Posted on 12/30/2001 11:21:38 AM PST by farmfriend
© 2001 WorldNetDaily.com
In the wake of the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, certain parties in the Department of Interior are using the nation's heightened concerns about security to advance a long-standing agenda that would turn DOI into one of the nation's "top cop" agencies – right up there with the FBI, BATF and the other law-enforcement agencies of the Justice and Treasury departments.
Under legislation drafted but not yet introduced, officers of the Department of Interior's five law enforcement agencies would be able to exercise extensive subpoena, warrant and arrest powers, not only on federal land areas under their agencies' jurisdiction but on non-federal property as well. Moreover, they could be moved hither-and-yon across the country in response to "emergencies."
The title of the one-page bill is "Department of Interior Law Enforcement Clarification Act of 2001." There is also a draft of a letter to the speaker of the House and president of the Senate detailing the alleged need for the legislation and awaiting only the signature of Interior Secretary Gale Norton.
"This legislation is needed to ensure that DOI law and enforcement resources are used effectively to uphold the laws of the United States and safeguard the American people," the letter reads.
Note: The websites of all agencies of the Department of Interior have been shut down temporarily in response to a court order and may not be accessible.
It is the scariest article I have ever read.
What's this about?
This ranks right up there with the "e-mail tax" and "Christians classified as terrorists by FBI."
Do you believe everything somebody sends you in an e-mail?
No but this is a real article from a real source. Who cares how it was brought to my attention.
Collectivisation in the Soviet Union was not about controll of agriculture in and of itself. Rather controlling the people with it.
I don't know. I didn't test it but it was in the article. Italics and everything.
In August and September 1997, the fledgling newssite published a series of articles titled "Armed and Dangerous: Federal agencies expanding use of firepower" that detailed the increasing federalization of law enforcement and the astonishing buildup in the numbers of armed officials. The first story focused not on the BATF, FBI or Drug Enforcement Administration, but on the National Park Service, one of the five agencies within the Department of Interior with law enforcement authorities.
The Park Service in January 1997 had conducted a mid-morning SWAT raid on a private bow-and-arrow hunting lodge on Santa Cruz Island, one of the Channel Islands off the California coast. Twenty heavily armed National Park Service law enforcement officers and local sheriff deputies descended on ropes from a military helicopter. Snipers took up their positions along the perimeter, while other agents staged dynamic entries. The raid resulted in the arrests of three unarmed men on charges of robbing Chumash Indian graves, but its real target was the 6,500-acre hunting ranch on which the lodge was located.
The ranch, which covered 10 percent of the island, was the last bastion of private property in the group of islands that Congress had declared a national park. Congress had recently authorized the NPS to seize the ranch through condemnation, but apparently the Park Service saw an opportunity to provide its agents with some on-the-job training in special weapons and tactics.
WorldNetDaily recalled another case that occurred five years earlier: the gunning down of millionaire Donald Scott in the bedroom of his home near Malibu, Calif., in October 1992, just one month after the U.S. Marshals Service launched its attack on Randy Weaver and his family at Ruby Ridge, Idaho.
Scott's property was in the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area, a sweeping expanse of coastal land under the auspices of the National Park system. Fourteen agencies took part in the armed assault, including NASA, Immigration and Naturalization Service, and the L.A. County Sheriff's Department, but the Park Service was the lead agency. The purported reason for the assault was an allegation by the Park Service that Scott was growing marijuana, but internal departmental documents show clearly that the true motivation was a desire to acquire Scott's very beautiful and valuable property, which he had refused to sell. No marijuana or drugs of any kind were found.
These accounts illustrated the kind of power National Park Service agents already possessed and were willing and able to deploy. They have full arrest and firearm authority granted by statute, though its exercise is limited to NPS-controlled land. WorldNetDaily also presented figures showing the number of gun-toting agents, not only in the NPS but throughout the federal agencies. There were at least 80,000 – enough for a small army.
It is very explicit: " ...authorize law enforcement personnel from the Department of the Interior to act as law enforcement officers to maintain law and order and protect persons and property within a Reclamation project or on Reclamation lands;... "
There are no exceptions to this limit on their authority in the bill.
I think the email is a hoax.
It is not a hoax! Click on Source:WorldNetDaily and bring up their copy of it or do a search on WND and track down the original.
http://www.wnd.com/news/printer-friendly.asp?ARTICLE_ID=25829
The Right Of The People To Keep And Bear Arms Shall Not Be Infringed !!
An Armed Citizen, Is A Safe Citizen !!
No Guns, No Rights !!
Molon Labe !!
Happy New Year !!
WorldNetDaily is an opinion-based website, not a "news organization."
Are you all maintaining that Joseph Farah can't be "had"?
Under legislation drafted but not yet introduced
No names, no sources, nothing but shady implications and innuendo.
This is Sarah Foster taking a SWAG and carrying it to the fifth decimal place.
But anything could be "drafted but not yet introduced"- absolutely anything, there is a long way from that to a law.
A name of an author of the draft would be informative.
The bill I cited is the only current bill having to do with calrifying DOI law enforcement powers.
If that guesstimate is close, I could call that a police state.
There is a lot of crime and the govt lands have their share. Smuggling, pot farms, meth labs, tree theft. Are there murders committed at Yellowstone?
The NPS has a webpage called The Morning Report that reports much of this type of activity.
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