In August of last year, I wrote an article -- DHS Prepares for Confrontation Against Pennsylvania Militia -- in which I relayed worrying information I had received concerning plans by the federal government to use military force against elements it deemed to be "right-wing militias in defiance of federal law." Though the information I received last summer concerned a defiant police chief in Pennsylvania, it was evident that the Obama administration was afraid that one wild confrontation against a single militia could create a cascade effect that would plunge the United States into chaos, and possibly civil war.
At the time it seemed ludicrous that our mighty federal government and our all powerful drone executioner could possibly be afraid of the consequences that would unravel from confronting a small, yet defiant right-wing militia; but considering how the Bureau of Land Management just yesterday retreated when confronted with the possibility of their ongoing Nevada operation escalating into a full kinetic conflict, their fear cannot be denied. The situation in Nevada is tense; the government is not facing only an armed family of ranchers refusing to pay grazing fees, it is facing various militia groups which have traveled from other states to defend the Bundy ranching clan.
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| BLM confronts Nevada ranchers. |
In their capitulation letter, the Bureau of Land Management claimed that it wanted to prevent violence, and that it would be seeking to: "to resolve the matter administratively and judicially." As a result of their surrender, the federal government has created an environment in which one of the following two possibilities are likely to manifest: either the feds return in full force, shedding blood with a brutality not seen in the US since Waco; or the militias are emboldened, setting a precedent that could lead to future escalation by militias when confronted with unpopular federal actions.
The federal government owns 84% of the land in Nevada, and it is increasingly seizing land that now is managed by conservative elements -- as rural areas generally tend to be more conservative and Republican. The massive take-over of land by the federal government will continue, and it looks like a battle is brewing between traditional ranchers and a liberal elite increasingly empowering the federal government with more environmental powers, environmental powers which allow it to seize territory largely at-will, and with little recourse for anyone too politically unconnected or incapable of hiring an army of lawyers.
As fears over global warming, deforestation, and the extinction of species increase, more people will find their traditional lifestyles rendered irrelevant in the face of increasing government powers. When the Bureau of Land Management retreated, they in reality merely postponed the inevitable. Their retreat was merely the federal government deciding that it wants to fight on its own terms and under its own timetable. But make no mistake about it, the fight is coming!
