The Fringe Loves Squatters, Hates The Constitution

It was apparently a good weekend to get your fringe on. First, the birthers were back. Trump promised to build a giant placebo to keep out all the Mexicans. And Jay Carney used photoshop to make it look like he owns more books than he does AND he collects Soviet propaganda. See! See people! If only the MSM would tell the TROOTH about these things! Then the public would be with us openly instead of secretly! And those aren’t even the BIG story! The BIG story was how fascist Obamaholderreid wants to strip reel ‘merikan Al Bundy of his property rights. But we faced 'em down!

//sarc off

Most of the land in the West belongs to the federal government. At one point, the feds were giving it away to anyone who would take it in the hopes that people would move from the East to the West. Later, when the West was more established, the feds stopped giving away public land, but they agreed to allow people like ranchers to graze their cattle on public land for a small grazing fee. Ditto miners and oil drillers and others. Indeed, this land is administered by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), which is charged with maintaining and administering public lands for the benefit of the public. This includes allowing private use of the land when that fits the BLM’s mission.

This is where the Bundy family comes into the picture. Somewhere in the late 1800s, the Bundy’s moved to Nevada and built a ranch. They took advantage of the fed’s policy of opening public lands and let their cattle graze on public lands near their ranch.

To hear the fringe tell it, the Bundy family was given the right to use this land forever until the evil BLM decided to save some turtle. At that point, the BLM ruthlessly tried to throw the Bundy's off the land they've been using since before Jesus was a child and have a forever right to use. When the saintly Bundy's resisted, the BLM appeared out of the blue with shock troops, tasered Bundy's helpless son, and would have made the whole family disappear into black helicopters if not for a couple of reel patriots like the nut jobs at InfoWars exposing the TROOTH.

Um... no... not even close.

Somewhere along the way, the BLM was told by the EPA that some rare turtle in Nevada needs protection. At that point in the 1990s, the BLM had no legal choice but to do what they could to protect that turtle. The BLM responded by limiting grazing rights for everyone in those areas to 150 head of cattle per permit. This included the Bundy’s. The Bundy’s, however, ignored this change by BLM in the grazing policy. Moreover, they stopped paying the renewal fee for the grazing permits.

Now, let me be clear because this is where the lunatics stop listening. The Bundy’s have NO right to graze on public land - no matter how long they've been doing it. They are entitled to do so only so long as the BLM has that land open for grazing. Moreover, they need to follow any terms and conditions or limits BLM places on that grazing; the Bundy’s can’t claim more rights than BLM is willing to grant. Nor can the Bundy’s claim what is called adverse possession because (1) you can’t do that to the government, (2) they don’t otherwise meet the requirements either, i.e. their possession was not adverse and they didn’t hold themselves out as owners. So the Bundy’s can’t claim the land is theirs, they can’t claim some sort of right to graze, they can’t claim more rights to graze than BLM grants them by permit, and they didn’t even pay the permit to get those. They are essentially grass thieves... or squatters.

The Bundy’s kept right on grazing, however, so the BLM went to court. On issue after issue, injunction after injunction, appeal after appeal, the Bundy’s lost. They lost every single legal battle for more than 20 years. Eventually, Bundy gave up on the court’s giving him what he wanted and he tried a different approach: he claimed that he does not recognize the existence of the Federal Government: “I don’t recognize the United States Government as even existing.” He then claimed to be armed and threatened anyone who tried to interfere with his cattle grazing.

BLM went to court and got another order to have the Bundy cattle removed. Bundy appealed and lost again. Bundy then removed his cattle. Only, they didn't stay away. For the next eleven years, Bundy snuck his cattle onto the land, sometimes mixing them with others and even leaving them unbranded in an attempt to keep investigators from knowing whose cattle they were. The BLM investigated however, and by June 2011, the BLM issued another cease and desist order.

Bundy then told BLM he would round up their cattle as ordered. He lied. Rather than round up his cattle, he began to build improvements on the land to make it easier to feed and water his cattle – something that has never been allowed. BLM contacted the Clark County Sheriff, who tried to broker a deal. At that point, Bundy threatened a “range war” if anyone tried to remove his cattle. BLM went back to court and got an order allowing them to remove the cattle.

That is where we are now, only with a couple hundred yahoos out there trying to menace the BLM agents as well. As an aside, these fringers are claiming Harry Reid's son is behind this because he wants to claim the land for a CHINESE!!! solar company. They heard this from pathological liar Alex Jones. The trouble is that it's false. The land Reid wants to use is miles away and this issue arose 10 years before Reid got into politics.

So here is who this patriot of patriots is. He is:

1. A man with no legal right to use the land he claims as his property. He is a squatter who is claiming property rights he doesn't have.
2. A man who litigated for more than 20 years and lost every single time... all affirmed on appeal, and when he lost he suddenly started claiming that the Federal Government doesn’t exist.
3. A man who failed to pay the grazing fees that would have let him continue with fewer cattle.
4. A man who has lied and failed to keep “his word” on several instances.
5. A man who has used threats of violence to try to keep the government from legally evicting him, and who then whines about BLM showing up with armed agents.

This Bundy guy is the exact opposite of everything conservatives hold dear. We believe in property rights, yet this guy is a squatter claiming entitlement to property he does not own and has no rights over. We believe in rule of law, which means an equal application of the law to all. The BLM has more than bent over backwards to give that here. Not only have they spent almost 30 years in court trying to get this resolved (winning at every step), but they have patiently tried to resolve this when they could have legally evicted Bundy at any point. Heck, they've even offered to give him rights to which he's not entitled to settle this. Conservatives cannot claim to support rule of law and then argue that the law cannot apply in this instance. Conservatives also stand for law and order and Bundy is violating that. Bundy has refused repeated valid court orders, he's failed to pay to keep his permits, and he's threatened violence if anyone tries to implement the law. That flies in the face of conservatism. Bundy is also a liar and a sneak, which I would hope are not conservative traits. Finally, note that Bundy doesn't claim some right under the constitution, instead he claims the federal government isn't a legal organization. That's about as far away from conservatism as you can get.

There are times the Federal Government is abusive and needs to be stopped. But latching onto "heroes" like this only discredits our side. Yet, here the far right embraces this nutjob as a hero.

This is what I've been warning people about with the fringe. These people are not conservatives -- they are militia types, tax dodgers, racists, anarchists, and they have worked their way onto the conservative side at the moment because they see an opportunity to warp conservatism to their cause. They do not believe in rule of law or property rights or even limited government, they believe in the abolition of the federal government, separatism and anarchy. They only hide behind terms like "rule of law" and "property rights" to trick people like you into thinking their goals are legitimate. Don't fall for it.

** By the way, the Feds have backed off for the moment and the fringe is crowing about the feds being cowards, because that's how they think. The truth is that this is effective law enforcement. The smart play is to wait for the militia types to go home and then grab Bundy when you can do it without shooting a hundred people. That's also the exact opposite way a supposed totalitarian regime would handle things.