Showing posts with label tyranny. Show all posts
Showing posts with label tyranny. Show all posts

Wednesday, September 2, 2015

Wingnuts in Uproar Over Denali Name Change

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Proving once again that wingnuts will despise ANYTHING President Obama does, the wingnuts went even more nuts than usual when the name of Mt. McKinley in Alaska was changed back to the Native name of "Denali."

Via National Geographic
What's in a name? For the tallest mountain in North America, plenty. On Sunday, U.S. Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell signed an order officially changing the name of the 20,320-foot (6,194-meter) peak in Alaska from Mount McKinley to Denali.
“With our own sense of reverence for this place, we are officially renaming the mountain Denali in recognition of the traditions of Alaska Natives and the strong support of the people of Alaska,” Jewell said in a statement.
Denali, the peak's traditional name in the local Koyukon Athabascan language, means "the great one."



Breitbart called it a "Teachable Moment in Tyranny" even while admitting that most Alaskans wanted the change. But . . . but . . . Obama, that tyrannical Kenyan!!!!!!
Alaskans, and millions who love Alaska, support changing the name of Mt. McKinley to Denali. And that is exactly why President Barack Obama’s unilateral decision to change the name is so wrong.
When we allow leaders to bend the rules for popular policies, we create bad precedents for them to bend the rules for unpopular ones. The name ought to have been changed through a legislative compromise, or a consultative administrative process–not by fiat.
. . . Instead, Obama acted out of sheer vanity, timing the name change with his Alaskan visit.

Donald Trump vowed to change it back, of course, hahaha. More likely he will name it for himself. Trump Mountain. Trump Highest Peak in North America.



The reason Trump says it is an "insult to Ohio" is that President McKinley was from Ohio. So of course, the Ohio wingnuts went berserk, including Senators Boehner and Portman:





Portman was wrong about the assassination of McKinley. According to Talking Points Memo, the mountain was officially named several years before McKinley died.

Bob Cesca pointed out on Salon:
• The Alaska Geographic Board has actually used “Denali” as Alaska’s official name for the mountain since 1975.
• The National Park that includes Denali has been known as “Denali National Park and Preserve” since 1980.
. . . Sarah Palin, of all people, referred to the mountain as Denali in her 2009 farewell address after resigning halfway through her first term as governor.

Yes, Sarah Palin called the mountain Denali, but her daughter Bristol wasn't paying attention (probably as usual). I thought Todd Palin had Inuit ancestors?

From Wonkette:
Well finally that Alaskan idiot — no, not Sarah, but her spawn Bristol ...has weighed in, and ...what the hell is she even talking about?

President Obama is taking a trip to the Alaskan Arctic.
I wish we could add up how much this trip costs the tax payers dollars……….. They probably had to BARGE limousines here!!!!!!! They rented out an entire TOWER at our nicest hotel here? A TOWER!!!!!!!!!!
Is her mother ghostwriting for her, or did Bristol just write this drunk? Did they really have to BARGE limousines here!!!!!! To a TOWER!!!!!!!!! At our nicest hotel here? All right, cut the semi-literate shit, let’s get to the good stuff:
By the way, no one is buying the “Denali is what the Alaskans have called it for years” line. I’ve never called the mountain Denali .. and neither does anyone I know …
It’s Mt. Mckinley … It always has been and always will be to most of us… What a waste..
Look, here is your mommy, on video, quitting her job and saying “Denali” ... “Denali, The Great One, soaring under the midnight sun,” Sarah Palin says, right around the 1:25 mark. Did that sound like “Mt. McKinley” to you, Bristol?




















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Saturday, April 12, 2014

#BundyRanch stand-off in Nevada attracts Militias and Wingnuts

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A rancher named Cliven Bundy in Nevada refuses to pay what he owes the Bureau of Land Management for 20 years of cattle-grazing rights on public land, so they have moved in to seize his cattle. The far right rabble-rousers and conspiracy nuts are using Bundy's plight to make political hay (pardon the pun) and call for an all-out range war against the Obama Administration. The Nevada Militia has called for back-up, and that's fine as long as no one gets shot, which could happen any minute. Then they will blame Obama instead of themselves, of course.


From the LA Times
Officials say (Cliven) Bundy is illegally running cattle in the 600,000-acre Gold Butte area, a habitat of the protected desert tortoise. Last year, a U.S. District Court judge ruled that if the 68-year-old veteran rancher did not remove his cattle, they could be seized by the Bureau of Land Management.
On Thursday, federal authorities began closing off Gold Butte area and rounding up what they call “trespass cattle” there. Many of them belong to Bundy.

For two decades, Bundy has waged a one-man range war with federal officials over his cattle's grazing on 150 square miles of scrub desert overseen by the BLM. Since 1993, he's refused to pay BLM grazing fees, arguing in court filings that his Mormon ancestors worked the land long before the BLM was formed, giving him rights that predate federal involvement.
Bundy also likes to say he "fired the BLM," vowing not to give one dime to an agency that he says is plotting his demise. The back fees exceed $300,000, he said.

The father of 14 insists that generations of his family have ranched and worked this unforgiving landscape along the Virgin River since the 1880s. He says government overregulation has already driven scores of fellow ranchers out of business in sprawling Clark County, leaving him as the last man standing.
For years the rancher has insisted that his cattle aren't going anywhere. He acknowledges that he keeps firearms at his ranch and has vowed to do "whatever it takes" to defend his animals from seizure.
"I've got to protect my property," he told The Times last year. "If people come to monkey with what's mine, I'll call the county sheriff. If that don't work, I'll gather my friends and kids and we'll try to stop it. I abide by all state laws. But I abide by almost zero federal laws."

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This is a lot bigger deal than just my cows. It’s a statement for freedom and liberty and the Constitution.
~ Cliven Bundy via Fox News

It just shows that we’re not a sovereign state. It just shows that the federal government thinks they have power over us. My county and my state is allowing this to happen. But you know what? They haven’t taken our cattle yet. We’re still hanging on.
~ Carol Bundy, wife of Cliven Bundy

Bundy with Sean Hannity on Fox, via Media Matters
BUNDY: Well, you know, my cattle is only one issue that the United States courts has ordered that the government can seize my cattle. But what they have done is seized Nevada statehood, Nevada law, Clark County public land, access to the land, and have seized access to all of the other rights of Clark County people that like to go hunting and fishing. They've closed all those things down, and we're here to protest that action. And we are after freedom. We're after liberty.

HANNITY: How far are you willing to go? How far are you willing to take this?

 BUNDY: My statement to the American people, I'll do whatever it takes to gain our liberty and freedom back.
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No cow justifies the atmosphere of intimidation which currently exists nor the limitation of constitutional rights that are sacred to all Nevadans.
~ Nevada Gov. Brian Sandoval, via Fox News

Despite having no legal right to do so, cattle from Bundy’s ranch have continued to graze throughout the Gold Butte area, competing with tortoises for food, hindering the ability of plants to recover from extensive wildfires, trampling rare plants, damaging ancient American Indian cultural sites and threatening the safety of recreationists.
~ Nonprofit Center for Biodiversity

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From CBS Las Vegas
LAS VEGAS (CBS Las Vegas/AP) — Militia groups are rallying behind a rancher whose cattle are being seized by the federal government.
The Las Vegas Review-Journal reports that two militia members from Montana and one from Utah have arrived at Cliven Bundy’s ranch.

“We need to be the barrier between the oppressed and the tyrants,” Ryan Payne of the West Mountain Rangers told the Review-Journal. “Expect to see a band of soldiers.”
Payne said that militias from New Hampshire, Texas and Florida are likely to join and stand with Bundy and stay at his ranch.
“They all tell me they are in the process of mobilizing as we speak,” Payne told the Review-Journal, adding that hundreds of militia members are expected.

The Review-Journal also reports that Bundy’s son, Ammon Bundy, was shot with a stun gun by law enforcement officers Wednesday and that the rancher’s sister, Margaret Houston, was pushed to the ground.
“I pulled the tasers out of him,” Cheryl Teerlink told the Review-Journal.



From The Blaze (conservative website):
“I’m seeing a lot of passionate Americans willing to stand up for important rights,” said Nevada state Assemblywoman Michele Fiore.

Fiore, a Republican, said Friday she has been making the 80-mile drive from Las Vegas to a growing tent city of militia members, advocates and protesters in dusty but scenic rangeland near Bundy’s ranch, just east of the Virgin River. She said she was horrified that BLM police used stun guns on one of Bundy’s adult sons during a Wednesday confrontation on a state highway near the Bundy melon farm in the Gold Butte area.

Video of that confrontation has spread on the Internet, along with blog commentary claiming excessive government force and calls to arms from self-described militia leaders. Some have invoked references to deadly confrontations with federal authorities, including a siege of a ranch home in Ruby Ridge, Idaho, in 1992 and the fiery destruction of a religious compound near Waco, Texas, that killed 76 people in 1993.

In Arizona, a congressman said he and several state Republican lawmakers may travel to Bunkerville to protest what they perceive as government heavy-handedness.


Friday, 4/11 - The FAA Closes airspace over the Bundy Ranch:

FDC 4/1687 ZLA NV..AIRSPACE MESQUITE, NV..TEMPORARY FLIGHT RESTRICTIONS WITHIN AREA DEFINED AS 3NM RADIUS OF 364624N/1141113W (MMM71 RADIAL AT 4.3NM) SFC-3000FT AGL LAW ENFORCEMENT INVESTIGATION. PURSUANT TO 14 CFR SECTION 91.137(A)(1) TEMPORARY FLIGHT RESTRICTIONS ARE IN EFFECT. ONLY RELIEF AIRCRAFT OPERATIONS UNDER DIRECTION OF BLM ARE AUTHORIZED IN THE AIRSPACE. BLM TELEPHONE 702-335-3191 IS IN CHARGE OF ON SCENE EMERGENCY RESPONSE ACTIVITY. LOS ANGELES /ZLA/ ARTCC TELEPHONE 661-265-8205 IS THE FAA COORDINATION FACILITY. 1404112140-1405111434


The Far Right is using #BundyRanch as an Anti-Obama Rallying Cry and Call to Arms

































The Left Wing view of the stand-off:





























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Friday, November 22, 2013

GOP Cries "Tyranny!" as Reid Nukes the Filibuster

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Harry Reid is giving them hell in the Senate! But Honey Badger Don't Care!

The change we propose today would ensure executive and judicial nominees get an up-or-down vote on confirmation – yes or no. This rule change will make cloture for all nominations other than Supreme Court nominees a majority threshold vote – yes or no.
The Senate is a living thing. And to survive, it must change. To the average American, adapting the rules to make Congress work again is just common sense. This is not about Democrats versus Republicans. This is about making Washington work – regardless of who’s in the White House or who controls the Senate. To remain relevant and effective as an institution, The Senate must evolve to meet the challenges of a modern era.
~ Senator Harry Reid, D-Nevada, Asking for Filibuster Reform on Floor of the Senate, 11-21-13





From Huffington Post
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) pulled the trigger Thursday, deploying a parliamentary procedure dubbed the "nuclear option" to change Senate rules to pass most executive and judicial nominees by a simple majority vote.
The Senate voted 52 to 48 for the move, with just three Democrats declining to go along with the rarely used maneuver.

From now until the Senate passes a new rule, executive branch nominees and judges nominated for all courts except the Supreme Court will be able to pass off the floor and take their seats on the bench with the approval of a simple majority of senators. They will no longer have to jump the traditional hurdle of 60 votes, which has increasingly proven a barrier to confirmation during the Obama administration.

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I realize that neither party has been blameless for these tactics. They developed over the years. But today’s pattern of obstruction, it just isn’t normal. It’s not what our founders envisioned. A deliberate and determined effort to obstruct everything, no matter what the merits, just to refight the results of an election is not normal, and for the sake of future generations we can’t let it become normal.
~ President Obama in remarks after the Filibuster Change





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Neither a Democratic president or a Republican president should face this level of obstructionism in exercising their Constitutional responsibility. They have a right to get an up or down vote on staffing the administration and on judges. Now a Republican president of the future will not face this unacceptable obstacle, either.
. . . The filibuster has been used to wage continuous warfare on the presidency. The Senate said today that’s not acceptable. A huge thank you to the leadership team.
~ Senator Jeff Merkley, D-Oregon, to Greg Sargent on The Plum Line, WaPo

. . . Reid never would have used the “nuclear option” without the lemming-like behavior of Senate Republicans. Less ideological GOP members could have voted more frequently to break cloture and force an up-or-down vote, as members of both parties have done, even as filibuster use has increased. They could have stopped the unprecedented number of filibusters of presidential nominations, given that the president has a clearly defined constitutional responsibility to appoint people. They could have stopped blocking duly passed laws. But they didn’t.
So Republicans decrying filibuster reform as “dictatorial” or “a day to be sad” or other hyperbolic claims should look in the mirror. No one forced them to turn filibusters from a rarity to an oft-used tool for nullification and unprecedented obstruction. They have only themselves to blame.
~ James Downe on Washington Post










































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