Interestingly, today, we have people on the left, scolding each other
because each faction believes that it has the true path to salvation or
revolution or whatever word one wishes to use for the goal toward which we
look. One of the differences among the various factions is style. Another is
intellectual conceptualizing. A third is generational. I listened to a very
long discussion yesterday, which was held in California between two women
from the BLM movement and a doctor who is director of a foundation that
provides funds for various projects that help young people. It was a very
Califonia kind of discussion, everyone being very gentle, kind, mindful,
etc. Then later, I listened to Democracy Now and one of the participants in
the political discussion was a BLM woman who reminded me very much of the
people I'd heard earlier. She kept talking about how BLM wasn't endorsing
any presidential candidate because real change has to come from the people,
from actions in the streets. And there was Cornell West, a different
generation who usually says he loves everyone, and who said he'd be in the
streets with her, but who very clearly thinks that political action is
important and who, by the way, did not say that he loves Sister Hillary. As
a matter of factd, he didn't call her "Sister", at all. And then there was
an old fashioned political operative from the Farm Workers Union, Dolores
Fuerte, who supports Hillary and who repeated the Democratic party line over
and over again, regardless of what she was supposed to be responding to. And
I thought about all of the other opinions on the left and the centrist
people who call themselves Progressive, and it is truly mind boggling. The
Right was able to take over in this country because it has been single
minded and ruthless, and because it eliminates any differences of opinion
arbitrarily.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Carl Jarvis
Sent: Thursday, March 10, 2016 10:57 AM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: 'The truth will come out: Finicum was flat
murdered'
At the risk of being too vague, basic human nature has not seemed to have
improved over the centuries. The biggest problem with looking to history is
that history is written with strong biases, and reflects more of the values
of the writers rather than actual happenings of the time being recorded.
But even with a slanted history, we can learn from broad overviews. If we
get too deep into quibbling over details, we run the risk of losing our own
point.
I notice how folks get caught up in customs and language that are out of
vogue today, sounding strange and offensive. We can't compare who we were
with who we are, based on superficial differences.
Expressions such as, "Noble Savages", or "Half Breed", or "Pickaninny"(a
small Black child). We come from people who have convinced themselves that
we are some sort of Special People. We use expressions to put those not of
our society in their place. A place well below ours. So today we have
different words to describe those people and customs and religions. But the
bottom line is the same.
Just because we are now so civilized that we say, "the N word" instead of
Nigger, does not mean we are a better people. We are just as base and mean
spirited as were the ancient Romans.
My point, if I even have one, is that Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels were
just as able to draw conclusions from the wealth of materials housed in the
great London library, as are today's social scientists, combing the Library
of Congress or the great New York Public Library.
In fact, back in Marx' day they may have been better able to get to their
basic conclusions more easily, since they would have had much less biased
material to wade through.
Interestingly, my grandmother Jarvis(Hickman) was nine years old at the time
of Marx' death. Grandma was raised in Missouri on a down-at-the-heels
plantation, by a Black Nanny. Grandma was nursed at birth by a Wet Nurse, a
Black woman. Grandma would watch TV and hear of the unrest in the South,
back in the late 50's, and tell me, "Coloreds are alright...in their place."
I didn't need to ask her just where that "place" might be.
So while today we use different words to identify other people and other
cultures, are we any less base and cruel? We need to get on with the task
of developing a way to be all inclusive in our interactions.
That is a very big challenge.
Carl Jarvis
On 3/10/16, joe harcz Comcast <joeharcz@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Yes, the trouble with e-mail threads.Complicated things get diffusedrunning water.
in to a
few comments.
But, Marx certainly did not have the wealth of archeological and other
findings we have today. In fact he had really very little and for the
most part, though not always was quite European centric. That is not a
knock, but
a fact.
That said he did have quite a bit for the times at his disposal of
wwhat was
available at the London Library.
Still the prevailing views of indiginious peoples were either that
they were
savages/barbarians or they were idealized as Rosseuan "noble savages".
Things were much more complex than that.
In the so-called "New World" pre-Columbian even by European standards
if applied objectively many cultures were, in many aspects even more
advanced than their conquerors. For, example the population center in
what is now Mexico City was greater than any city in Spain and most in
Europe. Water systems were as advanced as the ancient Romans with full
Agricultural techniques were far more sophisticated and superior toterritories.
those in
Span. Those are a few examples. Oh and structures were quitesophisticated.
The Mayans had far superior mathamatics and astronomy. On the other
hand both cultures didengage in religious human sacrifice....Oops the
Spaniards were pretty brutal too. Anyway you get my point.
That is all I'm saying.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Roger Loran Bailey (Redacted sender "rogerbailey81" for DMARC)"
<dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Wednesday, March 09, 2016 9:44 PM
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: 'The truth will come out: Finicum was
flat murdered'
I don't know that your statement that Marx thought it was all linear
development is accurate. Marx was well aware of uneven development. In
fact, he pointed to slavery in the new world while capitalism was in
full swing as an example of uneven development. What he did see,
though, was that history progresses through patterns. It is not just a
collection of random events. And in those patterns you can see when
one economic system transforms into another and you can observe how it
does so and so you can draw lessons from those observations.
On 3/5/2016 8:38 AM, joe harcz Comcast wrote:
Again, I'm talking about the notion of land as property. Also here
you Miriam are pointing to a post Columbian culture for there were
no horses
prior to the Spanish bringing them here.
You do have points however that there warring peoples at play here.
That
is true. And they had clashes between different cultures even
pre-Columbus.
But Roger is most correct in his fundamental point that in North
American
cultures, except for the Aztec and Mayan the land was "owned in common"
amongst the peoples and the wealth derived was shared or used in common.
It is very complicated however, to put rigid notions down on all of
this
"combined and uneven" development.
For things didn't happen in a linear development as Marx seemed to
suggest. Simply, it was much more complicated than that though Marx
did have some very valuable contributions he wrote at a time were
much of this was not known.
----- Original Message ----- From: "Miriam Vieni"
<miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Friday, March 04, 2016 10:41 PM
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: 'The truth will come out: Finicum was
flat
murdered'
It was my understanding that the American Indian tribes considered
themselves to be nations. They fought each other for a reason. The
aggressor nation started a fight with another nation in order to
take what it had.
So
it wasn't individuals owning things. It was a whole group owning
stuff and wanting the stuff that the other group owned. I don't
care what terms one uses. I don't care if you use a word other than
own. And I don't care if what they wanted was land or horses or
hides or women. Or maybe they were fighting just for the fun of it?
But they did take some of the members of the vanquished tribe as
slaves. The slaves belonged to the winners.
Miriam
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Roger ;
Loran Bailey (Redacted sender "rogerbailey81" for DMARC)
Sent: Friday, March 04, 2016 9:04 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: 'The truth will come out: Finicum
was flat murdered'
Remember that
no one claimed that primitive communism was ever practiced outside
the community. And also remember that American Indians were not
practicing primitive communism at the time of the European invasion
and had not been practicing it for many thousands of years at
least. With that said, it is true that certain communities did
control certain territories and if you insist that it be called
ownership then you can call it ownership even if the members of the
land controlling community may not have understood the concept of
ownership. However, if the territory was own it was owned by
the
community as a whole and it was exploited through the labor of the
community for the benefit of the community. That is, it was the
means of production and when the means of production is owned
commonly and worked commonly by everyone in the community then even
though you, as a member of a capitalist society, feel compelled to
assign ownership to someone, even if the someone is a collective,
it is effectively not property at all.
On 3/3/2016 11:17 AM, Miriam Vieni wrote:
The anthropologists studied people in many parts of the world, but
that was after our own native peoples had been ethnically cleansed
so what we have are the stories of the American Indians
themselves, and their lives as observed by their conquerers. I
gather that a tribe owned a vast swathe of land through which it
moved through the seasons. Buut then they invaded each other's
so were treated as just as much of the community as the first group."owned"
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of joe ;
harcz Comcast
Sent: Thursday, March 03, 2016 10:00 AM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: 'The truth will come out: Finicum
was flat murdered'
Land as property was not a concept among North American Indians
until long after Columbus.
It does not mean however that they were "primatives" for lands
were highly cultivated and even forest lands were managed. But
they were
so-to-speak in common, not by individual land holders, and for thecivilizations.
common good.
Now again I'm talking about North American cultures. There are
differences in some of the Mezo=-American (Aztecs, Mayans) and
Inca
than one century.
By the way before Columbus there were cities and cultures more
advanced and more populated than in Europe at the time. In fact
there were one hundred million native americans before Columbus.
But guns and germs and steal destroyed about 98 percent of that
population in less
limit of language.
98 million people! The holocaust was astounding.
have to scoot but there are some excellent books on this history
and they are "objective" too.
Joe
----- Original Message -----
From: "Miriam Vieni" <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Thursday, March 03, 2016 9:48 AM
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: 'The truth will come out: Finicum
was flat murdered'
But in some, people did own things and they used them as tokens
of wealth or power. Sometimes it was cows or shells. Some groups
had elaborite systems for evaluating wealth. I studied all of
this stuff in college so I can't remember all the details but
there was great variation in cultures.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of joe ;
harcz Comcast
Sent: Thursday, March 03, 2016 7:09 AM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: 'The truth will come out: Finicum
was flat murdered'
Again correct for the most part for these were for lack of better
words mutualist/communal societies.
Also in many indigenous societies there were no real notions of
private property including ownership of land itself.
It wasn't even a concept this private ownership of property that is.
Itwas indeed owned by all in common.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Roger Loran Bailey (Redacted sender "rogerbailey81" for
DMARC)"
<dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Wednesday, March 02, 2016 10:11 PM
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: 'The truth will come out: Finicum
was flat murdered'
If you are not using the word class in the same way that I am
then you are talking about a different subject and using the
same word to talk about a different subject to someone who is
talking about one subject at the same time that you are talking
about a different subject is a recipe for a failure to
communicate. Anyway, a classless society does not deny the
existence of leaders or even bullies. What makes preclass
societies classless is that all members of the community
participate in labor and the labor is conducted for the
collective good of the community. It would be a stretch of the
definition of exploitation, but if there is any exploitation of
labor then it is a mutual exploitation. One feature of the
Australian social system before the European colonization is the
lack of clear lines in regard to where one community ended and
another began. In most cases of preclass societies the limit was
the
Even in nearby New Guinea there were and still are hundreds of
languages in a very small area. These languages were
unintelligible to each other and effectively made a barrier that
defined the community. There are a lot of indications that prior
to ancient imperialist conquests the proliferation of languages
was similar over the entire planet. Of course, the necessity of
common origins of humanity means that even prior to that there
must have been only a few or even one universal language. The
linguistic distribution in Australia was a bit different,
though, and may well be closer to what the situation was prior
to the extreme proliferation of mutually unintelligible
languages. In one area the people spoke in the same way while
just a few miles away some of the words were different and
inflections were slightly different, but there was no problem in
understanding each other. The neighbors were considered part of
the community and aided each other. A few miles further along
the people spoke a little bit more different from the first
group and less different from the second group and to the second
group were no more difficult to understand than the first group and
and the others too.of pattern was seen.The first group would have noticed more profound differences in
their speech, but would have had not much trouble understanding
them while having less contact with them. Then just a few miles
even further away the same kind
Once you got about half way across the continent the peoplehave been considered to be of different nationalities.
would be speaking so different from the first group that they
would not be able to understand each other at all and so they
would effectively be speaking another language. But would it
really be a different language since each adjacent group would
be able to understand one another perfectly well? On the rare
occasions that people from one side of the continent interacted
with one another they would have considered each other to have
been different communities and in the modern world would
Nevertheless, each adjacent group considered itself to be one
community. They just lived in slightly different areas.
What this led to was that effectively the whole continent was
cooperating with each other for mutual benefit with no coercion
and no coordinating government. The whole continent was living
in anarchy, the same kind of anarchy that the anarchists
advocate. It functioned because the people of one locale saw
each other as friends and neighbors and realized that mutual
cooperation with the people around oneself was beneficial to oneself
everything up.They also had every reason to understand that cooperating withwas mutually beneficial too.
the people over the hill
That is, they had mutual interests and few conflicting interests.
Then the Europeans showed up and started deporting their
criminals into the continent and insisting that the natives
adopt the European culture or else and that kind of messed
characterization.equally.
On 3/2/2016 9:28 PM, Miriam Vieni wrote:
I don't know anything about the social organization and culture
of the indigenous population of Australia. But I do know how
little children behave in a play area. Some kids are more
aggressive than others. Some take toys from others. Some push
others out of the way in order to be first going down the
slide. I suspect that those folks in Australia had a power
structure with some being the leaders or the elites or
whatever, even if that meant that they were the ones who
decided how the food would be divided up or how tasks would be
allotted. I'm not using the word, "class", in the precise
manner that you are. But I am saying that in any group of
people, you'll end up with some individuals who are more
dominant, who are leaders in one way or another. The power is
never distributed
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of ;
Roger Loran Bailey (Redacted sender "rogerbailey81" for DMARC)
Sent: Wednesday, March 02, 2016 8:36 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: 'The truth will come out:
Finicum was flat murdered'
If you claim that the main barrier to a classless society is
human nature then you will have to explain all of the classless
and stateless societies that have existed. About the only way I
can see that you can do that is to exclude them from being
humans. To pick out just one example, I would expect that all
of the people who are descended from the residents of Australia
before the European colonization might rather object to such a
Feb.murdered'variety.
On 3/2/2016 10:59 AM, Miriam Vieni wrote:
I think the main barrier to a classless society is humananarchist.
nature, not the stae. But other than that, I suppose I could
call myself an
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of ;
Roger Loran Bailey (Redacted sender "rogerbailey81" for DMARC)
Sent: Tuesday, March 01, 2016 10:48 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: 'The truth will come out:
Finicum was flat murdered'
Anarchism and socialism are very similar. I have explained on
this list before that anarchists and communists have pretty
much the same goal.
Anarchists just call that goal anarchy and communists call it
communism.
Both tendencies are for the eventual abolition of the state.
The main difference is that the anarchists see the biggest
obstacle to that eventual goal to be the state itself. They
have the idea that class society is caused by the existence of
the state and that if the state were abolished then class
society would go away. Lenin's book, State and Revolution, was
mainly a polemic against the anarchists. He argued that their
stance that a classless society could be attained by the
abolition of the state would not work because those who had an
interest in the state's continued existence would just
reestablish it on the instant that it was abolished. I will
counterpose scientific socialism to anarchism now because even
though I said that socialism and anarchism are very similar it
is more accurate to point out that anarchists have always been
considered to be socialists, just not of the scientific
something in common.Scientific socialists hold that class society causes thewill gradually transform from a means of administering people
state, that the state is a way of regulating and administering
class relationships and that if class society is abolished
then the objective conditions for the continued existence of
the state will have been removed and the state will fade away.
That is, it
into a means of administering things.
By the way, it is important to remember that anarchists call
themselves libertarians. They were calling themselves
libertarians a long time before the right wing libertarians
started calling themselves libertarians. That is why I cringe
whenever the word libertarian is used on this list as if
right-wing libertarian was the only kind of libertarian.
Insofar as they advocate the abolition of the state or its
minimization, though, the right-wing libertarians and the
left-wing libertarians, the anarchists, have
The main difference between those two camps is that thetalking about and that Chuck does not know enough about it
left-wing libertarians are in favor of the abolition of
capitalism and class society in general and the right-wing
libertarians are for the elimination of the state, but have no
problem with capitalism and with class society in general.
Still, though, there are a whole lot of complete
misconceptions at large about what anarchism is and,
unfortunately, that is true among a lot of people who falsely
call themselves anarchists. That is probably why Chuck says
that all the anarchists he knows seem so selfish. The point is
that the people he knows who call themselves anarchists
probably do not know what they are
himself to recognize that.
On 3/1/2016 9:57 PM, Miriam Vieni wrote:Re:
Emma Goldman was an anarchist. There's a book about her on
BARD and one on Bookshare. I haven't gotten through much but
she sounds very close to being a socialist.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of ;
Roger Loran Bailey (Redacted sender "rogerbailey81" for
DMARC)
Sent: Tuesday, March 01, 2016 9:21 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: [blind-democracy] Re:
[blind-democracy]
[blind-democracy] Re: [blind-democracy] Re: [blind-democracy] Re:
[blind-democracy] 'The truth will come out: Finicum was flat
anarchist.Bakunin ...anarchy.
My comment about bringing on the anarchy was intended as a
sarcastic response to your elevation of property over justice
for human beings and the then disparaging indication that
otherwise you would have
But, actually, I wonder if you have really ever known an
anarchist.
Most of the people I have known who call themselves
anarchists do not know what they are talking about. I
remember one who was a singer in a punk band who called
himself an anarchist and I asked him which anarchist
tradition he adhered to. He didn't seem to know what I meant
so I offered some suggestions, Kropotkin, Proudhon,
who?
He then said that he was not an old anarchist, he was a new
selfishness.politics.anarchist.Then he threw around some words like death and destruction. Ivote for Bill Clinton.
just shut up having satisfied myself that he did not have the
slightest idea what an anarchist was. Then there was the
woman who claimed to be an anarchist and when I tried to
explain to her where I thought anarchist politics went wrong
she also seemed to not know what I was talking about and then
went on to tell me about how important it was to
The list goes on. There have been a few, though, who did
adhere to traditional anarchist collectivism. I worked with a
man in the anti-draft movement who was well grounded in
anarchist politics and history. At a later time I got
peripherally involved in the defense of a high school student
who was expelled from school for being an
I had some conversations with her and while I found her a bit
naive she was definitely learning about and following
anarchist
what anarchism is.Later she sued the school board and even though I was not
present in the courtroom I caught a report on television and
was surprised that my old comrade in the anti-draft movement
testified as a friend of the court and as an expert on anarchism.
He turned out to be a university professor by then. Since you
describe the anarchists you have known as selfish people I
suspect that they were of the variety who claim to be
anarchists but do not understand
And if you take their claims of being anarchists as good coinfact, anarchist philosophy is completely incompatible with
I suspect that you don't know much about it either. I do
happen to have some very strong reservations about anarchism,
especially the position about abolishing the state by decree
and the theory that capitalism is a manifestation of the
state rather than the state being a manifestation of
capitalism or some other class system, but it is undeniable
that many anarchists have dedicated themselves to anarchist
collectivism as both a revolutionary goal and as a way of
life. That is far from selfishness. In
out:On 3/1/2016 12:54 PM, Charles Krugman (Redacted sender
ckrugman for
DMARC) wrote:
what has anarchy ever done for people? The anarchists that I
know of are extremely self-serving and operate out of a very
narrow perspective, their own!
Chuck
-----Original Message----- From: Roger Loran Bailey
(Redacted sender "rogerbailey81" for DMARC)
Sent: Tuesday, February 23, 2016 5:09 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: [blind-democracy] Re:
[blind-democracy]
Re: [blind-democracy] Re: [blind-democracy] 'The truth will
come
2006.Finicum was flat murdered'
Property before people? How capitalist. Bring on the anarchy.
On 2/23/2016 6:38 AM, Charles Krugman (Redacted sender
ckrugman for
DMARC) wrote:
the real issue here is how one chooses to fight for injustice.
When one crosses certain boundaries such as property lines
there are potential consequences. We live in a society
where anarchy does not rule.
Chuck
-----Original Message----- From: Roger Loran Bailey
(Redacted sender "rogerbailey81" for DMARC)
Sent: Friday, February 19, 2016 8:31 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: [blind-democracy] Re:
[blind-democracy] 'The truth will come out: Finicum was
flat murdered'
And what does one risk when one chooses to not fight back
against injustice?
On 2/19/2016 9:26 PM, Charles Krugman (Redacted sender
ckrugman for
DMARC) wrote:
when one chooses to live as an outlaw and adopt the ways
of the wild west taking over property that doesn't belong
to them they run the risk of being killed or murderedd if
one chooses to use the melodramatic rflare.
Chuck
-----Original Message----- From: Roger Loran Bailey
(Redacted sender "rogerbailey81" for DMARC)
Sent: Monday, February 15, 2016 6:35 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] 'The truth will come out:
Finicum was flat murdered'
http://themilitant.com/2016/8007/800755.html
The Militant (logo)
Vol. 80/No. 7 February 22, 2016
'The truth will come out: Finicum was flat murdered'
BY SETH GALINSKY
Working people should denounce the cold-blooded Jan. 26
killing of Robert "LaVoy" Finicum by Oregon State Police
and the FBI; the frame-up conspiracy charges against Ammon
Bundy and others who took part in the occupation of the
Malheur National Wildlife Refuge; and the frame-up of
Dwight and Steven Hammond, two Harney County, Oregon,
cattle ranchers, imprisoned for a second time on the same
bogus arson charges dating back to 2001 and
"The truth will come out. LaVoy was just flat murdered,"
Tad Houpt, the owner of a small logging company, said by phone
over.farmers.cops.
7.
Finicum and Bundy were traveling to a Jan. 26 community
meeting that Houpt helped organize in John Day, Oregon,
when they were intercepted by the
Bundy initiated the refuge occupation Jan. 2 to draw
attention both to the frame-up of the Hammonds and to U.S.
government land policies that have been undermining the
livelihood of ranchers and
ranch.The persecution of the Hammonds outraged small ranchers
and farmers throughout the West - controlled burns are
common to control invasive plants and to prevent the
spread of wildfires.
Despite serving the sentence imposed by the trial judge,
the Hammonds went back to jail Jan. 4, because of a U.S.
Appeals Court ruling that their sentences didn't meet
federal minimum rules.
After the trial the U.S. Bureau of Land Management
vindictively revoked the Hammonds' grazing permits,
threatening the survival of their
Meanwhile, the Oregonian reported Feb. 6 that the scanty
official information and one grainy video released on the
killing confirm many aspects of the accounts by Shawna Cox
and Victoria Sharp - who were in the pickup truck driven
by Finicum.
According to both of them, the cops first fired one shot
at the vehicle they were in after Finicum initially pulled
refuge.ranchers participated.corner,"weapons," it reports.agitators.up.Finicum then shouted out to the cops, "I'm going to see
the sheriff," a reference to Sheriff Glenn Palmer of Grant
County, who was also scheduled to be at the John Day
meeting and has been quoted in the press as saying the
Hammonds should be freed.
Finicum tried to drive away, but was soon forced off the
road again.
The
Oregonian reports that the FBI admits lethal force was
used when the truck "approached the checkpoint," that is,
even before the vehicle crashed into the snow bank and
Finicum gets out with his hands
Much of the capitalist press justifies the killing and
prosecutions by labeling Finicum and Bundy as extremists
and outside
land policies."To his detractors," the New York Times said, "he was a
doctrinaire leader of an illegal protest that is deeply
opposed by many who live near the refuge." The paper
conveniently leaves out that most people in the area
support the demand to free the Hammonds and are
sympathetic to their opposition to the government
Many local residents visited the refuge, met Finicum and
Bundy or donated food and supplies to the occupiers.
Some 1,000 people attended Finicum's funeral in Kanab,
Utah, Feb .
5.
While pretending to be objective, the Times' description
of the scene plays on many of its readers' prejudices.
After the service there were "cowboys on horseback and
members of so-called patriot groups wearing camouflage and
carrying small
The Times did quote one rancher from Nevada, Diana Clark,
at the funeral. "All of us ranchers feel like we're backed
into a
she said. "And it's hard to get anyone to acknowledge our
needs, and so they gave us a platform."
At least 22 smaller protests against the killing of
Finicum took place Feb. 6, from Florida to Washington. One
common placard was "Hands Up, Don't Shoot," a slogan first
popularized by protesters against police brutality after
the killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, in
2014. At events in John Day and Prineville, Oregon, dozens
of local
Meanwhile, federal prosecutors have now indicted 16
supporters of the occupation with conspiracy to "prevent
by force, intimidation and threats, officers and employees
of the United States Fish and Wildlife Service . from
discharging the duties of their office" at the wildlife
firearms.
The list of what the indictment calls "overt acts" to
further the conspiracy is proof itself that the
prosecution is a frame-up.
The first "act" it lists is an Oct. 5 meeting where Ammon
Bundy warned Harney County Sheriff David Ward that if the
Hammonds went to jail there could be "extreme civil unrest."
Although the occupiers are not accused of pointing their
weapons at anyone, the indictment claims that they
"brandished and carried firearms." Oregon law allows the
open carrying of
97720.discussion.Bundy released a statement from prison Feb. 6, noting that
the occupation was civil disobedience. He encouraged those
"who disagree with my speech" or dislike his ideas to
engage in civil
"If you do not advocate for government to tolerate ideas
that it hates, then the First Amendment and free speech
mean nothing,"
he said. "Arm yourself with ideas. . Argue and disagree.
Be free."
Supporters of the Hammonds continue to organize. A new
online petition calling on President Barack Obama to free
the Hammonds had
3,341 signatures as of Feb. 9. The Oregon Cattlemen's
Association is asking that donations be sent to: The
Hammond Family, c/o Sandra Carlon at US Bank, 493 N.
Broadway, Burns, Oregon
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