If the Oregon militiamen were Muslim or black, they'd probably be dead by now

[kscarbel2]

The Guardian / January 4, 2016

If, in a vacuum, I told you that a bearded man with his head covered had posted a video on social media calling on his followers to leave their homes with weapons, migrate to a new area, take over government property “as long as necessary” and use violence if confronted by law enforcement, you’d probably assume that I was talking about the latest propaganda video released by Isis, filmed in Iraq or Syria and intended to recruit violent Muslim extremists.

But that exact call was recently issued on Facebook by white rancher Ammon Bundy, the son of Cliven Bundy who also engaged in an armed standoff with law enforcement in 2014 and who currently owes the government more than $1 million in fees. The younger Bundy’s goal this time was to encourage his fellow American “patriots” to take up arms against the US government in protest of the arson convictions of ranchers Dwight Hammond Jr and his son, Steven.

Militia leaders claim approximately 150 followers accepted Ammon Bundy’s call, although reporters on the ground are saying it’s far fewer. The armed men are currently occupying the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in Burns, Oregon to, in their words, “assist in helping the people of Harney County claim back their lands and resources”. Ammon Bundy has said that his people won’t “rule out violence” if law enforcement “tries to remove them”.

But, don’t worry America: he promised everyone that “we are not terrorists”. What a relief.

Of course they’re not “terrorists”: Bundy and his followers are just your average angry white “freedom fighters”, who use weapons and ammunition to protect the US constitution and American values from the government and other Americans who want them to abide by federal laws like everyone else.

But if Bundy and his followers were like the 38% of Americans who aren’t white, people across America wouldn’t be watching this surreal, dangerous episode unfold and wondering what they could do to be labeled a “militia” when occupying a federal area with guns instead of “terrorists”, “thugs”, “extremists” or “gangs”.

If one black man holding a plastic toy gun even walked in the direction of a federal building, let alone with 150 other black men all holding loaded rifles, he’d be shot dead by law enforcement, no questions asked. If 15 Muslims occupied a 7-Eleven with BB guns and masala Slurpees, federal law enforcement would probably roll up with six MRAPs and immediately take everyone out Waco-style (but without a congressional investigation).

We don’t need to racially profile individuals who look like these armed militiamen (white men with bushy beards and beer bellies), but it’s time for mainstream politicians to at least acknowledge and confront this dangerous threat within our borders.

Since 9/11, more people in America have been killed by rightwing terror attacks than violent jihadists (48 deaths to 45 deaths). America witnessed an “unprecedented rise” in radical rightwing, anti-government groups after the election of President Barack Hussein Obama. Yet, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) buried an analyst’s early 2009 warning about the growing threat of rightwing terror groups to focus solely on Muslim extremists, caving to conservative pundits who complained the DHS was demonizing rightwing speech by targeting these groups.

And although the number of people involved has reduced in the past two years, it has not dampened the level of criminal extremism, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center.

Such groups, some of whom have been involved in armed hostilities since the report was withdrawn, are also often openly white supremacist, hostile to immigrants, Islamophobic and prone to anti-government conspiracies.

In other words, they are not unlike Donald Trump’s base. And while this is the time that we would normally expect calls for all moderate militiamen to stand up and condemn the violent extremism within their midst, don’t hold your breath. Republican Senator and presidential candidate Ted Cruz will probably not ignore political correctness and ask, “How can we defeat radical white terrorism with presidential candidates who refuse to utter the words ‘radical white terrorists?’” Trump, who recently said that he’s in favor of killing the families of terrorists to defeat extremists, will assuredly not apply the same standard to white American “militia” members, even if they do employ the violence they’ve promised.

The sad truth is that extremists – both at home and abroad – are often disaffected, frightened and angry people desperately searching for purpose, validation and meaning in a world they feel has left them behind. It’s a sickness that can infect almost anyone, regardless of race, ethnicity, religion or gender.

It’s certainly taken hold of Jon Ritzheimer, a US marine veteran involved in the Oregon stand-off . He’s a member of the Three Percenter club, which alleges that their armed and trained members are “defenders of the constitution” willing to “protect our rights against a tyrannical government and foreign invaders”. (Like Bundy, they do not condone any threats or intimidation tactics “unless an action is warranted”.) Ritzheimer also led the armed, anti-Muslim mosque protests earlier this year in Arizona.

Before taking over the wildlife refuge, Ritzheimer – like other extremists before him – posted a “goodbye” video for his family rationalizing his actions as defending freedom against a “tyrannical government”. “I didn’t come here to shoot, I came here to die,” echoed another militia member, who identified himself only as “Captain Moroni”.

Extremism comes in different colors, ethnicities, beards and head coverings – which is why racial profiling cannot protect us from all extremist violence. Maybe it’s time for politicians and law enforcement to acknowledge inconvenient truths and confront the extremists with “American” names and grievances as they would any other. The security of our homeland – or at least our national wildlife refuges – might depend on it.

[kscarbel2]

The armed takeover of a federal government building by the Mormon Bundy brothers reignites the question: Why is the federal Bureau of Land Management continuing to allow the Mormon father of Ammon and Ryan, Cliven Bundy, a million dollar grazing fee exemption?

Is the BLM giving a free grazing pass on federal lands to all Mormons?

Is there an FBI policy which exempts Mormons from dislodgment of federal government property?

Are there any other religious of political groups which also may attack and occupy property owned by the people of the United States of America without consequence?

Will government officials continue to call these armed insurrectionists “gunman” instead of “terrorists” because they are Mormon?

Richard Ellmyer
Portland, Oregon

[Mcrafty1]

The bigger question here is ...What is the Federal Government doing taking possession of state owned land to begin with? Although I don't agree with what these 'armed militia' are doing in Burn,Oregon, I disagree just as much or more with what the Federal Government is doing to the rights of the States and the people they represent. The federal Government needs to be scaled back and contained in what they were originally intended for......none of which was to take and possess state owned land that belongs to individual states and the people within those borders.

I realize that to subscribe to this way of thinking one has to subscribe to the fact that "A Government that is big enough to give us everything. is big enough to take it all away" and except responsibility for ones own well being and not rely on Big Government to dictate (finance) how one lives their everyday lives.

[kscarbel2]

The bigger question here is ...What is the Federal Government doing taking possession of state owned land to begin with? Although I don't agree with what these 'armed militia' are doing in Burn,Oregon, I disagree just as much or more with what the Federal Government is doing to the rights of the States and the people they represent. The federal Government needs to be scaled back and contained in what they were originally intended for......none of which was to take and possess state owned land that belongs to individual states and the people within those borders.

I realize that to subscribe to this way of thinking one has to subscribe to the fact that "A Government that is big enough to give us everything. is big enough to take it all away" and except responsibility for ones own well being and not rely on Big Government to dictate (finance) how one lives their everyday lives.

C'mon, that's an easy one..........Theodore "Teddy" Roosevelt. He saved the most beautiful parts of the country from being destroyed by people and companies that lacked the foresight or integrity to preserve America's richest treasures in terms of land. He can't be given enough credit.

[Outbehindthebarn]

Have the militia men and their ilk opened fire on innocent civilians enjoying a night out? Have they strapped bombs to themselves and detonated them, intending to cause the most carnage possible? Have they beheaded officials/journalists on video, or soaked opponents with gasoline and lit them on fire and cheered while men literally burned to death in cages?

Have the militia men shot and killed anyone in their own communities, who share the same culture, lifestyle, music? (i.e. Chicago blacks)
Do the militia men abandon women they have impregnated in staggering numbers? Commit inordinate levels of crime in comparison to other groups?

The answer is a resounding "NO"!

I have no opinion about the virtue of the actions of Mormon ranchers in Oregon (Mostly because I don't know if their grievances are legit), the fact that they armed themselves is definitely alarming.... ghosts of Waco?

But to compare them to ISIS or the continuing tragedy of blacks in major cities is the LEFT stretching it to fit their inane, ignorant agenda.

I'd expect nothing less from "The Guardian" and its radical origin.

[Mcrafty1]

C'mon, that's an easy one..........Theodore "Teddy" Roosevelt. He saved the most beautiful parts of the country from being destroyed by people and companies that lacked the foresight or integrity to preserve America's riches treasures in terms of land. He can't be given enough credit.

Let me know how you feel when YOUR property is in the Federal Governments sights.

....I didn't say I was against reasonable land preservation, I just don't believe the Federal Government has any business owning said land....Every square foot they confiscate/purchase/commandeer or obtain in one way or another is a square foot the American land owner/ taxpayer has to pay more property tax on the land they own just to hand the balance the bloated budgets of ALL facets of Government.

[Outbehindthebarn]

Its always nice to read an article that starts out "In a vacuum" right after the headline If the Oregon militiamen were Muslim or black, they'd probably be dead by now

I call that sensationalism. "The Guardian" is a rag.

[james j neiweem]

RealDiehl-Well said.

[41chevy]

Let me know how you feel when YOUR property is in the Federal Governments sights.

....I didn't say I was against reasonable land preservation, I just don't believe the Federal Government has any business owning said land....Every square foot they confiscate/purchase/commandeer or obtain in one way or another is a square foot the American land owner/ taxpayer has to pay more property tax on the land they own just to hand the balance the bloated budgets of ALL facets of Government.

[HeavyGunner]

I heard on a talk radio show today that the government wants that piece of ranch land (privately owned property) to control irrigation, oil and natural gas in the area. The ranchers by no means are angels but it seems they are being targeted by the government for refusing to sell the land to hem for years now. No I can't site sources specifically but it was compelling to listen too. Another reason the turd in office wants our guns, we're easier to "govern" once we are unarmed.

[HeavyGunner]

C'mon, that's an easy one..........Theodore "Teddy" Roosevelt. He saved the most beautiful parts of the country from being destroyed by people and companies that lacked the foresight or integrity to preserve America's riches treasures in terms of land. He can't be given enough credit.

You're a smart well read guy so you know that national parks have long been established so no need to "preserve" more parks. Look at my home state where the Feds are trying a land grab in eastern Montana, hand in hand with hippies who want the farm and ranchers gone and buffalo put in there place. Then in the same general area there are hundreds of thousands of acre proposed to be "wilderness area" which simply means you and I John Q Public get shut out of the area like they've done with ALL of western Montana. Oh and Did I mention I n the very same area the "wilderness" is being proposed there is already a huge game preserve (Charles Marion Russel Game Preserve)? Google the Don't Buffalo Me campaign if you think I'm full of it. I don't condone violence but I will say I have an understanding of where they're coming from. How much more public land needs to be closed off? How much more private does the government need? How many more "wildernesses" that most people will never see unless they have a week off and horses to get to these now secluded places since the roads get closed? There certainly are special places that need protected but at this point we have them covered.

[41chevy]

interesting that a White House spoken person called the people in Oregon " Red State Rebels" and "Vanilla ISIS" Cute that it the opinion of the White House Staff.

The activists who began occupying government buildings in the Oregon wilderness over the weekend say that they’re protesting how federal authorities treated rancher Dwight Hammond, 73, and Steven Hammond, his middle-aged son.

Federal authorities charged the Hammonds with arson after they set a series of fires that spread to public land. A back burn in 2006 spread to Federal land while, “a burn ban was in effect while firefighters battled blazes started by a lightning storm on a hot day in August,” the newspaper reported. “Steven Hammond had started a ‘back burn’ to prevent the blaze from destroying the family’s winter feed for its cattle.” It was reported by Bureau of Land Management firefighters in the area, and the Justice Department notes that the Hammond's “took steps to ensure their safety.” It burned about an acre of public land, causing less than $1,000 in damage. Charged with a number of crimes related to arson, the father was convicted of just one count of arson while the son was convicted of two counts for the wilderness fires. The government used an anti-terrorism statute to secure its convictions.

The statute imposed a mandatory minimum sentence: 5 years imprisonment under the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996. U.S. District Judge Michael Hogan felt that five-year sentences were “grossly disproportionate” and would “shock his conscience,” given the context of the case. He sentenced the older man to three months in federal prison and the son to concurrent one-year sentences. Those punishments inspired no radical activism.

What happened next, did. The Department of Justice appealed the sentences, won in the 9th Circuit, and is forcing the men to return to prison after they thought they had done their prison time.Both will now serve the mandatory 5 year minimum sentences, on top of "time served".

[kscarbel2]

Let me know how you feel when YOUR property is in the Federal Governments sights.

....I didn't say I was against reasonable land preservation, I just don't believe the Federal Government has any business owning said land....Every square foot they confiscate/purchase/commandeer or obtain in one way or another is a square foot the American land owner/ taxpayer has to pay more property tax on the land they own just to hand the balance the bloated budgets of ALL facets of Government.

Relax friend, I posted this article as it covers most of the aspects of a current news event. The Pulitzer Prize-winning Guardian typically does a good job, often digging out details that the dramatics-driven CNN does not (my opinion).

Here's another map of interest. Again, one has to dig back into history and read up on the era of Teddy Roosevelt (in my opinion, on of the nation's finest presidents.......and certainly the most colorful). Teddy created huge swathes of federal land (speaking of Yosemite and the Grand Canyon barely scratches the surface), and I'm forever grateful.

http://www.nps.gov/thro/learn/historyculture/theodore-roosevelt-and-conservation.htm

http://www.nps.gov/thrb/learn/historyculture/trandthenpsystem.htm

http://www.pbs.org/nationalparks/people/historical/roosevelt/

.

[kscarbel2]

(Ken Burns is a superb narrator)

[TeamsterGrrrl]

A lot of the federal lands are just plain lands that no one wanted, or people tried to homestead and failed. In the midwest where I'm from, a lot of our state and national forests are poor farmland that even if the homesteaders were able to "prove up" on and make good their claim, they later couldn't even raise enough on the land to pay the taxes. After this cycle of failure was repeated a few times, the government just made the land a park or forest and preserved the land for future generations.

[MHfred]

Where would the "affluenza" kid be today if he were brown or black? He would be dead or rotting in prison for killing those 4 humans while driving drunk.

[thomastractorsvc]

Here is the reason in my opinion, the federal lands are being put up as collateral for national debt. The west is least populated but has vast natural resources which makes the lands more valuable than say the coast of Maine. Just look at the maps and compare where mineral, energy and other natural resources are. Also with small populations hard to make the national news compared to BLM taking over say half of Connecticut. Check out the maps http://minerals.usgs.gov/minerals/pubs/mapdata/

Took a little while to find a source that everyone could agree was "reliable enough" and provided enough of an explanation without the site prone to tinfoil hats and "koockoo for cocco puffs" writers.

It is an old article, but I heard something about this many years ago during a Military briefing when someone asked about "Chain of Command" as US Soldiers being under UN command like in Haiti in 1995-96, a Soldier asked or stated something and the S-2 or who ever it was given the briefing responded with some talk about this. I dismissed it as the "Conspiracy" chatter.

http://ireport.cnn.com/docs/DOC-197641

[Outbehindthebarn]

Where would the "affluenza" kid be today if he were brown or black? He would be dead or rotting in prison for killing those 4 humans while driving drunk.

I think the color in question with that incident is neither white nor black.... its GREEN.

[Outbehindthebarn]

A lot of the federal lands are just plain lands that no one wanted, or people tried to homestead and failed. In the midwest where I'm from, a lot of our state and national forests are poor farmland that even if the homesteaders were able to "prove up" on and make good their claim, they later couldn't even raise enough on the land to pay the taxes. After this cycle of failure was repeated a few times, the government just made the land a park or forest and preserved the land for future generations.

Right here, in my township, in 1968, the county kicked my future maternal great grandparents and paternal great grandparents (Yes that's right both of my parents's families) off of their land to create Brush Creek Park. The motion was made through Eminent Domain. Put a sour taste in the mouths of our families for generations, and I am living proof.

I don't take it quite so personally because it was so long before my time, but friends of local government Eminent Domain does not make.

I can only assume similar factors are at play with the emotions of the radical terrorist ranchers from Oregon who seek to establish a Mormon Caliphate there. I heard they are planning annual pilgrimages to Mt Hood.

[kscarbel2]

From Kim Davis to Oregon, the GOP’s love affair with lawbreakers

The Washington Post / January 4, 2015

Ammon Bundy and the other armed militants occupying a federal facility at a wildlife refuge in Oregon have a beef with the administration — the Teddy Roosevelt administration.

“It has been provided for us to be able to come together and unite in making a hard stand against this overreach, this taking of the people’s land and resources,” proclaimed Bundy, son of Cliven Bundy, the Nevada rancher who led a similar armed rebellion against the government two years ago. “If we do not make the hard stand, then we will be in a position where we won’t be able to as a people.”

But this “taking of the people’s land,” the “overreach” that moved these rebels to take up arms, occurred 108 years ago, when Roosevelt — a Republican president and a great conservationist — established the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, one of 51 such refuges he set aside, “as a preserve and breeding ground for native birds.”

So why have the militants chosen this moment, more than a century after the fact, to “unwind all these unconstitutional land transactions,” as Bundy put it? Perhaps it’s because they think the political atmosphere now condones such anti-government activity.

You can see why they might think so. Several of the Republican presidential candidates have been encouraging lawbreaking, winking at it or simply looking the other way.

A few months ago, Ted Cruz, Mike Huckabee and others rushed to defend Kim Davis, the Kentucky county clerk jailed for refusing to obey federal law. A federal judge had held her in contempt of court for refusing to recognize same-sex marriages, and the Supreme Court specifically declined to give Davis relief. But Cruz identified her jailing as “judicial tyranny” and said Davis was operating “under God’s authority.”

Donald Trump has put at the center of his campaign an extra-constitutional ban on admitting Muslims into the country.

Marco Rubio said that if the law conflicts with the Gospel, “God’s rules always win,” and that “we are called to ignore” the government’s authority.

Huckabee and Rick Santorum signed a pledge not to “respect an unjust law that directly conflicts with higher law.”

Huckabee floated the notion of using federal troops to block people from getting abortions and questioned the Supreme Court’s authority.

And, of course, there was the 2014 standoff in which Cliven Bundy, who refused to pay grazing fees for his use of federal land, got support or sympathy from Cruz, Trump, Huckabee, Rand Paul and Ben Carson. Cruz denounced the federal government for “using the jackboot of authoritarianism.”

The rancher lost much of his support when he delivered a racist rant. But not all of it: Last summer, Paul had a private meeting with the elder Bundy that the rancher said lasted 45 minutes. As my colleagues Katie Zezima and David Weigel noted, Paul and Cruz have both campaigned to transfer federal lands in the West to private ownership.

Flirting with extremists helps conservative candidates harness the prodigious anger in the electorate. A poll released this weekend by NBC, Esquire and Survey Monkey found anger is particularly intense among Republicans: Seventy-seven percent said the news makes them angry at least once a day (compared with 67 percent of Democrats). Seventy-three percent of white Americans are angered daily (vs. 66 percent of Hispanics and 56 percent of African Americans).

So when some very angry people led by Ammon Bundy took over the (unoccupied) compound at the wildlife preserve over the weekend, the Republican presidential candidates reacted mostly with silence.

A scan of tweets from Republican lawmakers also found nary a peep about the armed takeover of the federal facility.

An admirable exception (and one whose low standing proves the rule) was John Kasich, whose strategist John Weaver suggested “a good federal compound for Bundy and his gang: a U.S. penitentiary.”

Finally, in a radio interview Monday, Marco Rubio said the militants “cannot be lawless” — though he added that he agrees with their complaints about federal lands.

And Cruz, responding to a question, said he hoped Bundy’s gang would “stand down peaceably” because “we don’t have a constitutional right to use force and violence.”

That was mild criticism — Bundy had said he has no intention of using violence — but better than the usual wink.

As it happens, Cruz also released a TV ad Monday protesting inadequate enforcement of the border. “The rule of law,” he says in the ad, “wasn’t meant to be broken.” That’s a fine sentiment. But to live under the rule of law we must follow all laws — not just those we like.

[41chevy]

A lot of the federal lands are just plain lands that no one wanted, or people tried to homestead and failed. In the midwest where I'm from, a lot of our state and national forests are poor farmland that even if the homesteaders were able to "prove up" on and make good their claim, they later couldn't even raise enough on the land to pay the taxes. After this cycle of failure was repeated a few times, the government just made the land a park or forest and preserved the land for future generations.

Here's a timeline that proves just how complicated this case is — as well as the power that the media still retains to elevate a local political issue into a national one.

1989: The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service lists the desert tortoise as an endangered species. A year later, its designation was changed to "threatened."

March 1993: The Washington Post publishes a story about the federal government's efforts to protect the desert tortoise in Nevada. Near Las Vegas, the Bureau of Land Management designated hundreds of thousands of acres of federal land for strict conservation efforts. "Among the conservation measures required," according to the Post's coverage, "are the elimination of livestock grazing and off-road vehicle use in the protected tortoise habitat. Many people were not impressed by the new conservation plan. "Cliven Bundy, whose family homesteaded his ranch in 1877 and who accuses the government of a 'land grab,' are digging in for a fight and say they will not willingly sell their grazing privileges to create another preserve." People who use the desert to prospect for minerals and to race motorcycles and jeeps also feel shortchanged. "'It was shoved down our throat,' said Mark Trinko, who represents off-road vehicle users on the committee that oversees the plan."

April 1995: The fight between the Bureau of Land Management and the ranchers who want to use the federal land without fees or oversight is growing more tense, according to a story published in USA Today.Ultimately the issue will be settled by the courts, but ranchers who say they can't afford to raise livestock without access to public land, are taking matters into their own hands -- setting up what some officials say is an inevitable and dangerous confrontation.Jim Nelson, who oversees 7 million acres in Nevada, says his agency is just doing its job, which is to ensure that land remains healthy and viable for ranchers and any others who wish to use it.That goal, he says, is hindered by unattended, free-ranging cows that degrade the state's precious springs and stream banks. The reason that things were ramping up? Counties were starting to challenge federal ownership of land. In 1991, Catron County in New Mexico passed an ordinance that claimed state ownership and local management of public land in the state. Thirty five counties followed suit. Nye County, Nevada, became the first to act on its legislated threat. The county commissioner bulldozed his way down a closed national forest road. Forest rangers soon followed, who the county commissioner threatened to arrest if they interfered. One Elko County rancher, Cliff Gardner, has decided to take his case to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, arguing that states' rights mean the federal government has no authority over the land where his cattle graze.

1998: A federal judge issues a permanent injunction against Bundy, ordering him to remove his cattle from the federal lands. He lost an appeal to the San Francisco 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. He represented himself.

March 2002: Cliff Gardner is sentenced to a month in a Reno halfway house, along with a $5,000 fine and a year of probation. He has been under house arrest for the three previous months for not taking his cattle off of federal land.

July 2009:Rob Mrowka, a Conservation Lawyer who works for the Center for Biological Diversity, in Las Vegas started a civil suit against Bundy and other ranchers. Mrowka stated “Anyone can go out there anytime of the year and see cattle. BLM employees trying to protect sensitive plants and animals are very frustrated. It's a problem that's been going on and on.” Wild Horse advocated got angrier saying that the roaming cattle are ruining their habitats. Other scientists argue that the wild horses and cows alike are ruining habitats for other animals.

April 2012: The BLM plans to round up Bundy's cattle. After several threats, the plans are abandoned. The Center for Biological Diversity files an intent to sue against the BLM for canceling their plans.

March 27, 2014: The BLM has closed off 322,000 acres of public land, and is preparing to collect Bundy's cattle. Bundy files a notice with the county sheriff department, titled “Range War Emergency Notice and Demand for Protection." Deputy Sheriff Gardner. “I think Cliven is taking a stand not only for family ranchers, but also for every freedom-loving American, for everyone," Gardner said. "I’ve been trying to resolve the issues since 1984. Perhaps it’s difficult for the average American to understand, but protecting the individual was a underlying factor of our government. Clark County Commissioner Tom Collins also supports Bundy. “The U.S. government has perpetrated a bigger fraud on people over those tortoises than Al Capone did selling swampland in Miami."

April 5, 2014: After decades of trepidation, federal officials and cowboys start rounding up what they think are Cliven Bundy's hundreds of cows. The operation was going to cost $1 million, and reportedly last until May

April 24, 2014 Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid toldl local media outlets, "It's not over. We can't have American people violate the law and then just walk away from us. So it's not over ...far from it."

[kscarbel2]

Oregon standoff: memory of botched Waco siege shapes federal response

The Guardian / January 5, 2016

The shadow of Waco and other botched law enforcement sieges of the 1980s and 1990s is looming large over the standoff in south-eastern Oregon, where federal agents are avoiding anything that smacks of confrontation with the armed anti-government activists who have occupied a remote wildlife refuge since the weekend.

Where once federal law enforcement agencies might have been itching to meet the activists’ defiance head-on, now they are virtually invisible – apparently believing they have much more to lose from triggering violence than they have to gain by waiting the protesters out.

The reason, according to former federal agents and experts on rightwing extremism, is a vivid institutional memory of the bloodshed that marked standoffs with radical rightwingers in Ruby Ridge, Idaho, in 1992 and at Waco, Texas, the following year. Those operations not only led to loss of life on both sides – more than 80 people died in the fire that ended the siege of the Branch Davidian religious compound outside Waco – they also provoked scandal, investigations, congressional hearings, and years of further confrontations with radical groups outraged by the way the federal authorities behaved.

“What we’re seeing is definitely related to lessons learned at Ruby Ridge and Waco and Marion, Utah and other sieges since then,” said Mark Pitcavage, director of the Anti-Defamation League’s Center on Extremism. “From a law enforcement perspective, if you try to use force to resolve the situation, there’s a risk that one or more of the extremists involved may be killed and turn into martyrs. You can end up spawning far more retaliatory acts of violence than whatever harm the initial incident could have caused.”

At least one Waco veteran, an FBI hostage negotiator who has long since retired, has been hired back as a government adviser on the Oregon standoff. Another, the former head of the FBI’s Hostage Rescue Team, Danny Coulson, said it was gratifying to see the bureau take what he called a “laid-back posture”.

“Less is better here,” Coulson said. “Let ’em talk … The commander on the ground should be engaging in very close dialogue with the group’s leader, person to person. Sooner or later, the wives are going to get sick of the sight of their husbands screwing around out there, or they’ll need to go get cigarettes. It will end the right way.”

The Oregon standoff is a relatively low-stakes conflict because no shots have been fired in anger, nobody has been hurt or taken hostage and no evidence has emerged that one or more of the protesters is being sought for other offences. They could scarcely be in a more remote area, and they are occupying a building entirely devoid of strategic importance.

Nonetheless, the feds’ approach is a sea-change from the early 1990s, when a macho paramilitary culture and aggressive rules of engagement approved at the highest levels were ingrained in the FBI and contributed to disasters the bureau is now anxious never to repeat. Ruby Ridge started out as a failed attempt to lure an Idaho survivalist, Randy Weaver, into committing a gun charge so the feds would have leverage to persuade him to inform on his friends at the Aryan Nations compound down the mountain. By the time it was over, in September 1992, a US Marshal and Weaver’s 14-year-old son had died in a shootout and an FBI sharpshooter had killed Weaver’s wife while she cradled a 14-month-old baby in her arms.

The Waco siege began six months later when the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) mounted an assault-style raid on the Branch Davidian compound and tried to arrest the cult leader, David Koresh. Four ATF agents and six Branch Davidians were killed. As a siege got under way, heavy-handed FBI commanders disregarded the advice of their own hostage negotiators and steadily escalated the tension – deploying military Bradley fighting vehicles, blasting the compound with high-power lights and playing everything from Tibetan chants and the sound of dying rabbits to Nancy Sinatra singing These Boots Are Made for Walkin’, all at maximum volume.

With all avenues for a peaceful resolution closed, the feds moved in to end the siege by force after 51 days. A fire set by the Branch Davidian leadership as they saw the FBI coming killed almost everyone inside. Gary Noesner, one of the FBI hostage negotiators at Waco later wrote a book in which he reflected: “The harder we push, the more likely we are to be met with resistance.” He said the art of managing a standoff was to apply just the right amount of pressure – not so little that the subjects gain in confidence and not so much that it triggers a firefight.

Noesner was unavailable for interview for this story because the FBI, unusually, has called him out of retirement to advise them directly on the Oregon situation. The principle he invoked was put to good use in 1996, when a standoff with a group called the Montana Freemen ended peacefully after 81 days, and again in 1997 in a week-long drama involving hostages held by a group calling itself the Republic of Texas. Patience, not aggression, has been the watchword of law enforcement ever since.

When a New Hampshire couple, Ed and Elaine Brown, barricaded themselves in their mountain home in 2007 rather than return to court for their sentencing hearing in a tax evasion case, state and federal law enforcement sat pat for more than six months. The couple was heavily armed with weapons and explosives and their property was effectively a mini-fortress, with an observation tower, bunkers, tunnels and booby-traps set on approaches to the house. They relied on a steady stream of supporters – including Randy Weaver – to bring them food and other supplies. Eventually, two undercover US Marshals got inside by posing as sympathizers and arrested them without incident.

In Oregon, the strategy appears to be to cut off electricity to the wildlife refuge and wait until the protesters run out of generator fuel – following Noesner’s principle of applying some pressure but not too much. Coulson said the FBI would probably seek to impress on Ammon Bundy and his cohorts that a hot-headed resort to violence would be in nobody’s interest. “A conversation’s a hell of a lot better than a gunfight,” Coulson said.

Law enforcement’s soft approach is not immune from criticism, especially when police agencies appear to treat white men with guns one way and black people and suspected Muslim extremists another. Authorities in Texas have all but given up on one heavily armed fugitive, John Joe Gray, who has been holed up on his 47-acre property south-east of Dallas since 2000. They say it’s not worth risking the life of a single deputy just to make the arrest.

There has been criticism, too, of the Bureau of Land Management’s decision to back off from confiscating cattle belonging to Ammon Bundy’s father, Cliven Bundy, because he has not paid grazing fees and fines on his Nevada ranch since the early 1990s. Bundy issued a call to arms in 2014 and attracted so many supporters the BLM decided the risks of enforcing the law were too great. “It’s a pretty complex calculation of risks versus benefits,” Pitcavage of the ADL said. Would the advantages of confiscating Cliven Bundy’s cattle be worth possible casualties, or future acts of violence? “Certainly, there are negative consequences to backing down, but sometimes there are equal if not greater negative consequences in going forward.”

[rustydog]

I have heard the feds are going to send in Steven Segal with two jumbo SlimJims and take them all out.

[Mcrafty1]

Relax friend, I posted this article as it covers most of the aspects of a current news event. The Pulitzer Prize-winning Guardian typically does a good job, often digging out details that the dramatics-driven CNN does not (my opinion).

Here's another map of interest. Again, one has to dig back into history and read up on the era of Teddy Roosevelt (in my opinion, on of the nation's finest presidents.......and certainly the most colorful). Teddy created huge swathes of federal land (speaking of Yosemite and the Grand Canyon barely scratches the surface), and I'm forever grateful.

http://www.nps.gov/thro/learn/historyculture/theodore-roosevelt-and-conservation.htm

http://www.nps.gov/thrb/learn/historyculture/trandthenpsystem.htm

http://www.pbs.org/nationalparks/people/historical/roosevelt/

.

I get where you're coming from...to understand my point of view one has to hold the Federal Government at arms length, not embrace it...lets say you and I agree to disagree ..and leave it at that. Happy New year.

41chevy's post #12 pretty much sums up the reason I take the position I take in this matter. I can see more and more of Government railroading like this forthcoming... not less. jmho

..and I don't know where 41chevy gleaned his post from, but I doubt it was from 'the guardian'

[41chevy]

I get where you're coming from...to understand my point of view one has to hold the Federal Government at arms length, not embrace it...lets say you and I agree to disagree ..and leave it at that. Happy New year.

41chevy's post #12 pretty much sums up the reason I take the position I take in this matter. I can see more and more of Government railroading like this forthcoming... not less. jmho

..and I don't know where 41chevy gleaned his post from, but I doubt it was from 'the guardian'

The Washington Post and the New York Times both had this article/ op ed on the situation.