The Bundy Rumble

I've been following the Cliven Bundy story pretty much since the get-go, including live tweeting the most tense parts of this saga during the standoff between the BLM and the militia groups that rose to his defense. I've been too busy to blog about it until now and I've got a few things to say.

1) This is gross overreach by the BLM and the federal government pure and simple. 
Supposedly Mr. Bundy owes the federal government more or less a million dollars in grazing fees dating back to 1993 when he stopped paying. Ok, that might be true. I don't have time to delve into the intricacies of the law and what the various court proceedings have been over the decades. Here is what Mr. Bundy and his family have to say about the fees and the whole situation. What I do know is that no private citizen could EVER  legally show up at someone's property with a bunch of armed thugs and threaten violence against someone's person or property in order to satisfy a debt. Those are tactics reserved to the Mafia and ganglords, and the BLM and our government never resorts to those types of heavy-handed tactics, right? Right? Of course that's not right. Violence and threats of violence are the only tools a government has. They can only enforce their decrees at the barrel of a gun. And you know how the old saying goes, "When your only tool is a hammer everything begins to look like a nail". 

People forget, the government works for us, not the other way around. Why should Mr. Bundy pay this agency to "manage" him off his land like they did every other rancher in the area? Once again, I'm sure there is an appropriate Mafia comparison to be made here. Hey Guido, you must pay us to "protect" your business and you must continue paying us even if your business declines and if you stop paying us to protect your business, we'll break your legs and burn your business to the ground. Capisce?

 
2) Mr. Bundy is not a welfare rancher. 
Those of the liberal persuasion are trying to paint Mr. Bundy as some sort of a "welfare queen" because he has been using public lands to graze his cattle without paying for it. "He's been using public land to graze his cattle and not paying for it!", they scream.  "He owes us!", they howl.

He doesn't owe us squat. He's been doing more to that land than you, I, or the federal government ever has. I don't care when the deed for his property was taken out. He claims his family has been there since the 1800s. I don't care that supposedly they didn't sign the deed until the mid 1900s. Who has been there working the land, cultivating it, irrigating it, and homesteading it, the government or the Bundy family? Who has produced more value out of the land, Mr. Bundy by grazing his cattle which will be used to feed people and produce direct and indirect jobs due to his use of the land or the government who by magical decree drew some lines on a map, waved a wand, and declared it "theirs" despite letting it sit untouched (except for the nuclear bombs they've been detonating underground) for over a century?

Indeed, philosopher John Locke had some prescient thoughts on property rights even as far back as the 17th century, as disputes over property are as old as mankind. In a great synopsis of his life and work by the Foundation for Economic Education (FEE), there were several paragraphs dedicated to Locke's views on property rights in relation to government:

"Locke established that private property is absolutely essential for liberty: “every Man has a Property in his own Person. This no Body has any Right to but himself. The Labour of his Body, and the Work of his Hands, we may say, are properly his.” He continues: “The great and chief end therefore, of Mens uniting into Commonwealths, and putting themselves under Government, is the Preservation of their Property.”

Locke believed people legitimately turned common property into private property by mixing their labor with it, improving it. Marxists liked to claim this meant Locke embraced the labor theory of value, but he was talking about the basis of ownership rather than value.

He insisted that people, not rulers, are sovereign. Government, Locke wrote, “can never have a Power to take to themselves the whole or any part of the Subjects Property, without their own consent. For this would be in effect to leave them no Property at all.” He makes his point even more explicit: rulers “must not raise Taxes on the Property of the People, without the Consent of the People, given by themselves, or their Deputies."

Locke had enormous foresight to see beyond the struggles of his own day, which were directed against monarchy: “’Tis a Mistake to think this Fault [tyranny] is proper only to Monarchies; other Forms of Government are liable to it, as well as that. For where-ever the Power that is put in any hands for the Government of the People, and the Preservation of their Properties, is applied to other ends, and made use of to impoverish, harass, or subdue them to the Arbitrary and Irregular Commands of those that have it: There it presently becomes Tyranny, whether those that thus use it are one or many.”

Then Locke affirmed an explicit right to revolution: “whenever the Legislators endeavor to take away, and destroy the Property of the People, or to reduce them to Slavery under Arbitrary Power, they put themselves into a state of War with the People, who are thereupon absolved from any farther Obedience, and are left to the common Refuge, which God hath provided for all Men, against Force and Violence. Whensoever therefore the Legislative shall transgress this fundamental Rule of Society; and either by Ambition, Fear, Folly or Corruption, endeavor to grasp themselves, or put into the hands of any other an Absolute Power over the Lives, Liberties, and Estates of the People; By this breach of Trust they forfeit the Power, the People had put into their hands, for quite contrary ends, and it devolves to the People, who have a Right to resume their original Liberty.”

According to the Lockean view, if Mr. Bundy and his family have mixed their labor with the property and improved it, then the property is, by this definition, theirs ("The Labour of his Body and the Work of his Hands...are properly his.") The Bundys have spent decades doing so whereas the government, in this instance, has not. This is what Mr. Bundy is referring to when he says the property is theirs "by preemptive rights by beneficial use". For the government then to swoop in and claim that it's "their" land and that Mr. Bundy owes them money for the privilege of continuing to work and develop the property is ludicrous. Hence Locke's view that government "can never have a Power to take to themselves the whole or any part of the Subjects Property, without their own consent. For this would be in effect to leave them no Property at all.”

Given this view of the dispute, Mr. Bundy and his supporters are affirming the remedy offered by Mr. Locke in instances such as these that, “whenever the Legislators endeavor to take away, and destroy the Property of the People, or to reduce them to Slavery under Arbitrary Power, they put themselves into a state of War with the People, who are thereupon absolved from any farther Obedience, and are left to the common Refuge...against Force and Violence." The militias who rallied around Mr. Bundy innately understood this right to revolt against the BLM who "endeavored to take away and destroy the Property of the People..."

Just as the monarchs of old who would claim large swaths of land as "theirs" despite their never having set foot there or worked the land or produced anything of benefit or value from the land, so it is with our federal government and the BLM arrogantly stating that the land is "theirs" and Mr. Bundy must continue to pay for the privilege of being able to continue to graze his cattle there.

Which brings us to the point of property ownership. Let's forget the Bundys for a moment and just think of this in terms of any normal property "owner". Most of us get a 30 year mortgage in which we take that time to pay the bank off, with interest, during that span. Technically, while we're still paying off the mortgage, it could be said that we don't actually "own" the property outright.

What about once it's paid off, though? We own it then, right? WRONG. There's a little thing called property taxes. One must pay these forever and ever even long after one might have acquired outright "ownership" of their property. What happens if you stop paying these taxes? Well, something similar to what's been happening to Mr. Bundy in that some state or federal agents will show up at your home one day and kick you out of your property. It doesn't matter that your debt has been settled with the bank or the original creditor or that the property has been in your family for generations, you are forever in debt to the government. You see, you don't actually "own" your property. The government is just so benevolent as to let you continue to "rent" it from them so long as you pay your taxes. If you quit paying your taxes, then the government swoops in and collects what is rightfully theirs. If you actually owned your property, they wouldn't be able to do this.

Needless to say, most people don't understand these concepts. It's easier for the media and the unthinking masses to believe that this man is just mooching off of the rest of us tax-paying, law-abiding slaves, I mean, citizens and to demonize a man who dare stood up to the injustice of a federal agents trying to destroy and damage the property he's spent a lifetime nurturing and improving.

3) I don't care IF Mr. Bundy is a racist
Never one to miss a race-baiting moment, the national media has seized on some of the comments Mr. Bundy uttered in which he dared to wonder aloud if the plight of today's black community, enslaved in poverty by the entitlements given by the federal government, are actually no better off than when they were actual slaves working the plantations.

His statement was certainly not made very eloquently, to say the least, but that's not to say there weren't big boulders of truth in what he said. Indeed, many prominent black leaders have been saying the exact same thing for years. Is it only okay for black people to speak these truths? If so, here are a couple of black leaders affirming Bundy's own words. Are they racist too? Demonstrating some self-loathing?

Regardless, it doesn't matter in the issue regarding this man's property. His words make his case no less valid. Do racists not deserve equal protection under the law? Are racists afforded no rights? Do racists deserve to have their property taken from them? Is there a 'racist' exemption under the 1st, 2nd, 4th, or 5th amendments? It. Does. Not. Matter. It is a distraction from the issue at hand and I will not back down from my support of this man in his plight even IF he is a racist. One can reasonably disagree with his words on black people and slavery and still be able to support his cause. The two are not inextricably related.

4) Where is the outrage for the government's criminal actions?
Ok, Mr. Bundy uttered some racially insensitive words. Can anyone tell me who he has actually harmed? Can anyone point out a direct victim of Mr. Bundy's actions? Sure, some might conjecture that his withholding of his money prevented a bridge somewhere from being built or some textbooks being bought for a school. But one could also say that his withholding the money saved lives. By the same token, he might have prevented the federal government from drone bombing another wedding in Yemen and killing innocent children.

Speaking of which, why are liberals more outraged over this man's words and this man's plight than they are over the myriad crimes, actual deeds with actual identifiable victims, committed by the Obama administration? Here, here's a list of some of the youngest victims of Pres. Obama's secret drone murder program. Why isn't Rachel Maddow doing show after show on that? Why isn't Jon Stewart ridiculing and lambasting a president who has verifiably murdered hundreds of children in the Middle East based on secret evidence and a secret program that anoints the president, against our Constitution and any reasonable interpretation of state, federal, and international law as judge, jury, and executioner? Anyone care to explain that to me?

I've seen Twitter comments from the far left advocating for the government to just go ahead and drone bomb the Bundy ranch/family. If only the same vitriol were used against the same person who has been responsible for hundreds of drone murders all across the Middle East against countries we're not even at war with.

The government can lie to us, spy on us, steal our wealth and the fruits of our labor and nobody bats an eye. One man defends his property against government thugs and utters some allegedly racist words and everyone loses their friggin' mind. How do you like your cognitive dissonance in the morning? Scrambled or fried?

5) Last but not least
Finally, I'll say this to those people on the left and on the right who disagree and have done so from the beginning with Mr. Bundy. Even if, for argument's sake, Mr. Bundy is entirely wrong and he owes the government a million dollars and he is just being an obstinate, curmudgeonly bastard, by what right does the BLM have to show up in arms to settle this dispute? They showed up first with guns in hand. Mr. Bundy did not greet them surrounded by a militia and say "Come and take it". There were reports of government snipers on the ground from the very get-go. You DO NOT show up with armed henchmen to settle a property dispute. Period. End of story. Even if Mr. Bundy is in violation of the law, do he and his family deserve to be murdered by government thugs over it? NO!

Just think for a moment, if the federal government were not involved in this situation, would there even be a problem? No. Mr. Bundy is grazing his cattle, something that people have been doing for centuries now. The government is the one making the noise and beating their chest over this issue. Nobody has issued a complaint about Mr. Bundy. Mr. Bundy has not harmed anyone. There is literally no issue here except the one that the government wants to make an issue. 

Mr. Bundy and the militias that rallied to his side only did so in reaction to the heavy handed tactics that were clearly being attempted by the government. And had they gotten away with it, would it now be the precedent for every BLM contested property dispute? Thank goodness for the 2nd amendment in which the citizens are permitted to bear arms to prevent tyrannies like this from escalating like they did in Waco and Ruby Ridge. Does anyone actually think the government would have backed down if there were not armed citizens on standby? The 1st amendment doesn't mean a thing without the 2nd amendment. We Americans, unlike much of the rest of the world, have a right to bear arms in self-defense of our person and property; thank goodness our 2nd amendment does not force us to show up with knives to a gun fight.

The situation is still fluid in Nevada and I will continue monitoring this situation closely. Although I might not blog about it again, I will still be tweeting about it and posting about it on Facebook. We would do well to remember that the government works for us, we do not work for the government. They are our servants, not our masters. Too many have forgotten this fact. We must persist in our efforts to remind them.