When I think of Huckabee.....
Posted on 04/17/2014 11:58:09 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
GOP presidential hopefuls are largely steering clear of Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy’s fight with the federal government.
The showdown, which left armed militia members and feds staring each other down last week, has captivated talk radio and cable news shows, turning Bundy into a conservative cause célèbre.
Yet Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and Mike Huckabee, a former Arkansas governor and 2008 presidential candidate, are the only big-name Republicans to have spoken out on the dispute so far. Tea Party favorite Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) has been silent, and Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) have also not commented on Bundy, who has been fighting the federal government in and out of court for more than 20 years over his refusal to pay cattle grazing fees.
All three offices did not respond to calls for this story.
GOP strategists suggested that Bundy’s case is too risky for most candidates eyeing the presidency, particularly given the possibility of armed conflict with federal police.
“The Republican Party’s very sympathetic to Cliven Bundy’s property rights, states’ rights argument,” said strategist Ford O’Connell, who worked on John McCain’s 2008 campaign. “But many Republicans also prize the rule of law above all else. Right or wrong, Bundy had his day in court and lost.”
Matt Mackowiak, who has worked on various Capitol Hill campaigns and as a congressional press secretary, agreed that candidates have good reason to be cautious in the Bundy dispute.
“If you don’t know the person, and you haven’t followed the situation closely, all you do is you look at the situation and see risk,” Mackowiak, who contributes to The Hill's Pundits Blog, said.
Still, Bundy’s arguments and the battle on his ranch feed into a strain of the GOP worried about what it sees as a growing incursion
(Excerpt) Read more at thehill.com ...
Why do that when ‘lesser evils’ are so much easier? WINNING!!!
Remember purists are the problem and principle does not matter. So say the wizened sages of FR who got us a smashing victory in 2012 and helped President Romney ascend to the throne with a full cadre of sever conservatives who have since fought valiantly, opposing illegal immigration, cuts to vet benefits and the homofication of America and it’s military.
Almost makes ya wonder where they found the time to nail Holder, Lois and Hillary to the wall over Bhenghazi, Fast/Furious and the IRS thing.
but by god they did! YEA LESSER EVIL!!!
But whether Bundy is squeaky clean or legally in the right is not the only issue; the issue is that we have an armed federal bureacracy that is so vast, so powerful, so out of touch with the people, and so tyrannical in nature that they fail to recognize (or perhaps simply don't care about) the impact on public trust and popular sentiment incurred by
(i) taking away a mans livelihood by limiting the number of cattle permitted to graze as a condition of renewing his grazing rights on a property his family has stewarded since before there was a BLM
(ii) using their unlimited resources to wear him down emotionally and financially in the courts over a period of decades and finally
(iii) trying to take his cattle through direct force, with a para-military assault under dubious pretenses.
Rand Paul is the only one who has addressed THIS issue ("The federal government shouldn’t violate the law, nor should we have 48 federal agencies carrying weapons and having SWAT teams") as far as I know.
It shows me that none of the DC crowd has the instincts to respond in fast-moving situations. Anyone who was really on the side of constitutional conservatives would not have missed the opportunity to say those BLM agents should be on the US border with Mexico, protecting US citizens and property from invasion, and not assaulting US citizens and destroying their herds.
That lack of quick-thinking instinctive responses to defend US citizens from federal over-reach makes me question if any of them should be President.
“:If he’s not squeaky clean, the MSM will use that to clobber him and make him out the bad guy who deserves what he gets.”
Not necessarily true.
Cause trouble, insurrectionists shake their fists and brandish their weapons, cuss and pound tables. Look foolish in general. Best way to convince the ‘undecided’ to steer clear of Conservatism which the left has successfully linked to the insurrectionists, willingly I may add.
Marginalize, chastise, demonize then finally criminalize. The insurrectionists fall for it every time.
I don’t think any of them care.
“I’ve read just about everything that’s been published on this case, and in my view it is an act of civil disobedience in protest of an unjust regulation that would not be merely an inconvenience, but would run Mr. Bundy out of the ranching business, and effectively end a way of life that has been a tradition in the American west for over 100 years.”
Good summation.
But on the subject of the title of this thread, which is that DC GOP politicians haven't leapt to the defense of Mr. Bundy...
That's a choice concerning whether to make Mr. Bundy a symbol of the larger issues you enumerate so well.
The MSM would like nothing better than to discredit an individual who symbolizes an issue our side believes strongly in.
If he turns out to have feet of clay, the MSM would see to it that his flaws are the only thing that anyone remembers about this entire episode.
Thank you both! I will read. I want to understand this situation.
If people condemn the guy over saying FU to the BLM extortion over bad optics after accepting the optics of a pro gay pro abortion liar as their 2012 standard bearer, we no longer have a country worth saving.
When I think of Huckabee.....
I'm not sure I'd go quite so far, but I take your point.
I would point out, however, that declining to make Mr. Bundy a symbol of a movement is not identical to condemning him.
And I admit it is ironic that we have to be so careful about our standard bearers, whilst our opposition rallies around people who have actual criminal records (in some cases) and the MSM lets them get away with it.
Bottom line is: it's nice to have the MSM in your pocket.
If you don’t regulate the fisheries there will be no more fish. We’ve already seen that with Atlantic cod.
I understand and agree with what you have said. I guess my point was that there are ways to not “steer clear of [the] Nevada ranch fight” in the headline, with courage, that do not play into the MSM’s hands and are not contingent on the infallability of Mr. Bundy.
I would say that by not getting behind them they have indeed condemned him and anyone who a govt agency has the power to stop into non existence.
They destroyed an industry (off roading/racing) that brought literally BILLIONS of dollars into Nevada and California (at one time the overall industry was 6 billion a year total) to appease environmentalists and give bennies to their cronies.
The current solar plant south of vegas sits on a one time portion of race course that had to be stopped/done away with due to the danger to the tortise. It is now PAVED in glass and metal. But a lot of people lost a lot of money so a few could get a lot of money.
And that is but ONE example in the Mohave desert. there are many more. Laughlin NV is stagnated over BLM land restrictions. It is endless. And it happened because ‘our guys’ sat silently.
Do you consider the Constitution to be the Supreme Law of the Land?
If so can you show me where in the Constitution it gives the Federal Government the authority to own 85% of the real estate in a sovereign state?
Mr. Bundy represented himself against an army of Government lawyers in those cases. He then stood firm against an army of Federal goons armed with automatic weapons and assault vehicles.
Al Sharpton owes $1.9 million in back taxes and Obama and Reid treat him like their best friend. Then Obama spends millions of dollars hiring an army to confiscate Bundy's cattle and shoot his family and friends if the opportunity arose.
Just because some court rules against you doesn't mean you don't have a legal leg to stand on. I think it is pretty clear that from a strict Constitutional standpoint, the BLM had no constitutional authority to charge grazing fees on land within the boundaries of Nevada. The fees should have been collected by Nevada and then if Nevada chose to pay tribute, then they could have sent some of the money to the crooks in Washington.
As it stands, Nevada is not a legitimate state on an equal footing with states east of the Mississippi. If I were the governor of Nevada, I would have called out the National Guard to protect the Bundy family from the armed federal goons. Instead it was his family and friends who had to do that job.
What really irritates me is how the US government allows illegal aliens over our border. They are grazing off the US taxpayer. They turn the other cheek and bestow them with benefits that they pilfer from US taxpayers.
Bundy is about the last rancher standing in that county and the US government won’t be happy until he is removed or killed in order to make big bucks for politicians over green phoney energy contracts.
They want to hold this family to owing the taxpayers. He doesn’t owe anyone anything. He is producing food for Americans.
The shamefulness of this episode disgusts the hell out of me.
I agree but what disgusts me far more than the BLM, the worthless GOP/politicians or the silent talking heads is the people on right wing web sites siding with the BLM, the worthless GOP/politicians and the silent talking heads.
Having spent no small amount of time dealing with land use issues in a professional capacity I have seen what the reality is. And that reality is that many people are flat out too cowardly to stand up for themselves and fight this insanity.
Well, I’m disappointed in Cruz. He should have spoken out.
As for all the legal mumbo jumbo being against Bundy, well, the legal voodoo doctors say you can kill babies. Shows what they know.
The bottom line is that the Fed has had 150 years to divest themselves of Nevada public land, and they haven’t accomplished it. That means they’ve been derelict.
Moreover, they have permitted the range to be used for grazing for generations, so the Fed has identified its purpose, and the governor of Nevada should now be in charge of it, seeing that the Fed has determined its disposition.
Moreover, Bundy has legal water rights that can’t be removed from him.
Additionally, adverse possession can’t be applied to public land, according to some, but adverse utilization can be. In the past, under cabin rights, all a man had to do was build a cabin, clear land, and farm/ranch it.
That went away, but the Fed approved of open range for so long, that adverse utilization should apply.
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