Friday, April 10, 2015

One year later, authorities mum as Bundy celebrates

Rogue rancher Cliven Bundy and his family are inviting some of their patriot movement pals to a three-day party this weekend to celebrate the anniversary of their standoff with the federal government. Starting today, the Liberty Celebration outside Bunkerville, 80 miles north of Las Vegas, will feature live music, cowboy poetry and speeches from the Bundys’ sovereign-state supporters. Meanwhile, almost nothing is being said by those who found themselves on the other side of the standoff that ended one year ago Sunday, when the Bureau of Land Management hastily canceled its roundup and let Bundy retrieve his impounded cattle. Since then, BLM officials in Nevada and Washington, D.C., have repeatedly declined to answer specific questions about what happened last year and what could happen next. The agency responded to inquiries this week with the following statement: “The Bureau of Land Management remains resolute in addressing issues involved in efforts to gather Mr. Bundy’s cattle last year and we are pursuing the matter through the legal system. Our primary goal remains, as it was a year ago, to resolve this matter safely and according to the rule of the law.” Both the FBI and the U.S. Department of Justice declined to comment, as did Clark County Sheriff Joe Lombardo. Shayne Sampson, owner of the Utah company hired by the BLM to round up Bundy’s cows last year, didn’t want to talk, either. Reached for comment Wednesday, Sampson said he wasn’t allowed to say anything. Then he offered a clarification: It wasn’t that he couldn’t comment, he just didn’t want to.  In advance of this weekend’s event at the Bundy ranch, the National Park Service sent a reminder to its employees at Lake Mead National Recreation Area to be on their toes. Jessica Kershaw, spokeswoman for the Department of Interior, called the internal communication “a prudent and routine step taken to raise situational awareness when additional activity is expected on or near public lands or waters.”...more

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

There are many similarities between the tactics of Cliven Bundy and the tactics of Mahatma Ghandi.