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Gopherus agassizii is the binomial name given to the desert tortoise, a roughly foot-long creature with a lifespan that can stretch to more than half-a-century. This turtle inhabits the Mojave Desert in America’s great southwest. On paper, the desert tortoise seems an innocuous amphibian; however, it has the curious attribute of being able provoke nearly open warfare between U.S. citizens and the federal government. The notion of a “range war” may harken back to the days of the American cowboy riding the fence each morning and protecting his homestead from attack. Yet, last week the federal Bureau of Land Management...

I love that picture from the Bundy Ranch. You know the one that I’m talking about: I’m talking about all of them. I love the horn-handed Cowboys, with real, honest trail dirt on them; I love the American flags; I love the sagebrush; and I love the rebellion-- as in civil, non-violent disobedience. And the question now is, where does this go? Rebellion typically starts after a period of lassitude and hopelessness in the face of overwhelming power. Populations spend years, even decades muttering under their breath about abuses of power, but feel ineffectual to enact real reform. Then...

Griff Jenkins investigates. Video only.

Harry Reid seems to have taken the Bundy standoff rather personally: "Well, it's not over. We can't have an American people that violate the law and then just walk away from it. So it's not over," Reid said. It is a very scary thing when a government officer takes such things personally -- given that the government can and does order the use of lethal force against citizens. What is the rationale for Reid's We-Must-Not-Let-This-Insult-Pass attitude? Were Reid talking about a slight from a hostile foreign power -- such as Russia, or, for that matter, al-Qaeda -- he's more than...

(VIDEO-AT-LINK)KRYSTAL BALL: Next Monday is Patriots' Day in Boston and thousands of modern patriots will take to the streets to run, to celebrate and to come together out of tragedy, proving true the words of our pledge, one nation, under God, indivisible. That word though, patriot, has become a really loaded one. To see what I mean, consider Cliven Bundy, the rancher who has refused to pay the people of the U.S. what he owes for use of our land because he views the U.S. federal government as a foreign interloper. Mr. Bundy denies the legitimacy of our republic. And...

(VIDEO-AT-LINK)Judge Andrew Napolitano reacted to the latest developments in the Nevada ranch standoff, telling Elisabeth Hasselbeck that the federal government has acted inappropriately and is trying to scare the Bundy family. Fox and Friends played an audio clip of a Bureau of Land Management (BLM) special agent, who maintained that federal agents respect the Constitution and "understand free speech." He argued that the BLM was trying to avoid conflict, noting that some of the protesters were "holding rocks above their heads to throw at police officers." Napolitano recalled that he was shocked to see that BLM agents were armed. "The...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3XLDXK-iMUo SEN. RAND PAUL: I think there’s an opposite thing to what Harry Reid said, and that’s that the federal government shouldn’t violate the law. Nor should we have 48 federal agencies carrying weapons and having SWAT teams.

Amid raucous debate, Nevada Republican Party conventioneers on Saturday stripped opposition to gay marriage and abortion from the party platform and endorsed Gov. Brian Sandoval for governor in the June 10 primary despite misgivings by conservatives, his criticism of the process and his absence from the meeting. The convention also backed Sue Lowden for lieutenant governor over state Sen. Mark Hutchison, R-Las Vegas, who was endorsed by Sandoval and who also spurned the party’s move to endorse candidates before the primary. A nominating committee proposed more than three dozen pre-primary endorsements, although the panel decided against recommending anybody in the...

Tensions simmered Tuesday in the standoff between federal land managers and a Nevada rancher—but the feds are being coy about how far they’ll go to pursue Cliven Bundy as both sides regroup for their next move. Federal land managers backed down in a weekend standoff with Bundy after hundreds of states’ rights protesters, including armed militia members, showed up to protest federal officials seizing his cattle. Some protesters had their guns drawn and pointed toward law enforcement, some of whom were also armed, on the scene—ultimately, no shots were fired and the Bureau of Land Management reported that officials left...

Harry Reid’s jihad against the Koch Brothers has already yielded a hilarious video compilation (by the Free Beacon) of his 134 mentions of their name. But now with new information, his Koch addiction can become a potent tool in the hands of Republicans. Call it karma, if you like, but the former boxer now leading the Senate majority has left himself wide open.It turns out that Koch Industries employees and PACs have donated to quite a large number of Congressional Democrats. The data was right there on Open Secrets when Jeff Dunetz of Truth Revolt picked it up and posted...

The Threat of Cheap Denham: Don’t be fooled by press accounts that downplay the significance of Rep. Jeff Denham’s attempt to add something called the ENLIST Act to the defense authorization (NDAA) bill. It’s a significant push for a substantial immigration amnesty, and it has a good chance of succeeding. Opponents of an “Amnesty First” approach to immigration should be worried. Here’s why: – On the surface, it looks like Denham’s amendment would give amnesty only to an almost comically appealing group of illegal immigrants: “DREAMers” who were brought to this country when they were young and who also serve...

Full title: Cliven Bundy on Harry Reid: 'I Don't Think There's Any Hope for Him, He Needs to Be Kicked Out of Office' SEAN HANNITY, HOST: This is a "FOX News Alert." The federal government has caved to public pressure in the battle against Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy over cattle grazing rights. Now, in just a moment, Cliven, his two sons will join us for their first exclusive interview since the siege ended. But first, the government surrendered this weekend after tensions escalated in the week-long standoff between Bundy family, supporters, and of course, federal agents. Now, the Bureau of...

The events in Nevada this week have made a number of things crystal clear: 1) Our government, at least at the upper management/executive service level, is incredibly corrupt. 2) Senator Harry Reid (D-NV), Senate Majority Misleader, is incredibly corrupt. 3) Obama’s Executive Branch, which allowed this situation to take place in the way that it did, is incredibly corrupt. 4) The judicial branch that has consistently allowed “environmentalists” to dictate public land policy is incredibly corrupt. 5) The “environmentalists” and their co-conspirators in Congress who foisted the so-called “Endangered Species Act” and numerous other extreme laws on us, and turned...

Glenn Beck has a message for anyone who is “crying for revolution, insurrection … and a call to arms”: He wants nothing to do with you. “This morning I got up and I saw some more news reports, and more people in America that are standing up now and crying for revolution, insurrection, arming yourself, and a call to arms,” Beck said on his radio program Tuesday. “I will tell you I believe in the Second Amendment, and I will defend myself. I believe in the rights that we have. But I will tell you more than I believe in...

A plan, now stealthily making its way through state legislatures with astonishing speed, would junk the Electoral College and award the presidency to the winner of the popular vote. The plan involves an Interstate Compact where states would commit to select electors pledged to vote for the national popular vote winner regardless of how their own state voted. When enough states pass this law, sufficient to cast 270 votes which is the majority of the Electoral College, it will take effect. So far, nine states and the District of Columbia, casting 136 electoral votes, have joined. This is halfway to...

For once he’s right. John Hinderaker, who’s sympathetic to Bundy, nonetheless acknowledges that he doesn’t have a leg to stand on legally. Bundy’s theory, that land universally recognized for the past 150 years as belonging to the federal government really belongs to Nevada because it was never properly conveyed to the U.S., is DOA in court. He’ll lose his appeals and then, presumably, he’ll go on refusing to pay grazing fees to use the land. What should the feds do then? Given the publicity the case has drawn and the fact that the judiciary’s on his side, Obama can’t look...

RENO, Nev. (CBS Las Vegas/AP) — A Nevada rancher said Monday he’s trying to determine if federal agents damaged his cattle when the animals were rounded up then released in a showdown with angry protesters over a decades-long dispute about rangeland rights. U.S. Bureau of Land Management Director Neil Kornze said the agency backed off to avoid a potentially violent situation over the weekend. However, he vowed to go to court to collect more than $1 million in back grazing fees he says Cliven Bundy owes for trespassing on federal lands since the 1990s. Bundy, whose family has operated a...

A heated land dispute between the federal government and a Nevada cattle rancher subsided over the weekend, but longtime lawmaker and former presidential hopeful Ron Paul says tensions might soon worsen once again. An armed standoff between Cliven Bundy and the United States Bureau of Land Management ended on Saturday with the federal agency agreeing to release around 400 head of cattle it had seized from the Clark County, Nevada rancher. The bureau said Bundy owed roughly $1 million to the government because for the last two decades he failed to pay a fee for letting his cattle graze on...

Following remarks Senate Majority leader Harry Reid made at the University of Nevada, Reno on Monday, the Nevada Democrat told Reno's KRNV TV his thoughts on the cattle controversy in Gold Butte. "Well, it's not over. We can't have an American people that violate the law and then just walk away from it. So it's not over," Reid said. There is no question that there were a lot of things going on down there with breaking the law," Reid said. "And that is not over yet. We can't let that continue. So I'm sure it is not the end of...

Land Management: A Chinese solar farm that fries birds is OK, as is redrawing tortoise habitat boundaries to benefit political donors. But an American rancher grazing his cattle brings feds with sniper rifles. It appears Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy has, at least temporarily, wonhis "range war" with the paramilitary wing of the Bureau of Land Management. Fearing another Waco, BLM has announced it will no longer enforce a court order and stop stealing Bundy's cows, called "trespass cattle" by the feds, accused of grazing free on part of the 84% of Nevada that is federal property.