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Blackrobes, Black Hats, Black Deeds

Media-Suppressed Nevada Case History Shines Truth on Government Ranch invaders


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By —— Bio and Archives April 12, 2014

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Coming clearly through the throbbing of helicopters and the roar of the SUVS of the feds harassing the Cliven Bundy Ranch, patriots there for Bundy should “tell it to the judge”.
There is mainstream media-suppressed case history in Nevada the feds are desperately trying to keep under wraps. Chief Judge Robert C. Jones of the Federal District Court of Nevada smacked down high-handed, abusive feds, sending the pretend cowboys riding roughshod over Western ranchers and property owners back to their cobweb-laced offices in 2013. In spite of their 200 armed snipers with boy toys in tow, those Stetson-wearing feds hunkering down on Cliven Bundy’s Ranch are nothing more than a bunch of cowardly ‘cobweb cowboys’ doing duty for radical environmentalists. In the upheaval of Bureau of Land Management bureaucrats caving in fear to the radical environmentalists of the day, the Rule of Law still works in court, and everyone of those feds brandishing weapons knows it down at heart. “The court case, U.S. v. Hage, has been keenly watched by legal analysts and constitutional scholars--but has been completely ignored by the major media.” (New American, June 3, 2013)
“As we reported last November ("Judge Blasts Federal Conspiracy; Ranch Family Vindicated — Again!"), in June 2012, Judge Jones had issued a scorching preliminary bench ruling that charged federal officials of the U.S. Forest Service (USFS) and the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) with an ongoing series of illegal actions against Nevada rancher E. Wayne Hage that the judge described as “abhorrent” and a literal, criminal conspiracy.

“Judge Jones said he found that “the government and the agents of the government in that locale, sometime in the ’70s and ’80s, entered into a conspiracy, a literal, intentional conspiracy, to deprive the Hages of not only their permit grazing rights, for whatever reason, but also to deprive them of their vested property rights under the takings clause, and I find that that’s a sufficient basis to hold that there is irreparable harm if I don’t … restrain the government from continuing in that conduct.” No cowpoke cuss could ever transcend what Judge Jones openly called feds invading ranch land.

“In fact, Judge Jones accused the federal bureaucrats of racketeering under the federal RICO (Racketeer Influenced and Corruption Organizations) statute, and accused them as well of extortion, mail fraud, and fraud, in an effort “to kill the business of Mr. Hage.”
Judge Jones bottom-lined what the government is doing to ranchers and property owners--end of chapter! He, and likely other federal court black robes, know that the mainstream media goes into overdrive in trying to keep the truth from the masses. Tragically, Fed-harassed rancher Wayne Hage was vindicated three years after he died. (Capital Press, Dec. 8, 2009). While no one (mercifully) has died on the Bundy ranch--yet--the stories of Bundy, ---Hage, Wally Klump and others are a disturbing match.
“In a previous court decision, Senior Judge Loren Smith referred to the well-publicized Hage lawsuit as "a drama worthy of a tragic opera with heroic characters." “A federal judge has added $150,000 to the original $4.22 million judgment won by the estate of rancher Wayne Hage in a years-long battle over property rights. “The federal government had asked Senior Judge Loren Smith to throw out the judgment. Instead, he increased it. “Hage, a leader of the "Sagebrush Rebellion" against federal control of land, was the husband of former Rep. Helen Chenoweth-Hage, R-Idaho. They both died in 2006. “The order is the most recent victory in a legal dispute that stretches back to 1991, when Hage filed suit against the government for taking his private property without just compensation. “Hage's 7,000-acre ranch in Nye County, Nev., bordered several allotments in the Toiyabe National Forest on which he built fences, corrals, water facilities and other rangeland improvements for cattle grazing. “Tensions began to mount between the rancher and the U.S. Forest Service in the late 1970s, when the agency permitted the introduction of elk to the national forest, resulting in damaged fences and scattered cattle, according to court records. “Over the next decade, other incidents aggravated the strain and eventually led to the lawsuit. “According to court documents, the Forest Service excluded Hage's cattle from forage and water in certain allotments, impounded animals that entered those allotments and prevented him from maintaining ditches needed to exercise his water rights. “In his legal complaint, Hage claimed the agency had breached its contractual obligations and violated his constitutional rights. “During the course of litigation, the U.S. Court of Federal Claims decided the Forest Service could legally prohibit grazing on the allotments without compensating Hage, since grazing permits are licenses and not contracts. “As such, the impoundment of cattle was not an unconstitutional taking because the cattle had trespassed on government land, the court said. “However, the court ruled that the agency had taken Hage's water rights, ditch rights-of-way, roads, water facilities and other structures without just compensation and in 2008 ordered the government to pay him $4.22 million. “The federal government asked the court to change or set aside the financial compensation, alleging there's no evidence Hage actually built hundreds of miles of fences, trails, ditches and pipelines on the allotments. “Under the law, Hage would qualify for compensation only if he had built the structures, the government said. “Because his grazing permits only authorized Hage to maintain the structures, he was not entitled to their full value, the government said. “The judge disagreed. “In the context of the grazing permits, "maintenance" included placing or construction, he said in the most recent ruling. “The government's argument "cannot be squared with the language of the statute and the reality of range work and construction," Smith said. “In adding more than $150,000 to the award, the judge ruled that his previous decision had mistakenly omitted the value of ditches and pipelines taken by the government.”
Yesterday, there were reports of confrontations “teetering on violence” at the Bundy Ranch, where family members and supporters angrily confronted rangers holding tasers and barking dogs. The sounds of the Sagebrush Revolution are getting louder with a warning to high-handed feds frightened into doing the work of radical environmentalists against ranchers. The warning coming through loudly and clearly is telling the cobweb cowboys of the government: “Back off!”



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Judi McLeod is an award-winning journalist with 30 years’ experience in the print media. A former Toronto Sun columnist, she also worked for the Kingston Whig Standard. Her work has appeared on Rush Limbaugh, Newsmax.com, Drudge Report, Foxnews.com.

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