Tried to find out what is going on at the occupied federal building in Oregon.
Accessed radio, newspaper, blogs, television, and word of mouth.
Discovered that all of these media transmit the single idea that “if these were Muslims or blacks, they’d be dead already.”
Got very tired of hearing this statement.
Gave up on the possibility of finding out what the hell is going on.
Not much. According to reports, the ranchers the Feds wanted have turned themselves in. The Feds are not reacting to the protest, which was organied by someone with a different ax to grind.
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Here’s the scoop:
An empty government building on federally-owned land in rural Oregon has been “occupied” (a considerably over-used word) by a handful of far-right “militia” nuts with assault rifles who think that the U.S. government is their enemy and that it’s their “duty” to defend their constitutional rights. (They should trying reading the Constitution: “armed insurrection” against the federal government is treason.)
The background issue in Oregon is decades old: The federal government owns vast amounts of land in that state that many ranchers think rightfully belongs to private citizens (them). The ranchers have gone through the U.S. court system repeatedly, but when the law rules against them, the ranchers decide that they don’t have to obey the law.
In this specific case, as Vic says, “the ranchers the Feds wanted have turned themselves in” and have disavowed the occupation. Most of the “occupying” militia forces are outsiders (non-Oregon residents) who are using the situation as an excuse to pick a fight with the U.S. government — some of them are actually crazy enough believe that this fight would inspire a nation-wide shooting war of like-minded nuts against the federal government.
Why isn’t the government charging at them like black rioters in an urban environment or Muslim terrorists actively killing people? Because these militia idiots are basically harmless. For the most part, they’re all piss and no prick — they like to march around with big guns and silly phony uniforms, but don’t shoot off anything but their mouths.
Whenever they’ve been stupid enough to actually force the U.S. government into a firefight, the government’s overwhelming force has slaughtered them (think Ruby Ridge and Waco, Texas).
The Feds are right to give these nuts a little time to get their scrambled brains together and do some thinking, and hopefully reach a peaceful solution. But within a relatively short time, the government needs to end this conflict decisively with NO concessions to the militias — the government set a VERY bad example two years ago, when it backed down from armed civilians protecting lawless rancher Cliven Bundy, who still hasn’t been brought to justice.
If I sound openly contemptuous of these clowns, that’s because I am. The last thing I want to see in this country is a “revolution” — whether it starts in Washington or in rural Oregon.
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Thank you, Dreidel, this is a great explanation.
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I thought this particular protest was about the sentencing of two poachers who started a forest fire.
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/wtf-is-happening-in-the-oregon-militia-standoff-explained-20160103
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That’s how it started, but it’s snowballed…
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This is the most interesting link I have seen regarding the Oregon situation.
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If I understand this correctly:
So freeloaders are camping out in a federal building with a bunch of guns to protest the sentence of a bunch of freeloading arsonist child abusers? And some libertarians think their arson sentences are too harsh? No wonder everything I’ve seen is a bunch of comparison memes fueled by resentment.
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Please, just please, let’s remove any talk of “child abusers” from this. I find it absolutely disgusting when people (not you but the authors of the idiotic Thinkprogress article) roll out an entirely fake concern over children to prove some idiotic point. I promise they will forget all about any child abuse two seconds after they get the website hits they were trying to get from the article.
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Here’s the best article I’ve seen on the situation:
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This really is a great article. Thank you! Finally, I feel like I know what’s happening.
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A conservative literary critic and college professor
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