad at whoever invited her. I know it wasn’t the Obamas. Was she there because of affirmative action? I think they needed to balance out the SLAY quotient of the night. Amidst all those bright suits and LAID hair, they needed to bring the level of FIERCE down so someone had Kim show up. In this alphet:
Kay
@Peale:
No laws of any kind apply to them- local, state, federal, doesn’t matter:
I certainly hope the fake grand jury doesn’t indict the sheriff is all I can say. They may take him into custody.
MomSense
@Miss Bianca:
Brava.
Adam L Silverman
@lgerard: That’s funny because the tests top out at 150.
Steve in the ATL
@trollhattan:
Rural [insert name of any state] seems like a hot mess.
alhutch
Adam – The quote about the “every gun in the house is loaded” was from a local policeman’s wife (family also followed), not the pastor’s wife.
bemused
@Miss Bianca:
What makes them think that if federal lands were in private hands they would benefit? Big business and corps want to get their hands on federal lands and if they did, they aren’t going to give a rat’s ass what those “rugged individualists” want.
Adam L Silverman
@Sande in St Louis: I just reread it. They’re two different sets of questions. So if they answers to the first batch are yes, technically it implies a no set for the second and vice versa, but that’s not how I wrote it. I’ll go back and edit for clarity as it obviously was confusing.
Steve in the ATL
@Miss Bianca: Damn, gurl. Well said.
trollhattan
BTW, these Bundy pricks are strictly amateur at getting stuff they want. For the professional approach, behold Westlands Water District.
trollhattan
@bemused:
Presumably, they’d be the ones bundling it and selling it off. At some point the nice bits would become rural retreats for our billionaire plutocrats, the rest would become salt flats.
Adam L Silverman
@alhutch: fixed!
The Other Chuck
@Kay:
On the other hand, that might spur law enforcement to actually do something about these thugs.
Mike J
Amanda Peacher @amandapeacher 1h1 hour ago
Burns fire chief & #bundymilitia sympathizer Chris Briels announced resignation. Says he won’t work for gov he can’t trust. #Oregonstandoff
The Other Chuck
@Mike J: #selfcorrectingproblems
bemused
@trollhattan:
No doubt there would be ranchers that would sell out but there will always be others clinging to their treasured way of life fantasies who will be gobsmacked when they are barred from entering land owned by billionaires instead of government.
trollhattan
@Mike J:
That’s just weird. But never fear, I have the perfect replacement.
Calouste
@rikyrah: I always thought that one of the cardinal rules in an investment strategy was diversification, not putting all your eggs in one basket for 30 years. You definitely wouldn’t want to put everything away for 30 years at the moment when the interest rates are historically low.
Renie
Just looking at the way Edith Childs and Kim Davis dress shows how much they do (and in Davis’s case – don’t) respect our government. And with the amount of money Davis makes ($80K) she can afford to dress better when going to such an important event.
Mai.naem.mobile
I know this sounds silly and simplistic but is there some kind of chemical agent that can be detonated like a stink bomb to sedate these guys. Either that or send in pizza or chick-fil-a food laced with a strong sedative. I don’t give a shit if one or more have a reaction to the sedative but I’m assuming a judge would give the FBI the okay to check the medical records of these idjits for allergies. Better they have an allergic reaction than one of the law.enforcment people lose their lives going in with guns.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@rikyrah:
That describes me so well. I want to be Miss Edith when I grow up.
gex
@chopper: They are white and right wing. The latter characteristic is just as important as the former.
Peale
@Mike J: And the town is probably better off looking for a fire chief who wants to spend his time preparing to fight fires than one interested in revolutionary politics.
The Other Chuck
@Mai.naem.mobile: They’ll throw in CS gas right before they go in. It can’t be used in a sustained fashion. Are there things they could do to make them more uncomfortable there? Sure. But as it is, they’re practically giving them a fucking concierge service right now.
Peale
@Soylent Green: Yeah, sure you didn’t.
Anyway, its the middle of winter. How much forage was he expecting his cattle to find in the wildlife refuge. And why should I care that a farmer has more cows on his land than he can feed?
Peale
@a different chris: Yeah. Unlike vension, which I only like once in a while, I’ve heard good things about this beef product. I could see hunters going crazy for it. I hear it makes good steaks and sausage.
WarMunchkin
Q’s I have. They’re going to sound weird, but I’ve been trying to wrap my head around this stuff, and for the life of me, I can’t figure this out, at all.
1. For any arbitrary size community, if there are enough united and armed people who oppose the controlling authority, isn’t it impossible to enforce law there without loss of life?
1a. If there is an armed force defending the area where a majority of locals support the action, isn’t that basically a nation?
1b. In that case, how accurate is it for them to claim right of conquest?
2. If the executive branch (of any applicable party) were to attempt to apply existing law, wouldn’t it be a value judgement against the lives of the people sent to enforce said law? For example, if we were to send special forces to take these guys out, and it was likely that three members of the squad would be killed – the president or governor or whoever would have to weigh that value against simply not enforcing the rule of law and appraise potential damage against the political process in non-occupied territory.
2a. If the people sent to enforce the law (say, the Oregon National Guard), were more loyal to the occupiers than the orders of the controlling authority and refused to carry out orders to kill the militants, what happens?
I guess what I’m getting to is – I don’t really understand the politics of what’s going on here. I’m not talking about morality or rule of law – just straight up political currency. If people don’t want to spend their lives trying to bring national and state law to a community that doesn’t want national or state law, then what happens? Like, I dunno, I can’t imagine a military family being told that their kid had to die because some authority ordered a military raid against these jokers. (Not that I’d blame the orderer, of course; just trying to figure out political sentiment).
And if we won’t apply economic sanctions, and we’re not willing to expend lives to take these people out — what, they just become Lesotho?
Peale
@bemused: I believe the plan is to give the lands to themselves. I don’t believe the plan involves the government selling the land to anyone. Claim rights from the Spanish Crown, intimidate the sheriff and put men with guns on it and its as good as yours.
Raven Onthill
@kc: “I would really appreciate an explanation as to why the Bundys have been permitted to flout the law for years”
My impression is that they have substantial support from elected officials, and therefore there is no action. It for-sure helps they are white cowboys.
J
@Miss Bianca: Many thanks for this! (And the allusion to Margery Sharp in the name you’ve chosen stirred pleasant memories of childhood reading.)
The Other Chuck
@WarMunchkin: A nation exists by way of recognition. What they could most charitably be called is an occupying (insurrectionist and not foreign) force, and I’ll take my chances on the Powerball before imagining they’d be successful in some imagined “right of conquest”.
But what they really are is a bunch of squatters occupying a facility that’s closed for the season anyway. Springtime will bring assault vehicles methinks.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@The Other Chuck: Any possibility of luring you out of tech retirement, if you know what I mean? Have $ will paypal…
Renie
@WarMunchkin: Great questions. Hope Adam gets a chance to comment on them?
The whole situation is ridiculous. I don’t know why the feds are allowing this to happen. Just creates a sense of entitlement for other RWNJ groups to do the same thing.
Mike J
Note to organizers: Paul Revere got caught. Sybil Ludington, a 17 year old girl, rode twice as far and beat a highwayman with a stick when he tried to stop her.
The Other Chuck
@a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q): Possibly — there’s some shit going on in my private life that’s keeping me from doing any major projects, but a side project might be what I need.
Feel free to email me with the details: [email protected]
Adam L Silverman
@Mike J: Someone needs to explain to him that he works for the county government, not the Federal government. Not sure he’d understand that though.
Sande in St Louis
@Adam L Silverman: Adam, I was probably the only one confused, but it is a powerful piece of writing that calls for a wide audience; I appreciate the edit, as I will be asking others to read this and a few of my friends may have also been confused at the construct.
You are a very clear and articulate writer; I am humbled by your output – I very much have enjoyed your recent front page articles.
Adam L Silverman
@Mai.naem.mobile: There’s a nasty sedative that Putin had his folks use at the Beslan massacre. It basically makes you relive your worst nightmare for several hours. It also, supposedly, has some other nasty side effects like death…
Soylent Green
What community? Burns, Oregon? The people of Burns want their lives back and for these disruptive characters from other states to go away.
bemused
@Mai.naem.mobile:
There are kids in there. One father even takes a kid with him outside to check the perimeters, armed no doubt. Cowards, putting their kids in that situation.
Adam L Silverman
@WarMunchkin: These are good and important questions. Law, Rule of Law, application of Law are only effective when members of a society are socialized to it and accept both the Law and its administrators as legitimate. In this case, the Bundys and their fellow travelers and supporters, as well as significant numbers of the local community do not accept either the state or Federal foundational/constitutional and statutory Law in regards to public land. Oregon, when it entered into the Union, enshrined in its state Constitution that it recognized the Federal ownership and administration of significant amounts of the land within what was the Federal territory and was becoming the state of Oregon. So this isn’t just a recognition of Federal claims, but also of Oregon’s own constitutional reality. This is also another great example of no one actually caring about or understanding either Federalism or the wacky subset of it known as state’s rights (and once again, state’s do not have rights, they have powers, people have rights). For a lot of people, even in 2016, the Federal government is still this big thing in DC that seems to take money away and tell people what to do. And like the rabbi’s blessing for the tsar: “god should bless it and keep it far away from us”. There is no recognition of the fact that everyone in the US, through the Federal government is paying for the upkeep of these lands, as well as subsidizing usage of them for ranching, forestry, and recreation, and for disaster management and response in case of wildfire. Largely this is because most people just don’t think about these things or even know how much their states take in from the Federal government for the tax dollars that they and their neighbors send to DC. This is why the local fire chief that MikeJ mentioned resigned from the county government because he’s mad at the Federal government. That’s like going upstairs to look in the basement from the second floor in your house.
Adam L Silverman
@Mike J: Don’t forget Israel Bissell:
http://www.lrgaf.org/journeys/bissell.htm
Miss Bianca
@bemused:
don’t even get me started on that issue. The Kochs own mucho, mucho land around where I used to live.
bemused
@Peale:
Delusional to think they’d get the land, delusional to think they’d all agree who’d get which parcel of land, delusional to think they’d ever hold onto the land, neverending fantasies.
Adam L Silverman
@Sande in St Louis: You’re quite welcome and no worries. Basically what we have tried to do when working with staffs is get them to thing about two different dynamics in regards to an areas stability. So we give them two different set of measures, which is what I’d originally written up, and they use it as a checklist when getting input back in from elements that are out within the Area of Responsibility. What’s interesting is that if an area seems to be stable on these measures, there is a follow on question: is this because the government (that we’re supporting) is providing the security and stability or is it because the anti-government elements are? That’s a harder question to answer.
Miss Bianca
@rikyrah:
Hot.Damn.Tamale.
I think I need Miss Edith for my fairy godmother.
Mike in NC
I think the Bundy gang has a lot of sympathizers sitting in the US Congress. For example, the largest number of representatives in the so-called Freedom Caucus are from Arizona. Many senators and representatives think their main constituents in the big empty Western states are the logging, mining, and ranching lobbies. If you see one of them on TV, odds are they’ll sound very much like Bundy and company.
Keith G
@WarMunchkin:
I imagine that this is a bit of what is going on here. If the government were to choose force to end this, it would be over quickly – a tactical team going in at 3 AM with night-vision aided by longer range infra red surveillance. The blood loss would be very one sided. But, then what? Slow walking this is not a bad thing if the bad guys eventually lose a bit of their freedom for a bit.
As to your other questions, they are a bit irrelevant in that there are significant precedents about how the central government feels about threats to its territorial integrity.
I think that there is a good debate to be had about the long term benefits (or lack thereof) to how flexible the feds are being here. Maybe some day we can learn what Obama and Lynch were feeling about this in real time as it has developed.
polyorchnid octopunch
@rikyrah: I am 100% agreed. It’s unbelievable to me that this has been allowed to happen. What is wrong with those people?
People a long way up that food chain need to go to jail. They poisoned how many thousands of people?
Mnemosyne
@Miss Bianca:
Depending on your friends, there may be another argument that would get through to them:
They were convicted of poaching. They killed deer out of season and then set a fire to cover it up. Are your friends just fine with poachers killing game out of season? If so, then you can safely Unfriend them.
Mnemosyne
@srv:
Sorry, dude, your side lost that argument way back in 1791. My man Alexander Hamilton kicked your asses. Get over it.
Miss Bianca
@J:
Miss Bianca is my heroine. A tiny little ladylike mouse who kicks some serious ass. I can only aspire to be worthy of her.. : )
WarMunchkin
@Keith G:
I guess my limited knowledge of history is kicking my ass here. I’m thinking of, say, the Battle of Little Bighorn and Fort Sumter as my comparison points. In one case, white settlers encroached upon Native American land, and the government elected to defend them in breach of treaty; in the other, the Union sustained a direct attack and opted to commit lives to reclaim territory.
And the mechanics of that make sense (though not morally in the first case) to me – as they do here – it’s just that lives seem to be a much higher political price than any federal or state official can pay in what seems to be armed and hostile territory. Didn’t Lincoln have to convince people that the South was worth reclaiming? Thus the doing nothing. Suppose there was a nontrivial chance of committing lives and the value of literally scorching the earth with a drone strike was higher than what American voters and leaders are willing to pay.
Miss Bianca
@Mnemosyne:
I tried that argument. They buy the Hammonds’ argument that NO WAY did they start the fire to cover their tracks, it was totally a controlled burn that got un-. And oh, the Federal Government is telling them they can’t use their wells, and telling them that they can only sell the property to the govt. I just…can’t. even. And I love these folks, that’s what it makes it painful. I just basically unfriended myself from FB, because I realized that yelling at people there was just making me feel like an asshole.
Keith G
@srv:
Right next to the section on regulating air travel.
Which is to say it is not innumerated, but exists as a power belonging to a sovereign government.
trollhattan
@srv:
Small correction: the BLM owns no land. The people of the United States, however, do.
Mnemosyne
@Miss Bianca:
Ugh. There’s not much you can do when people decide that the court got it wrong. It’s usually because they’re getting bad information, but it’s frustrating as hell.
Adam L Silverman
@srv: I’m going to treat this seriously because its a good question. The agreements that brought the western states into the Union as states from simply being territories, all including agreements between the Federal government and then soon to be state governments on management of these lands. As is the case with the Oregon state constitution, these agreements are reflected in the constitutions of most, if not all of, the western states. So this is a Federalism agreement, between each state and the Federal government, and it would fall under the 10th Amendment. Again, and again, and again: state’s do not have rights, not enumerated or otherwise, they have powers. And this is true whether its the Federal state or each state within the Union. To sum up: the Constitution of each of these states creates an agreement with the Federal government that places these lands under Federal ownership and/or oversight and gives the Federal government the power to administer them.
Adam L Silverman
@Mnemosyne: Is there a song or scene about it in the musical?
Keith G
@WarMunchkin:
We live in a republic so that our political leadership is given agency to act in our behalf. We do not plebiscite decision making. We ask that the leadership use their best judgment and then hold them accountable at election time.
As war was waged in Europe in 1940, FDR had to find ways around the statutory and public opinion barriers limiting what material help could be given to the forces fighting the Nazis. That is the nature of leadership.
WarMunchkin
@Keith G: I guess the analog here is a state-level government unwilling or unable to exercise military force, and the federal government providing non-military aid. That seems to be going on. So, basically, it’s just like what a commenter above stated – they won’t go in until people are calling for blood or negotiations work out.
jl
@srv: @Adam L Silverman:
I think the US federal government is clearly the senior partner. The Constitution specifies requirements for statehood. Congress can make and they can unmake states if those requirements are not met.
I think the first Reconstruction Act laid out a legal framework for reorganizing and admitting states. Probably not good enough for srv, since clearly, something might be different about what to do after a violent rebellion.
Probably too obscure to find a reference, but there was discussion in Congress of changing the status of Nevada after the Comstock Lode played out. Nevada depopulated, the federal mint was opened and closed a couple of times and there was a fuss about what to do with the damn thing. Nevada politics became a tad thugish and violent. Maybe too small a population, which is dwindling too quickly to support a true republican government? Congress didn’t seem to sense a Constitutional crisis in the making, but then srv was not around to get them all riled up.
Luckily, gold and silver strikes in Tonopah solved Nevada’s problems around 1900.
Anyway, as another commenter pointed out, Hamilton and Madison explained it all way back when. The federal government is supreme, not the states, not the counties, and not roaming gangs of armed high plains grifters..
Lokahi
Realizing this is a dying thread past it’s prime, but couldn’t resist sharing that I’ve joined dozens of others in sending a Bag of Dicks to these bunch of dicks in Oregon. Unfortunately, they aren’t salted…and they’re apparently not being received very graciously.
jl
As long as high plains grifters came up, one Oregan rancher in Harney County is not happy that the Bundy Gang cut his damn fence.
Rancher: Bundy & Co. ‘Didn’t Have My Permission’ To Destroy Fence
Tim Puckett, a rancher whose land runs adjacent to the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, told The Oregonian Wednesday he’s never spoken to Bundy, and his ranch hands have already fixed the fence.
“I am very upset,” Puckett told the paper. “They didn’t have my permission to do anything.”
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/tim-puckett-bundy-militia-oregon
Mnemosyne
@Adam L Silverman:
Sadly, the Whiskey Rebellion was cut for time — the show is already close to 3 hours as it is. There is a musical number about the Constitutional Covention and writing of the Federalist Papers, though. And a rap battle over creating a national bank.
amk
@Miss Bianca:
‘Bottom line: if government helps, and keeps helping, white people whose ancestors were lucky enough to be on hand to cash in on The Homestead Act, then Government is OK. The minute the government decides to recognize the interests of any other group, be it wolves or spotted owls or Native American fishermen or quiet-use hikers, the Government Sucks.’
This. teanutz in a nutshell.
Soylent Green
The nation’s first forest reserves were formed in 1893. “Cut and run” logging had already leveled the forests of the Upper Midwest, and was on the march in the mountain and Pacific states, its destructiveness much enhanced by steam power. There was no money appropriated to protect these forests from rampant timber theft until Teddy R. established the Forest Service in 1906 to oversee and guard them. The agency’s mission, in the words of its first chief Gifford Pinchot, was to provide “the greatest good for the greatest number” (the American people as a whole) and not just enrich the greediest, most powerful, or most corrupt among us.
kc
@a different chris:
Let’s just get up an armed militia to seize the cattle, in the name of the PEOPLE.
Sad_Dem
Will those heavily armed white guys in cowboy hats come to the aid of the Dann Sisters?
Sad_Dem
@amk: You may just have Ryan Payne’s number.
Bill Murray
Back in the day, those were not lynching parties, but citizen’s grand juries. See what we have to look forward to.
PurpleGirl
@rikyrah: Thank you Rikyrah for that link. I love the blog post. And Ms. Edith Childs is every Church Lady I saw from the bus window when I used to going shopping Sunday mornings and passed by all the storefront churches and Baptist churches in East Elmhurst (on Northern Blvd). You saw all these women proud in their crowns (fancy hats) and best suits and dresses — to them Sunday morning was an important time and they were going to look that way. No sloppy jeans and t-shirts. They dressed to the nines. Feathers, sequins, jewels, the whole nine-yards of personal adornment. Kim Davis may think she’s following the Bible by being plain and fugly but, no, she’s just being lazy about her own appearance. I salute all the Church Ladies and their crowns. (I may no longer attend services and I didn’t get gussied up as the Church Ladies do, but you have got to love them.)
Adam L Silverman
@Mnemosyne: Perhaps if you start a write in campaign they’ll include it in the sequel. Or in the director’s cut box set DVDs.
E
@srv: The Property Clause is what you are looking for, srv. Article IV, Sec. 3, “The Congress shall have Power to dispose of and make all needful Rules and Regulations respecting the Territory or other Property belonging to the United States.”
The land came under federal ownership after we stole it fair and square from the Indians. The Western States were all granted statehood after accepting the federal ownership. However, I am sure the Sovereign Citizen movement can direct us to documentation in the Magna Carta, Code of Hammurabi, and Icelandic Sagas that prove beyond any doubt that the BLM does not actually exist.
Gian
@Mnemosyne:
I had good information (the manson family prosecutor wrote a book)
Bush v. Gore was the wrong ruling and is an abomination. the court got it wrong.
Gian
@Soylent Green:
deforestation fueled floods may have been on the policy minds at the time
Paul in KY
@Miss Bianca: Write that back to them.
Paul in KY
@Kay: Don’t worry, Kay. I’m on it. Just a few more sequins to get on robe…
What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us?
@Waspuppet: Yeah, I’m convinced the only thing these guys will respect, in the end, is use of asymmetric force. I say we roll in a few Bradley fighting vehicles with a couple Warthogs in close air support. Let these guys know that their little game is about to get real, and when it gets real, those pea shooters they have with them aren’t going to do anything but make the guys coming for them madder.