Cliven Bundy

[JimC]

I think it's time to send in the black helicopters...

[pErvinalia]

They're busy at my place at the moment, Jim..

[JimC]

Don't take 'em all out with your store of heat-seeking missiles, leave some for Cliven...

[piscator]

Well, that turns out to be exciting, doesn't it, kids? While we await further developments, this is a good time to recap the story so far for those of you who have missed the start or are handicapped by a short attention span:

Nevada was a territory until 1864. One condition of becoming part of the US was to sign ownership of all unappropriated land over to the federal government. Nevada signed.

As long as Bundy paid rent for the use of federal land in the form of $1.35 per head of cattle per month the BLM had no problem with it being used by him for grazing his cattle. When he ceased paying that pittance he became a squatter and a thief. The government took him to court. For twenty years Bundy fought them there and lost every single case. Then he refused to attend court any further. That's when the BLM stepped in with arms, but decided to withdraw in order to prevent bloodshed when confronted by an armed bunch of sovereign citizen nutters from several Hicksvilles in the US.

That's pretty close, except the government cut a Faustian deal in a smoke-filled room with a sneaky ChiCom energy concern to lease a piece of prime solar collection and desert tortoise country. So the Federal land managers took another (larger) piece of prime desert tortoise habitat and set it aside as a desert tortoise reservation, not only to re mediate the loss of the land to the dirty Chinese devils, but so the sum total of desert tortoise reservation (and hopefully DTs) actually increases due in part to the solar energy plant.
This is why the autocratic Bundy has such a hairlip over Sen. Harry Reid - he can't abide "being steamrolled" by a 135-lb Jack Mormon who wears cufflinks.

And lest we forget, Bundy has used this land for his own monetary edification. At minimum, he owes for grazing at probably a higher fee than a law-abiding welfare rancher, plus fines, and taxpayer costs associated with this debacle.

[pErvinalia]

Commies and chinks?!? Fuck. No wonder the rednecks are up in arms!

[rainbow]

I think it's time to send in the black helicopters...

Racist!

[Tero]

Sometimes grazing helps the environment, but not always. The only way to know for sure in this case would be to analyze how that area has fared since grazing was allowed there. It has probably been done. Apologies if this has already been address in this thread, but I ain't reading through all that to find out.

Well, Seth has no PhD in ranching or grazing mammals. But the whole point of natural grazers is that they migrate. Managed cattle don't. Buffalo are not smarter, they just have the skills to migrate.

[Svartalf]

Well, domestic cattle are simply unable to migrate when the area they are in becomes overgrazed, unless led, there's often those pesky barbed wires or other things impeding their way.

[pErvinalia]

Fences are a tool of the Marxist!

[Tero]

In America, man leads cows. In Marxist France, cows lead man! Who survives on Gubment farm subsidy.

[Seth]

Surprised to see you supporting someone whose family has subsisted on federal welfare for generations.

I'm not. The BLM makes billions of dollars every year for the government on various types of leases, so it's not "welfare," it's leasing the land just like I did when I owned my ranch.

As for Bundy, I disagree with his not paying his lease, but I disagree more with the actions of the BLM in cutting his allotment, which is legally and historically a property right his family established more than a century ago, to a size that makes it impossible for him to continue ranching (150 cows), and I vehemently disagree with the paramilitary tactics the BLM has been using, and their long history of harassment of ranchers to drive them out of business as a part of a BLM (not national) agenda to get rid of public lands ranchers.

[Seth]

Well, domestic cattle are simply unable to migrate when the area they are in becomes overgrazed, unless led, there's often those pesky barbed wires or other things impeding their way.

Being from France, you don't understand the concept of "open range" here in the US. In Nevada the fences are miles, or dozens of miles apart, if they exist at all. There is no fence surrounding his allotment, which is huge (for a reason), but there are "drift fences" used to guide cattle into and out of different (huge) areas. The cattle are regularly rotated and moved around specifically to avoid overgrazing. That's what cowboys do...they go ride the range and herd the cattle around and keep them in roughly the same place as well as checking them for health, etc.. The cows aren't confined in a small area at all, and in Nevada every cow might be allotted 100 to 1000 or more acres per animal unit as the appropriate carrying capacity of the land. His allotment supported more than a thousand cows for more than 130 years until it was cut to 150 cows by the BLM for the supposed benefit of the tortoise, but in actuality to drive him out of business like the BLM has driven every other rancher in Clark County, Nevada out of business by doing the same thing.

That's wrong, and his established allotment right was unlawfully reduced, which is a "taking" under the Constitution.

[piscator]

Surprised to see you supporting someone whose family has subsisted on federal welfare for generations.

I'm not. The BLM makes billions of dollars every year for the government on various types of leases, so it's not "welfare," it's leasing the land just like I did when I owned my ranch.

As for Bundy, I disagree with his not paying his lease, but I disagree more with the actions of the BLM in cutting his allotment, which is legally and historically a property right his family established more than a century ago, to a size that makes it impossible for him to continue ranching (150 cows), and I vehemently disagree with the paramilitary tactics the BLM has been using, and their long history of harassment of ranchers to drive them out of business as a part of a BLM (not national) agenda to get rid of public lands ranchers.

1. The Bundys never had property rights to the land in question. The taxpayer owns it, and never gave or sold it to anyone.*

2. The Bundys have guns and are threatening to use them to preserve their income stream.






*

The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo (Tratado de Guadalupe Hidalgo in Spanish), officially entitled the Treaty of Peace, Friendship, Limits and Settlement between the United States of America and the Mexican Republic,[1] is the peace treaty signed in 1848 in the Villa de Guadalupe Hidalgo (now a neighborhood of Mexico City) between the U.S. and Mexico that ended the Mexican–American War (1846–48). With the defeat of its army and the fall of the capital, Mexico entered into negotiations to end the war. The treaty called for the United States to pay $15 million to Mexico and pay off the claims of American citizens against Mexico up to $3.25 million. It gave the United States the Rio Grande boundary for Texas, and gave the U.S. ownership of California, and a large area comprising New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada, Utah, and parts of Wyoming and Colorado. Mexicans in those annexed areas had the choice of relocating to Mexico or receiving American citizenship with full civil rights; over 90% remained. The U.S. Senate ratified the treaty by a vote of 38–14...

[Seth]

1. The Bundys never had property rights to the land in question. The taxpayer owns it, and never gave or sold it to anyone.*

Go read the Taylor Grazing Act and shut the fuck up.

In 1916 Congress enacted the Stock Raising Homestead Law as a result of, among other things, the Johnson County Cattle War. That law allowed individuals one section (640 acres) of public land to be used mainly for grazing and forage cultivation. Settlers had to live on the land and make improvements equal to $1.25 per acre.
Over the years it became apparent that a section of land was inadequate to support enough livestock for a family ranch. The idea of a grazing lease system was debated for several years.

In 1934, Secretary of the Interior Harold Ickes threatened to withdraw the lands. The Taylor Grazing Act was signed in 1934 by President Franklin Roosevelt. Approximately 80 million acres of land valuable for grazing and forage crops were available to be placed into grazing districts. To administer these grazing districts, Secretary of the Interior Harold Ickes created a Division of Grazing with Farrington Carpenter, a Colorado rancher, at the helm. Carpenter held a series of meetings with ranchers and state officials to determine grazing district boundaries. The first grazing district (Rawlins), was established in Wyoming on March 20, 1935; others soon followed. By June 1935, over 65 million acres had been placed in grazing districts. All the established grazing districts are still in effect today.

Note: Nevada is part of the BLM Wyoming district office.

Those grazing allotments are, by law and supreme court precedent, valuable private property rights, as are the established water rights on those lands. The fee to the land itself remains in the federal government, although it should be titled to the State of Nevada under the Equal Footing Doctrine, but the right to graze cattle and use the water is a severed property right that belongs to Bundy that cannot be taken from him without paying for it.

2. The Bundys have guns and are threatening to use them to preserve their income stream.

Good for them, because the BLM is threatening to shoot them, and has shot their cattle, which they have no authority to do.

[piscator]

1. The Bundys never had property rights to the land in question. The taxpayer owns it, and never gave or sold it to anyone.*

Go read the Taylor Grazing Act and shut the fuck up.

It'll have to wait until I get off your mom, Shithawk.

In 1916 Congress enacted the Stock Raising Homestead Law as a result of, among other things, the Johnson County Cattle War. That law allowed individuals one section (640 acres) of public land to be used mainly for grazing and forage cultivation. Settlers had to live on the land and make improvements equal to $1.25 per acre.
Over the years it became apparent that a section of land was inadequate to support enough livestock for a family ranch. The idea of a grazing lease system was debated for several years.

In 1934, Secretary of the Interior Harold Ickes threatened to withdraw the lands. The Taylor Grazing Act was signed in 1934 by President Franklin Roosevelt. Approximately 80 million acres of land valuable for grazing and forage crops were available to be placed into grazing districts. To administer these grazing districts, Secretary of the Interior Harold Ickes created a Division of Grazing with Farrington Carpenter, a Colorado rancher, at the helm. Carpenter held a series of meetings with ranchers and state officials to determine grazing district boundaries. The first grazing district (Rawlins), was established in Wyoming on March 20, 1935; others soon followed. By June 1935, over 65 million acres had been placed in grazing districts. All the established grazing districts are still in effect today.

Note: Nevada is part of the BLM Wyoming district office.

Those grazing allotments are, by law and supreme court precedent, valuable private property rights, as are the established water rights on those lands. The fee to the land itself remains in the federal government, although it should be titled to the State of Nevada under the Equal Footing Doctrine, but the right to graze cattle and use the water is a severed property right that belongs to Bundy that cannot be taken from him without paying for it.

All the judges who have heard Bundy's story have said, "Your sainted ancestors failed to file a claim, so Fuck You."

See, instead of being thankful for the generations of sustenance the taxpayers have so graciously provided to Clan Bundy, Cliven figures it's all his because he's benefited so much from it for so long.

2. The Bundys have guns and are threatening to use them to preserve their income stream.

Good for them, because the BLM is threatening to shoot them, and has shot their cattle, which they have no authority to do.

[/quote]


There's a big difference between the BLM arbitrarily deciding to shoot them for yelling and waving signs, and the BLM threatening to shoot them if they don't drop their weapons.