"Those Crazies In Montana Who Say, 'We're Going To Kill ATF Agents Because The U.N.'s Going To Take Over' -- Well, They're Beginning To Have A Case." - Dick Morris, Fox News March 20095 members of the Bundy Insurrection at Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, refused to enter pleas, during their April 15th Court appearance. The defendants engaged in other right-wing Sovereign Citizen "Tactics", such as demanding the entire 64 page indictment be read out loud and requesting to represent themselves. The presiding Judge entered Not Guilty pleas for them. Cliven Bundy, in a separate Court, also refused to recognize the Court's Authority and did not enter a plea.
First of all, I think the Department of Justice, originally under Eric Holder, and the FBI have done a fantastic job defusing these conservative terrorist incidents and not allowing Faux News and the right-wing internet to incite a full-scale right-wing violent revolution. A overtly violent confrontation would have been used by Faux News and the right-wing internet in all manner of nefarious ways to continue their Quest to Destroy the United States and End the American Dream. However, much of the liberal and leftist coverage of the 2 Bundy Stand-offs was focused on the juxaposition of Law Enforcement response to minorities/Occupy protests and the Bundy Armed Rebellions.
While this was valid criticism, it ignored two more salient points; First, any right-wing protest no matter how ridiculous (e.g. The Truckers Ride for the Overthrow of the Government) or unlawful (e.g. Republicon Senators Mike Lee and Ted Cruz marching on the White House demanding the Lynching of President Obama) is going to receive widespread positive media coverage from the Mainstream Corporate Owned Media. It's just the nature of the beast and while it needs to be understood there is no point crying about it. Second, and more importantly, violence especially by the Government, should always be the last option, if possible.
Thus, I was in favor of letting the Bundy Buffoons self-exile at the Malheur Refuge, because of it's remoteness. Of course, within 1 months' time the assembled gaggle of right-wing domestic terrorists had despoiled the area with vast trenches of shit. A ripe analogy for what conservatives have been doing to the country for the past 35 years.
But, following their lawful arrest and detention such open contempt for a Court's Authority would not and should not be tolerated. Judges, in my Cook County District Courthouse, would rightly hold the accused felons in contempt but, when dealing with right-wing domestic terrorists, the velvet glove does not cover the iron fist of justice but the gentle fluffing hand of Nevada State Representative Michelle Fiore and multiple other elected Republican officials.
"We really need to get these patriots released," Fiore told the Las Vegas Review-Journal. "We want to make sure our patriots know we stand with them."An elected official standing with those who've taken up arms against the Government is the definition of Republicon Patriotism. But, Fiore is not alone as Grant County Sheriff Glenn Palmer also gave aid and comfort to the Bundy Insurrectionists prior to their arrest. These two and the many other Republicon officials apparently feel emboldened enough to ignore their real Oaths of Office for the fake ones like the ones taken by the Oathbreakers.
Unlike the standard member of the Trumpenproletariat, the Bundy Insurrectionists, their Sovereign Citizen fellow-travelers, the III Inchers, the Oathbreakers, the Unconstituional Sheriffs of America, and other unaligned right-wing domestic terrorists have been aching to murder liberals, women, and minorities in order to Make America Great Again.
The Trumpenproletariat is facing is the gross naked evil of Cut-Throat Capitalism and want to lash out. The 1% have shredded the Social Contract and no longer view the white American Worker any different than a Worker in Indonesia or Guatemala, i.e. an expense to be kept as cheap as possible and replaced as soon as it becomes old, broken, or too expensive.
A Crafty Demagogue like Trump has seen this and stoked the anger, but the Bundy Clan have used it in a different but, classic way. The Bundy's were criminals long before their 2014 Insurrection. But, with the myth of the self-made Western Rancher, and Sage Brush Rebellion infrastructure to fall back on, they received wide-spread support from all the fetid corners of the feverish right-wing.
"The draconian, authoritarian way that the government is going after Mr. Bundy is obviously to try and scare him, and scare ranchers, and send a message which is utterly un-American and not consistent with a free people," Andrew Napolitano, April 2014, Future Supreme Court Justice under President Donald Trump.Therefore, the criminals felt smugly self-assure they could travel to a fellow conservative terrorist, Sheriff Palmer at their leisure. It ended in multiple arrests and the death of Robert LaVoy Finicum when he attempted to kill Oregon State Troopers and FBI Agents trying to detain him.
It's a pitiful thing. The Bundy Insurrectionists may consider themselves Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn or Nelson Mandela, but their closer analogy is members of Vice Lord Nation. The Bundy's and their fellow criminals have staked out terrority, threaten law enforcement with guns and violence, ignore laws, recruit fellow criminals, and put innocent bystanders living in those communities at risk.
The Bundy's and members of other Right-Wing Organizations have declared War on the American Government and should be treated exactly the same way as the detainees in Guantanamo Bay.
Updated:
Surprise, the Bundy Domestic Terrorists were present for at least 2 months prior to their Armed Insurrection, trying to strong arm Sheriff Ozzie Knezovich, intimidating the local residents, committing various crimes, and apparently trying to form a shadow government to perform some crude Coup and establish a right-wing patriot state.
