Posted on 04/15/2014 4:11:13 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
Federal officials appear to be waiting out Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy and his supporters.
Two days after a dispute over grazing rights, cattle and $1 million in fees and fines threatened to spin into a Wild West shootout, officials with the Bureau of Land Management promised they weren’t finished with Bundy.
“The BLM will continue to work to resolve the matter administratively and judicially,” BLM Director Neil Kornze said in a statement that followed the Bureau’s decision to release nearly 400 head of Bundy’s cattle that had been seized as part of a fight over grazing fees.
Spokesman Craig Leff declined to be more specific.
States rights supporters, including some armed militia members, stormed to Bundy’s aid in the last week amid a confrontation that had been building for more than two decades. It had provoked fears of a violent standoff like the 1993 standoff in Waco, Texas that ended with the burning of the Branch Davidian compound.
The government says Bundy’s cattle have been trespassing on and grazing on federal land for 20 years. They say Bundy hasn’t paid for a grazing permit since a dispute that began in 1993 over protections for the desert tortoise, when the government first sought to make Bundy pay.
The agency has obtained numerous court orders mandating that Bundy stop using the land.
Bundy doesn’t recognize the federal government’s authority over the land, which his cattle have grazed upon for decades. He has asserted that his family has used the land as a ranch for generations, before BLM existed.
The rancher, his family and supporters have also cried foul at what they see as unnecessary force from federal officials and contractors, including carrying guns and allegedly assaulting protestors.
Bundy did not return requests for comment.
Observers say the government would be smart to wait for the dust to settle, and then to try to resolve the situation.
“It’s a very prudent strategy for the government to say ‘we’re going to let this go for now, but we’re going to revisit it,’” said James McCarthy, a professor of political geography at Clark University.
“They can afford to play the long game,” said McCarthy, who suggested the government could wait six months or longer for its next action.
Jonathan Emord, a Washington, D.C.-based attorney specializing in disputes over federal land, predicted that the government will move to the courts for the next battle.
“They’ll press charges against him in federal court, and they’ll try to basically bleed his ability to defend himself, and beat him up on technical grounds,” Emord said. “They’ll put him in a situation where he’ll end up with a determination of liability that would be so great that he would have to sell his ranch to them to extinguish his debt.”
McCarthy said the dispute can be linked to federal government decisions in the late 19th century to keep large swaths of land in public ownership while allowing private citizens to use the land for various reasons.
“When our federal land system was set up, it was completely understood and accepted and part of the design that the private landowners … would have really extensive access to and use of public lands,” McCarthy said.
One of BLM’s predecessors, the Grazing Service, was established to manage the land that had been set aside for livestock grazing. Though the federal government owned the land, it always had a system to allow grazing.
“There’s a long history of federal allowance of trespass,” Emord said.
The land management also was put in place in order to encourage settlers to move to the remote areas and use it for purposes like ranching, logging and gold exploration.
“Here you have the law inviting people to settle in the West,” he said. “You create populations out there who are then dependent on the business that you invited as the federal government.”
But in the latter half of the 20th century, as the country become more aware of its effects on the environment, the government’s priorities moved away from providing economic benefits through its land and more toward conservation.
“They are not wrong that the system that was set up really explicitly with the understanding that it would be used for commodity production and economic purposes,” McCarthy said. “The rules and the priorities shifted on them somewhat quickly.”
Emord said restrictions on land use, such as grazing fees, sprung up in the 1990s. Since those restrictions devalue people’s livelihoods and businesses, they amount to taking of property, Emord said.
“It destroys the economic value of the ranch without just compensation,” he said.
The patriotic AMERICAN way to stand up is to indeed make this THE stand.
I am really hoping patriots from all across America decide to partake, at least a million strong, all have well thought out long term equipment they will bring and to donate.
I am dismayed to see so many other forums have embedded trolls trying to marginalize Bundy, to hold back the facts.They argue in favor of observing the illegal corrupt laws.
These same people probably had descendants who argued against dumping Tea in Boston many generations ago.
Its the principle to make the stand, no more will we cower against a corrupt government, we will change the laws, even if it goes all the way to the top.
The BLM says it will wait them out, I think Bunkerville will have semi permanent population for as long as it takes.
Its the principle, the message, its We The People.
“His is not a winning case.”
You may be technically right.
But as I said here yesterday; the Colonists were at the tine legally obligated to pay taxes to the British.
Passive and compliant people are not the ones who who start the fights to throw off tyranny.
THINK about it....TWENTY YEARS!
Does anyone seriously believe if the BLM/feds had the authority they're continually trying to claim, that this would have been going on for 20 years? LOL! Not hardly. It would have been over so long ago it would have long disappeared down the memory hole.
It’s only when the “kook theory” starts to gain resonance with the masses of people will the ruling class start to tremble...now folks understand why the second amendment was put in place.
Yeah...the British tried that too, just pissed folks off more.
Interesting point. I think that with a gay feminized military they can now be trusted to fire on Americans-with glee!
The agencies alone with their differing styles of enforcement with varying levels of tactical training or lack thereof would not mesh well and they would be hard pressed to control a flash uprising of 5 or 10 thousand folks. Military force would be needed.
I don’t see a mad rush by 2 per cent of the population attempting to fill all ranks of the military...what you’d see is more of a conflicted military...straights basically “fragging” gay commanders who dared issue such orders to fire on civilians.
The Chinese are waiting for their “promised” land in exchange for trade debts.
What if they covertly insert thousands of armed soldiers to speed things up?
Sure Reid is the bad guy but it goes much higher and further back, back to the Clintons. And now Obama has agreed to cede US Territory to the Chinese for their promises of solar plants and such, which of course lines Reids pocket and the Democratic party.
Totally difference circumstances and time. Think of it from a marketing perspective. We’re selling the idea of liberty to the American public, a majority of which put Obama and Reid in power (nationally and in Nevada). They don’t get it and if Bundy can be dismissed as a scofflaw with a kooky land theory, one that’s been dismissed over and over again, it will harm our cause.
Right now we’re spot on, but we need to pivot away from Bundy as our hero/focus and get it on all the others abused. The anger is real, the response is great, but Bundy will lose.
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“These tortoises were doing so poorly a veterinarian, Dr. Jarchow, was consulted. He reported all six specimens were suffering from osteoporosis caused by a protein deficiency in their diet. Dr. Jarchow examined five specimens from the same mountains that shared their range with cattle. He reported these specimens were all healthy and well nourished.
“The historical record proves conclusively that tortoise thrive when cattle are on the range with them and without cattle grazing they are always malnourished and unhealthy and their numbers plummet.
"Compound"? Compound?
How about the murder of 76 people, including at least 21 children, by immolation?
Many people preferred the yoke of the British back then as well.
Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
The Barbed Wire Wars...
They always play some form of the waiting game, usually just stand by until the issue disappears from the news.
Reid calling the shots?
Dingy Harry says.."YOU AIN'T SEEN THE LAST OF ME!" 
What a crock of govmitt vomit this is.
Let’s all wait to find out what dirty harry reid’s fingerprints are on this.
We can’t let that slippery turd escape this time. Maybe the Kocgh (sp) brothers should hire some investigators and open this stink bomb for the country to smell.
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