Inviting wrath of judge may be part of a calculated approach....(OREGON STANDOFF TRIAL)

It would be nearly impossible for jurors not to notice U.S. District Judge Anna J. Brown's growing exasperation with Ammon Bundy's lawyer Marcus Mumford.

Since the Bundy trial began two weeks ago, the judge has repeatedly told Mumford to follow her rulings, reword his questions to government witnesses and occasionally to either stand up when he addresses her or sit down and stop challenging her directives.

Despite her earlier orders that defense lawyers weren't to raise questions at trial about who owns the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, Mumford tried to solicit responses....

Despite the judge's warnings that she didn't want any defendant or defense lawyer to ask witnesses about the circumstances surrounding the fatal police shooting of occupation spokesman Robert "LaVoy" Finicum, Mumford passed off as a question a stinging remark that Finicum was shot three times in the back, asked another witness how close police were to him when he was shot and why the FBI wasn't investigating the shooting.

Each time, prosecutors objected. Each time, the judge asked jurors to disregard Mumford's bids to get around her edicts....

She threatened Mumford with contempt of court...She told him she'd fine him $1,000 for each time...

He knows what he's doing. It's intentional," said Matthew Schindler, a lawyer helping co-defendant Kenneth Medenbach. "I don't believe he makes choices without a strategic focus."

Mumford may be trying to mimic Bundy's narrative--that the federal government hasn't listened to his concerns and that's why he needed to take a stand....

Schindler, who typically asks witnesses a few pointed questions and moves on, said he's proud of Mumford.

"I've never seen anybody get Judge Brown so fired up," Schindler said. "We're not there to be friends with judges. Justice is not done by sitting down and shutting up.".........

It looks like Ammon Bundy's defense lawyer, Marcus Mumford, is fighting hard for his defendant in the tradition of Muhammad Ali in sports, Donald Trump in politics and so on. He's taunting the opponents and getting under their skin.

He's found the "Bull Connor" in District Judge Anna Brown to create a sense in the jurors minds that the judge is being cruel to the defense as indeed she is.

He's getting under the skin of his opponent, Judge Brown, and her 'kangaroo court' as activist Gavin Seim calls it.

Seim spoke late Friday with Ammon Bundy and made a video of his conversation with Bundy calling from jail about the case and the kind of defense argument he would like to make to the jury.

Yes, last summer Trump made a brief statement in support of farmer and rancher right and remarked that he could resolve the conflict with a simple phone call.

I posted last year a link to Trump’s statement. He was magnificent in his defense of ranchers but was insistent on following the law.

If I can find it I will post it.

Actually, Trump’s remarks were in January of this year. Here is a link and some of his remarks:

http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/donald-trump-takes-on-federal-land-control/article/2579978

In a new op-ed for the Reno Gazette-Journal, the Republican presidential front-runner rails against the “draconian rule” of the Bureau of Land Management and the Obama administration’s “land grab” in the western United States.

“The BLM controls over 85 percent of the land in Nevada,” Trump explains. “In the rural areas, those who for decades have had access to public lands for ranching, mining, logging and energy development are forced to deal with arbitrary and capricious rules that are influenced by special interests that profit from the D.C. rule-making and who fill the campaign coffers of Washington politicians.”

On Thursday, Trump told the New York Times he would end an ongoing dispute between Oregon ranchers and federal officials, that’s culminated with a group of armed protesters staging an ongoing occupation of a federal wildlife refuge, with a “phone call.”

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Importantly, Trump does not call for just handing over federal lands to STATES without thinking it over thoroughly. This caused a bit of an uproar, why? Because Trump knows that there exist many corrupt state officials who would sell or lease the lands to the highest bidder whereas Donald would advocate for best use of the lands.

I called for handing control of the lands to a Charter Association of Farmers and Ranchers with limited federal regulations about how the charter was to be managed in terms of membership so that a clique could not control the charter and thus the lands. This approach would seem to follow Trump principles of putting leadership into the hands of those that know the business the best, not federal or state bureaucrats.

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