@SamTLevinreports for The Guardian that the last four occupiers have surrendered to federal law enforcement. Cliven Bundy was also indicted.
…[F]ederal prosecutors filed a criminal complaint in neighboring Nevada against Cliven Bundy, the cattle rancher whose defiant standoff in 2014 inspired the occupation in Oregon. The indictment of 69-year-old Bundy, a spiritual grandfather for the ultra-conservative federal lands movement, signaled a determination to clamp down on the wider anti-government militia movement.
He was arrested in Portland late Wednesday evening, shortly after the FBI announced a changed in tactic, moving in on the last remaining occupiers of the Malheur national wildlife refuge.
Prosecutors have accused Bundy – who has for years refused to pay grazing fees to the government – of conspiracy against the federal government, assault on an officer, interference with commerce by extortion and several other serious offenses.
Will the occupiers’ surrender and indictment of Bundy reduce or enhance consevatives’ credibility?
The NY Times reported on the last minutes before the last surrender by David Fry, which included a linked video livestream.
…[T]he last holdout, David Fry, grew agitated and said at first that he would not leave.
In an extraordinary exchange, streamed live online to thousands of people listening, Mr. Fry argued with supporters who urged him to give himself up, while at the same time he could be heard negotiating with F.B.I. agents on another phone.
“I’m actually feeling suicidal right now,” said Mr. Fry, 27, who lives in Ohio. “It’s liberty or death. I will not go another day as a slave to this system.”
He railed against taxpayer money being used for abortions and drone strikes in Pakistan, said bankers were to blame for the world wars, complained of being unable to obtain medical marijuana in his home state, and accused the government of suppressing breakthrough inventions, concealing U.F.O.’s, and “chemically castrating everybody.”
“I declare war against the federal government,” he said a few minutes later. “I’ve peacefully voted and nothing is ever done.”
But after more than an hour sitting in his tent, Mr. Fry abruptly gave himself up without a fight.
But seriously, I agree with maybe a third of what he’s complaining about. I don’t like that my tax money is going to drone strikes in Yemen and Pakistan. I don’t like that medical marijuana is illegal in Idaho, I think the current patent system doesn’t serve its original purpose (but I don’t think the government is particularly suppressing inventions, just snapping up good ones for itself.)
There’s an old saying: “You have four boxes in a democracy: soap, ballot, jury and ammo, use in that order”. They skipped over the soap box and jury box in favor of ammo boxes.
If your voting isn’t working, maybe your idea doesn’t seem valid to the populous. Why don’t you get on a soap box, and campaign for elected office when you start feeling ignored in local issues?
This is right on and, plus, irony because some AM radio conservatives seem to never stop misrepresenting “the founders” with nonsensical tough talk.
These occupiers may have accidentally rediscovered rational debate as an alternative preferable to ranting incoherently while armed.
The GOP conservatives are entrenched in SCOTUS, both houses of Congress and many corporate media.
So why not try rational debate, an actual practice of actual founders?
Yes, heard. True. Obeyed even.
Maybe the new generation considering their options who don’t want to be pointlessly arrested will learn by example. And at least the violence was less than it might’ve been.
That David Fry might have expressing such desperation to possibly have been in need of medical help is not surprising.
The real question, for me, is whether anyone on the inside was worried about him. And, if so, why did they leave him all alone in the end when he was actively talking about suicide?
Mr. Fry’s father, William Fry Jr., 56, said he … had been in frequent contact during the occupation. “I support his purpose,” the elder Mr. Fry said, adding that his son’s purpose was “trying to make a change, to save our country from the problems that we’ve got.”
“How many millennials do you know that stand up and are brave enough to do that?” he said, adding that he had listened to his son’s live-streamed suicide threats and lengthy ramblings. “I’m thinking he’s playing shock jock again,” Mr. Fry said. “He’s trying to — you know, shocking statements sometimes can send a message.”
Because he was threatening to take people with him. Waiting for the lunatic with a gun to surrender saves lives, and the cost of a trial if he kills himself. Win-win!
Pretty sure the FLDS doesn’t hold truck with jury-based judiciary, at best they might have a counsel of elders decide the fate of wrongdoers and people who just aren’t white and delightsome enough.
I don’t think any agents there really wanted people to get hurt.
There were probably plenty of … erm, complicated feelings … anger. But events like the livestreaming about UFO’s and medical marijuana pushed the drama into farce.
And Cliven Bundy seems to have behaved badly and put everyone at risk by contradicting his son.
It looks like they think if they just use the right invocations of old-timey words with some random legalese that this grants them a magical God-mode placing them above the law (powers granted by the ancient spell books - the Bible, Magna Carta, Constitution).
Yeah, sovereign citizens are cute. They’re like kids who got too into Harry Potter back in the day who really really badly wanted to be wizards. Kinda cute and funny. Until they start bullying the locals, shooting people, and stealing stuff.
They’re the bad kind of crazy, but they are motivated by magical thinking - they really believe that the right mix of words grant special magical powers. This has caused violent altercations many times when the incantations fail when they’re applied to law enforcement.
