Posted on 05/18/2014 8:24:05 AM PDT by Nachum
Video at link
(Excerpt) Read more at youtube.com ...
The list, Ping
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Government power period is frightening.
A bit off topic yet not. I found out last week a big camping area near here is going to be shut down by the feds. they are going to plant Aspen trees.
It is a area that has a creek that is crooked. They are going to straighten it out and put artificial reefs in the water for the fish.
The US Government, now infused with islamism
It should be pointed out that the BLM and Forest Service get a great deal of criticism from enviros for being too much in bed with local timber and ranching interests.
Or at least that was the case 20 years ago. I don’t know if it still is.
I think the BLM is now a de factor arm of the Sierra Club.
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I didn't listen to the video as I don't have speakers hooked up. So my comment may
have been addressed.
I guess the question begs as to who owns the land? The gov’t or private
interest? Most of the west was owned by the federal gov’t at the time of acquisition
and never ceded to the states as they originated.
The Sierra Club would like to think that, but they are also just a tool. BLM lands are collateral for U.S. debt obligations.
As per the video, the family has owned the ranch for more than a hundred years. The feds came in with arbitrary rules to take the land from the ranchers to get the water rights and to use the land for political gain.
The feds are in the wrong and are just trying to wear the ranchers down with abuse, fines, illegal land seizures and other measures.
Thanks for the info. Seems the feds are trying to take
back land they already deeded to someone else.
BLM has no say on how the 7000 acre ranch was managed, but they do have authority on how the 700,000 grazing lease was managed. Hage, Jr points out in the film that his father knew there were problems on the lease before he bought the 7000 acres. Coinciding with the purchase, Congress enacted FLPMA, which definitely required BLM to manage the 700,000 acre lease more stringently. As the film mentioned, overgrazing the native grass was allowing the invasive grass to take over.
There are no grazing rights, only grazing leases. Hage won his case on the water rights, not grazing rights. The court said that BLM was not letting Hage put the water to its highest beneficial use.
Under prior appropriation water rights there are 3 rules.
First in time first in right. The water was used first by a grazer and was passed down or sold down, eventually to be owned by Hage.
Use it or lose it. If he doesn't use the water, someone else can use it, and he loses the water right
Highest beneficial use. In this case, watering livestock.
So whatever authority BLM may have had on requiring Hage to reduce his grazing, that was trumped because that would have denied him the water right, which he owned.
The gov’t impacts a huge amount of the west because of the huge amount of land
or other rights they possess.
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