How To Build Your Own Lynch Mob- The Sunday Collage

Thanks to all of you who said nice things to me about the Wounded Knee blog. That by the way, was a once a year deal. I am just not that consistently bright. If you are hoping to find something as equally good today- you are shit out of luck.

Ok, so my mom reads this. Other than my sister and younger brother, there aren't many children that my mother is proud of. Mom has three kids. So I had to clean up the original title of this piece- fragments of which can be found in the next few sentences.

Back in my policing days, I had a fellow law enforcer who had a poster of a gorgeous blond hanging in his locker. At the bottom of that poster the caption read, "Somewhere, some guy, is sick of her shit."

The point being that despite her good looks, she was a pain in the ass. And replaceable. I think we all know somebody like that.

Now I'm going to move from replaceable women to all sorts of things with the blinding speed of an old A.D.D. patient swilling coffee and wearing tinfoil. Please try to keep up if you are new here.

In college, I had this professor named Ralph Maughan. I always viewed him as sort of a hippie. He taught Political Science in jeans and tennis shoes. He was a heap big environmentalist and still is. I think I was already pre-disposed to protecting the environment having been raised in Butte and exposed to the worst man made environmental disaster in the lower 48. In Butte, you can see first hand how greedy corporate interests can quite literally destroy the planet and walk away. I actually cringe a little bit while watching gold mining shows on television to this day- as miners rip up some pristine mountain top- looking for gold.

At any rate, Ralph Maughan is an ultra environmentalist and I think- he was once a past president of the Sierra Club. I also believe he had quite a bit to do with the re-introduction of wolves. I had lost contact with him over the years until this week. Ralph, you see, has a blog of his own called the Wildlife News. At the Wildlife News, the writers and the readers are pro anything that has to do with protecting the environment. Mostly I'm ok with that- up until such point that the envirocons tell me I have to pay for their really lame ideas.

Environmentalists and common sense part ways when they want to do some ridiculous thing like introduce a hated predator that we have since replaced in the food chain. People hate wolves, generally speaking- and they will kill them. I on the other hand, love wolves. In fact, a lot of my college research and writing projects were centered on wolves because at one point in my life I was absolutely obsessed with them. That's why I was against wolf re-introduction. I did not want to see wolves get killed because if I understand one animal better than wolves- it is human beings.

So the environmentalists and wildlife people have won a little battle but will lose the war- because as the population expands- they will once again remove top of the food chain predators like grizzlies and wolves. Today's victory in the annals of time- will be tomorrow's loss. 

We all assume that environmentalists walk with a left lean and mostly I think- that's true. They tend to be Federal Government supporting statists because the only way an environmentalist can advance their agenda- is to get laws passed by one, supreme, umbrella government which supports their agenda and which also tends to diminish opposing agendas. It would be too difficult to get individual states to agree to some sweeping proposal like wolf reintroduction. Think rancher dominated legislatures like Montana, Wyoming, and Idaho. They would have never signed off on wolf re-introduction and the environmentalists knew that. So that is where the culture clashes. Environmentalists v ranching interests.

Do not get these passions confused with politics. These are too opposing forces. One believes in stewarding the environment and wildlife and one believes in his God given right to make a living and to protect his assets. Politics unfortunately, is how we decide who wins and who loses. 

Freedom thrives where laws are scarce. Every time you pass a law- freedom suffers. Laws restrict human behavior. I'm for moderation when creating new laws. I've always been against creating unenforceable or silly laws- that is the libertarian in me.

Which brings me to Cliven Bundy and his trespassing cows.

During the week, I found myself on Wildlife News reading all of the predictable comments and threads with regard to Cliven Bundy and his stand off with the Federal Government. The folks at Wildlife News call Cliven a welfare rancher, a criminal, and a right wing nut job. 

Why? Because they have a one way lens on their telescope. They only see life one way. Their way. And they don't give two shits about any other way- because they believe they are the keepers of the moral high ground. They will argue and delete you. The law they think- is always on their side. The law, history shows us, has always been on the side of overthrown governments just before they get overthrown. It is not such a stretch to understand that a crooked and over reaching government will pass laws to try and protect itself.

I'm not going to link the Wildlife News here. Honestly, there's just too much politics embedded in that site and I don't want the track back here. 

Do I think people should be allowed to damage publicly owned land? No. But the evolution of the United States encouraged homesteading, farming, and ranching. That's been our history which occurred long before I landed on this rock. So maybe we've passed that moment in time where we no longer want people to use or cultivate wild or public lands. Are there solutions and remedies? Of course. The Federal Government could return lands to the individual states. People like Bundy could be grandfathered in and eventually their rights to graze could slowly sunset or phase out. Maybe this government, which has no problem allowing bankers to commit fraud while extorting giant billion dollar fines- could negotiate some form of settlement with Bundy. This is all more constructive and above board than using some pretense that cows destroy tortoise habitat. 

I have to tell you this. I enjoyed seeing a bunch of right wing nut jobs with guns back down the Federal Government and the left wing nut jobs. And I'll tell you why..

It's not because I'm some anarchist (well, maybe a little) but I have grown weary of the Federal Government and their shit. I am sick of hearing about non existent economic recoveries, about Bureau of Labor Statistics figures that are nothing but propaganda and lies. I am sick of a government which refuses to enforce the rule of law on fraud committing bankers, a government which has stolen trillions from our treasury, and continues to cover up every scandal from Fast and Furious, Benghazi, and IRS. I am sick of being told to obey the law while the Treasury won't even allow an audit of the FED or of the gold allegedly contained in Fort Knox. I am sick of QE programs, the worst Congress and President ever, and the erosion of our human and civil rights.

Did you see those ridiculous little "First Amendment" pens the government set up near Bundy's ranch? Protest here- where nobody can see you. Laughable.

The problem with most people picking sides in the Bundy battle is that while they debated the nuances and issues of who was right and who was wrong- they forgot to look at the big picture. The big picture is the one where millions of people are getting sick of a government that thinks it can bully whoever it chooses without reprisal.

It doesn't matter whether Bundy was right or not. Whether he paid his fees or his cows walked on the backs of tortoises. Our government is like a bully that has done so many wrongs- that even when it manages to do one thing right- nobody cares anymore. That's the moment we are in right now.

That's why thousands of people flocked down to Nevada. They weren't fighting Bundy's war. They were fighting their own war against an oppressive government that continues to steal and erode their freedoms. That mob is growing. People might just be getting sick of this government's shit and the BLM may have figured that out this week.

You want to die over cows and tortoises? I guess not. If the government is good at anything right now- it is getting very good at disenfranchising millions of us. It would have been interesting to see what they would have done after the fall elections.

Happy Easter everyone!






 

Corporate Welfare, Globally Speaking

Where the Cactus Grows- The Sunday Collage

So once again, another showdown on BLM range land- this time with Clive Bundy and his cattle. It's ok to detonate atomic bombs in the Nevada desert which apparently has little or no effect on the endangered desert tortoise. Instead, the chief enemy of the desert tortoise as we all might surmise from government sources- are grazing cattle.

So between slaughtering wild mustangs, re-introducing wolves, and putting a stop to tortoise murdering cows- our BLM masters have been hard at work managing our range lands for us.

I have four or five friends- liberal friends- who are forever posting their conservative hating rants on Facebook. I confront a couple of them from time to time. Not because it doesn't lead to nowheresville but quite simply because I get tired of reading their narrow minded vitriol.

You know the type. The GOP did this, the GOP did that. We care about people- they don't.

Now you'd think that level of unconsciousness would erode some over time- but instead- I believe it has gotten far worse- at least for these 4 or 5. At any rate, one of them posted a "BLM is rounding up and slaughtering wild mustangs" piece a week or so ago. Something like this. http://investigations.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/05/14/17708998-the-case-of-the-missing-mustangs-what-happened-to-1700-wild-horses

Of course the BLM denies any knowledge of the mustangs eventual fate. Think Hogan's Heroes and Sergeant Schultz. "I know nushink!"

I use all of these things only as illustrations.

So let me tally up the grand successes of the Federal Government while utilizing their wildlife wizardry and animal central planning. We have a wolf re-introduction program which has cost millions and maybe billions, and is an utter disaster. The Feds have spent gawd knows how much rounding up and slaughtering wild mustangs because they have determined what numbers the range can withstand and they presumably have protected the desert tortoise from the voracious attack of grazing cattle.  

All of this "management"- can be accomplished by the states themselves. It is an interesting point to note that a bunch of non resident political hacks sit in Washington D.C. tell everyone else (we refer to them as residents) how to use their own lands.

By Saturday, Cliven Bundy and armed militia men had backed down the Federal Government. Oddly enough, this occurred sometime after people began noting the absence of Senator Harry Reid in the fray. Citizen journalists began to peer into the Reid connection only to find out that Reid has solar projects slated for this very area. With Chinese partners. Indeed, they are very likely, tortoise friendly solar projects. Maybe they have little turtle shelters underneath the panels.

Last week I wrote about how the Feds tried to buy the Wounded Knee killing ground from the Sioux. The Sioux tribe refused to take the government bribe. One only has to go to Custer's battlefield to see what happens when the government takes over. The same things happen at Mt. Rushmore, at the Grand Canyon, Yellowstone Park, or any other place the government can find to further plunder the public. And get this...

There will always be someone who carries the government water. Statists who always say things like, "Well they need to be able to pay for upkeep, salaries, uniforms and pointy hats, all those sorts of things."

Last year, American taxpayers paid 400 billion dollars worth of interest to bankers on behalf of the national debt because Congress refuses to spend within it's means. Of course, this number can only rise. Four hundred billion buys a lot of admission tickets and pointy hats.

I point this out every time I hear one of their water boys tell me that we have to pay for the cost of these venues. I tell them, I have already paid.

In fact, I'll be paying again this week. Tuesday to be precise.  

The solution of course is for the Federal Government to get out of our lives. Refund some of the tax money they have been seizing from citizens so that we can put out a fire once in awhile and decide how to administer our own lands. Return tourist destinations to state control or allow states to best collaborate on how to administer their own tourist venues. Local control makes a lot of sense. Chief Executives, like Governors and state legislatures can decide what to do with lands within their borders and let the residents of that state select governance based on how well they manage those things. Without the spectre of Federal government interference.

Texas is so lucky. Not one acre of BLM land. No confrontations.

I'm not against government- I'm just against bad government. I'm not against Federal Government- but I am against a Federal Government that thinks it has the authority to do anything it wants and is quite willing to attempt to do so. I'm proud that Americans and militia men took a stand and asserted their rights as free men to assemble this week. 

Now we are beginning to understand why Homeland Security bought all of that ammunition.

Can you name one society or culture anywhere that perished because they removed layers of redundant government? I can't. But I can sure name cultures that were obliterated because they ignored the creep of central planners.

I gotta tell ya, I know that area of Nevada near Mesquite pretty well. I have traveled through that desert many times including the back highways on my motorcycle. Sand, snakes, scorpions, and a few rabbits. A lot of cactus, rocks, and scrub brush. It's a tough, very hot place. As you look out at the terrain, it's hard to imagine that any of it really needs any managing at all. It's not like there are enormous herds of cows devouring the vegetation and tiptoeing on the backs of desert tortoises. It's not like that at all. It is an immense place- completely barren and unpopulated.

That desert has survived quite nicely just the way that it is. I think it will continue to do so with or without the Bureau of Land Management, cows, or desert tortoises.