My computer took a massive crap on me, so I lost an awful lot of info I had acquired over the years from work I did with both USFS and BLM.
Technically, the BLM came into the game late. But it wasn't uncalled for. When a state receives statehood, the public lands are sectioned off with the state getting some. The feds get a large percentage of it. And before statehood was reached, the land was still, technically, federal.
Otherwise a lot of the federal laws passed such as the Homestead Act would have no authority! And while those are considered federal lands, technically they are OUR lands. The BLM and USFS are only caretakers, essentially a property management business.
Granted, Mr. Bundy is using grazing rights his family has held since the mid 1800's. But to say the feds have no authority is erroneous.
However- the BLM overstepped it's authority. They cannot lawfully take any private property without a court order explicitly saying they can. And to do so requires that Mr. Bundy and his lawyer be present for the hearing and the court order typically has a 120 day life. I do not recall the law that says this, or where it's at in the books. But this is very different than either a civil or a criminal civil forfeiture.
However, for the duration of the hold of personal property, the government agency that confiscated it is responsible for it's condition. Like the cattle. They gotta feed them. And last I heard a mass grave was found. Filled with...cattle. Where are the livestock cooperatives now? The ASPCA? The Humane Society? The ACLU?
Tactically, I think that Dan Love should be respected. He, being the lead ranger for the incident, put his men in a dangerous spot, giving the advantage to the militia. This allowed for cooler heads to prevail. When you are in a major pickle and you’re looking at losing, you are more prone to making decisions that you normally wouldn’t. In this case someone somewhere could have accidentally fired the shot that would have ended it all. He had nothing to lose if he put his men in a good spot. They had backup available. The Posse Comitatus rule applies to all civilian issues, but when you involve a federal agency, it turns into a grey area. If the militia fired the first shot, they may have won that battle, but the military could very well have become involved. And you can’t compare it to Waco. At Waco you had a church that allegedly was making automatic firearms and molesting children (though they are the same children murdered by the FBI). This time it’s just a bunch of stinking cattle. And Mr. Love should be appreciated for his foresight, not ostracized for doing his job. He’s just there to do a job, not be the judge or the jury.
We need individuals to stand up to these so called "lawful orders" Japanese internment camps would have been a nice time to start. Jailing people for simply educating slaves was done under "lawful order." It seems that the true cattle are the ones who blindly do what they are told, finding themselves justifying the loading of humans onto train cars.
When people start talking about how terrible that was, just remember that it was nothing in comparison to how the Japanese or the Germans treated American civilians. I guess an American being exterminated because he’s a Methodist preacher means nothing to some. The internment camps could have been much worse of course. And certainly they could have been better. But all in all, considering other factors such as racism masking itself as a form of pseudo-patriotism, in some cases I think the camps may have saved a lot of insult, injury and grief.
And don’t forget the Niihau Incident, either. All factors considered, the internment camps were the best option available at the time.
