Hello all, native from that area here.
http://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/22xbf6/feds_end_roundup_release_cattle_after_tense/cgrqo1p
Over the last 30 years, the BLM has taken more and more land, locking off more and more public space, and becoming more and more aggressive and less interested in conservation.
This is part of Bundy's point. Some people are claiming that he is raping the land and refusing to pay his way. It is far more complicated than that. As for raping the land, we covered that. His tax bill is another matter. The fees he was paying were supposed to go toward conservation. This wasn't occurring, as promised by the BLM. What was happening was that they were trying to put him out of business. He was paying them and they were working against him. He only stopped paying the fees to the BLM when it was clear to him that they weren't living up to their obligations. He appealed to the state and even sent checks for the fees to the state, which refused to take them. This was about taxation without representation, not tax evasion.
They will tell you it is because he's ruining the land or taking advantage of the system. The real reason is that the area is rich in mineral wealth that various state and local politicians have been using to get rich for decades, the latest and greatest of which is Senator Harry Reid. And now, his son Rory is getting in on the game as well.
Reid is probably involved in two deals currently. One, with the Chinese, to build a huge solar farm in the area. And the other with various oil and gas companies, who have been drilling exploratory wells in the area recently. It seems that fracking is on its way to Nevada and Reid intends to be the wheel that gets greased.
Bundy is in the way of this. Every other cattle rancher in the area has been bribed, intimidated, or both, until they have given up and quit.
Here's the REAL DEAL on the Taylor Grazing Act, and the BLM's games:
Take aways from the ongoing Bundyranch situation
http://www.reddit.com/r/Anarcho_Capitalism/comments/22ntn8/take_aways_from_the_ongoing_bundyranch_situation/cgoyftl
Nevada is over 90% federal land.
When the state was carved out right at the end of the civil war, Lincoln, (the worst constitutional president in our history prior to the current one) made sure that all the states entering would bow down to the the fed and our state constitution and the great amount of federal land reflects that.
Since most of the state is desert, ranchers have always had to use tremendous acreage to feed cattle here. Our state was brought into the union around 1865. Prior to that, and after that, up till 1934 ranchers had legal free reign to graze cattle with no restrictions. This was called forage rights.
In the 1930's the ranchers had arguments between themselves regarding territories. So a few of the larger ones got together and asked the fed if they could hire them, by paying minimal fees to "manage" the land and break it out into sections. This was made into the Taylor Grazing Act of 1934.
The fees are minimal. $1.74 per cow & calf per month. Ranchers had no problem paying that just to have disagreements settled.
Ranchers were also required to secure water rights and maintain and make improvements on the land. Mr. Bundy and his predecessors have always done that. No one is arguing that fact.
Bundy's ranch was established in 1877. His family purchased it later, in the 1880's. But when they did, they had to PAY for the water and forage rights.
After the 1934 act they continued to pay grazing fees and make improvements up until the 1990's.
Somewhere along the way the Bureau of Land Management was created. I don't know what year.
Around 1990 or so they told him that he could no longer graze more than 150 of his 600 or so head of cattle there.
He told them to pound sand and kept paying his fees and grazing his cattle.
Around 1994 they told him he could only graze them in the summer, fall and winter and said it was so that the cattle didn't disturb the Desert Tortoise. (more on that later)
He told them that they were HIRED by the Taylor Grazing act to MANAGE the land for the ranchers. So he FIRED them and started paying his fees to to the state of Nevada. Soon they didn't know where to put it so they quit taking payments.
Meanwhile they came at him from another angle. When they saw they weren't going to be able to force him off the land the BLM SOLD the rights to the land to the state of Nevada under the condition that the state RETIRE the grazing rights permanently. Nevada legislators, being idiots, did their bidding. That was around 1996 or so.
But the state left him alone and let him forage all those years.
A few years ago, due to Agenda 21, Ranchers around the nation were being shut down and either bought out (with a program that paid them a lump sum of YOUR taxpayer funds in exchange for quitting ranching.
A lot of them did. The program was touted as "optional" but they intimidated the ranchers with lawsuits ranging from environmental concerns to water concerns to endangered species.
Before all this there were 50 ranchers in Clark County Nevada. Now there is one. Cliven Bundy.
For 20 years they tried to remove another rancher, Mr Hage, from a neighboring county. The sheriff of that county came to his aid and told the feds to screw off. They threatened the sheriff with a swat team and he told them to bring it on, he had his own swat team. The feds screwed up with Mr Hage though. They made it a water rights issue and after 20 years, about a year after he died, they lost in court.
Now they don't play the water rights card anymore because it is too cut and dry. They now play the environmental card because they can make up the rules and change them whenever they like.
This is what they have done with Bundy. Everytime he gets where he can win, they change the laws and he loses in court.
So now it is about the Desert Tortoise. This is an animal the BLM had a habitat for, but when they ran out of money to run the habitat they slaughtered 1800 of them. Miraculously they now claim they have mysteriously found 3 million dollars that they are paying to round up and steal Bundy's cattle. They are paying the slimy for hire private cowboys 1 million of that.
Note that the Bundys PAID for the water rights, which the Bungling Feudal Land Mismanagers are trying to steal (they brought a backhoe to a "cattle roundup")...
It’s nice to know the back story, thanks.
Folks are getting bogged down in minutiae. The main point is this and we all know it: We the People have had enough. Progs have run things almost 100 years now and they have really f’d things up. Worse, in the face of just how badly so they refuse to acknowledge same and continue to lie and cheat with no integrity whatsoever meanwhile continuing their corruption as if they were doing such a good job they deserved it. They deserve it, alright and it is high time they got it. We are on the verge of giving it to them. THESE are the facts that matter not chapter and verse of legal minutia.