Tag Archive for: Cliven Bundy

So What if Cliven Bundy is a “Racist”?

For the record, I don’t believe Cliven Bundy is a “racist.”

For the record, I don’t even care.

Such indifference to that damnable failing, that thing we all know is the worst thing one can be, must make me a damnable man. But I am flexible. I just want equality. I’m perfectly willing to demonize “racists,” provided we give other sinners equal time.

I just want to hear, for example, “Forget the facts of the matter! The man is lustful!” or “Don’t listen to that miscreant. He’s guilty of sloth!” Or let’s say a fellow posits an opinion on, oh, taxation. Our very intellectual response could be, “Hey, didn’t I hear you talkin’ to your girlfriend about how you scarfed down four cheeseburgers at the barbecue and binged on ice cream in your easy chair? Look, everyone, he’s a glutton!”

This isn’t to say that being a bigot — the word “racist” is in quotation marks because it’s an invention of leftist language manipulators — is a good thing. Not at all. But neither is being lustful, slothful or gluttonous. Yet people who couldn’t name three of the Seven Deadly Sins and are thoroughly guilty of at least six, will claim they can disqualify a person, and his point of view, from debate based on their assessment of his moral state. What blindness — and hubris.

Bigotry is simply a sub-category of wrath, one part of one-seventh, not the moral end-all and be-all. And even if Bundy did have racial hang-ups, would it follow that he was wrong about his case or on federal power in general? Can a man be flawed, and even sinful, but yet right on a matter? Can he still have virtues? Albert Einstein could be lewd and lascivious, Galileo an irascible jerk, Ernest Hemingway was a drunkard.

This isn’t to say, as certain people with poor character once averred, that character doesn’t matter. It’s not to say a person’s vices can’t speak to motivations; it’s valid to point it out if a judge who rules that pornography has First Amendment protections habitually views porn himself. But it’s not valid to fixate on the allegedly “racist” tendencies of a judge who rules that racial commentary enjoys such protections (at least not within the context of analyzing the ruling). The difference is that since the former is wrong, there’s good reason to believe that his personal inclinations corrupted his judgment on the matter; with the latter judge, however, dwelling on the supposed flaw in question would only serve to discredit a legitimate ruling.

The point is that we all have flaws, yet all can be correct about a whole host of things. I wouldn’t have wanted Einstein to care for a teenage daughter or be president, but I wouldn’t deny that E=mc2.

Of course, it really is true that some flaws are more unequal than others — there is a hierarchy of sin — but moderns’ sense of proportion is highly askew. G.K. Chesterton said that a “Puritan is a person who pours righteous indignation into the wrong things.” Today we have Impuritans, complete reprobates worshipping at hedonism’s altar, who pour their indignation onto others in a vain attempt to wash their own souls clean of sin. But there is much more to being a “good” person than simply not being bigoted.

To further illustrate this askew sense of proportion, consider again the gluttony example. Gluttony is a sin, no doubt. But now let’s say that our society considered it the ultimate disqualifier. Let’s say we might scrutinize a person, asking “What are his food bills?” “Do cookbooks figure too prominently in his library?” “Does he wile away excessive time watching Emeril Live?” “Is he the one who cleared the buffet table like a hurdler?” And imagine we visited pariah status on the person after deeming him guilty.

Would you think this society’s greater fault was gluttony — or being hung-up about it? I’d think it exhibited a gluttonous zeal for eradicating gluttony.

The problem is that man always swings from one extreme to another. The early to mid 20th century saw the embrace of eugenics and racial-superiority dogma, which was then discredited by the loathsome Nazis. But now we just as zealously impose a dogma denying the reality of group differences and mandating equality of outcome among races.

This tendency toward true extremism — meaning, extreme deviation from Truth — brings to mind C.S. Lewis’ observation that evil always tries to persuade us to exaggerate our flaws, telling the militant he’s too pacifistic and the pacifist that he’s too militant. As an example, today we have Impuritans who, awash in the Great Sexual Heresy, will still lament how “Puritan” America is so sexually “repressed.” Evil tells the pervert he’s too prudish, just as it tells self-hating whites that they’re too anti-black.

But what we should be is anti-“racism.” I don’t mean what you think. We need to oppose both the word and the concept — at least how the latter is often conceptualized.

Bigotry is bad by definition, and that definition is commonly agreed upon. But “racism” often has a different meaning, one whose influence is readily apparent in the reaction to Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling’s much reported comments. Al Sharpton, who once used the term “white interlopers” and once said, “White folks was in caves while we were building empires…,” called for a boycott of the NBA. Former hoop star Larry Johnson reacted to a man who didn’t want blacks around by saying he didn’t want whites around, as he suggested creating an all-black basketball league. Spike Lee told CNN he wished that white NBA players would speak out against Sterling, which is a bit like John Gotti having wished that someone would speak out against racketeering. And Barack Obama took time away from destroying our world standing, healthcare system, social policy and economy to say that “comments reportedly made by Sterling are ‘incredibly offensive racist statements,’ before casting them as part of a continuing legacy of slavery and segregation that Americans must confront,” wrote CBS DC. He then opined, “When ignorant folks want to advertise their ignorance, you don’t really have to do anything; you just let them talk” (you don’t have to do anything except, I suppose, “confront” a “legacy of slavery and segregation”). But, okay, I’ll just let Obama talk.

Now, opportunism is often a factor in such hypocrisy, but there is something else: a striking sense of entitlement. This is why many black people will condemn a white person for making a bigoted comment with an equally bigoted comment without batting an eye; when whites are bigoted, it’s “racist”; when blacks are, it’s something else. And, in fact, this idea is encapsulated in the definition of “racism” I alluded to earlier. It’s one you’ve probably heard:

Only whites can be “racist” because a prerequisite for “racism” is not only bigoted intent, but the power to act upon it.

And, actually, they’ll get no argument from me. As I’ve said before, the left originated the word “racism,” so they may define it. They may have it.

And if they ask, I’ll tell them where they can stick it.

The problem is that conservatives, being conservative — meaning, conserving yesterday’s liberals’ social victories — parrot the word. It’s another example of how, forgetting that the side defining the vocabulary of a debate, wins the debate, conservatives slavishly use the Lexicon of the Left.

Of course, eventually this will all be left in the dustbin of history. Movements, peoples and civilizations come and go, and we’ll get over our fixation with one part of one-seventh of the Deadly Sins. And then man will swing to another extreme, as he goes on to the next great mistake.

Contact Selwyn Duke, follow him on Twitter or log on to SelwynDuke.com

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Why is Obama decimating the military while arming federal agencies?

The rate at which this administration is arming federal agencies is quite alarming. Case in point–the recent standoff against Cliven Bundy in Nevada. In recent years, armed federal government agents have stormed against citizens in Ruby Ridge, Miami (the Elian Gonzalez case), and Waco, Texas (the Branch Davidians). Each of these assaults occurred under a Democrat presidential administration. Enabled by lies and deceit, could it be that liberal progressive socialism only works by fear, intimidation, and coercion? Or is Obama more afraid of the American people than our enemies abroad?

I find it humorous that liberal progressives accuse their opponents of being fascists, but the liberals are actually the most intolerant and oppressive when it comes to free speech, expression, and petition of redress of grievances by the American citizenry.

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) and the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) now have armed agents. The Department of Justice is heavily partisan — and that assertion has nothing to do with racism. I support our law enforcement agencies having the proper resources and equipment to fulfill their mission of keeping us safe from criminals and enemies who have penetrated our sovereign borders. However, we do not need to become a “police state” where our government agencies start to resemble special operation strike troops of the U.S. mlitary.

During the 2008 campaign, I recall then-Senator Obama stating, “We cannot continue to rely only on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives that we’ve set. We’ve got to have a civilian national security force that’s just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded.” Just like the fundamental transformation of America, what exactly did this mean? And just as amazingly, behind the young inexperienced junior Senator, you can see American military veterans applauding.

[youtube]http://youtu.be/Tt2yGzHfy7s[/youtube]

So, as we decimate our military, cut retiree and veteran benefits, and cut benefits to our military families, we are arming federal agencies. Why?

I don’t know about you, but I ain’t about to be a sheep heading to the slaughter.

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared on AllenBWest.com.

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RELATED VIDEO: Bleeding The Military by Bill Finley:

[youtube]http://youtu.be/jEXb54PuC0I[/youtube]

Senator Harry Reid (D-NV) Was Behind BLM Land Grab of The Bundy Ranch

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Neil Kornze, Principal Deputy Director, Bureau of Land Management.

A article by Kit Daniels from InfoWar.com outlines in detail how corrupted Senator Reid was behind the land grab of the Bundy Ranch. It turns out that Neil Kornze, who was raised in Elko, Nevada, was a former senior advisor on Majority Leader, Senator Harry Reid’s staff. Kornze joined the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) in 2011 and had been leading the agency as the Principal Deputy Director. He was subsequently appointed Director of the Bureau of Land Management, by a US Senate vote of 71 to 28. The BLM oversees more than 245 million acres of public lands nationwide, including 48 million acres in Nevada.

So why did Senator Reid’s aide who owed his appointment to his old boss go after Cliven Bundy’s cattle ranch that had been in the Bundy family since 1870?

It turns out that in 2012, Harry Reid’s son, Rory Reid who is lawyer with the prominent Harvey Whittemore law firm in Las Vegas, became the chief representative for a Chinese Communist Energy Giant, ENN Energy Group. Journalist Marcus Stern with Reuters reported that Senator Reid was heavily involved in a “DEAL,” as well as his oldest son Rory Reid who works for lobbyist Harvey Whittemore. Whittemore was convicted in 2013 of illegally funneling $100,000 to Senator Reid’s campaign.

Rory and his father were both involved in an effort to get the ENN Energy Group to build a $5 billion utility scale solar energy facility and panel manufacturing plant in the Nevada desert. Rather than helping a US energy company benefit from such a development, Harry Reid helped the Chinese develop a utility scale solar energy plant. Marcus Stern wrote that that Senator Reid has been the most prominent advocate of recruiting the Communist Chinese Energy Giant, ENN Energy Group on his trip to Communist China in 2011. It was during this same time frame that Senator Reid placed his senior senate advisor, Neil Kornze, in the BLM as the Principal Deputy Director.

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Senator Harry Reid (D-NV)

Marcus Stern reported that Harry Reid applied his political muscle on behalf of developing the ENN project in Nevada (Regional Mitigation Strategy for the Dry Lake Solar Energy Zone : Technical Note 444). Then in 2012, Rory Reid facilitated ENN in developing plans to build the $5 billion solar plant on public land in Nevada by helping the ENN locate a 9000 acre desert site that it planned to buy well below the going market value of land sold by Clark County. Rory Reid as the former Chairman of the Clark County Commission helped facilitate the deal.

Unfortunately the problem with the area was that the 908 head of cattle in the herd on 67 year old Cliven Bundy’s family Bundy Ranch roamed and grazed free as they had been doing since the 1870, their grazing on open range would interfere with the Chinese Communist Energy Giant, ENN Energy Group’s solar field.

So Rory Reid, working with Neil Kornze, trumped up the bogus charge that the grazing cattle were destroying an endangered species, the desert tortoise. The desert tortoise were proliferating (they were not in danger), despite the fact that the cattle from the Bundy Ranch had been grazing in their habitat for over 140 years, in fact the Interior Department had implemented euthanasia of the desert tortoise to keep the population from getting out of control.

The BLM’s official reason for encircling the Bundy Ranch and family with sniper teams and helicopters was to protect the endangered desert tortoise which the Interior Department had been killing in mass for some time. Journalist Dana Loesch wrote “The tortoise wasn’t of concern when US Senator Harry Reid worked with the BLM and his former senior aide, Neil Kornze, who was now in charge of the BLM when they were literally changing the boundaries of the tortoise habitat to accommodate the development plans of the Communist Chinese Energy Giant, ENN Energy Group and the second most powerful man in Nevada, after Senator Reid, Harvey Whittemore,” who just happened to be the employer for Rory Reid’s and Rory’s three brothers (Harry Reid’s four sons).

Unfortunately, the media establishment spun the story so Americans would view Cliven Bundy as grossly violating federal regulations and a law breaker, not the true story of how Senator Reid was facilitating a Communist Chinese Energy Giant to come into the United States, displacing any possibility of a US Energy Company from getting to develop solar energy in Nevada.

Reid arranged for the Communists to get ownership of US public land in Nevada below the going market price, while using Gestapo-style tactics to illegally remove a Patriotic Cattle Rancher off the land his family owned since the 1870s in violation of the rights accorded him by the US Constitution, the Tenth Amendment, and the Bill of Rights. It should have been a story about the overreach by yet another bloated, corrupt, and out of control bureaucracy that was doing absolutely nothing to manage the overgrowth on public land that they were supposed to be doing. In fact, the cattle from the Bundy Ranch were feeding on the overgrowth keeping the overgrowth under control.

The principle and courageous stand by Cliven Bundy in the face of an oppressive BLM and the prosecution by Holder’s Justice Department, while fining him $1 million, illegally rustling 400 cattle of his herd, surrounding his family with snipers, knocking down his pregnant daughter-in-law, grinding Clive’s head into the dirt with boots on his head, arresting his son for taking photos of the Gestapo-type tactics, and tazing his son three times. Cliven Bundy’s principled stand was a seminal event, Patriotic Americans from all over the Republic mobilized, rode to the aide of the rancher with American flags flying, and supported the Bundy Ranch against an out of control government bureaucracy.

When Neil Kornze realized the magnitude of the opposition he and Reid engendered from throughout the Republic, resulting in over 3000+ armed Americans who had arrived on the Bundy Ranch (with thousands more enroute), in opposition to his 200 federal armed guards, Kornze released the 400 rustled cattle he intended to sell, and pulled his 200 federal armed guards back from the brink of an armed conflict with very angry American citizens from throughout the Republic, who now had their own snipers in place at the ranch aimed at the 200 federal armed guards. This attempt at grand larceny by the BLM, and violation of Cliven Bundy’s freedoms all Americans are afforded by the US Constitution requires a Congressional investigation and actions in the courts to charge the BLM.

We wonder if the Republican leadership in Congress will do anything about this attempt by an agency of the US Government to support a group in Nevada commit grand larceny on behalf of the Chinese Communist Energy Giant, or will they just let it ride, and hope it goes away?

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EDITORS NOTE: The featured image is courtesy of InfoWars.com.