Posted on 04/22/2014 6:56:08 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
Senior writer John McCormack joined Greta van Susteren's political panel Monday on Fox News to discuss the protest at the Bundy ranch in Nevada. Watch the video below:
(VIDEO-AT-LINK)
Meanwhile, in this week's issue, the Scrapbook writes about the problems with Cliven Bundy's cause:
Twenty years ago, the federal government, which owns the land on which Bundy grazes his 900 cattle, decided to impose a grazing fee. Bundy opposes that fee, has consistently refused to pay it, and the federal Bureau of Land Management now claims that he owes $1 million in unpaid fees. Bundy has challenged the grazing fee in federal court—indeed, has challenged the federal government’s title to land in Nevada—and has consistently lost. Sixteen years ago, a federal judge issued a permanent injunction against Bundy, ordering the removal of his cattle. Bundy appealed that ruling to the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, and lost again. Last August, a federal court gave Bundy 45 days to remove his cattle, and in October, a federal district judge ordered Bundy not to “physically interfere with any seizure or impoundment operation.”
This does not sound to The Scrapbook like the dread hand of tyranny, in Nevada or Washington, oppressing an innocent farmer, or pushing some law-abiding citizen around. It sounds, instead, like a rancher gaming the system to his own financial advantage, and disguising his scheme in populist rhetoric: refusing to pay a tax which others must pay, and “tying up the courts”—for two decades!—as he continues to ignore the law. Far from acting in an arbitrary or capricious manner, the federal government has shown patience and forbearance in the face of lawlessness that customarily lands people in jail. It is worth noting that Bundy’s rancher-neighbors and the Nevada Cattlemen’s Association, who contend with the same federal policies, offer him little support.
Bundy has exercised his First Amendment right to plead his case publicly and inflame his admirers. And inflamed they have been: A few hundred people from around the country converged on Nye County, Nevada—many armed and brandishing weapons—to disrupt the government’s attempt to enforce the law, taunting and attacking agents dutifully carrying out the orders of a federal court. Last week, fearful of violence, the BLM suspended its roundup and withdrew from the area.
This is no victory for anyone other than Bundy and, The Scrapbook hopes, a temporary one at that. There is a term to describe the people who surround him, and it isn’t “militia.” The word is “mob.” And what this mob has practiced is not civil disobedience but armed provocation of a democratic government which has afforded Cliven Bundy every right and privilege as a citizen. One of Bundy’s supporters boasted to the press that “we were actually strategizing to put all the women up at the front.” This is the same spirit that animates people who attack firemen during riots, or opposed school integration with violence in Little Rock, Arkansas. In that case, 57 years ago, President Eisenhower was obliged to send the 101st Airborne because, as he said, “mob rule cannot be allowed to override the decisions of our courts.”
What was true then remains true today. Cliven Bundy is no hero of any kind. No conservative would pick and choose the laws he intends to obey, defy the rest, and challenge the rule of democracy with guns. No hero would adopt the terrorist’s tactic of placing innocents in harm’s way. Any fool can pick up a weapon and aim at an officer of the law; the moral power of civil disobedience lies in the willingness to defer to the law and accept punishment on principle.
The TEA party ain’t a party. It’s a movement.
The Tea Party opposes government overreach and overkill - but it tends to avoid Gordon Kahl style muttering.
The point here is that the BLM sent an army against an old man who never fired a shot.
Well, I don’t know if it is tarnishing us, but we are indeed a minority and a majority of Americans just don’t agree with our vision. That is a truism.
What will that mean in the long run? Too early to tell.
Well, I think I see a shark swimming away unharmed by the Weekly Standard’s latest screed from the GOPe end of the ruling elite.
a ...”mob”
given that the Armed American Civilians did not use their arms should seperate them from terms like [a] MOB.
Ive never heard of an armed....”mob” not using thier weapons...
Did Lexington and Concord “tarnish” the Minutemen?
Shillage ALERT!
“No conservative would pick and choose the laws he intends to obey, defy the rest, and challenge the rule of democracy with guns.”
A) What democracy, we don’t have one. We don’t have a republic either anymore.
B) The Founders gave us the 2nd Amendment exactly for instances like this. Facing down tyranny.
This is a hit piece.
The point here is that OBAMA and the government sent an army against an old man who never fired a shot.
Uh huh. Assuming the law is amenable to that form of suasion. The Jews found out what happens when it isn't.
No conservative would pick and choose the laws he intends to obey, defy the rest, and challenge the rule of democracy with guns.
This isn't a democracy. And every citizen in it is not only capable, but obligated, to choose to disobey laws that are unconstitutional. It isn't a privilege, it's a duty. The author of this Scrapbook is unworthy to be an American.
Amen and amen ... you have the right of it.
Fred and Bill probably think so.
I would hope that I would never have to count on someone like you for support.
Bundy is kind of stinky in my mind....20 yrs profit off federal land...
But then theres Reed and his sons Selling fed land for a fraction of its value....to the chinese ...
Two issues just reached the public...finally .....Reed is very dirty...
And some of our political hacks are selling our land to the chins.....Dugh
Gun control,Alaskan Oil,Destabilize Mexico,and Special Economic Zones....Thats what they Pay for....Thats where the bribe money IS.....Soon the gen public will see...imo..
I forgot “weaken the military”
That prob. pays well too.
Dear Mr. Warren, you folks consistently miss the point, even when the point is as big as a house, you manage to miss it. The man has a legitimate beef. $50,000 a year for grazing fees with no improvements and the grazing fees just went into effect a few decades ago. With them came promises that were never fulfilled. Have you seen that land? It’s not lush pasture, it’s scrub brush. But even if he’s wrong, the government had NO business coming onto his land, destroying the water tower, killing cattle to collect a bill. Doesn’t that bother you? Or are you so cowed that you will accept anything. Where is your manhood Mr. Warren?
Weakly Standard has always been second rate and off kilter.
WS is, and has been, GOPe tripe.
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