I don’t think his wealth is liquid. My understanding is that it is mostly comprised of the land his family owns. He represented himself in his various lawsuits against the government and that did not turn out well at all. I am thinking if he had the resources he would have hired someone to represent his interests.
My wealth is not liquid. But if or when my business fails I will make an effort to make it liquid instead of blaming the government. I don’t understand why farmers and ranchers fail to understand the downside of the free market economy. That’s just the way it is. There is nothing sacred about your assets, just as there is nothing sacred about my assets.
Good with the bad, my friends.
I’m not sympathetic to the cause and I certainly think we should be calling the so-called militia terrorists. Having said that, I don’t know that storming the building should be the first course of action as it would likely result in the loss of lives (including the lives of police or government agents). If nobody needs access to the building, why not surround the area, turn off the heat and other utilities, cut off egress and ingress, and then ignore them. If they don’t get any attention, after a while of hanging out together in a cold and dark building for no purpose, they may get tired and pull up stakes.
Yes, I agree, I certainly do not think that the government should go “branch Davidian” on them. But it does throw an interesting light on what constitutes a terrorist and what our response as a nation is.
The Bundy’s are “Sovereign Citizens” who don’t recognize the Federal government among other things. The FBI has labeled some of these thugs terrorist.
I think that the whole government “subsidy” arrangement is a somewhat symbiotic one. The most subsidized industries are politically connected - oil, utilities, banking and farming. ( I don’t think independent ranching is all that heavily subsidized.) Government supports these industries and the politicians benefit from contributions. The dollars involved are very different from those that can be generated from small businesses. Some industries become dependent on those subsidies. The latest WHO findings that processed meats are associated with higher risk of cancer cannot be helping the meat industry in general.
But I do agree that at some point the ranchers have to face the reality of the changing market landscape.
I have family in the area and part of the problem is that hay prices have increased dramatically due to drought. Unfortunately climate changes are a strictly forbidden topic in AM radio land so they can’t address the real issues behind the pressure on water resources and cattle feed. The BLM (old school definition) has been doing good research in the area on different range grasses that will hold up better to fire as, of course, wildfire has been a greater issue and threatens to get worse in the future. Local ranchers have also taken issue with the BLM on how many years post fire range land must be fallow before grazing. None of this has anything to do with the Bundy agenda.
There is a big difference between disagreements over range management and disagreements over the legitimacy of the federal government.
Looking at the map of eastern Oregon, it seems that very little of the land is publically owned. And as locals remark, eastern Oregon is high desert in the middle of nowhere, so I can’t believe that land there costs very much. If people want cattle ranches in eastern Oregon, why don’t they just buy some land and run cattle on it? There are some privately owned cattle ranches there.
Can we spell out BLM in these messages? Sometimes it is meaning Black Lives Matter and other times it is meaning Bureau of Land Management. I’m getting confused.
Sigh. Great way to start the year off.
As I understand it, the two ranchers convicted of arson were given a sentence that was less than the legal minimum sentence. The government went back to court to get it increased, since they contended it was illegally too short, and they won, so now the two ranchers have to go back and serve the rest of their sentence. The only problem I have with this is the first judge who issued the wrong sentence.
How about we use BLM to mean Bureau of Land Management as we are talking about that agency primarily in this thread. BLM manages range land and grazing here. BLM makes rules about wildfire control and grazing post fire. And here it’s about water and fodder not raw acreage.
Cardinal Fang, I totally disagree. It appears that the Hammonds are the victims of a classic case of prosecutorial overreach.
That has nothing to do with an armed horde taking over a federal building. But I say let them sit there and ignore them. Shut off the utilities, blockade the place. No need to rush in to anything.
How is it prosecutorial overreach to insist that arsonists get at least the minimum sentence for arson? I don’t have any sympathy for these guys. Setting fires endangers innocent people.
The Hammonds want nothing to do with the Bundys.
This isn’t about the Hammonds.
The ranchers in that area want nothing to do with the Bundys.
The elder Bundy wants nothing to do with this.
Isn’t this telling?
We have knowledgable posters here. I think this article fits with their narative.
http://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/news/a40914/oregon-bundy-militia/
Malheur is a premium birdwatching area. Supposedly, it’s one of the best in the US. Probably the birdwatching isn’t great right now, but numerous raptors overwinter there. The feds need to remove these armed nuisances.
And can somebody please explain to me how an armed group taking over federal land doesn’t constitute sedition?
Wow, this whole thread I thought BLM was referring to Black Lives Matter. Bureau of Land Management never popped into my head. Suddenly, everything makes wayyyyy more sense.
I don’t understand what they want. What would have to happen for them to leave peacefully?
I find the situation very disturbing.