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Oregon standoff ends after 41 days with dramatic surrender

Frank Apisa said:
This was beautifully handled. It could have been a disaster if handled in a ham-fisted way...but it wasn't.

Law enforcement showed itself at its best.

The occupiers deserve a fair trial...and if found guilty, they should receive a stiff penalty.
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Good analysis here:

The Bundy brigade?s delusional last stand: What the failed wing-nut revolt really tells us - Salon.com

The Bundy brigade’s delusional last stand: What the failed wing-nut revolt really tells us
The armed occupation of an Oregon refuge, which ended yesterday, is a depressing testament to decades of paranoia
Gary Legum

I spent a good chunk of Wednesday night and Thursday morning glued to the live-stream of various right-wing figures trying to convince the last four holdouts of the occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge to lay down their guns and surrender. It might have been more entertaining than anything that was on TV, that’s for sure.

The long phone conversations had something for everyone. There was the irritation of listening to the occupiers complain about the possibility that they might have to surrender their guns and go to jail for, you know, breaking one or more laws, as if they didn’t truly understand the mechanics of civil disobedience. There was the surreality of Nevada Assemblywoman Michele Fiore, previously best known for being such a perfect representative of glib wingnuttery that she might have been grown in the same lab that produced Glenn Beck, putting in a heroic effort to talk the occupiers down when it looked as if they might come completely unglued and start shooting at the FBI agents surrounding them.

There was high comedy when Fiore told holdout Sandy Anderson to write down her story of the occupation in granular detail, “like that author did in ‘Fifty Shades of Grey,’” Which raised the specter that the most lasting consequence of this event will be some poorly-written erotic occupation slashfic getting adapted into a series of terrible movies.

And there was genuine pathos in the voice of David Fry as this sad and desperate young man, the last holdout to surrender, urgently tried to convince Fiore and others that seemingly every conspiracy theory he had ever read on the Internet was indeed true. His father, meanwhile, was telling media outlets he was worried his disturbed son would rather commit suicide than give up. One can only hope that Fry gets the care he so obviously needs. Or failing that, a seat in Congress, where his lunacy will be less noticeable.

But what was most obvious in the long, long list of grievances that Fry, Anderson, her husband Sean, and the fourth person, Jeff Banta, was that these were people steeped in the muddled and reactionary right-wing politics that have turned the base of the Republican Party into a stew of resentment and victimization. These were people who have spent years being told by conservative media that everyone is out to get them and everyone is stepping all over them while minorities and liberals and immigrants and jackbooted federal officers steal their jobs and their guns and turn America into a giant, sharia-ruled suburb of Tijuana.
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X Factor said:
I can honestly say that I paid them very little attention. I'm serious when I said earlier that I thought the whole thing ended awhile back. I just noticed a major difference in your attitude regarding these guys and other people who you immediately rush to defend, that's all.
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Well there is a difference between illegally occupying federal facilities for 41 days while armed, calling for government overthrow, calling on fellow "patriots" to come up and spreading sedition. This was a planned mission by some disturbed militia types who think they can ignore federal law. Yeah, I defend a 12 year old kid who didn't even have the luxury of a single second of negotiation, a cop drove up got out of his car and shot him dead within a few seconds. That is not good police work.
 
calamity said:
I didn't know that. That was a smart move on their part.

Thanks.
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It happened at the start of this. The Hammond family was loud, clear and concise in stating they did not support the Bundy's.
Now with this over and done with, it has left a small community divided, split families apart and friendships bit the dust.
 
danarhea said:
Finally, the last holdouts in Oregon have been arrested, after one of them threatened to go David Koresh on them and kill himself.

And the father, Cliven Bundy, has now been arrested for assault on a Federal officer.

These punks are actually getting off easy. They should have been charged with treason.

Another episode of criminals, disguised as patriots, now comes to an end. To hell with them. Let them rot.

Article is here.
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Should all people who protest the government be held for treason or only the ones who are armed?
 
Blue_State said:
Should all people who protest the government be held for treason or only the ones who are armed?
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You can protest without guns, or you can protest with guns. Makes no difference to me. However, when you use your guns in a violent, threatening, or intimidating manner while taking over a Federal property, then IMHO, you have declared war on the United States, and you deserve to die. You are no different than a terrorist.
 
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beefheart said:
Well there is a difference between illegally occupying federal facilities for 41 days while armed, calling for government overthrow, calling on fellow "patriots" to come up and spreading sedition. This was a planned mission by some disturbed militia types who think they can ignore federal law. Yeah, I defend a 12 year old kid who didn't even have the luxury of a single second of negotiation, a cop drove up got out of his car and shot him dead within a few seconds. That is not good police work.
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I believe the cop was a rookie. It is reasonable that he assumed the gun was real and simply overreacted when the kid reached for it. An honest mistake, one worthy of disqualifying him from the force too. I might add.

The Oregon stand-off thing is a lot different. In this case no one was threatened directly until that one guy reached for his gun, at which point the cops sent him to meet his maker. The nuts didn't do much but hole-up in that building, waiting with guns and saying a bunch of stuff, both out loud and on the internet, which simply put more years on their eventual prison terms.
 
X Factor said:
There seems to be some truth to that. Not nearly enough blood for some of their tastes to be sure.
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I think a moment's reflection would show that the disappointed group are the supporters of the High Plains Grifters, who got no martyrs for their cause from the chickenhawk holdouts.
 
Manc Skipper said:
I think a moment's reflection would show that the disappointed group are the supporters of the High Plains Grifters, who got no martyrs for their cause from the chickenhawk holdouts.
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Yep. Making martyrs was what this game was all about. The Feds were smart not to play along.
 
danarhea said:
You can protest without guns, or you can protest with guns. Makes no difference to me. However, when you use your guns in a violent, threatening, or intimidating manner while taking over a Federal property, then IMHO, you have declared war on the United States, and you deserve to die. You are no different than a terrorist.
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Then you would support LEO's taking the lead and be the first to use lethal force?
If so, when should they have doen this?
Day 1?
Week 1 ?
What should they have done differently?
 
danarhea said:
Finally, the last holdouts in Oregon have been arrested, after one of them threatened to go David Koresh on them and kill himself.

And the father, Cliven Bundy, has now been arrested for assault on a Federal officer.

These punks are actually getting off easy. They should have been charged with treason.

Another episode of criminals, disguised as patriots, now comes to an end. To hell with them. Let them rot.

Article is here.
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NPR shared a sample of the armed occupiers' indy radio broadcast. One of them was completely losing his mind about how America wasn't coming to "support" them. It was absolutely hilarious. :lamo
 
Top Cat said:
LOL I'm weeping. Stupid assholes accomplished what exactly?
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A lot of people now know about the questionable history of BLM in Oregon that wouldn't have before.

We're all terribly sorry that they were not as shooty as you wanted them to be.
 
Top Cat said:
LOL I'm weeping. Stupid assholes accomplished what exactly?
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The issues with BLM have caused many problems that are completely ignored as they are managed in the East.
 
jmotivator said:
Top Cat is inconsolable.
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Yup. Liberals want the crazies on the right shot, but if it was some Occupy idiots, they'd want them to get away with murder.
 
jmotivator said:
A lot of people now know about the questionable history of BLM in Oregon that wouldn't have before.

We're all terribly sorry that they were not as shooty as you wanted them to be.
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A real downer.
 
In the past, those involved in the first standoff where guns were pointed en masse at federal agents would have been treated as armed insurrectionists (treason), and these Wildlife occupiers here would have a fair chance of being treated similarly.

See the thing about a right to bear arms and a well-trained militia.....that's so you can risk failing in a revolution against the government. It's not about having an actual right to point guns at federal agents so long as you ramble about freedoms and the constitution. It's about actually winning a war against an actually tyrannical government.



The Occupiers didn't threaten mass armed resistance (read: gun violence) against the government. Things generally change when you do that.

These guys should be counting their lucky stars that the government held off in the interest of saving lives.
 
Mr Person said:
In the past, those involved in the first standoff where guns were pointed en masse at federal agents would have been treated as armed insurrectionists (treason), and these Wildlife occupiers here would have a fair chance of being treated similarly.

See the thing about a right to bear arms and a well-trained militia.....that's so you can risk failing in a revolution against the government. It's not about having an actual right to point guns at federal agents so long as you ramble about freedoms and the constitution. It's about actually winning a war against an actually tyrannical government.



The Occupiers didn't threaten mass armed resistance (read: gun violence) against the government. Things generally change when you do that.

These guys should be counting their lucky stars that the government held off in the interest of saving lives.
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As Beefheart and a couple others have noted, law enforcement acted in an exemplary way in this particular confrontation. The guys and gals handling this should be dispatched to teach other law enforcement people how to deal reasonably (and safely) with these kinds of situations.
 
danarhea said:
You can protest without guns, or you can protest with guns. Makes no difference to me. However, when you use your guns in a violent, threatening, or intimidating manner while taking over a Federal property, then IMHO, you have declared war on the United States, and you deserve to die. You are no different than a terrorist.
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I want to make sure I get this. If they held the Federal Property, without firearms, you would say they are terrorists? Or, if you hold federal property while you have a firearm in your possession, then you are a terrorist?
 
Blue_State said:
I want to make sure I get this. If they held the Federal Property, without firearms, you would say they are terrorists? Or, if you hold federal property while you have a firearm in your possession, then you are a terrorist?
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The key here is whether or not they brandished the firearms during the takeover. They did, and that makes them terrorists.
 
Blue_State said:
I want to make sure I get this. If they held the Federal Property, without firearms, you would say they are terrorists? Or, if you hold federal property while you have a firearm in your possession, then you are a terrorist?
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Uhh...

Taking a government complex with the use of force on pursuit of political aims is NOT terrorism in your view ?
 
Absentglare said:
Uhh...

Taking a government complex with the use of force on pursuit of political aims is NOT terrorism in your view ?
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Um, tell me exactly how do you take an empty, unoccupied building 'with the use of force'?
 
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