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NPS Director Discussed Plan To Close Monuments With White House (October 16, 2013)

(CNSNews.com) – National Park Service (NPS) rangers removed the handles from some 40 public water pumps and closed restrooms in the 184.5 mile- C&O Canal National Historical Park, but they haven’t been able to keep hikers and bikers off the popular trail known as a “cyclist’s dream.” “It’s full every day,” said Gail Hall, who runs Mountain Side Bikes at the trailhead in Cumberland, Md. “They’re bringing in their own water and utilizing the tree-lined areas [of the park] for restrooms. Some towns like Harper’s Ferry even brought in potties to accommodate them. As long as they can pedal, they...

FOX NEWS ALERT! The barricades are back up!

At the Million Vet March in DC people have torn down the barricades at the Lincoln Memorial and are carrying them to the White House to Barricade the White House. One man carrying a barricade said,"We are taking these things where they belong." Watch Live on Ustream. http://www.ustream.tv/channel/mlr13

On Saturday, at a little before 9:30 a.m., citizens determined to break through the “barrycades” around the Lincoln Memorial moved the government barricades aside and proceeded to enter the Memorial. According to Taylor Hemness from KLTV 7: [The protesters] went completely up those steps, past the National Parks Service members who didn’t do anything to stop them as they made their way up to the Lincoln monument asking people to come with them, begging them to make people in DC listen to what they were doing.

Veterans from every branch of the military have a message for our government. The message will be delivered in person at 9 a.m. on Sunday, Oct. 13, in Washington, D.C. and at war memorials all across the nation. The Million Vet March on the Memorials is a grassroots movement started by five military brats, a term used to describe children of military members, to honor the nation's veterans.

The Obama administration has turned bureaucrats at environmental agencies into armed SWAT teams to conduct unprecedented raids on small mining operations for what used to be simple reviews of clean water permits. That’s according to Colorado Republican Rep. Doug Lamborn, chairman of the House Natural Resources subcommittee on energy and mineral resources, who held a hearing Thursday that examined the August raid of armed federal officials including the Environmental Protection Agency in Chicken, Alaska. Lamborn said the “EPA SWAT team of heavily armed and armored agents conducted paperwork inspections on small mining operations, in what appears nothing more than an...

Another example of your hard-earned tax dollars at work! Apparently, the National Park Service has a ton of money lying around and thought that maybe producing some pro-Islam videos might further their mission to provide national parks to Americans. Seems legit. So they hired a media person to visit the AnNur Islamic School in Schenectady, NY and got the real truth about Islam. Which may surprise you. From the National Park Service official website: People think that Islam oppresses women and there’s no equality, but they’re wrong – there’s equity… 7th century A.D. Islam gave women the right to be...

In an era of the federal government excoriating Christianity, how is it that it can at the same time promote Islam...my country is being destroyed by politicians who want cheap Mexican labor and want to pacify the Muslims here......get your head out of your @ss and think about how stupid this approach is for the future of our country.....

The Statue of Liberty reopened to the public Sunday after the state agreed to shoulder the costs of running the site during the federal government shutdown. Ferry trips from Manhattan to the Statue of Liberty resumed at 9 a.m., and eager visitors were already lining up. Esther Athanase, a 26-year-old au pair from Le Havre, France, was using a ticket she'd booked months ago with a friend. "We have to do this,'' she said. "It's an American symbol. And it was a gift from France.'' Ahmed Albin-Hamad, 24, a Saudi Arabian student at Drexel University in Pennsylvania, said he came...

We are constantly told that the Constitution’s First Amendment mandates “a separation of church and state,” on the basis of which prayers are forbidden in public schools, and the Ten Commandments removed from court houses across America. So why is it that an agency of the United States federal government — the Department of the Interior’s National Park Service — has produced a series of videos defending and extolling the Islamic religion? ______________________ Note: The words “separation of church and state” are not in the First Amendment, but are words from the phrase, “wall of separation between church and state,”...

"...................But perhaps the most extraordinary story to emerge from the NPS is that of the tour group of foreign seniors whose bus was trapped in Yellowstone Park on the day the shutdown began. They were pulled over photographing a herd of bison when an armed ranger informed them, with the insouciant ad-hoc unilateral lawmaking to which the armed bureaucrat is distressingly prone, that taking photographs counts as illegal “recreation.” “Sir, you are recreating,” the ranger informed the tour guide. And we can’t have that, can we? They were ordered back to the Old Faithful Inn, next to the geyser of...

Soooo I'm searching for info on a Civil War historic site and click on a National Park Service page presented  (high) in the Google results- yet all I get is this: "Because of the Federal Government Shutdown,  all national parks are closed  and the National Park Service webpages are not operating.  For more information, go to www.doi.gov" It costs less somehow to generate/post disingenuous Obama propaganda and close down all their other pages, then? And these messages are putting themselves up? That ain't how it works with my server- Just in case you missed that, a big, black banner promptly...

700,000 people a day would have been visiting the parks and that the surrounding areas are losing $76 million in visitor spending per day. The park service said it is losing $450,000 per day in revenue from entrance fees and other in-park expenditures, such as campground fees and boat rentals.

Aggressive actions and double standards used by the National Park Service are vindictive and designed to inflict maximum inconvenience and fear among visitors, say Republican lawmakers whose efforts to reopen the parks are gridlocked by Senate Democrats. World War II veterans were blocked by barricades and armed guards from paying tribute at their memorial last week. However, the national mall where the memorial is located was opened Tuesday to allow hundreds of illegal immigrants to stage a protest demanding amnesty. ... the administration has closed the Mall and memorials to some groups and not others, giving preferential treatment under the...

The Pisgah Inn on the Blue Ridge Parkway in North Carolina created a publicity crap storm for the Spite House when operators were forced to close during the government shutdown. The inn sits on federal land and despite the owner’s attempt to defy orders from the Park Police, he was forced to close his doors and throw away spoiled food during the height of fall foliage season. Today, the inn will reopen at 5 p.m. and all October reservations will be honored.

No water for you! Via the DC: The National Park Service has actually had someone remove the handles off all the well pumps along the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal that runs 184 miles from Washington, D.C. to Cumberland, Maryland, according to sources. The NPS has also stationed officers in the park to make sure bikers don’t ride down closed bike paths and that no one can come near the scenic waterway.

SERIOUSLY? National Park Service spitefully removes handles from water fountains By Marshall Connolly, Catholic Online (NEWS CONSORTIUM) 10/8/2013 LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) - Until very recently, the National Park Service was one of the least-loathed government agencies in the country. Now, with orders from on high to keep the public from visiting beloved parks and monuments the agency is developing a poor reputation. ..... It what looks like a spiteful move, the NPS even removed handles from water spigots along the Chesapeake and Ohio canal where bikers and joggers exercise as well as along the Great Allegheny Passage, just...

On Thursday, the Pisgah Inn, which holds a concession on the Blue Ridge Parkway in Asheville, North Carolina, announced that it would defy the National Park Service’s order to close up, and would open doors for business on Friday. On Friday morning, NPS rangers showed up, lights swirling, to close down the business and turn away its customers, supposedly thanks to the government shutdown. Pisgah Inn receives no federal money, and according to owner Bruce O’Connell, who spoke exclusively to Breitbart News, “All we do is pay the government money. We don’t take anything from them.” It is located on...

On his radio show yesterday, our pal Michael Graham spoke to one of the tourists held under house arrest (or hotel arrest) by the National Park Service geyser stasi at Yellowstone Park. Here’s part of the interview: There was a large group of Asians there. Not many spoke English… They said, ‘Are we under arrest?’ I mean, they were fearful. I mean, it looked like we were inside a prison. There were two large guards doing a walk up and down in front of the doors, so people felt like they were in prison. And the Australians said that would...

TUSAYAN, Ariz. (AP) — Nearly two dozen people have been issued citations for entering Grand Canyon National Park after a partial government shutdown forced its closure. Grand Canyon Chief Ranger Bill Wright says some people have been caught at the South Rim, on trails, attempting rim-to-rim hikes or trying to sneak in through dirt roads. All of the citations will be handled by the U.S. Attorney’s Office. Wright says each of the 21 citations issued as of Monday has a mandatory order to appear in federal court.

Jon Ostendorff @JonOstendorff Workers at Pisgah Inn forced to throw out food today as #shutdown lingers. #avlnews #ncpol The Pisgah Inn sits on federal land on the Blue Ridge Parkway in North Carolina. When the government shut down, the inn was forced to close right in the middle of the fall foliage tourism season. Federal workers are likely to be paid retroactively, but the Pisgah Inn is losing money. And now, several days into the shutdown, the kitchen is tossing out food.

“I am now occupying the building at this time.” And with that one decision – restaurant owner Glenn Helseth joined the ranks of Americans who’ve decided to defy the strong-arm tactics of the National Park Service. For the past 11 years Helseth and his wife have operated the Carrot Tree Kitchens Restaurant inside the historic Cole Digges House in Yorktown, Va. At least 20 of Helseth's longtime employees are facing unemployment. They can’t make rent and some are faced with choosing between buying food or buying medicine. The National Park Service owns and operates the building. So when the government...

I[f] anyone had any doubt about the vicious and petty character of Barack Obama and his administration the past week should have put those doubts to rest. Not even Nixon’s “enemies list” can compete with Obama. Nixon’s list was focused on not inviting certain pustulent bags of crap, like Daniel Schorr, to White House function. Obama and his minions have effectively declared all Americans the enemy in an attempt to make the impact of the government shutdown artificially painful. This could not succeed without the assistance of a corps of facilitators, Little Eichmanns, if you will, who are willing to...

The National Park Service is allowing an Oct. 8 pro-immigration rally on the national mall, even as it posts pickets and barriers to bar Americans from visiting their open-air memorials. “They’re going to be allowed to go [ahead] because it is a First Amendment activity,” Shannon Maurer, a spokeswoman for the “March for Immigrant Dignity and Respect,” told The Daily Caller. “They allowed us to have it because it is part of the First Amendment of the constitution,” said Susana Flores, a spokeswoman for CASA in Action, which is organizing the rally. ”We’re going to have a stage and microphones,”...

Folks who live in the Great Smoky Mountains have just about reached their breaking point with the federal government. “It’s almost like they are pushing to see how far they can push before the American people say enough is enough,” said Ed Mitchell, the mayor of Blount County, Tenn. “We were founded on a declaration of independence. And they are about to push the people to the line again.” Nearly a third of Blount County is inside the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. So when the federal government shut down the park, it also shut down one of the area’s...

<p>The Monitor in McAllen (http://bit.ly/1huO8fh ) reported Sunday that County Commissioner David Garza said no federal money is spent on staffing, managing or maintaining the park. However, he was reluctant to question the federal authorities' decision.</p> <p>"We don't want to get into a fight with the federal government at this time," he said.</p>

Whatever the perceived shortcomings of Ted Cruz and his hardy band of stalwarts, they've performed a remarkable public service by highlighting the fate that awaits all who rub wrongly the translucently thin skin of King Barack the Petulant. The Spartans may have had their shields, Native Americans their tomahawks and arrows, the Samurai may have wielded his sword with all the deadly grace of a tiger in mid-attack, but pound for pound, nothing comes close to the audacious stupidity of "Barrycades" and people in pointy little Smokey the Bear hats, poised to protect America's monuments from law-abiding citizens Welcome to...

WASHINGTON, DC - So far, the National Park Police don't seem to be targeting visitors jumping over barricades to see the monuments or use federal parks. But violators could technically be ticketed and fined $50. Fox 5 found many out-of-town tourists ignoring signs that say parks and attractions are closed. Dozens of locals who normally play beach volleyball in a section of West Potomac Park were there enjoying the weather and some games this afternoon. Some didn't realize the park was closed. Others aware of the government shutdown thought a $50 fine was too steep. We called the Park Police...

During the Government Shutdown, the National Park Service Police are the first defense against society collapsing under the onslaught of tourists and World War II veterans overwhelming the Barry-cades at our most precious national monuments. These are their stories.

Tax-paying, hard-working families aren’t letting White House shutdown politics stop them from enjoying America’s beauty. They’re defying the orange cones at Mount Rushmore. They’re breaching the barrycades at Zion National Park. And now, the Badlands of South Dakota. Noelle Bruno tweets that she and her family made it through Mount Rushmore despite the White House obstacles:

Evil Thought of the Day: If the Park Service is evicting residents from homes built on Federal Park lands. . . . . . .isn't the White House on National Park Land. Under Equal Protection Under Law, shouldn't the Obama's be evicted, too ??? Not that it will happen, as Some Animals are More Equal than Others. but. . .

Washington’s grown a bit nastier and colder since the last government shutdown, and the casualties of the partisan fight are the family memories lost from being denied access to public landmarks that are supposed to belong to the people. The government doesn’t see it that way anymore – it’s all just a “damn game” and the folks running the Capitol are just toying with the American people. That’s right – public memorials, monuments and parks remained open under President Clinton and the Republican Congress in 1995/96, causing one to wonder how much inconvenience and financial hardship this partial government shutdown...

Local organization finds way to allow visitors to experience memorial "It's sad. A lot of people are coming over and expressing their disappointment on not being able to view the memorial or walk on it," said Mike Carr, president and COO of the USS Missouri Memorial Association.

Signs like this are being posted by union thugs. Government workers are instructed to "make life as difficult for people as we can" and these signs are used to assign the blame. What is the correct message that should be on the sign? If you are going to one of these Unnecessary Shutdown sites, please consider posting the corrected signage. The "official" signs appear to be durable materials and have official logos and department letterhead. If there is not a thug around, you might tape your message onto the sign under their letterhead. Remember, almost everything you do in life...

The government shutdown is being felt close to home for some locals. They say they're being forced out of private homes on Lake Mead because they sit on federal land. Joyce Spencer is 77-years-old and her husband Ralph is 80. They've been spending most of their time in the family ice cream store since going home isn't an option. The Spencers never expected to be forced out of their Lake Mead home, which they've owned since the 70s, but on Thursday, a park ranger said they had 24 hours to get out. "I had to go to town today and...

George Washington’s home – Mt. Vernon, sustained a direct attack from the Obama Administration today. Mt. Vernon just became the latest victim of the government shutdown, reports The Daily Caller. The home of America’s first President is privately owned and operated by the Mt. Vernon Ladies’ Association, reports The Free Beacon. Since the home itself isn’t run by the National Park Service, the house couldn’t be justifiably closed. However, the parking lot area and the trails surrounding the home are technically owned by the government. Today, the Feds decided to close the bike/walking trails and barricade the parking lot. They...

First reported by the Washington Free Beacon Wednesday, Fox News' On the Record reported Thursday on the Claude Moore Colonial Farm, which sits on federal land and was forced to close by the National Parks Service until Congress again funds the government. The government provides no resources for the farm's maintenance or operation.

The Pisgah Inn, a private hotel that holds a concession on the Blue Ridge Parkway, has become a national sensation as it defies "intimidation" and a National Park Service order to close its doors. After a tumultuous few days, inn owner Bruce O'Connell told The Washington Times on Friday morning that he had just reopened his doors for customers, despite the park service telling him he had to shut down. He says he's essentially private property, on a road that's still open, and uses no government personnel, so he sees no reason to quit operating

Park ranger breaks down "sometimes you just want to punch these congressmen in the face."Park ranger "you know who was moving these barricades in the first place? The damn congressmen."

Government watchdog Judicial Watch has filed a Freedom of Information Act request to get to the bottom of the National Park Service’s actions at the World War II Memorial in Washington this week. The NPS has barricaded the memorial and on Tuesday tried to prevent veterans from visiting the memorial, which has no amenities and is normally open to the public at all times. The National Park service has closed facilities that are either unmanned or take no federal funding, and says that the Obama administration ordered the shutdown. Anna Eberly, managing director of the Claude Moore Colonial Farm in...

The National Park Service has ordered the closure of a Virginia park that sits on federal land, even though the government provides no resources for its maintenance or operation. The Claude Moore Colonial Farm announced on Wednesday that NPS has ordered it to suspend operations until Congress agrees to a deal to fund the federal government. According to Anna Eberly, managing director of the farm, NPS sent law enforcement agents to the park on Tuesday evening to remove staff and volunteers from the property. “You do have to wonder about the wisdom of an organization that would use staff they...

Come again? There are two elements in the title of this post that don’t compute. One is the phrase “Islam's contributions to women's rights.” We’ll return to this shortly. The second is the proposition “National Park Service produces videos praising Islam's contributions.” How exactly is it within the purview of the National Park Service to praise — or even condemn — a religion? At least you can rest easy in the knowledge that your tax dollars are paying for these videos

On Sunday, a stunned audience sat in silence as Doris Kearns Goodwin turned the keynote address at the opening ceremony for the 150th anniversary of the Battle of Gettysburg into a political lecture focusing on women's and gay rights. Missing from much of her keynote: Gettysburg.

150 years ago, the fields and forests near Murfreesboro saw one of the bloodiest and most important battles of the American Civil War. Join park rangers and volunteers for a variety of programs that tell the story of this tragic event that affected the lives of thousands and continues to affect our lives today.

A California family that has operated an oyster farm on the bucolic Northern California coast is fighting back after the federal government moved to kick it off of the National Park Service property where the shellfish have been legally harvested for nearly 80 years. The Drakes Bay Oyster Company faces closure and its 30 employees will be out of work if the National Park Service reclaims some 1,100 acres of an estuary as part of a plan to create a larger marine wilderness preserve at Point Reyes National Seashore in Marin County. Owner Kevin Lunny said federal officials told him...

California public health officials have tested 100 workers at Yosemite National Park to determine whether they were exposed to the deadly mouse-borne hantavirus. Nine people who spent time at the park this year have been infected with the rare virus, the majority after staying at the “Signature” cabins in Curry Village. Three of them died. KTVU-TV Oakland said 100 park workers submitted to voluntary testing on Wednesday and they have been ordered not to discuss the testing.

The name might not be recognizable, but you've probably seen a Gadsden flag, typically yellow with a coiled rattlesnake and the warning "Don't tread on me." The flag was flown by colonists rebelling against British rule. And more recently, it's become the adopted symbol of the Tea parties and conservative Republicans, prompting questions as to whether it's an appropriate theme for merchandise sold at the Gettysburg battlefield bookstore. There shoppers will find Gadsden flag shot glasses, mugs, magnets and pins. The souvenirs are the only items representing the Revolutionary War sold in the bookstore, said an employee. Mostly, the store...

Big Green has an unlikely new sales pitch to convince Congress to fund ever-expanding land grabs by the National Park Service -- save wildlife migration. A map overlay showing all the U.S. wildlife migration paths would blot out nearly half the nation -- a very clever diagram for empire-building bureaucrats. The obscure but well-heeled Wildlife Conservation Society (2010 assets $764 million) unveiled the idea last week in "Spectacular Migrations in the Western U.S.," a 45-page report on the purportedly urgent need for a widespread network of wildlife migration corridors to avert countless extinctions. The WCS is a consortium of zoos...

National Park Service spokesman Bill Line has lashed out at conservative critics of the trashing of the National Mall by attendees of the leftist One Nation Working Together rally held at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. on Saturday.The Park Service is part of the Interior Department which is headed up by Obama appointee, former U.S. Senator Ken Salazar (Dem.-CO).Line spoke to the Daily Caller, in an unprecedented protest of coverage by the Caller and other conservative news sites and blogs that criticized the One Nation Rally for the large amounts of trash left at the Lincoln Memorial, the World...