Woman whose family inspired Oregon standoff hopes more challenge govt

The wife and mother of two men whose imprisonment in January precipitated a 41-day standoff at an Oregon wildlife refuge told Reuters on Thursday she hopes the peaceful outcome will spur further activism to curb the reach of the federal government. Speaking exclusively to Reuters, Susan Hammond, who did not participate in the standoff, said that she hoped the attention brought by the occupation would galvanize Americans to pursue legal avenues for weakening federal government control of millions of acres of land. "I don't think it's over. I think it's just beginning," she said in a telephone interview. "We have hopes that possibly this will be the beginning of a change in the overreach of federal government, but it's only the beginning." Members of the Hammond family hold differing views on the Bundy’s methods, Susan Hammond said. Hammond said she did not know the Bundy family well, but had met Ammon Bundy on more than one occasion. She suggested that the Bundys were being targeted by the government and expressed her support in the wake of Cliven Bundy’s arrest. "I cannot imagine why they would pick up an old man at the airport and charge him with something like that,” Hammond said. "It's just piling on of government bureaucracy onto the Bundy family.”...more