Category Archives: Justice

The Feds Are Not Through Tormenting Poor Amerindians

America, History, Justice, Law, Private Property, Regulation

Before Cliven Bundy there were the Dunns, whose ordeal with the “BLM Brownshirts” began decades back, and should break even a heart made of flint, such is the destruction to the lives, land and livestock of this family of Amerindians.

As wonderful William N. Grigg tells it, “the Dann family spent two decades fighting in federal courts to defend their property against the depredations of the federal government. As members of the Western Shoshone nation, the Dann family had inherited land that was protected by the 1863 Treaty of Ruby Valley and the U.S. Constitution – parchment barricades against aggression that were quickly reduced to ashes by the flame of elite ambitions.”

Below is the culmination of one of the Bureau of Land Grabs’ roundups:

A previous roundup nearly resulted in tragedy when a member of the family doused himself in gasoline and threatened to set himself on fire. The 59-year-old man, who had no previous criminal record, was tackled, beaten by law enforcement officers, arrested, and prosecuted on terrorism-related charges.
After spending several years in prison, that supposed terrorist, Clifford Dann, was allowed to return to the tiny, ramshackle homestead he shares with his 82-year-old sister, Carrie, who is the same age their elder sister Mary was when she died in an accident while repairing a fence in 2005. …

… In 1974, the US Government sued the Dann family, claiming that they had committed “trespassing” by grazing their horses and cattle on land that legally belonged to them. Successive rulings by federal judges upheld the Government’s claims.
The Supreme Court declined to hear the Dann family’s appeal, insisting that the matter was closed when the federal government paid itself $26 million to consummate the theft of the Shoshone lands. The Feds would eventually claim that the impoverished Indian family owed nearly $5 million in grazing fees and interest.
The BLM staged its first cattle rustling raid against the Danns in April 1992. At about 4:30 in the morning, the ranch lands were invaded by a column of vehicles that decanted a platoon of BLM Brownshirts. Not intimidated by the bullying display, Carrie plowed through the picket line and cast herself into a cattle chute to prevent hireling cowboys from loading her stolen cattle onto a truck.
“My land has never been for sale,” Carrie told Eureka County Sheriff Ken Jones, who rather than defending his constituent’s rights was aligned with the invaders. “It’s not for sale now, it’s not for sale tomorrow, either. And that’s the way it is, Mr. Jones.” …

MORE.

Why The Land Belongs To Bundy

Justice, libertarianism, Natural Law, Private Property, States' Rights, Taxation, The State

The current column, now on WND, applies the doctrine of natural law and Lockean homesteading to explain “Why The Land Belongs To Bundy.” (Cliven Bundy is the farmer from Nevada who is “in mutiny against the federal government”) The essay exposes “both political factions” for “siding with the state and against natural law,” and explains why, ethically and logically, there is no such things as “government grass.”

Here’s a short excerpt from the (middle of) the essay:

NO SUCH THING AS ‘GOVERNMENT GRASS’

Unlike the positive law, which is state-created; natural law in not enacted. Rather, it is a higher law—a system of ethics—knowable through reason, revelation and experience. “By natural law,” propounded McClellan in “Liberty, Order, And Justice,” “we mean those principles which are inherent in man’s nature as a rational, moral, and social being, and which cannot be casually ignored.”

Tamara Holder, another Democrat, grasps the natural law not at all. “Can I go into your house and steal stuff; can I trespass onto your land?” she hollered at Sean Hannity. Holder, of course, was implying that the disputed land belonged to the state and was as good as the government’s house.

In siding with the heroic homesteader against the BLM, Mr. Hannity’s heart is in the right place. He and Fox News colleague Greta Van Susteren probably staved off a Waco-style massacre, in Bunkerville. When the militarized BLM, SAWT teams and all, trained sights on the Bundy family and their supporters; the two turned the cameras on the aggressors, who then retreated.

In the course of butting against buttheads like Holder, however, Mr. Hannity has refused to engage his head. (The anchor, moreover, is performing no public service when he gives this and other prototypical TV tarts a platform from which to spread ignorance.) Ms. Holder: the government doesn’t have a house. There is no such thing as “government grass”! Not in natural law. Government cannot morally claim to own “public property,” explain Linda and Morris Tannehill, in “The Market For Liberty.” “Government doesn’t produce anything. Whatever it has, it has as a result of expropriation. It is no more correct to call the expropriated wealth in government’s possession property than it is to say that a thief rightfully owns the loot he has stolen.”

Then there is the matter of logic. “The public” is an abstraction. In logic, an abstraction cannot possess property. To borrow from libertarian political philosopher Murray Rothbard, “There is no existing entity called ‘society’—there are only interacting individuals.” To say that “society” should own property in common is essentially to say that “government bureaucrats” should own property, in our case, at the expense of the dispossessed homesteader. …

… Read the complete essay. “Why The Land Belongs To Bundy” is now on WND.

Drone On The Attack

Foreign Policy, Justice, Propaganda, Terrorism, War

GOP TV (Fox News) correctly frames delays and exemptions in the implementation of Zero Care as a pre-election ploy. However, the drone-in-chief’s deadly show of force in Yemen, at a crucial time during an election cycle: now that’s all above board. Standard operating procedure. No hidden agenda there.

Obama’s illegal and naturally illicit drone attacks on Yemen are craven and far from ‘successful.’ Fox News cops to at least six civilians killed in the course of taking out “nine suspected Al Qaeda militants.” That’s an almost 50 percent failure rate, if you take on faith the tack offered by those operating outside the law (natural and other). Yes, you’d have to believe the Obama administration that individuals who’ve not been afforded due process of law are guilty. And you’d have to have faith in the same goons that the other casualties are necessary “collateral damage.”

I don’t. Nor should you.

Antiwar.com offers what is likely a more accurate account:

A barrage of US drone strikes across Yemen’s south and east has entered its third day today, and shows no signs of slowing down, as the latest US attacks targeted the Shabwa Province.
With so many of the attacks occurring against remote villages in the hills of Yemen’s rural interior, the death toll is difficult to ascertain, but at least 68 are believed to be dead over the past three days.
Yemeni officials say the strikes are targeting “top leader” of al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), and that they have high hopes they may kill one such leader, but they can’t confirm anything of the sort so far.
Indeed, while all of the official statements from Yemen have termed the slain “militants” or at the very least “suspects,” not a single person has been identified at all so far officially, and many civilians were confirmed among the slain on Saturday.

To listen to other US mainstream media, it’s hard to ascertain who exactly is responsible for raining drones down on the southern and eastern parts of Yemen. The passive voice is deployed to conceal culpability.

“A ‘massive and unprecedented’ assault against al Qaeda fighters in Yemen appears to be targeting high-level operatives of the terrorist network,” writes CNN. In reading the article @ CNN.com it’s near impossible to determine for sure whodunit.

UPDATE II: The Elephant In the Courtroom

Crime, Justice, Law, Racism, South-Africa

Finally, media other than yours truly mentions, if fleetingly, the elephant in the Pistorius courtroom: unidirectional, black-on-black and black-on-white violent crime. Examined in depth and at length in Into the Cannibal’s Pot, crime, and the fear of being butchered, was likely behind the blade runner’s irrational, irresponsible actions.

“[F]or all his privilege, Oscar Pistorius knows the rapacity and invincibility of the criminal class in his country. Like every other Afrikaner, he knew in his gut what infiltrating gangs would do to a legless Boer. He had seen images of the mangled bodies.” (From “Blade Runner Killing And The Media Blackout.”)

The Economist doesn’t go so far as to acknowledge the legitimacy of the fear, but does mention it:

When Mr Pistorius declared in his testimony, “I shot out of fear,” he became the voice of many white South Africans. They tend to see themselves as living in the shadow of violent crime, retreating behind high walls, electric fences and steel doors. From there they can summon private security guards, who are twice as numerous as policemen, by pressing a panic button.

The trial has revived a long-running debate about other aspects of crime. South Africa’s murder rate is one of the highest in the world: 30.9 for every 100,000 people, compared with 4.7 in the United States. Yet the rate has fallen by half in the past 15 years. Rich whites, the most fearful among South Africans, are actually the least endangered. Most victims are poor and black.

Though both the accused and the victim in the Pistorius case are white, race is never far away. … the case in fact involves a third protagonist, “the threatening body, nameless and faceless, of an armed and dangerous black intruder”. …

Actually, in proportion to their numbers in the general population, whites and Indians are more likely to be victimized by the criminal class in South Africa.

UPDATE I (4/21): A reader affirms the above, writing as follows:

“I have so often, ever since the dreadful act that ended the life of Oscar Pistorius’ girlfriend, wanted to write to you Ilana, and say: Please tell your readers about the ghastly fear that every Afrikaner suffers from; the fear that he would be murdered in the most atrocious manner, mangled, tortured, raped before family members;slaughtered. So thank you for being true to the truth. His is the insane reaction of anyone—especially an Afrikaner living in his birthland—who knows what he will suffer at the hands of black criminal gangs who almost have permission to murder from the silent government. You, Ilana, are the right person, at the right time to make this known.”

UPDATE II: Via Brian James Smith on Facebook: Thanks to Cuan Elgin with the below list. Nothing to fear? South African justice is seen to be working like this circus of a trial…? Think again. The reality of South Africa this past week.
Black-on-White attacks: 7 Days. 20 Attacks. 27 Victims. 3 Women Raped. 7 People shot. 6 People Murdered:
9 April: Leon Pretorius (50) and his wife Phylis (49) were attacked at their place of business in Bloemspruit. Leon was shot twice. He is in hospital.
9 April: An Elderly man was attacked and murdered in his home in Dinwiddi. He was stabbed and his neck was broken.
9 April: An elderly couple was attacked, assaulted, tied up and robbed in Helderkruin.
10 April: A Family was attacked in their home in the Featherbrooke Estate. The mother and daughter were assaulted and the father was shot. He is recovering in hospital.
10 April: A 27-year-old woman was attacked by 4 black men. She was abducted and raped.
10 April: ‘A 58-year old woman was attacked and raped at the Anstey’s Beach Guest House in Brighton Beach.
10 April: The Lombaard couple was attacked on their farm in Tulbach. They were able to defend themselves and the attackers fled.
11 April: Lazlo (87) and Carol Bercsenyi were attacked in Bon Accord. They were hacked with axes. Lazlow died from his injuries.
12 April: Jaap Pretorius (52) is in a critical condition after an attacked on him and his fiancé in Bloemfontein. He was shot in the head.
12 April: A 62-year-old man was attacked in his holiday home in St. Francis. He was assaulted, tied up and robbed.
12 April: Vicus Botha (63) was assaulted in front of his home in Pietermaritzburg. He was badly beaten and died from his injuries.
13 April: A 48-year-old woman and her husband were attacked by 4 black men in their home in Benoni. The woman was raped by the attackers in front of her husband.
14 April: Kobus Nieuwoudt (41) was attacked, assaulted and shot in Ontdekkerspark.
15 April: Rina Hough (65) was stabbed to death at her home in Senekal.
15 April: Bart Klopper (63) was attacked and assaulted at his farm in Edeville. He sustained serious head injuries.
15 April: Johan Nel and his 13-year-old son were attacked and assaulted on their farm in Wolmaransstad by 6 black men armed with CZ88 pistols.
15 April: Frik Bodenstein (58) was attacked on his farm in Witbank. He was hacked with machetes and is recovering in hospital.
16 April: Johan Bornman and his wife were attacked in their farm in Vredefort. Johan was shot in his face and shoulder and is in hospital.
16 April: W/O Steven Britz (44) was shot dead at the Klapmuts Police Station.
17 April: Hannes Duvenhage (68) shot dead in Ermelo