Talk:Bundy standoff/Archives/2014/April

Orphan tag

I propose taking away the "orphan" tag on this article, as the page Grazing rights links to it. However, this "Bundy standoff" is rife with politicized coverage (and I googled it, and apparently conspiracy theorists are all over this stuff, it's a bit toxic), so I urge particular caution on further edits. Samcashion (talk) 05:53, 12 April 2014 (UTC)

Removal

I removed the "orphan" tag on the article. Biased or politicized or not, the "orphan" tag is used to denote a page with no pages that link to it. Grazing rights links to this page, so I removed the orphan tag. (Someone added "Clive Bundy" to the See also section of the page. His name is 'Cliven,' not 'Clive.' So I removed it altogether and added the link to Bundy standoff. NiklawskiMSTM traveled from the fourth dimension to deliver this text to you. Please thank him on his talk page. 16:53, 12 April 2014 (UTC)

Good! I didn't want to unilaterally remove it myself, because I wasn't sure whether there were other things that needed to be done first. Thanks Samcashion (talk) 23:14, 12 April 2014 (UTC)

Removal of unconstructive edits

Someone with the IP address of 187.250.123.47 made a few edits that I deemed destructive. Here's a list of the edits, my action, and an explanation of my actions:

• Reverted "[...] somehow "owned" the land long before the establishment of the BLM -- despite his lack of any legal title or evidence. The BLM argues that allowing Bundy not to pay his land management fees discriminates against the over 16,000 law-abiding ranchers who pay the same fees. Bundy's refusal to pay his fees thus gives him a competitive advantage over law-abiding ranchers. The BLM also makes an environmental argument, noting that the illegal grazing of Bundy's cows is further endangering the desert tortoise." I reverted this due to the very evident bias towards the side of the BLM. What would be less biased is if the editor had put, "According to the BLM, Bundy's refusal (blah blah blah). (citation)," and the lack of the citation shows clear bias. And I even cited how the government is executing the desert tortoise. Sure, Infowars might not be a good resource, but a bad resource is better than no resource.
• Reverted all changes of "taxes" to "fees" as if you look into it, the payments in question are actually payments that Bundy was required by law (though didn't anyway) to pay as income tax.
• Reverted the request for a citation for the part where it says that Sean Hannity called out the BLM. I would cite it if I knew how to cite a television program.
• Reverted the request for a citation at the part where it says many people have claimed that the BLM used excessive force. If you go on and read about why many people claim that the BLM has used excessive force, the reasons have their own citations, thus rendering an additional one redundant.
• Reverted unnecessary capitalizations. Did they pass English? If it doesn't start a sentence and isn't a proper noun, don't capitalize it!
• Reverted "Unfortunately this argument makes no sense, as the enforcement action has its origins in a 1998 decision, upheld by a Nevada judge in 2013, that Cliven Bundy was violating the law. In that 1998 decision Cliven Bundy was permanently enjoined from grazing his cattle on the land he illegally claimed." This was heavily biased. And, speaking from the view of someone who believes this conspiracy (I'm personally on the fence about it), the government may say that that is why, but Harry Reid may have something to do with it and the government isn't telling us. Speaking from the point of view of someone who doesn't believe it, still. Why make a perfectly unbiased section of Wikipedia describing a conspiracy theory biased?
• Changed "Over 200 agents<citation #2> Bundy then dramatically exacerbated the situation by bringing in outside militia groups to attack federal officials who were attempting to retake the federal range land," back to its previous state as "Over 200 agents<citation #2>" The line, "Bundy then dramatically exacerbated the situation [...]" is biased and unnecessary. In Bundy's eyes, he was doing the right thing. In the BLM's eyes, he dramatically exacerbated the situation. So let's just keep it unbiased and remove the biased portion. Fair?

I haven't taken out the Infowars citations yet. I have second-hand knowledge that some things that are referenced from Infowars happened, as my friend's dad was down there and gave me live updates. So I'll be looking for alternative references.

Oh, and if you're wondering, I accidentally deleted some of the edits that actually were not destructive, including the conspiracy theory. They should be back up soon. — Preceding unsigned comment added by NiklawskiMSTM (talk • contribs) 00:46, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

You admit above to not being the best writer, and you show gross misunderstandings of sources and biases. For the sake of a balanced viewpoint, please stop editing this article. Corey Glynn (talk) 03:44, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

Some suggestions for balance

Realiable sources. Excerpts from something someone allegedly said on TV should never be used unless you have a transcript or other recording to direct people to. Try to use publications which have a reputation for even handedness and good fact checking. Remember to include both sides of the argument. Right now, this article's kind of a disgrace IMO. 173.228.54.18 (talk) 22:23, 12 April 2014 (UTC)

"Bundy is the trespasser, and is responsible for past fees, liable for damages, and must negotiate grazing and fees with the agency going forward"...this is a biased statement. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.71.24.90 (talk) 22:47, 12 April 2014 (UTC)

Referring to First Amendment Zones as unconstitutional is a biased statement. They have not been unambiguously ruled as such by the Supreme Court. Actually the court has ruled them constitutional so long as a set of criteria for their use has been met. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.87.139.9 (talk) 01:01, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

Remove the term 'statist' from the phrase 'statist courts'. The meaning of the term statist is tied to one's POV, and as such cannot be used without creating ambiguity. In the Wikipedia definition any and all court is statist because the only form of society that is not statist is anarchy. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.87.139.9 (talk) 19:50, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

Add a reference to the FAA No Fly Zone that was imposed over the area restricting access to "ONLY RELIEF AIRCRAFT OPERATIONS UNDER DIRECTION OF BLM" http://tfr.faa.gov/save_pages/detail_4_1687.html

Add details from this original youtube video of the confrontation at the cattle coral. Note the frame that shows BLM snipers overlooking the scene. Note the protestors steadily advancing on foot and horseback on the heavily armed law enforcement personnel. Not clear if law enforcement is threatening over bullhorns to shoot. Note that the law enforcement withdrew and did not engage with the protestors. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bD61YFxUga4 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.202.22.176 (talk) 22:55, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

More unbiased now

Recent edits and organization of sections have resulted in a significantly better article with much less bias. Neutral wording and the addition of factual material with cites have contributed to a more encyclopedic reading. This article will need to be improved more, especially by the addition of more cites on the protest section. Baleywik (talk) 23:57, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

After several hours of cleanup, the page is starting to form into more of a wikipedia article. Editors should pay attention to the need for cites when new material is added. This helps to make it unbiased. Baleywik (talk) 01:46, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

It's filling up with facts!

I just wanted to say, kudos to the editors who've improved this article pretty dramatically over the last several hours. 173.228.54.18 (talk) 04:43, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

You can "thank" the various editors by going to the View History page https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Bundy_standoff&action=history and at the end of each edit you will see "thank". Click the ones you think are worthy of your thanks :) Baleywik (talk) 01:51, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

Suggestion that Page be Removed

Trying to keep my language as neutral as possible: any coverage of this issue will be seen as biased by somebody. Report on it when it is history. 174.56.63.69 (talk) 02:16, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

It has been happening since 1993. It is history. 173.153.10.128 (talk) 03:00, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

Shoot to kill

Watch the videos and audio of the final confrontation at the gate. The BLM clearly state over the loud speaker that they (THE BLM) were going to shoot the American Patriots if they attempted to cross the BLM line. The BLM had military assault rifles pointed at the crowd and the BLM were hiding behind armored vehicles. 09:17, 14 April 2014‎ 66.87.90.25 (talk)‎

You can add such material in a different paragraph or sentence if you have a written transcript of it you can point to, or if it is in print somewhere that you can cite a reference to it. However, you can't just change the previous entry that was written that has a cite reference already with an exact quote. If you persist it is vandalism to keep reverting it. Baleywik (talk) 09:36, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

Last Man Standing debunked

Reported claims by media and Bundy that he is the last cattle rancher in Nevada or Bunkerville have been debunked. In fact, cattle owned by other ranchers were rounded up in the same pens as Bundy's. See the cites in the article for reference. Baleywik (talk) 09:55, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

Could you post the source and quote here for future reference? The page changes too fast and I don't want the information to be lost. 70.8.177.67 (talk) 16:57, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

Bundy may be the last cattle grazer in the Bunkerville allotment area only because he is illegally grazing in an area where cattle aren't allowed anymore! But even that has been debunked, because here is the cite showing cattle owned by other Bunkerville cattle ranchers were rounded up in the BLM roundup contractor sweep https://www.reviewjournal.com/news/nevada/good-progress-cattle-roundup-decelerate Baleywik (talk) 22:37, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

According to BLM records the Bunkerville 02005 allotment area has been officially closed to cattle for many years. Any livestock found on that land are there illegally. You can reference it easily in the BLM map system by going to the http://www.geocommunicator.gov/blmMap/Map.jsp?MAP=SiteMapper and in the Select Map drop down in the upper right select Rangeland, turn on all the sub layers, then zoom into the Bunkerville area. Here is a pdf of the listing https://www.blm.gov/workspace/ihtml/Request?DocUUID=0000010c1214c4b1-0000-691d-0a780c38&DocInstanceID=1&SectionName=&StatusID=0&Command=ExportPDF&FileName=&ObjectIDs=&Params=CurrentPageNo%7C1%7CCurrentPageNoH%7C1%7CCntSz%7C1037x674&BrowserURL=&HiddenParams= Too bad nobody cares about facts anymore. There are too many 'true believers' out there stirring up trouble, it seems, IMHO Baleywik (talk) 22:35, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

Family History Fixed

I fixed the family history section based on the source. Leavitt was only in Bunkerville for a few years, and Cliven's ancestors were quickly moved elsewhere. It also explains why Cliven's family didn't return to Bunkerville until after the 1930s. 70.8.177.67 (talk) 18:27, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

It should be enough for the article to say he makes all sorts of unverified claims that have no effect on the outcome even if they're true. Even if his family grazed cattle in the Virgin Valley since 1877, it doesn't mean he has the right to ignore the law. Bundy has the burden of proof and the burden to provide arguments that make sense. The article should not assume his arguments make sense, nor does it have a burden to disprove a negative by having a section on family history that could potentially grow to include all of his ancestors from the era to exhaust all possibility of his claim being true. KinkyLipids (talk) 00:09, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

The Leavitt family is part of the central claims. Putting up the family history is important to telling this tale. This is more than a legal battle. It is a complete PR war by the Bundy family against everyone. Putting up all the facts is important for the reader so they can see where reality stands in comparison to Bundy's claims. 173.153.5.233 (talk) 00:17, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

The Blaze as a source

The Blaze is being used as a source in this article currently. That isn't really appropriate, seeing as The Blaze doesn't really have any reasonable pretense of being an objective source of information. There are obvious POV issues with anything coming from this site. We really should try to find other sources verifying what they say, or scrap the section using it as a source entirely. Last night I edited the section which was stating a dubious assertion by Carol Bundy that there were/are snipers in this conflict, as fact, and noted that (even within the article it says BLM spokeswoman Kirsten Cannon didn't confirm this) there has been no verification of what Bundy said. I'm not sure if that's enough though, because this still might mislead people. Samcashion (talk) 23:30, 12 April 2014 (UTC)

Samcashion asserts, "There are obvious POV issues with anything coming from this site."

Here are five statements coming from The Blaze.

• A 4-year-old southeastern Pennsylvania boy is dead after police said he was hit by a van just after his father’s funeral.
• The co-pilot of the missing Malaysia Airlines jet attempted to make a call mid-flight, moments before the aircraft vanished from radar, a Malaysian newspaper reported.
• Ukraine’s interior minister says one security officer has been killed and five others have been wounded in a gunfight with pro-Russian militia.
• A Texan, apparently, isn’t easily accepting the ticket he got in the mail after a camera allegedly caught him in a traffic violation.
• The Metro Transit Authority said it uncovered a camera made to look like a power outlet and a credit card skimming machine at a busy Manhattan subway station.

None have obvious POV issues.

Now that Samcashion's assertion has been disproven, one wonders whether Wikipedia editors who make such false assertions themselves have obvious POV issues. 75.163.143.115 (talk) 17:28, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

You have mischaracterized that user's actual assertion, which is: "The Blaze doesn't really have any reasonable pretense of being an objective source of information." The POV issues stem from that. Regardless of your ability to pull quotes, and without remarking on the validity of your assertion that "None [of the statements] have obvious POV issues", there are better sources of information for a story of this exposure. Corey Glynn (talk) 22:00, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

Did someone redefine the word "actual" while I wasn't looking? I'll repeat Samcashion's actual assertion again: "There are obvious POV issues with anything coming from this site." Not only didn't I mischaracterize his actual assertion, I took care to accurately copy and paste every single letter of it. The thing you wrote is most definitely not his actual assertion.

If you see any "POV issues," obvious or not, with the five Blaze statements reproduced here, by all means please point them out. That would give us some insight into where you're coming from. 75.163.143.115 (talk) 01:01, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

I doubt anyone besides you understood the user to mean that literally every string of characters on the site has POV issues. I wouldn't get too caught up on this — we are not using The Blaze as a source. Corey Glynn (talk) 06:34, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

Is Taser a Commonly Understood Word Among Readers At Large?

Twice now I have edited the first occurrence of the word Taser to have double brackets, thereby creating a link to the Wikipedia article on this device. And twice, different folks have steamrolled right over this helpful link, replacing whole paragraphs, leaving some readers in the dark as to what is being discussed.

My idea of helpful text is to have a few hyperlinks to other Wikipedia articles here and there as appropriate. Since Taser and especially tasering and tasered are not yet what I call common words, I consider it entirely appropriate to link the first occurrence for the benefit of readers.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help:Link

If useful hyperlinks get carelessly removed, more articles would earn the dreaded "orphan" tag, and where would that leave us?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Orphanage

What is the consensus on Taser? I certainly don't want to keep adding links that nobody wants. But I can't help but think that the folks who are editing this article every two minutes are well aware of Tasers, and have given no thought to the possibility that there might be readers who need to find out what one is. Megapod (talk) 01:11, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

definately a good idea wo ad d a wikilinkLihaas (talk) 15:12, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

Page creation

I created this page because I am really interested in this. But this is Wikipedia, which is an encyclopedia. We want to keep things as unbiased as possible. I'm not the best writer, so if you can put it in there in an unbiased fashion, that'd be great.

NiklawskiMSTM traveled from the fourth dimension to deliver this text to you. Please thank him on his talk page. 16:50, 12 April 2014 (UTC)

Thanks to NiklawskiMSTM for creating this page. Elevated this section to top level instead of subsection. Baleywik (talk) 00:38, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

No mention of the top story on internet the day before ... you guys sleeping?

www.infowarscom/breaking-sen-harry-reid-behind-blm-land-grab-of-bundy-ranch/

What about all the videos:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bD61YFxUga4

Wikipedia is useless for anything other than non-controverial neutral info such as some basic biology or mathematics.

Xowets (talk) 23:48, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

Infowars is a fringe site that has been repeatedly debunked on basic claims (like how long the family has been in the area, the background, etc.). They might as well put a notice at the top of the page reading "the facts are opposite of what we will say below" or move the site to The Onion. 173.153.0.21 (talk) 00:12, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

We don't need that kind of disinformation. Wikipedia is an online encyclopedia, not a sensationalist blog or tabloid. Baleywik (talk) 02:41, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

On conspiracy theories of Reid profiting from land

"Ranch Stash" snopes.com. — goethean 18:21, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

Has Bundy made any statements on private ownership?

As Bundy does not want the Federal Government to own the disputed land, has he made any comments regarding it being rendered private by being sold to the highest bidder? If this wasn't him would he be okay with removing his cattle off the then private property, because his principle is about fighting big government? Has any source asked him this question, as it would be good to add such a response to this article to indicate whether he is acting out of principle or self-interest.==Wowaconia (talk) 22:26, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

There are already reports of Bundy cattle roaming on others' land and tearing up private property owned by others in the Bunkerville area. There are reports of Bundy cattle running wild on the highways and roads of the area and getting hit by cars. There are reports of Bundy cattle in Lake Mead National Recreation Area (National Park Service). See some of the cites in the article about it or the uploaded image of the BLM website. Baleywik (talk) 23:18, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

Very little sense to seems to be able to be hashed out of his stance on these things. I read all the court filings, and essentially he argues that the state of Nevada owns the land, not the federal government, but also that he has preemptive rights to graze on them (Not a shining beacon of internal consistency). At one point the government offered to help sell his cattle to the highest bidder at no cost to him with him receiving all sales of the proceeds. He flatly refused, so it doesn't sound like self-interest is the only thing motivating him. There have been a number of traffic accidents caused directly by his cattle. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Dlk0606 (talk • contribs) 06:08, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

Mixing of court cases

The ruling provided in the bottom of the US v Bundy summary box is part of a separate case against the guy from the 90s (different parcels of land). Most of those documents predate PACER so they would be harder to get, but I can pull what I can find; perhaps we should create two distinct boxes for the two cases to avoid confusion. Dlk0606 (talk) 06:19, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

Please add all 1998 transcripts to the same Infobox. They are the same court, just another round. Two infoboxes will make it much too bulky. IMHO Baleywik (talk) 07:13, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

It is the same Court and the same caption (because it's the same parties litigating in the same district), but they are two distinct federal actions dealing with closely related but different causes of action; perhaps there is a way to create an internal distinction between the two? Dlk0606 (talk) 12:03, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

Specifically, we would be best served by noting the existence of the two cases and grouping documents from the two cases separately. Right now we only have the order from Oct. 2013 for the first action (1998), but I've gathered several additional pleadings as well as the pre-ECF docket sheet that I can load onto the wiki Dlk0606 (talk) 13:28, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

Similar federal grazing legal cases

Since several other legal cases in Nevada seem to run parallel to the Bundy case, it is appropriate to make note of them in a top level section near the bottom of the article. They all involve US Federal lands and ranchers who were taken to court for cattle grazing permit violations or trespass cattle, and there were different outcomes in each of the cases.Baleywik (talk) 19:01, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

United States v Gardner

This case is very similar to Bundy, in fact Bundy cited it in his case. It was argued and lost on states' rights. Baleywik (talk) 19:01, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

Similarity to US v Hage

I am having a difficult time finding a reference that demonstrates similarity between the Bundy case and US v Hage. The Bundy case is about whether grazing permits are required at all. But Hage was about water rights, grazing incidental to those water rights, and the unfair denial of grazing permit applications. In Hage, the court ruled on the basis of expert testimony that grazing incidental to water rights was allowed within one-half mile of the water source. My understanding is that the ruling concludes that unpermitted grazing beyond that distance would constitute trespass, but that the government had acted unfairly in denying Hage his permits. The ruling orders that (1) the Hage estate will apply for permits consistent with those held before the government refused to renew them, that (2) the BLM and USFS will consider and approve those applications "in accordance with regulation and statute" (i.e., no jerking them around), and that (3) the Hage estate will pay the standard fees for those permits.

Those conclusions are described in pages 101 to 104 of this ruling. My understanding of the Bundy case is that Bundy rejects the assertion that any permits are required whatsoever. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.17.128.88 (talk) 15:36, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

Bundy has attempted to pay his grazing fees to the state or county, and paid his fees until the BLM orchestrated a cap of 150 animals, that effectively destroyed over 50 ranches. The United States v Hage found that the Forestry department had engaged malfeasance. It is reported by eye-witnesses that the BLM last week was engaged in removing water sources from the area. The document I referenced is in the Congressional record, I had problems finding the actual court case, reading it now 009o9 (talk) 00:24, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

The county clearly told him that they were not the agency to pay. The Hage case is also completely unrelated. The "destroyed over 50 ranchers" was already debunked. 173.153.3.126 (talk) 00:37, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

It is normal to offer fee in trust in disputed contractual claims and also demonstrates an Adverse possession claim. Just because a file clerk does not accept the fees in trust does not mean that the good-faith offer was not made. For instance, if a landlord refuses to maintain the apartment you've rented, in many jurisdictions, it is perfectly acceptable to to pay your rent to a trust instead of the landlord until the case is resolved in court.

US v Hage specifically addresses the 1993 ruling where Mr. Hage wrote some kind of signing statement, and subsequently, the BLM refused to issue a permit. likely because they would be bound to such an agreement. I believe that Mr. Bundy refused to sign because the document compelled him to give away some of his existing grazing rights. This is simply an alternate way to test the law, in this case to see if an Executive branch agency had over-stepped its bounds. Page 99 "Defendants clearly had a good faith belief in their right to use the land as they did and had no intention to disregard the right of others. This does not prevent a trespass claim, but it does prevent punitive damages."

THE COURT FURTHER FINDS that the denial of E. Wayne Hage’s renewal grazing application for the years 1993–2003 was an abuse of discretion, as well as a violation of due process, as the only reason given for the denial was that the applicant noted near his signature that he did not thereby relinquish certain unidentified rights under the UCC, a superfluous condition that cannot possibly have affected the terms of the permit. It is this violation that has led to all of the allegedly un-permitted grazing to date and the BLM’s refusal to offer any permit to Hage himself.

The court also instructed the BLM to issue back permits in accordance with historical usage, so if Bundy had agreed to the 150 head limit for any length of time, he would probably be stuck with it.

IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that Hage shall apply for renewal grazing permits consistent with those possessed by E. Wayne Hage before the refusal of the BLM and USFS to renew them, using standard application forms, and without attempting to add any conditions or commentary not provided for on the standard forms. The BLM and USFS must consider and grant the application(s) in accordance with statute and regulation, i.e., in accordance with those historical usages and preferences in the relevant areas existing as of the last date E. Wayne Hage or Jean Hage had such permits in good standing, and Hage shall pay the required standard fees.

It does appear that there can be trespass, but the BLS must prove each instance of the animal being more than half a mile from the location owner's watering rights. Those watering rights appear to include irrigated areas.

Now, let's see about this "debunking" you speak of.009o9 (talk) 02:09, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

"Fee in trust" is not a thing, which is why the county rejected taking any of that money. This is the equivalent of saying that you don't trust the IRS so you will send what you owe to your state instead. That isn't how it works and it is silly to use that as a justification. Also, Hage has nothing to do with this case. Bundy was originally in the Bunkerville Allotment and claimed grazing rights there. Then he left and went to the Golden Butte, where he never had any claims. The current dispute is Golden Butte. 173.153.3.126 (talk) 02:16, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

There are tons of diffent kinds of trust accounts, most commonly they are called escrows, fund control accounts and retainers, in fact the tax withholding taken from your paycheck is likely placed in a segregated account and dispersed to the government quarterly. I haven't found anything that supports your claim of Bundy moving, or that it would somehow extinguish his family's rights water and grazing rights. Even the court documents, filed by the BLM against Bundy state that the family has been working the land in question since 1877. Bundy's personal residence is irrelevant here.

Now you are trying to tell me that Federal statutes are not uniform between the Bunkerville allotment and Golden Butte?009o9 (talk) 02:39, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

What I am telling you is that they were two different parcels. They claimed to have rights to the one, but never did and were removed. Then they went further into the park land where there was no possible way for them to have the rights, and they suddenly make it up now. Also, none of the court documents mention that he had rights but state that "even if he did" have some claim that it would not matter because any supposed claim would not have been legal. It has already been proven by Bundy's ancestors biography and his family website that they lived in Arizona and not Nevada. They did not work the land according to their own previous history. 173.153.3.126 (talk) 03:38, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

In fact, I do recall reading that the water and grazing rights were purchased from his father, so it is quite likely that Bundy may have lived elsewhere, even so, since when is a businessman required to live at his business?009o9 (talk) 02:45, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

There is no proof that they were ranchers in that area until well after 1930. 173.153.3.126 (talk) 03:38, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

What does 1930s that have to do with the case at hand? The BLM wasn't created until 1946, both are irrelevant. It is without question that Bundy had grazing rights prior to 1993, so the rights are established. On May 23, 2013 it was discovered that the government agents had been perpetrating fraud against ranchers (via water and grazing rights in the same jurisdiction) for decades (70s and 80s). This is the discovery of new evidence and grounds for appeal and very relevant to this article. 009o9 (talk) 04:49, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

[1] The Federal Government had an agency that later became the BLM since 1787. The Taylor Grazing Act was also there in 1934. No one has been able to say that the Bundy have ever had grazing "rights" nor is it a right. It would be a permit. There could also be no claim to Bundy having anything in Golden Butte because he never claimed that until the recent case. Before, he was illegally in the Bunkerville Allotment, and Golden Butte is further into the Federal lands from there. 174.147.113.160 (talk) 14:10, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

"oo9", if you have ANY actual evidence, show it. You claim something found on May 23, 2013 - I can find no links that back you up. Either come up with evidence or go away. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.31.236.94 (talk) 14:12, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

I added a citation needed tag. If the two cases are similar, and if the similarities are both noteworthy and relevant, then it should be easy for someone to find a reference that verifies this similarity. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.17.128.88 (talk) 14:18, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

I undid a revision that purported to establish similarity between the two cases. The only similarities that are well-established are that the government and a rancher went to court over a trespass claim. The paragraph about US v Hage does not emphasize that aspect of the trial; it emphasizes how the court ruled harshly against the BLM and USFS. In the Bundy case, courts have repeatedly ruled in favor of the government and against Bundy. I agree that the cases are similar insofar as they both involve trespass on federal lands. But there are substantial dissimilarities — one is about unfairly denied permits, and the other is about permits that a rancher refused to apply for. An authoritative, unbiased (or minimally biased) source is needed in order to verifiably establish how these cases are similar. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.17.128.88 (talk) 15:25, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

Concur with this - we need a GOOD source (not a primary source or connected source) primarily about Bundy that mentions that the Hage case is related. That's it, that's all that's needed to connect this. Ravensfire (talk) 15:45, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

Simple enough, I'll spend the rest of my day informing media resources, let them digest US v. Hage, and we'll see what comes up. 009o9 (talk) 16:09, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

Anonymous, so sending a swat team in for a trespass violation is not a harsh ruling? At this point I suspect WP:COI, do you work for the Department of Interior or subsidiaries? Both men were accused of grazing trespass cattle without a permit on BLM managed land in Nevada. In the case of Hage, he was denied a 1993 permit because he added a signing statement to attempt to preserve his rights, Bundy refused to sign the 1993 agreement because the understood the instrument could limit his rights. Both men continued to run cattle starting in 1993 in violation of trespass.

Additionally, you don't find it absolutely extraordinary that government witnesses were found guilty contempt and witness tampering? Is this common-place in Nevada?

I can't revert my edit because, newer edits have been added -- I will have to re-edit the section. I was going to leave the section alone, but since you added the citation needed tag, I'm going to oblige you. I can add a lot more to the section, but I'm trying to honor other editors preference to keep the section brief. 009o9 (talk) 16:01, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

If you readd the same information with teh same sources you did earlier, I will revert it as the sources do not mention Bundy, are primary sources and/or are flat out poor sources. EDIT: Also, you need a source that directly mentions the connection, otherwise it's synthesis. You might consider creating an article about Hage, then linking it as a See Also from here. Ravensfire (talk) 16:21, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

The Court record is FACT and is a primary source, and the two instances of testimony to Congress are also primary sources. I only provided facts drawn cleanly from primary sources and according to Secondary_does_not_mean_independent synthesis can only occur in secondary sources. I only provided unneeded secondary sources as a courtesy. As I look around, I can see that you guys have already wrecked Wikipedia with your intolerant POV and off the cuff declarations of what media sources are credible. Bundy standoff has not even reached 40,000 views, congratulations guys, you've turned Wikipedia into Media Matters, nobody comes here for credible information. I'm sure most will find nothing wrong with that.

I'm sure that when I locate a secondary source, connecting Bundy and Hage, the source will be challenged because it is not a source that is compromised with an FCC license or White House press credential. 009o9 (talk) 18:50, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

Your attempt to make this a liberal vs conservative issue by mentioning Media Matters falls flat. None of the conservative or Republican pundits are backing Bundy. Only the Libertarians are. Conservatism believes in upholding the law, not having militias rove in packs and doing whatever they want. The backers are in the smallest minority and most of the videos they praise have been met by shock and horror at what the militias are doing by the average person. 70.8.248.135 (talk) 19:12, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

Primary sources are great if this article were called U.S. v. Hage or 'the Hage Forest Service dispute', but secondary sources establishing independent synthesis are required to establish the connection to this article. I don't understand why you think it's unneeded. Anyways, the primary source you gave for the 1993 rule changes did not even say anything about those changes. Credibility of media sources is established by consensus, as I said before. If you can't find a source espousing your POV outside of the John Birch Society, which blatantly misquoted the court ruling, that tells you something about yourself and about the strength of your argument. I noticed you did find one reliable secondary source, but it provided no connection to Bundy. Again, that's the point of a secondary source. It's not just meant as a courtesy to complement a primary source.

It's interesting that you're now making accusations of ulterior motives against editors without evidence. And you're still using less than a handful of individual convictions to generalize to rampant corruption in Nevada. You've also generalized the few editors on this article as responsible for wrecking all of Wikipedia. And you make predictions about how future additions will be challenged by us for reasons we've never used. This also tells you about the pattern in your thinking. KinkyLipids (talk) 19:43, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

The Washington Post cite used in the article to establish a connection between Bundy and U.S. v. Gardner is a good example of a secondary source establishing independent synthesis, as opposed to original synthesis, which is original research. That's all it takes. KinkyLipids (talk) 20:07, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

The local SWAT team was called out because armed militia members attacked a construction site. Police are always called to such incidents. No one has the right to point a loaded weapon at a Federal agent unless they are a law enforcement officer operating as such. 70.8.248.135 (talk) 16:44, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

So you are saying that no matter what I write on the topic, you are going to delete it? I see you have a new IP address today, are you running a proxy?

BLM arrived with full automatic weapons and sniper teams, as far as I'm concerned this is a swat team, this behavior dates back to 1992. I'm not talking about the BLM swat team that arrived on day one. I haven't seen any sources about an attack on a construction site.

The BLM does not have "automatic weapons" or "sniper teams." They are an agency with a small budget. If you looked at uniforms, those who were armed and active are local police that were called in because of heavily armed militias that have been threatening locals and park employees. 70.8.248.135 (talk) 19:13, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

Hi. The other anonymous commenter with a different IP address is a different person. I am a small business owner and I am not a government employee, contractor, or anything else that would constitute a conflict of interest. I am working under the assumption that you are editing in good faith and would appreciate it if you would do the same. If Hage is both similar and relevant to this case, it should be possible to find some source that has compared the two cases in some way. I have tried and failed to find such a source. I am working under the assumption that such a source exists and has not yet been found, which is why I have not deleted the section on Hage. I am asking if you can please help me find a verifiable source. I hope you agree that doing so will improve the quality of this article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.17.128.88 (talk) 15:21, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

Bundy answer nominated for deletion at Commons

I nominated the file File:United States v Bundy - Answer June 2012.pdf for deletion at Commons; you can find the deletion discussion here. RJaguar3 | u | t 13:40, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

That's fine, it will probably be deleted eventually, due to the fact that it is in a gray area of copyright law that hasn't been adjudicated (copyright status of third party public court documents). The document is pertinent to the article here, and very difficult or elusive for most to access, so it was uploaded. The few days of it being available here might enable it to be made available at a more accessible web location.Baleywik (talk) 19:44, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

I opposed the nomination for deletion, although I recognize that there are legitimate arguments for deleting it. Given that court records are public and freely available for view or copy by anybody with a PACER account or who travels to the courthouse (or calls its clerk), and our use here is definitely for education, I doubt any legitimate copyright claim could possibly arise out of its being posted. Further, as the only federal case I know of addressing unauthorized copying of court filings on copyright grounds (White et al v. West Publishing et al) has concluded in summary judgment being granted against plaintiffs, it seems there should be little issue here. Of course, a full order complete with legal reasoning is still pending in that case, and West moved on the basis of fair use (which, I think, is not recognized here), so it's not apples to apples. That having been said, I think that if we wait for jurisprudence on this issue, ie wait for someone to file a copyright infringement based on not-for-profit use, we will be waiting for a very long time, as I can't imagine many people taking up federal causes of action against RECAP etc. - and we'll be doing the public a great disservice in the interim. I recognize WikiMedia's policies are stringent, but surely they too can be a target of reasonable interpretation by intelligent people. Dlk0606 (talk) 13:39, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

Honestly, what does it add to the article? We should be summarizing what's in the court filings, not referencing them directly. Secondary sources should be pointing us to what's important in the documents, not our own interpretation. Ravensfire (talk) 14:08, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

I think that there is a valid argument to be made for providing the underlying documents so that people can view and get a better understanding of what exactly is at issue, should they so choose. There's not going to be much objective legal scholarship of any substance on cases that are both so recent and that create essentially no new precedent. Dlk0606 (talk) 16:34, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

Article disproving solar conspiracy

[2] This is a good resource that should be incorporated sometime. 70.8.153.27 (talk) 17:06, 18 April 2014 (UTC)

Proposed: a new page for Nevada grazing legal actions

The present section "Other Nevada grazing legal actions" is starting to take over the Bundy page. Already the bullet points and huge paragraphs full of legal issues regarding the Colvin and Hage case are way too off-topic for this Bundy page. It was fine when it was just a small paragraph about a background, but now it has legs of its own. It might be better to either de-emphasize the Colvin Hage section by moving it to the bottom, or else start a new page for it and just have a small paragraph on the Bundy page that refers to it. Baleywik (talk) 18:19, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose deletion or move. Since the Hage material has been pared down to a paragraph or two, and more cites added to provide good similarity between US v Hage and US v Bundy cases, we retract support for taking this section elsewhere or removing it. The material that is in the article now at this point should remain in it.Baleywik (talk) 18:45, 18 April 2014 (UTC)

• Support moving the whole subsection to a new article. It may be similar enough to be indirectly related to Bundy, but without a direct connection, there should be reliable secondary source establishing that the similarity is notable. At most, indirectly related cases would go into a See Also section. Otherwise anyone can start detailing every indirectly related case from the entire judicial history of grazing cases. KinkyLipids (talk) 18:39, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

Looks like much of the unrelated details have been removed, so there's no need to move anything to a new article, whose notability would be dependent on this article and be orphaned. They both appear to result from the 1993 rule change, and the Hage judge's ruling in favor of ownership of water rights gained through "local custom" might be relevant to Bundy's land improvement claim. I might not be remembering it correctly since it was removed and since the article changes rapidly. The quote about the government conspiracy appears to be specific to the Forest Service and unrelated to Bundy. Not specifying which agency generalizes it to any government agency and contributes to mass cynicism. KinkyLipids (talk) 01:22, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

• Opposed The government corruption in the Hage case needs the scrutiny it will receive from the Bundy publicity. Both cases originate from the same 1993 BLM "administrative" changes (profiteering) and the only difference is that the two men handled the same situation (in the same state and BLM region) differently. —Another thought, I'm not qualified to wade through years of water and grazing law, I don't think I'm qualified to do a US v Hage article. So in the absence of someone who is really dedicated to the topic, the likelihood that the two articles get merged back together is pretty high.009o9 (talk) 22:25, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

New Bundy Militia article

In related news, a new article has been started on the Bundy militia, also known as Bundy's militia. The wikipedia article is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bundy_militia . It only has about 4 cites so far, but the general framework for the article is in place.Baleywik (talk) 02:19, 19 April 2014 (UTC) Baleywik (talk) 05:21, 19 April 2014 (UTC)

Deletion of the Bundy militia article?

Within an hour of the Bundy militia page going up, someone objected to its existence :) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Bundy_militia Baleywik (talk) 02:19, 19 April 2014 (UTC) Baleywik (talk) 05:21, 19 April 2014 (UTC)

You are violating the rules by posting that. 173.153.4.250 (talk) 04:31, 19 April 2014 (UTC)

The above entry regarding possible deletion or keeping of the Bundy militia article has been modified to be more unbiased than previously worded. To quote wikipedia guidelines on canvassing: "In general, it is perfectly acceptable to notify other editors of ongoing discussions, provided that it is done with the intent to improve the quality of the discussion by broadening participation to more fully achieve consensus." Baleywik (talk) 07:13, 19 April 2014 (UTC)

1998 Ruling

A good resource we can use to better this article is the 1998 US District Court ruling. It has been uploaded here: http://www.scribd.com/doc/218116757/1998-U-S-Dist-LEXIS-23835 I see right off that the Bundy Ranch did not start grazing in this area until 1954. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.33.230.34 (talk) 00:32, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

Please read our pages on primary sources and especially using primary sources in a BLP article. Ravensfire (talk) 02:54, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

This is not a BLP. Court rulings are a well-established source of some types of factual information on WP. Eaglizard (talk) 17:07, 19 April 2014 (UTC)

Standoff numbers

[3] Reuters says that there were 1,000 in the militia with sniper rifles and the rest. It says that there were only a dozen rangers part of the BLM. Much of the IP vandalism and fringe sources are trying to suggest that there was a huge and armed Federal presence. That is clearly not the case. 173.153.10.44 (talk) 22:19, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

The article says 1000 total protesters. not 1000 militia. But, it seems that some enterprising editor could make the case and add cites for a factual entry about Bundy raising his own armed militia to wage war, and those 1000 people were indeed that militia. Feel free to talk about it more. The page probably needs a section to cover the armed confrontation incidents, which are well-documented in newspapers. Baleywik (talk) — Preceding undated comment added 23:03, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

The article describes only one militia sniper. KinkyLipids (talk) 05:28, 20 April 2014 (UTC)

Occupation (protest)

Does it deserve mention that the presence of Bundy's cattle on the land is an occupation protest to challenge the federal ownership of the land?

Efcmagnew (talk) 23:27, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

Maybe; is he reported as having characterized it as such? Dlk0606 (talk) 23:40, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

Doubtful, since cows aren't citizens. They are property of Bundy, and the cattle are primarly for commercial purposes. You would need to elevate the legal status of the trespass cattle from simply property, to an oppressed class of Nevadan-American bovine persons who lack suffrage and are vying to be recognized. But, that might have to pass muster at the state level first, then be pursued legislatively under states' rights issues as well. A constitutional amendment might be needed. I'm sure that many newspapers would write about it at that point, and you could add it to wikipedia then. :) Baleywik (talk) 23:45, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

LOL, Baleywik! But seriously, Dlk0606, if reliable sources describe it as an occupation while using the term "occupation" then we can too. --Elvey (talk) 16:25, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

Very Biased Article

This article is seriously biased. I attempted to clean it up but somebody reverted back to the la-la-land version. Issues:

-- It's a fact that the stand-off began when Bundy stopped respecting US law and failed to pay his grazing fees. The editor who edits it back to the idea that the stand-off originated because the government was at fault just doesn't understand how rule of law works. -- The Harry Reid conspiracy theories at the end are ridiculous; the most recent stand-off is a consequence of a Nevada judge's ruling in 2013 that the 1998 permanent injunction against Bundy was valid. This has nothing at all to do with Harry Reid. -- Infowars, a cartoonish "news" fabricator, should not be cited as a source. -- I noted in my edits that the BLM argues that allowing Bundy to get away with not paying his grazing fees discriminates against the 16,000 who do. Whoever edited out that edit is turning this article into a joke. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 187.250.123.47 (talk) 01:04, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

Rule of law doesn't equate to abrogation of the law (note- not necessarily saying this is). At any rate, youre supporting the othe rbias of the state side. There are 2 sides to every coin.Lihaas (talk) 15:57, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

I agree with most of the above. However, I'd say it's more appropriate to say, 'It's a fact that the stand-off escalated when Bundy stopped paying grazing fees.' Whether his reasoning is correct or not, a reasonable opinion is that what he has 'stopped respecting' is specific court interpretations of US law. "Bundy stopped respecting US law" is quite a different claim. --Elvey (talk) 18:04, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

Requested move or Title Change

The word "standoff" implies that two heavily-armed parties have each other in their sights, and both parties are potentially willing to escalate into violence.

While the government employees in the area were certainly heavily armed, there have been no reports that the Bundy family is heavily armed; and there have been no reports that the Bundy family was interested in escalating the situation into violence.

Even the first sentence of the article backs off from use of the word "standoff." It says "The Bundy standoff is a dispute", not "the Bundy standoff is a standoff".

Since it's actually a dispute, not a standoff, let's change the article name to "Bundy cattle-grazing dispute". 75.163.143.115 (talk) 17:51, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

• Support move to Bundy cattle-grazing dispute or Bundy grazing dispute. A standoff suggests an individual confrontation and has Wild West connotations similar to Mexican standoff or showdown. Merriam-Webster defines it as "an argument, contest, etc., in which there is no winner; a tie, deadlock". This article covers not just the recent confrontation but also the decades-long dispute. KinkyLipids (talk) 18:09, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

Support move to Bundy cattle-grazing dispute. It is more descriptive as an encyclopedic entry, and the article covers an ongoing, more historic legal dispute rather than just a few days of protest or armed confrontation. If there needs to be a spin-off of the article regarding the armed protest and confrontation, it should be called Bundy armed confrontation or something.(talk) 13 April 2014 Baleywik (talk) 19:57, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose move to Bundy cattle-grazing dispute or Bundy grazing dispute. The article and the dispute involves much more than the grazing issue. It involves land rights, state's rights, First Amendment, and others. Changing the title as proposed would give future editors an excuse to remove content about those other issues. Since the problem involves the word "standoff", I suggest simply changing the title to Bundy dispute. Sparkie82 (t•c) 19:31, 13 April 2014 (UTC)
• Alternative article names

This section is for proposed alternative article names.Baleywik (talk) 00:36, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

There should at least be another word between Bundy and dispute since there must be plenty of notable disputes involving someone named Bundy. Otherwise this article could show up in google search results for something like Ted Bundy. KinkyLipids (talk) 19:47, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

Agreed. I would support "Bundy land-use dispute" if Sparkie82 feels that "Bundy cattle-grazing dispute" is not general enough. 75.163.143.115 (talk) 20:06, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

Yeah, "Bundy dispute" is not descriptive enough, but I think "land-use" may be too narrow since the one of the key issues is the ownership/rights in the property, not just land use. Some other options: Bundy Bunkerville despute, Bunkerville dispute, Bunkerville Bundy dispute, Bunkerville BLM dispute, Bundy BLM dispute... I'm going to revert the recent name-change edits in the article until we have a consensus. Sparkie82 (t•c) 21:07, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

I'd go with Bundy BLM dispute and against anything with Bunkerville. The map of the disputed lands extends beyond the city limits of Bunkerville. KinkyLipids (talk) 21:22, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

• Standoff word is temporary Let's keep this in perspective. Standoffs are very temporary things. This is a 20 year-long legal dispute. Depending on how this whole thing plays out in the near future, the two-day Standoff incident will probably be looked back upon as merely a temporary speedbump in the legal process of booting Bundy trespass cattle out, and incarcerating Bundy. That is what happened in the US v Gardner case, which was very very similar to US v Bundy. So, we shouldn't get too hung up with the Standoff word for now, because this whole page will probably need to be moved to something like Bundy illegal grazing incident or Bundy illegal grazing case eventually. Honest, this is not being cynical, just realistic, based on experience with the normal course of wiki articles about events like this. Baleywik (talk) 04:39, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

• Noting user 2602:306:ce9a:860:80c2:633b:b33f:2c09 keeps trying to inject various biased versions of 'title-like' changes as first words of the opening paragraph, which also has the effect of making the first sentence grammatically unreadable. It had to be undone/reverted several times so far in the past 2 days. The user 2602:306:ce9a:860:80c2:633b:b33f:2c09 has not appeared on the talk page yet. Baleywik (talk) 08:25, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

We may want to hold off on any decisions about a name change until the split is decided. Sparkie82 (t•c) 03:26, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

Agreed.--Elvey (talk) 18:04, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

'Bundy has since accumulated over $1 million of debt in unpaid grazing fees'

From the CNN cite - "To environmentalists and the feds, however, he's an outlaw of sorts who owes U.S. taxpayers more than $1 million in unpaid grazing fees."

Another citation is need or this statement needs to be changed to reflect the fact that the one million dollar figure is a POV of the environmentalists and the feds and is not stated as a fact by CNN. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.86.161.120 (talk) 04:44, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

Seems reasonable, per guidance at WP:NPOV: "opinions should not be stated in Wikipedia's voice" given the way the Feds acted toward Hage, it seems reasonable to make the change; section WP:YESPOV is not applicable. --Elvey (talk) 18:04, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

Protected edit request on 21 April 2014

In the history of Nevada, the article states that the land in question where Bundy's ranch resides is public land that is part of Nevada. At the time of statehood, the land in question was part of the Arizona Territory and not included as part of the state of Nevada. Later in 1867, the land south of the border with Utah incorporated into the borders of the state of Nevada. This included all land south along the west bank of the Colorado river to the Calfornia border. Dlbkr2 (talk) 21:33, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

@Dlbkr2, the problem is that special conditions were foisted upon Nevada " and the 14 Western States" as a condition to admittance to the Union (civil war period) concerning public lands. In some cases, the "Western States" are treated differently in Federal law and Bundy should/will ultimately be seen as a catalyst for a Constitutional challenge for state equal treatment under the law. The entire topic probably encompasses a dozen other Wikipedia articles. It is becoming pretty apparent that much of this article needs to be merged into other existing articles with "For more details on …, see …" templates in the various sections.009o9 (talk) 01:11, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

Not done: You need to be specific about what you want to change, and you also need to have a consensus to make that change, so this request is not currently actionable. — Mr. Stradivarius ^{♪ talk ♪} 10:07, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

Fair enough. Surely a RS has reported on the content of Bundy's court filings. And the filings are a RS, and acceptable if better secondary sources aren't shown to be available. --Elvey (talk) 18:04, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

Protected edit request on 20 April 2014

Under Reaction by media personalities, it should be clarified that Joe Walsh is a former U.S. Representative from Illinois (IL-8). Saying "Illinois Representative" sounds like he was in the state legislature, not Congress. Farolif (talk) 04:47, 20 April 2014 (UTC)

Not done: please establish a consensus for this alteration before using the {{edit protected}} template. Your suggested addition makes the sentence read slightly awkwardly, so I don't think it counts as entirely uncontroversial. Let's wait to hear what others think before enacting it. Best — Mr. Stradivarius ^{♪ talk ♪} 07:48, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

Currently the article calls him a state representative. It should be changed to "Former Rep. Joe Walsh (R-IL), now a talk radio show host and Tea Party activist, also supported the protesters." KinkyLipids (talk) 00:08, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

Not done: The new wording looks more readable, but we still need a consensus for it before I can put it live. Please don't reactivate the {{edit protected}} template until you have a consensus. — Mr. Stradivarius ^{♪ talk ♪} 10:10, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

The new wording seems reasonable and uncontroversial. --Elvey (talk) 18:04, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

Thanks, Elvey. Normally I would have just made the edit, and the lack of a revert or any changes by others would count as a consensus, per the diagram at wp:consensus. I guess the most common form of consensus is suspended during protection lockdown. How many editors do we need for a consensus under protection lockdown? Sixty is my favorite number, but today I'm fine with two. KinkyLipids (talk) 18:25, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

Vandalism of this page

Hey, I'll be restoring this page to its pre-vandalism state. The vandalism was perpetrated by someone with the IP address of 98.224.28.167. NiklawskiMSTM traveled from the fourth dimension to deliver this text to you. Please thank him on his talk page. 17:55, 12 April 2014 (UTC)

Another vandal at 08:44, 14 April 2014‎.. The vandal's IP address is 66.87.90.25 . Others should out watch for that IP address because it is repetitive. Baleywik (talk) 09:24, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

Noting the 4th instance of IP address 66.87.90.25 vandalism. Baleywik (talk) 09:47, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

Noting the 5th instance of IP address 66.87.90.25 vandalism. Baleywik (talk) 04:57, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

Noting 5 instances of vandalism, deletion or blanking whole paragraphs, in the Family history section by a vandal at IP Address 204.48.45.32. on 15:58, 16 April 2014 and 15:56, 16 April 2014 and 23:46, 15 April 2014 and 18:01, 15 April 2014 and 17:14, 15 April 2014. Baleywik (talk) 16:34, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

Noting an instance of vandalism, deletion or blanking whole paragraph, in the Family history section, by a vandal at IP address 50.38.0.49 with same location as above IP Address 204.48.45.32. We should be attentive to this vandal and use the "Undo Vandalism" if/when it happens again. Baleywik (talk) 18:27, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

Vandalism of section: Other Nevada grazing legal actions

I will be restoring the following to Other Nevada grazing legal actions, anonymous user (173.153.3.126) has blanked the section and has already threatened to report me for edit-warring with only one revert. My reading of WP:NOT3RR indicates that reverting vandalism (i.e., blanking of relevant information) is not edit warring. The section in the article currently includes accusations against other ranchers in Nevada grazing cases, but the anonymous user appears to wish to censor the trial's outcome from the public -- citing original research.

Perhaps the quote box will make it more apparent that this is testimony and documented fact rather than original research.

Begin section revert:

The charges against Colvin were dismissed, Chief Judge Robert C. Jones of the Federal District Court of Nevada found in favor of Hage concerning water rights, grazing rights and all but two livestock trespass charges in United States vs. Wayne Hage (2013).

Judge Jones found:

• Congress prescribed grazing rights on federal lands were to be granted based on a rancher’s ownership of water rights established under local law and custom.

• Hage has a right of access to put his livestock water rights to beneficial use, therefore the livestock could not be found in trespass. [Within one half mile of water rights]

• USFS employee Steve Williams was found in contempt of court and guilty of witness intimidation.

• Tonopah BLM manager Tom Seley as found in contempt of court and guilty of witness intimidation.

• Williams and Seley were held personally liable for damages with fines exceeding $33,000.

• The Hage’s were found guilty of only two minor trespass violations and were fined $165.88

• Regional Forester Harv Forsgren was excluded from testifying at trial during witness credibility hearing for lying to the Court.

Chief Judge Robert C. Jones stated at the conclusion of the case:

"I find specifically that beginning in the late ‘70s and ‘80s, first, the Forest Service entered into a conspiracy to intentionally deprive the defendants here of their grazing rights, permit rights, preference rights."

Statement of Randy N. Parker for, The US House of Representatives, Committee on Natural Resources, Subcommittee on Water and Power, October 10, 2013

End section revert: I for one, find the trial outcome very interesting and highly relevant to the Nevada grazing rights issue. Regards 009o9 (talk) 08:04, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

You kept adding original research, which is against the rules. That makes your posts vandalism. I reported you for it and I hope you are blocked. If you even bothered to look at your sources, you would see that Monitor Valley is over a hundred miles away. 174.147.113.160 (talk) 13:41, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

Let's see, that would put the case in Nevada, USA, wouldn't that be the same jurisdiction? You might note that the preceding accusatory paragraph (not mine), is about exactly the same persons and topic WP:BALANCE. Why don't you tell us the real reason you want this very relevant information censored?

Original research. I can put up cases where people threatened other with guns and went to jail based on your rationale. The Bundy group took pictures where they aimed sniper rifles at unarmed rangers. That is a serious crime. You want to put in original research against the rules. 174.147.113.160 (talk) 15:52, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

What does any of this have to do with US v Hage? 009o9 (talk) 16:11, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

What does Hage have to do with this page? Nothing. Your original research and off topic posts have violated multiple rules. 174.147.113.160 (talk) 17:43, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

Administrators, please see User_talk:009o9#WP_No_Original_Research009o9 (talk) 16:11, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

Just a thought, if Mr. Bundy had been aware of the outcome of US v Hage, would he have chosen to pursue a remedy through the court rather a direct confrontation with government swat-teams? I don't know. It is very telling when an anonymous poster is engaged in promoting the criminality of one side while attempting to censor the criminality of the other. Censorship could very well be a contributing cause of the confrontation. I'm sure that this is not a concern for the "ends justifies the means" type mentalities though. 009o9 (talk) 16:44, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

I've got a couple of problems with that section. First, it's way too long. Second, it's got a lot of primary sources in the court documents. It uses The New American as a source which Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_134#The_New_American_usable_as_a_RS.3F which has been questioned at RSN. The massive quote is pulled from a statement from the CEO of the Utah Farm Bureau Federation. No WAY is that a usable source folks. There may (!) be something to this section, but it needs to be pulled from solid sources, not what's out there now. I'm trimming it back a fair amount, but hopefully some better sources can be found for this. Ravensfire (talk) 20:12, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

Some quick googling turned up this which is by a law professor. Still probably not a good source, but it gives a much better background on the Hage case than the other sources used here. In other words, there are better sources out there that present this in a fairly balanced manner and give some background into the legal situations. Ravensfire (talk) 20:34, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

Having read some of the filings in the case, and the professor's powerpointish PDF, I would say that indeed, this PDF is not a good source; while the facts are not false, the selection and presentation is biased at every turn against Hage. --Elvey (talk) 18:04, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

That was pulled from a google search while trying to push editors to finding secondary sources to explicitly tie the Hage case to Bundy. t looks like that presentation is part of a larger event on litigation and land use. While it does have some bias, it's one of the few scholarly sources specific to the Hage case. I don't like that it's a presentation only and probably would reject it for that reason. Ravensfire (talk) 18:52, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

Feller's resume is on ASU's website and he's written some publications that would be some interesting possible sources specific to Hage and also for the general law in this area but both would need to be in a separate article. At least from the titles, nothing is specific to Bundy. Ravensfire (talk) 19:04, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

Another possible good source - here Ravensfire (talk) 20:44, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

Questions on similar cases to Bundy on whether it is Original Research

See Wikipedia:No original research

Original research isn't an issue of failure to provide a cite, its that the linkage doesn't exist outside of our, wikipedia editors, opinions. We are neither notable nor reliable as per wiki-standards. I am not saying there is an issue with the information on the cases in those segments, I am saying that only wikipeida editors are making any claim that these cases have a direct impact on the Bundy standoff, no one of notabality is saying this in a reliable and quotable medium.

While I or other wiki editors may hold that there are links, it doesn't matter what we think according to Wikipedia. Our humble opinions do not raise to the level of notable or reliable so if these segments are to remain on the page a reliable and notable source must be found that links them - the best I could find was blogs which also don't rise to notable and reliable under wikipedia standards. So short of finding someone notable to back up the opinion that there is a link, these segments have to go.

I would rather see them moved and given their own articles than just deleted, but in either case they can not long remain here in violation of wikipedia standards. The opinions of anonymous wikipeida editors is not encylopedic and wikipedia is not a blog for us to assert by our own authority that connections exist.--Wowaconia (talk) 20:23, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

For clarity let me say - I am not speaking about the infobox at this point, which does directly mention Bundy but rather I am speaking about this subsegment:Bundy standoff#Similar federal grazing legal cases. --Wowaconia (talk) 20:26, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

Proper cite was added that emphasizes similarity and in fact directly mentions similarity between US v Bundy and US v Hage. Two proper cites for showing similarity between US v Bundy and US v Gardner were already present in the article. The "no original research" argument for this moving this material is moot :) Baleywik (talk) 20:50, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

The addition of a notable linking US v Hage to Bundy is from a reliable source and does remove concerns of O.R. from that part of the sub-segment.

The sources on the US v Gardner are all legal papers except for an article that lists the events of the dispute over Southwestern Federal land and does not link Gardnder's case to the Bundy standoff outside of chronology.

It does mention that Gardner and Bundy are friends that support each other, but there is no indication within the article that Bundy's strategy was affected by the Gardner case or that a notable thinks its instructive (as the notable cited for the Hage case did).

It is in effect like listing all the events of American History up to the Cold War and then saying that becuse the article mentioned the Declaration of Independence that this proves a major motive behind America's stance in opposing the USSR was the Declaration. It may well be true, but without a more direct linking it still remains speculation by anyonomous wikipedia editors asserting links that can not be backed up by direct quotation. If what was provided for the Hage case, can be provided for Gardner the objection of O.R. will be nullified for both parts. As it is, Hage can stay if that is consensus but Gardner still has to go.--Wowaconia (talk) 21:16, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

Proper cite was added for US v Gardner that emphasizes similarity and in fact directly mentions similarity between US v Bundy and US v Gardner. The "no original research" argument for this moving this material is rendered moot :) Baleywik (talk) 18:48, 18 April 2014 (UTC)

The concern that the subsegments link to the standoff was resting only on OR has been nullified. The additions not only show their link but increase the readability of this part of the article. Well done.--Wowaconia (talk) 20:46, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

The sub-segment "Other Reactions" does not appear to be on topic

The sub-segment under Reactions, entitled "Other reactions" is actually not a reaction to the events in this article at all. It seems that the editor adding them wanted to point out that elsewhere in the region there are concerns over land-development that involve Harry Reid. I have not examined any of the refs offered so I can not verify if they are notable or reliable, but right now I don't even see how this information is germane to this page. If the information about the environmentalists can be expanded while remaining on topic to this article perhaps it could be included but otherwise it seems it should be moved to either the Harry Reid page or to a page about the environmentalists themselves.--Wowaconia (talk) 22:40, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

I moved this section to Coyote Springs Investment, a stub that seemed more relevant to this content. Mreed911 (talk) 23:11, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

When this comes down from lockdown, there should be changes made to the "Reactions by Public Officials" and "Reactions by Media Personalities" to show both sides. As of now, it only lists people who support the Bundy side, not the BLM. It comes off as biased and poorly researched. Craigstealsheep (talk) 22:31, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

Bundy family history

I think there should be description of the history of the disputed land, such as the fact that the Bundy family has owned the land since the 1800s, before Nevada even became a state. Now the government wants to confiscate the land, allegedly because cattle somehow threaten a tortoise, yet people unconnected to the ranch do offroad vehicle driving in that area all the time. You'd think the government would try to do something about that, but they don't. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.168.150.252 (talk) 08:28, 12 April 2014 (UTC)

Except there is no dispute of his ownership of the lands. They are not his. According to public record, the land for his family didn't include any of this land. He has also never paid property taxes on the land in question (again, according to public record). He has also admitted he is willing to pay the state for the grazing fees, which would be a bizarre thing to do if you are claiming it's your own land. His stance on using the land is that federal lands cannot exist once a state becomes a state. While at the moment it is true in the Constitution, once the state agrees to give that land back to the federal government, it's federal land inside the state boundaries. It's therefore not a "fact" they owned the land. His other position is that he allowed his cattle to graze on the land long before the BLM was formed. Except it was formed 2 years before he was born. Thus there are no land disputes. HE is basically disputing who's land it is - the states or the federals, in any situation, it isn't his and never was. Furthermore, after the ruling on the lands he was already on, he rerouted the cattle to be on more public land. Seola (talk) 07:04, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

"He has also admitted he is willing to pay the state for the grazing fees, which would be a bizarre thing to do if you are claiming it's your own land." Very true, but irrelevant because the family does not claim to own the land. There is no dispute over ownership of the lands, just over grazing rights. It is claimed that the Bundy family purchased permanent grazing rights in 1887. Perhaps that was a legitimate transaction, which was never nullified. Just because the BLM (created in 1946) has no record of that transaction, does not mean it never took place and should not be afforded legal consideration. If that transaction indeed took place, and is to be nullified by eminent domain or some similar process, the family has a right to some compensation. I'd like to see this article examine the claim about the purported 1887 transaction. 75.163.143.115 (talk) 16:39, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

Actually, he is claiming it is his land, via radio interviews. His story is incredibly inconsistent in that he owns the land, he doesn't own the land but has grazing rights or that he does owe but not to the federal government and his reasoning for that is he doesn't recognize a federal government exists. (Again, that is from his OWN mouth on radio interviews.) Saying you own it or don't own it but have forever grazing rights because you don't believe in the government is not a valid argument nor a logical one. It depends on which interview you listen to as to which story he gives. Seola (talk) 05:37, 23 April 2014 (UTC)

Added section Bundy family background

The section was added today, to provide background on the Bundy family, relevant to the inheritance claims Bundy made in his legal cases. Please don't get too carried away on the whole family tree or offshoots of the clan, that are not really pertinent to the encyclopedic article. :) Baleywik (talk) 22:37, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

Bundy family Morman polygamists and Vandal blanking

Bundy claimed inheritance of land rights, and there has been a lot of material appearing in the family background section about his Morman polygamist ancestors who are actually the ones he is claiming as the source of his "vested rights" or special rights. It seems that every time any of this material is added, with cites, a vandal at IP address 204.48.45.32 in Oregon blanks the section out. We need to watch for this vandal and restore. Wikipedia has proper methods to cite and support material or delete it if it is not appropriate. However, semi-anonymous blanking is not one of the valid procedures.Baleywik (talk) 16:21, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

Many of the supporters don't want to know about Bundy's family history because they are ashamed of it. Bundy's ancestors had multiple families, which makes claims to any particular plot or land hard to uphold. There was too little original ownership divided among far too many people. It also goes to Bundy's mindset that they have been at constant odds with the government, state and federal, over polygamy and other issues. The issue is less about a guy fighting for his rights and more like a Warren Jeffs situation (Jeffs has the same background and the community had a lot of similarities). 70.8.248.135 (talk) 16:36, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

Protected edit request on 21 April 2014

Please change the first occurrence of Taser to read Taser. Please see Talk:Bundy_standoff item 16 for my reasons. I can see a need for automatically checking any edits which replace entire paragraphs to be sure that all pre-existing internal cross-references and citations are preserved. Megapod (talk) 14:35, 22 April 2014 (UTC) Megapod (talk) 14:35, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

This is an appropriate change, but it can wait 'till the protection is over, or be done along with any other changes that have achieved consensus. --Elvey (talk) 18:04, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

And Page Protection becomes an excuse for not doing anything at all. This is THE MOST inefficient way to edit an article that I can possibly imagine. Admins (and not editors) have become the final arbiters of content. I sure wonder what User:Jimbo is thinking. <shrug> Eaglizard (talk) 19:18, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

@Eaglizard: Inefficient, yes, I will grant you that. However, admins can't actually decide anything about the content themselves, beyond whether or not proposed additions fulfil Wikipedia policies and guidelines. If they make decisions about the content themselves, that makes them involved, and admins involved with a particular article can't make administrative actions there - it's a catch 22. All admins get to decide is whether a proposed edit has consensus, and whether or not it satisfies policy. If those conditions are fulfilled, then admins should make the edit to the article, even if they personally disagree with it. For my part, I always try and stick by this principle when I answer protected edit requests.

In this case, I don't think we have a consensus quite yet. Megapod wants to keep the word "taser" (and link it), but KinkyLipids wants to use the word "stun gun". I can't see any useful way to judge which of these proposed edits has consensus - both are allowed by policy, and there is no obvious agreement between editors here. So I'm forced to answer this request as a "not done".

This brings us back to the point behind page protection - it is intended to make editors discuss their disagreements on the talk page, rather than edit warring on the article. Part of the reason things are not working so well on this talk page is that a few editors don't seem to understand that edits that are contended require discussion. This is how Wikipedia works, whether the article is protected or not. It is possible to have a very contentious article that is not protected - it simply requires the editors to discuss their edits whenever they disagree, and to keep discussing those edits until they come to an agreement. So let's discuss things a little bit more, both in this section and elsewhere on the talk page, and then hopefully I can start to actually enact some of these edit requests. Best — Mr. Stradivarius ^{♪ talk ♪} 10:46, 23 April 2014 (UTC)

We can say 'stun gun', which is self-descriptive enough to not require a wikilink. I'm not sure if any source using the word Taser actually bothered to check if that specific brand was being used. The uses of 'taser' as a verb can be change to 'stun'. KinkyLipids (talk) 18:36, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

Not done: per my comment above. — Mr. Stradivarius ^{♪ talk ♪} 10:46, 23 April 2014 (UTC)

Protected edit request on 21 April 2014

The consensus appears to be no split concerning subsegments calling for discussion of such in the article, concerns over O.R. in these segments have been nullified by quotes and citations. I was the originator of the call for the split, and bow to consensus against me. I also raised the question of O.R. but an editor has improved the article and that is no longer an issue. Therefor please remove the tags seeking consensus about whether the subsegments should be split off. Thank you, Wowaconia (talk) 20:21, 22 April 2014 (UTC) Wowaconia (talk) 20:21, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

See Talk:Bundy_standoff#Question_of_whether_Info_box_and_links_to_court_findings.2C_briefs.2C_etc._should_be_moved_to_articles_on_the_court_cases for vote tallys. --Wowaconia (talk) 20:51, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

Subsegments that are tagged are found at: Bundy_standoff#Similar_federal_grazing_legal_cases --Wowaconia (talk) 20:53, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

Done — Mr. Stradivarius ^{♪ talk ♪} 10:56, 23 April 2014 (UTC)

Bundy family not from that area

[4] This is Cliven's dad, from Arizona. Records show that the family was in Arizona until at least the 30s (birth records). The grandparents were also not from the area. They were never able to prove that the family had rights or deeds going back that long. This is why. 173.153.11.73 (talk) 20:31, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

That's interesting, but doesn't disprove the claim that the family purchased permanent grazing rights in 1887. I own a parcel of land that's 1700 miles from my residence. Seems equally likely that I could own grazing rights, mineral rights, water rights, or some other rights associated with a property that's far from my residence. 75.163.143.115 (talk) 20:49, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

Permit rights weren't in existence until the 1930s. They also provided no documents for that claim, and they claimed they owned the property many times, not just a permit for it. 173.153.11.73 (talk) 21:00, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

Whatever the family's earlier understanding may have been, the current statement from Shiree Bundy Cox says that "rights," not land, were purchased in 1887. Can you cite a source saying that sale of land-use rights, as separate from land ownership, was not practiced before the 1930s? 75.163.143.115 (talk) 21:32, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

I've answered my own question: at least one type of land-use rights -- rights of way -- were bought and sold long before the 1930s. 75.163.143.115 (talk) 21:32, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

Also, this is just original research. And Bundy's claim is that his family has grazed cattle in the Virgin Valley, not just Clark County, so being born in Arizona is consistent with their claim. I'd be content with a secondary source concluding that there simply is no pre-existing Bundy deed or ownership of grazing rights anywhere in the Virgin Valley. KinkyLipids (talk) 20:58, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

Virgin Valley is on the other side of Lake Mead from where his family was from. Cattle don't magically jump across the Grand Canyon. [5] Map of Lake Mead and the Colorado River to show that magic cows were not owned by the Bundy family. 173.153.11.73 (talk) 21:00, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

No magic cows? Next you'll tell me that the dish didn't run away with the spoon. I was assuming that Mount Trumbull in the birth record refers to some town near Mount Trumbull Wilderness, which is on the north side of the Colorado River. KinkyLipids (talk) 21:17, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

That would be BLM land and get you into trouble. [6] This is the town. The wilderness is huge and not the town. 34 miles south east of Wolf Hole Lake according to those directions. That puts you a far way away from the range. 184.63.185.239 (talk) 21:25, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

Just a friendly reminder that Wikipedia does not accept original research using primary sources. This talk page is also not a place to clog up the threads with original arguments, no matter how compelling. Please find secondary sources so we can end debate and so I can remove the tag. KinkyLipids (talk) 22:21, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

I removed the text saying his paternal family did not move to Nevada until much later than he claimed. The source only says his father was born in Arizona. It's original research to say more than that in the article. KinkyLipids (talk) 02:01, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

The book source shows when the family moved to Arizona in 1880 and lived there. The father was born in Arizona. 173.153.3.126 (talk) 02:14, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

Are you suggesting it's impossible for cattle that graze on one side of a canyon to be owned by a person who resides on the other side of the canyon? Bear in mind that cattle can graze without human oversight for many months at a time, and many livestock owners never see the animals they own, because they hire ranch hands to do roundup work, etc. 75.163.143.115 (talk) 21:11, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

During the 19th century, YES. A resounding yes! You didn't let your cattle go a hundred miles away in such a lawless place. 184.63.185.239 (talk) 21:25, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

Local ranch hands hired by distant well-off owners to supervise the herd didn't exist in the 19th century? I see... 75.163.143.115 (talk) 21:35, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

No where have they claimed that. No where have they admitted they were from Arizona. No where have they produced any documentation. They claim and claim and claim, but have no proof. 184.63.185.239 (talk) 21:40, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

Another point that should be made: nobody is claiming that David Bundy (b. 1922, Arizona) purchased permanent grazing rights in 1887. The claim is that an earlier Bundy ancestor did so. The earlier ancestor may or may not have resided near Bunkerville at the time. 75.163.143.115 (talk) 21:11, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

The family claimed to have actually owned the property. Grazing rights weren't a thing until much later. None of the dates match up or are possible. That is the problem. The Bundy family has hoodwinked a lot of people. That is why there is little proof of their claims and why so many statements by the family contradict. 184.63.185.239 (talk) 21:14, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

[7] This is the Taylor Grazing Act from the 30s. [8] This is a Congressional review of the act that the Bundy family testified on because their permit was under it. Their permit came from the 30s, which matches up to the time that the family moved to Nevada from Arizona. 184.63.185.239 (talk) 21:18, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

Here's what we know... David Bundy was born 90 miles southeast of Bunkerville in 1922, and on the same side of the Grand Canyon as Bunkerville. This tells us nothing about whether an earlier Bundy ancestor purchased permanent grazing rights on public land near Bunkerville in 1887. 75.163.143.115 (talk) 01:49, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

The town was south east of the mountain, and the mountain was adjacent to the Grand Canyon. Your statement about it not having the Grand Canyon, along with a large mount, and a mountain range, and a river separating them is a little far fetched. The distance is insurmountable. They obviously had no connection to the land until much later than they claim. Also, there is no such thing as a "permanent grazing right" on public land. The Taylor Grazing Act limits it to 10 years and stipulates that it is not a right but can be revoked due to drought and other issues. 173.153.10.128 (talk) 02:41, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

How would the Taylor Grazing Act of 1934 have any relevance to a transaction that took place in 1887?

Your statement that this 90-mile distance is insurmountable is beyond farfetched. Many 19th-century pioneers are known to have crossed the entire North American continent. 75.163.143.115 (talk) 07:20, 23 April 2014 (UTC)

Before the Taylor Grazing Act of 1934, there were no "grazing rights." It would be impossible to claim you had them because they did not exist until they were established in that bill. And 90 miles is insurmountable for property to be owned, especially when sources already show that other people lived there. Try reading the information about his history. There are other sources that have already verified that Bundy was not correct about any of it. 184.242.92.185 (talk) 14:02, 23 April 2014 (UTC)

Cliven Bundy's dad, David Ammon Bundy, was still living in Arizona in 1940 [9]. Even some of Cliven's siblings were born in Arizona, one died there young [10]. David's father (Cliven's paternal grandfather) Roy Bundy was born in Nebraska. David's mother (Cliven's paternal grandmother) Doretta Marie Iverson was born in Washington, Utah. Cliven's mother, Margaret Bodel Jensen, was born in/near Bunkerville [11]. Her mother (Cliven's maternal grandmother) Abigail Christena Abbott was also born in that area in 1891. Her father (Cliven's maternal grandfather) John Jensen was born in Sanpete County, Utah in 1887. So Cliven Bundy's only family claim in that area before the 1940s comes through his maternal grandmother (the Abbott family).209.33.230.34 (talk) 21:52, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

Protected edit request on 19 April 2014

The statement that no shots where fired is factually incorrect. The BLM has stated that they shoot several bull cattle due to their perceived danger to the roundup. 97.124.171.118 (talk) 19:52, 19 April 2014 (UTC)

Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made. — {{U|Technical 13}} ^{(t • e • c)} 21:08, 19 April 2014 (UTC)

I'm sure this can wait The two bulls posed “a safety hazard,” said BLM spokesman Craig Leff, who didn’t elaborate on the circumstances. BLM did not address the cattle deaths from heat exhaustion/dehydration or damaging the water system equipment. 009o9 (talk) 04:46, 20 April 2014 (UTC)

The phrase "no shots were fired" should be removed, and the killing of two bulls should be added under section 'BLM actions'. KinkyLipids (talk) 23:53, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

Not done: As Technical 13 says, this request needs to be backed up by reliable sources before we can put it in the article. It also needs to have a specific wording to be proposed, and for that wording to be backed up by consensus. If any of those three conditions aren't met, this request will only be denied again. — Mr. Stradivarius ^{♪ talk ♪} 10:13, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

Makes sense. Are you saying www.reviewjournal.com isn't a RS? Certainly seems reasonable for anyone to remove the at-best dubious "and no shots were fired in the incident," at least after the protection expires. Someone could [then add/replace it with] a revised version that cites a RS.--Elvey (talk) 18:04, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

Looks reliable to me. The sentence, "There was no armed battle and no shots were fired in the incident," should be changed to "There was no armed battle." The phrase, "although there was actually no armed battle and no shots were fired," should be changed to, "although there was actually no armed battle." The sentence, "Two bulls were killed," should be added with the cite under the section 'BLM actions' after the sentence ending with, "a ranching term for unmarked livestock." So far it looks like four-to-zero in favor of correcting the article. KinkyLipids (talk) 18:58, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

Yes, reviewjournal.com is fine - sorry if I implied that it wasn't. @Elvey, 009o9, and 97.124.171.118: do you agree with KinkyLipids' wording? If we have agreement on the wording then I'll update the article. (Also, please ping me when you reply - I'm not watching this page.) — Mr. Stradivarius ^{♪ talk ♪} 10:53, 23 April 2014 (UTC)

Premature Technically, from what I've read, the BLM has not admitted to shooting the bulls, they have admitted to euthanizing the bulls (as if they could sneak up on a bull in open-range to administer an injection). The Bundy's have unearthed some dead cattle and released photos of bulls that appear to have bullet wounds. Sadly, I don't believe that this establishes that shots were fired. I'm afraid we will have problems with drive-by editors unless carefully worded and emerging evidence will support that many other animals died as a result of BLM handling practices. pinging Mr. Stradivarius -- Signed 009o9 (talk) 14:17, 23 April 2014 (UTC)

I would go with the phrase "euthanized" as that's the wording used in the source. Ravensfire (talk) 14:30, 23 April 2014 (UTC)

Since, the BLM did not disclose how they euthanized the cattle, if we are accepting an incomplete/evasive statement from the BLM, statements from the Bundy side should be included and hold equal weight. (Who, What, Why, Where, When and How) and WP:BALANCE pinging Mr. Stradivarius -- Signed 009o9 (talk) 15:28, 23 April 2014 (UTC)

The word euthanize includes killing with a gun. Since bulls have been found with bullet wounds, and since the BLM confirms they "euthanized" bulls, that pretty much confirms it. Otherwise we would be assuming that there are dead bulls out there with needles stuck in them and that there's a cow-killing gunslinger wandering the range. Also, protection has only been dropped for registered editors, so IP editors won't be able to drive by and remove the info. KinkyLipids (talk) 15:53, 23 April 2014 (UTC)

(009o9 - you don't need to ping me for every single post, just ones that require my attention...) — Mr. Stradivarius ^{♪ talk ♪} 16:28, 23 April 2014 (UTC)

The source (Inquistr.com) is listed on Goolge news and is #1548 US on Alexa, however the name of the quoted source is misspelled Michele Fiore. WesternJournalism.com is covering the photos without the quotes, MSM won't touch the story.

     

Nevada assemblywoman Michel Fiore was among those who maintained that BLM agents either killed cattle by either shooting them or running them to death during the Bunkerville incident. [...] A Fox News reporter, among others, who viewed the bull holding pens after the livestock were “euthanized” noted that any evidence of wild behavior such as damaged gates or fencing were not evident.

This seems to be a notable subject for the quote, discusses both the shots fired and clarification of the BLM euthanized verbiage. 009o9 (talk) 18:02, 23 April 2014 (UTC)

Ranch purchase and family history refs

Turns out the land that Bundy actually owns near Bunkerville was purchased in 1948 by his parents. He apparently got some water rights with that. The refs also discuss his family history, which at a glance is consistent with what is already in the article.

http://www.8newsnow.com/story/25301551/bundys-ancestral-rights-come-under-scrutin

http://www.8newsnow.com/story/25302186/an-abbreviated-look-at-rancher-cliven-bundys-family-history

As best I can tell, Bundy seems to be asserting that he has grazing rights because his mother's mother's father did.99.184.74.183 (talk) 22:01, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

The statement released by Shiree Bundy Cox says "My great grandpa bought the rights to the Bunkerville allotment back in 1887 around there. Then he sold them to my grandpa who then turned them over to my dad in 1972." So the assertion is not that a Bundy ancestor merely had rights, but that two Bundy ancestors executed purchases of rights. 75.163.143.115 (talk) 07:38, 23 April 2014 (UTC)

Gold Butte is not the Bunkerville Allotment. It was already established in multiple sources that Shiree's statement was incorrect on its merits, but even if it suddenly became true it is still the wrong area. 184.242.92.185 (talk) 14:03, 23 April 2014 (UTC)

Gold Butte NCA is/was a range/region or named grazing allotment, the "S. 1054: Gold Butte National Conservation Area Act" introduced May 23, 2013, is a combination of the many of the range allotments in the Bunkerville area.Map Shortened, Gold Butte, tends to describe two similar regions. 009o9 (talk) 15:08, 23 April 2014 (UTC)

There has been considerable amounts of work done on the Bundy lineage and where Cliven Bundy lived at a specific point in time. These arguments are moot, the land rights are patented and are transferable real property, most sources agree that Cliven Bundy purchased the patents from his father. The question at hand is whether the Federal government is within its authority to limit and alter these patents on public lands and whom has the authority to decide and the authority enforce resultant judgments.009o9 (talk) 15:08, 23 April 2014 (UTC)

That couldn't be further from the truth. The "land rights" don't exist. There were no "rights." There are permits that are not transferable and are time limited. Those permits were established in a law created 15 years before his father moved back from Arizona. We have reliable sources that express that while there are only some blogs that didn't fact check Bundy that say otherwise. Also, the Bunkerville Allotment and Gold Butte region in current dispute are over 10 miles apart from each other. Here is a good quote "The May 14 complaint reads:“While the United States seeks relief only with respect to the new trespass lands, and does not seek in this action any relief in connection with the former Bunkerville allotment" [12] That was heard in the court case as pointed out above. You are confusing a general term for an area with the designated territory when the specific areas are different. You can see that on your own map how 348.515 is the area in dispute and not the greater territory you suggest. Some more background: [13] [14] [15] The last one mentions how the cows are in the "south east" region while the Bunkerville Allotment was in the northern region before being "retired." 184.242.92.185 (talk) 16:20, 23 April 2014 (UTC)

The land where the Bundy family has their farm was homesteaded and patented by Eldred Leavitt, it made its way to the Bundy family in 1948. The Bundy family is not descended from this Leavitt family, although they share a common ancestor. Here is the patent info: glorecords.blm.gov You'll see it was for 160-acres only, nothing more (and that is all the Bundy family owns today). There are no other patents, etc. for any of Bundy's ancestors. 209.33.230.34 (talk) 22:54, 23 April 2014 (UTC)

Formal request for removal of protection

I've just posted a comment on ANI that I would like to repeat here.

• There is no content dispute. I would like to add a general observation to this discussion. As I am not an admin, I have had time for the luxury of reviewing hundreds of edits to this article over the period of 13 April until 19 April, when page protection was applied. I could not find any evidence of an actual content dispute. I found NO examples of contentious or disruptive editing (other than some unrepeated vandalism). Even the edit summaries were shockingly free of snark or argument. Nearly every single edit seemed a consensual improvement to the article. I did not find a single case of an editor -- not even the IP editor who tried to add Infowars as a source -- not one editor repeatedly tried to insert material that had been rejected by other editors. No particular section was ever repeatedly worked over by a editor or group of editors in apparent opposition to another editor or group of editors. Not one single time (with one exception). The last 5 edits not made by an admin are the single edit war I found, in which an IP and a confirmed editor flirted with (but did not violate) 3RR. In general, I must congratulate every single editor of this article, as I find it to be a sterling example of exactly how WP is supposed to work. I'm afraid I must conclude that the page protection was premature, and inappropriate for this instance. (That'll be 0.02USD, please.) Eaglizard (talk) 21:28, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

In general, I find every editor that has contributed meaningfully to this article, including the nearly 50% IP editors, have done an impressive and remarkable job of producing a high-quality article on a topic that should be expected to be riddled with POV issues. My congratulations to all of you.

Also, and in light of my conclusion above, I am formally requesting that protection be removed from this page, unless some evidence of actual disruptive or contentious editing can be supplied. Eaglizard (talk) 21:56, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

You'll probably get most attention by making your request at the Request for Page Protection page in the section for reducing page protection level. It won't hurt to include a pointer to this section of the talk page for the reasoning plus noting that the standoff has ended which was probably driving some of the attention to this article. Ravensfire (talk) 22:05, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

Done. Thank you very much. :D Eaglizard (talk) 23:27, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

I did this earlier per process but Admin took it to ANI. All protection is now lifted. --DHeyward (talk) 05:14, 24 April 2014 (UTC)

Oh, since I started this as a completely uninvolved and uninformed editor that didn't understand the need for full PP (even that is a specific remedy for content dispute), please don't make me look like an idiot (it's not hard, but still...). WP:BRD is your friend and any revert requires discussion. Semi-PP will be implemented if IP editors start reverting. --DHeyward (talk) 05:14, 24 April 2014 (UTC)

This is a reminder, that though all protection from this page is lifted, this article is now subject to general sanctions. -- Atama頭 15:40, 24 April 2014 (UTC)

Reactions sections seem to lack due weight

The various Reactions sections seem to be vastly tilted toward those reactions positive to Mr. Bundy. This doesn't seem to reflect the weight of those reactions among all reactions to the situation, regardless of catagory. I think we either need to pare down the pro-bundy reactions, or add additional opposing reactions. The article would seem to suggest that the overwhelming majority of reactions from the categories posted were pro-bundy, but that doesn't seem to match the general coverage of the event. I don't have a problem with any specific reaction/source (though some are potentially questionable in their notiability), just the lack of due weight.204.65.34.237 (talk) 21:50, 24 April 2014 (UTC)

Agree. It is a mess. Cwobeel (talk) 21:55, 24 April 2014 (UTC)

Article is under a 1RR general sanction

Reminding editors that this article is under General Sanctions, with 1RR per editor per 24 hrs. See Talk:Bundy_standoff/General_Sanctions Cwobeel (talk) 22:36, 24 April 2014 (UTC)

On question of notablity of a Nevada county commissioner

In the subsegment entitled "United States v Hage" a county commissioner was quoted. A question of notability was raised concerning this.

Many news-sources are referring to the incident discussed in this article as being part of the Sagebrush Rebellion which was a political movement that came to the fore in the 1970s. (At least one reference to it being viewed that way was provided in the article, citing a reporter for the Christian Science Monitor, more could be provided if desired.)

The Sagebrush Rebellion was spearheaded at the county level, were they made resolutions declaring federal lands were now under the authority of the counties, one of the most famous incidents is cited in wiki's article on the movement...

"On July 4, 1994, Nye County commissioner Dick Carver plowed open a road that the National Forest Service had declared closed as a statement supporting county supremacy over the federal government. Carver and his supporters claimed that the federal government's ownership of 93% of the land in Nye County was illegal."

So a good argument can be made that an elected official at the county commissioner level in Nevada has notability on this topic and can be quoted.

--Wowaconia (talk) 00:29, 25 April 2014 (UTC)

I would agree with others (see above) that the whole segment United States v Hage in the article under "Similar federal grazing legal cases" isn't directly involved in the standoff and could be dropped or moved to different articles, without damage to the reader seeking to know more about the standoff. If others disagree and consensus is that this information stay, the level of notability seems to have been met.--Wowaconia (talk) 00:50, 25 April 2014 (UTC)

RfC on Hage material

Simple: should the Hage material, which says that a local commissioner advised Bundy to study United States v Hage, be included?

• No. The only thing linking the two is a blog post in the Las Vegas Review-Journal that reports that this guy said that (the guy is not notable, the court case doesn't have an article (yet)). All the other sourcing for the section is primary. That this is relevant to the article is synthesis, and the paucity of the sourcing (one single secondary source) is indicative of it. We have better things to do than to bloat this article with anything that seems halfway relevant. Drmies (talk) 23:06, 24 April 2014 (UTC)

• No. As noted above there is only one secondary source which argues a POV that US v Hage is "similar". Quoting from the US v Hage decision is specious and irrelevant. JuanRiley (talk) 23:37, 24 April 2014 (UTC)

• No. It remains my position that not just this case, but the United States v Gardner case should be split off into their own articles as the event on this page is the standoff not the history of Sagebrush II, (the name of the land-dispute movement since the late 1980s). Also the infobox listing the case history involving Bundy unbalances the page and should be split off to a page solely on those cases. Even the info on the cases directly involving Bundy could be trimmed. On the Hage material, the local commissioner may be notable enough, see below, but this page is about the Standoff not every event that might possibly be connected to it. The whole segment "Similar federal grazing legal cases" should go.--Wowaconia (talk) 00:41, 25 April 2014 (UTC)
  • There was nothing here about infoboxes--please don't obfuscate an otherwise relatively simple question. Thank you. Drmies (talk) 01:32, 25 April 2014 (UTC)

• Keep These other secondary sources seem to think the two cases are related. Hage is an extraordinary case, is aligned with the current Nevada Constitution, and highly relevant to Bundy. I firmly believe that it deserves more than a "see also".009o9 (talk) 02:11, 25 April 2014 (UTC)
  • Washington Examiner
  • Fox Special Report w Bret Baier
  • ThinkProgress.org
  • CanadaFreePress.com
  • TheFederalist.com
  • FoxNews

Similar federal grazing legal cases

That section may be violating WP:NOR? If there are no sources connecting Bundy's case with these other cases, Wikipedia should not be the one connecting them. See WP:SYNTH for an explanation. Cwobeel (talk) 16:49, 25 April 2014 (UTC)

The Las Vegas Review is a secondary source that asserts that US v Hage and US v Bundy are connected, I can add about five more good references if you insist, as I recall a couple of them mention US v Gardner. See Talk:Bundy_standoff#RfC_on_Hage_material 009o9 (talk) 17:58, 25 April 2014 (UTC)

The RFC was short with three responses, two of which were "nays". Cwobeel (talk) 21:34, 25 April 2014 (UTC)

The RfC_on_Hage_material wasn't the first time US v Hage was challenged for removal and it appears the Rfc was dropped the objections were addressed with the proof that other reliable sources exist. As such, a consensus appears to have been achieved concerning appropriateness, relativity, notability and reliable sources WP:NOTDEM. Hage v US probably isn't related to US v Bundy because it is about government attempts to limit Hage's access to his water patent, not grazing. Alternately, the BLM and USFS brought criminal charges against Hage in US v Hage, but in Hage v US, a $4.4million monetary judgment against USFS was overturned on appeal. 009o9 (talk) 00:13, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

More comments by Bundy

No idea how to add this stuff, but as it has been said by the person himself, it should be summarized [16] Cwobeel (talk) 15:56, 25 April 2014 (UTC)

We should include comments by Bundy, but it is not our place to say in the article whether they were "racist" comments, as this would violate NPOV policy. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 17:51, 25 April 2014 (UTC)

Given the numerous sources which do identify his statements as racist, there isn't anything POV about it. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 21:59, 25 April 2014 (UTC)

Bundy only commented on what he thought was true. That by itself is not "racist", and the media only reports that some have claimed the comments were "racist". see my comments above. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 22:43, 25 April 2014 (UTC)

We report what reliable sources say about a subject, and it is not just "the media". See WP:V for more information. Cwobeel (talk) 22:46, 25 April 2014 (UTC)

Also read WP:NPOV: Editing from a neutral point of view (NPOV) means representing fairly, proportionately, and, as far as possible, without bias, all of the significant views that have been published by reliable sources on a topic. And the assertion that his comments were racist are significant views published on the topic. Cwobeel (talk) 22:48, 25 April 2014 (UTC)

No one has said any particular view is not significant. Indeed, both views are significant. Again, the major news sources have not said Bundy's comments were "racist" and have only related what some others have said, so we do the same and report in the same manner. We don't say 'Bundy made racist comments, period'. That's not only intellectually dishonest, it's pushing a POV. This is obviously a controversial topic, so we should just provide Bundy's comments and let the readers make their own decisions as to what may be considered "racist" or not. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 00:06, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

There is an overwhelming number of sources describing his comments as racist. Cwobeel (talk) 04:38, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

I don't see this overwhelming number, and you've failed to link to even one. There are numerous major news sources, several that I've linked to, that have not made that assumption. Seems we're a little eager to push the POV. And remember, there is no list of 'reliable sources'. Wikipedia editors are the ones who decide what sources are reliable for an article. We are not 'copy-rewrite-bots' with no minds of our own here. If a source makes an assumption with no concrete facts to support it, they become less then reliable for purposes of a given article, esp ones that involve controversial topics, so we have to use our own judgement when determining matters like this. Remember also, that the media isn't the most accurate source of info out there as I'm sure you're aware, and have a history of placating to the left or right as the case may be, so you need to be a bit more careful before you leap to conclusions. What comment made by Bundy is actually "racist"? -- Gwillhickers (talk) 16:28, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

Since the article has not itself called Bundy racist and has only used the word racist in relation to what politicians have called him, this thread is moot. Editors who say there are numerous or an overwhelming number of sources should cite those sources before adding 'racist' as a fact. Editors who say there are significant views on the other side should cite those views as well. KinkyLipids (talk) 17:43, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

The article is young and there seems to be a willingness by some to say 'Bundy made racist comments', so the topic is not moot, esp since you saw fit to add advice about what editors should do. Thanks for your interest. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 17:52, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

Touché. I also agreed with you, if you didn't notice. Thanks for your courteous dismissal of me. And I stand by my agreement with you, so unless someone actually does what you worry they will do, why clutter the talk page? We can clutter that bridge once someone crosses it. KinkyLipids (talk) 18:25, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

Racist comments by Bundy and aftermath

• http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/apr/24/conservatives-should-feel-exposed-bundys-racist-co/
• http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2014/04/24/cliven-bundy-wonders-if-black-people-were-better-off-as-slaves/
• http://www.politico.com/story/2014/04/rand-paul-dean-heller-cliven-bundy-105982.html

Cwobeel (talk) 15:37, 24 April 2014 (UTC)

So called "racist" comments

Actually, there was noting "racist" about what Bundy said. Had he said, blacks should have remained slaves 'because' they were black, that would have been much different. Bundy expressed a 'wonder' about blacks and slavery and cited a number of reasons, including the number of blacks dependent on gov, number of blacks in prison, etc. He also was concerned about their freedoms when he said "They didn’t get no more freedom. They got less freedom."
Whether you agree with this view or not, his comments were not "racist". Many news sources, including the New York Times, LA Times, Washington Times and Fox News refer to them as comments about race and only report that some have regarded Bundy's comments as "racist". These news sources themselves do not say his comments were "racist". Anyone who actually takes the time to read his comments can see that they are not. Bundy only commented on what he thought was true. That is not "racist". -- Gwillhickers (talk) 17:42, 25 April 2014 (UTC)

It sure seems like someWP:BALANCE would be appropriate. Truth in Media: Cliven Bundy’s “Racist” Remarks Were Also Promoting Hispanic Culture? What MSM Isn’t Telling You He used some pretty archaic terms, but I don't think the man is racist -- taken from the video (by me) the preceding paragraphs put the question Bundy posited into context.

Paragraphs immediately preceding NY Times purported Bundy racist comments

And so what I'm testifying to you is that I was in the Watts riots.

I saw the beginning fire and I saw the last fire. What I'd seen was civil disturbance, people who were not happy people who were thinking they don't have their freedom, they don't have these things and they didn't have them.

We've progressed quite a bit from that day until now and we sure don't want to go back. We sure don't want these colored people to have to go back to that point, we sure don't want these Mexican people to have to go back to that point.

And we can make a difference right now by taking care of some of these bureaucracies and do it in a peaceful way.

009o9 (talk) 02:54, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

I guess you can quote him using the video. But as a useful note: racism is not necessarily about hatred but about generalizations, oversimplifications, or stereotypes, of an entire group of individual human beings. The same goes with sexism and all other forms of prejudice. For example, a man can say he cares a lot about women because women are more emotionally vulnerable, more beautiful, and more dependent. Sure he cares, but he also has a sexist understanding of women by generalizing them, simplifying them, and stereotyping them. Bundy says he cares about black people while caricaturing and simplifying millions of black individuals as dependent on government, idle, abortionist, criminal, and natural cotton-pickers. So I'm not sure how much of a difference context will make. KinkyLipids (talk) 03:37, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

Regardless, how exactly are these recent and personal comments relevant to the land situation on this page? The comments were made yesterday, while the last BLM incident was near the beginning of April. Seems a bit over-extended, if not packaged into an agenda. Pushing for a review. 67.142.130.36 (talk) 04:08, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

The comments were only reported yesterday, but they were made the day after the victory celebration by Bundy supporters, which was less than a week after the last BLM incident. But if you think that it's not relevant to the land situation and that it's a bit over-extended, then ok, propose a split to move the heavily reported comments to a new article. KinkyLipids (talk) 04:34, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

We can't engage in a discussion about if his comments were racists or not (although it seems quite obvious what they are given the repudiation by so many of these that supported him before), as that is not our role here. These comments where not "so called racist", the comments were called racist by the many sources available. Cwobeel (talk) 04:42, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

The definition of Racism is: 1. n. a belief that race is the primary determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race In fact, Mr. Bundy was not speaking to the inferiority or superiority of any race, he was speaking of two arguably oppressed groups of people and the Federal management of both.

The question at hand is WP:Balance if you look at the current lede, the racism accusation not only does not belong there, but it looks like it is an obvious paste-job to slant the article. At this point the POV is pretty much comical. The NY Times inferred to their opinion of Mr. Bundy's presumed beliefs from an out of context quote. Ben Swann, a highly decorated journalist has made a counter claim. Are we going to devote 400 words in the lede for this, or move it down to Media reactions where both sides can be presented?009o9 (talk) 07:06, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

So, his comments only showed concern for oppressed groups and didn't make any preconceived opinions that are racist and prejudiced. The definition you quoted is only the first listed definition. The full definition defines racism as prejudice, which is defined as preconceived opinions. Is it not preconceived opinion to say black people are on government subsidy, have nothing to do, abort their children, put their young men in prison, and never learned how to pick cotton? Is it not racist to use those stereotyped traits to distinguish black people from white people? Prejudice clothed in the context of concern is still prejudice. As for the article's lead, there was no accusation of racism, and the word racist was not even present. It was just a summary of his own words with reaction from previous supporters. The summary was word-for-word. It's his own words that are so problematic for anyone who says the words aren't racist. KinkyLipids (talk) 18:35, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

requesting a map revision

The map used in the "Grazing on US federal rangeland in Nevada" is not completely appropriate since it shows all federal lands including national parks and military facilities. The issue here involves lands managed by the BLM. A better map would be something like this one from The Economist, which shows BLM lands in a separate color from other federal lands.GabrielF (talk) 21:56, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

It is a nice map, but who owns the copyright? Likely to be problematic without permission from the owner009o9 (talk) 23:19, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

Ben Swann - undue weight?

User:009o9 recently added some commentary by Ben Swann on Bundy's racial remarks.[17] This material strikes me as giving undue weight to a minority opinion. I don't necessarily have a problem with including Bundy's positive remarks about Hispanics, but Swann's ideas are clearly out of the mainstream. We certainly shouldn't put the viewpoint that Bundy was "inarticulate" and "misrepresented" by the media ahead of condemnations of Bundy's words from figures such as Harry Reid, Dean Heller, Sean Hannity, Glenn Beck, Reince Priebus and others. These condemnations represent the (overwhelming) majority view. Swann should not be the first citation for the factual content in this section - above the original NYTimes reporting.GabrielF (talk) 21:50, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

@GabrielF First, the New York Times article is listed above the Ben Swann reference. Second, IMHO the proper format for section flow would be point, and then counter point, using the available secondary references (Swann article contains a primary), and then the tertiary sources to follow. The reactionary statements from Reid and others were solicited, they should hold the same weight as a press release.

From the NY Times article, soliciting for reactions

A spokesman for Mr. Paul, informed of Mr. Bundy’s remarks, said the senator was not available for immediate comment. Chandler Smith, a spokesman for Mr. Heller, said that the senator “completely disagrees with Mr. Bundy’s appalling and racist statements, and condemns them in the most strenuous way.” A spokeswoman for Mr. Abbott, Laura Bean, said that the letter he wrote “was regarding a dispute in Texas and is in no way related to the dispute in Nevada.”

009o9 (talk) 22:27, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

As for WP:UNDUE, would we even be having this conversation (or the section) if Al Sharpton had said the words negro or colored? 009o9 (talk) 22:38, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

@GabrielF— Positive remarks? Sure, but in Bundy's mind, if you're Spanish/Mexican, then you must have crossed the border against the law. That's a stereotyped generalization. There was no room in his remarks for the possibility of a Mexican who's here legally. Apparently, if you're hispanic and you're in the U.S., you must be here against the law, even if you're The Governor of Nevada! Yikes! KinkyLipids (talk) 06:41, 27 April 2014 (UTC)

Whitewashing

(No pun intended). The lead does not include the racially charged comments made by Bundy, which have been significantly covered by an abundance of sources, and some editors are replacing hos words about "the negro" with "African Americans" which was not what Bundy said. As this article is under 1RR, I will not revert these edits, but others may be breaching the 1RR limitation on this article, so beware. Cwobeel (talk) 23:47, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

I just re-read the article after the edits made today, and OMG, what a bloody disaster! This article now is totally un-reflective of what the sources say about the subject and has become an apologetic article about Bundy. Cwobeel (talk) 00:01, 27 April 2014 (UTC)

The article is about the standoff, and the remarks, which appropriately should be quoted in the body of the text, not in the lede, have been blown way out of proportion, esp since they are not really "racist". Again, cite one actual racist remark if you can. Let's not lose sight of the real issue. i.e.Armed Federal Government encroachment on American citizens and the standoff. Funny how some are more outraged about the comments than they are about that. Bundy could have been a full fledged member of the KKK, but that doesn't excuse what the armed BLM goons did. Seems much of the media are using Bundy's remarks to intentionally distract people from that issue. Let's not follow along and turn this article into something that belongs in a tabloid. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 11:51, 27 April 2014 (UTC)

This is not a forum WP:NOTFORUM. Cwobeel (talk) 13:35, 27 April 2014 (UTC)

Oh please, stop with the recital. These are considerations for any editor who wishes to contribute to this article. Are we going to put most of our energy into Bundy's comments now? That is a legitimate consideration, and mention of the above was intended to provide some insight into the matter. And kindly do not attempt to put Bundy's comments in the lede. Thank you. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 17:45, 27 April 2014 (UTC)

Reactions by media personalities

First I found that this section was being used to host a reaction by Bundy himself, obviously inappropriate as we have a section for that, this is for reactions by media personalities. Then I noted that the only 2 media personalities noted were right wing commentators - clearly pov so I've added a pov tag for the section. Dougweller (talk) 10:22, 27 April 2014 (UTC)

Why didn't you simply add some coverage from some left wing or counter-culture type personalities to the section for balance? Since no one is being prevented from doing that, I removed the tag until the section has a chance to average out. (add:) I added a comment from Oliver Willis from Media Matters, a left wing source. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 11:41, 27 April 2014 (UTC)

Oliver Willins quote is not notable, and I have removed it. There is no need to pile on. Cwobeel (talk) 13:38, 27 April 2014 (UTC)

It seems you have a habit of overstating matters. 'Pile on'? It was one sentence, intended to bring some balance, and it's entirely debatable if Willis is not notable. He certainly isn't as notable as Hannity, okay, but that doesn't mean he doesn't appear on the map, and even though I don't agree with his assessment, I'm restoring the edit. As there is a 1RR in place, please give this more thought and discuss matters before you try to assert your opinion without a discussion around here. You also seem to have dominated the edits in the article and here on the talk page, so please be reminded that you don't own the article & talk page and need to stop carrying on as if you do. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 18:05, 27 April 2014 (UTC)

What is this if not a discussion? if your intent is to add fringe commentary by non-notable sources, I don't think that is a good idea, and starting with a comment from an editor at Media Matters is not a good sign. Cwobeel (talk) 21:01, 27 April 2014 (UTC)

Well, I'm no big fan of Media Matters, at all, but the section needed something for balance. Fringe? Hmmm... I'm inclined to think so, but again, that would be an opinion, and in my case, a biased opinion. Are you now saying that the idea of Bundy's comments being "racist" is a fringe idea? As much as I disagree with the idea that his comments were "racist" I have no problem acknowledging that this is not a fringe idea. In any case, until something better comes along, let's let Willis' statement ride for the time being. Btw, your summary in the lede about Bundy's remarks are fine, imo. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 21:41, 27 April 2014 (UTC)

I'm surprised that Cwobeel and Gwillhickers haven't been blocked yet for violating the 1RR and inserting their POV. 184.242.172.181 (talk) 22:05, 27 April 2014 (UTC)

I'm surprised you apparently can't count to two, which is the number of reverts required to violate the 1RR. I have made one 'revert' to the article, which was only restoring my only edit which some one else reverted. I haven't combed through Cwobeel's edit history, but it seems he or she has not violated the 1RR either. And what POV have I inserted into the article? POV's occur on talk pages for various reasons, all the time, and POV's often make it to the main article, so long as they are based in tangible facts and are backed by consensus, not mere opinion. Hope this helps. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 22:27, 27 April 2014 (UTC)

RfC Section Organization

The section Court judgments against Bundy's claims presupposes that Bundy will lose all future judgments and legal remedies. The section name also tends to slant the article WP:NPOV as these judgments are already covered elsewhere. There are sparse details about Bundy's "We the People" States Rights claims and nowhere to put them. I'm assuming that the BLM is going to take this issue back to court, Bundy is likely to have representation and this is possibly a SCOTUS case, due to the modifications in the Nevada State Constitution over the last few decades.

My thinking here is that a lot Legal content could be organized into a more appealing structure for the reader. As things stand, a lot of little factoids are being dropped off everywhere without much structure.

United States v. Bundy

Current claims and counter claims

Prosecution

Defense

Grazing on public lands in Nevada

Federal

State of Nevada

Previous rulings

Decisions and actions 1993 to 1998

Decisions and actions 1998 to 2012

Decisions and actions 2012 to 2014

Decisions and actions etc...

Related cases and decisions

US v Gardner (1997)

US v Hage (2013)

009o9 (talk) 04:56, 26 April 2014 (UTC)009o9 (talk) 04:59, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

I agree that Court judgments against Bundy's claims should be changed to Current claims and counter claims with Bundy's claims separate from court judgments. Otherwise it forces a POV point-by-point refutation. The Grazing on US federal rangeland in Nevada section probably doesn't need to be divided into federal and state subsections, since the Nevada-specific Federal rangeland regulatory changes in 1993 subsection is mostly redundant from other sections. The subsection can be merged with other sections, and Grazing on US federal rangeland in Nevada can be changed to a more general Grazing on federally managed lands. KinkyLipids (talk) 05:30, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

The problem is that there is both State and Federal law concerning grazing and the Nevada Constitution has changed regarding unappropriated lands (public lands). Bundy's letter to the Sheriff in March 2014, addresses a NEVADA OPEN RANGE LAW (1893). According to state law on the open range, the party who wishes to keep the animals off of their land is required to provide and maintain a fence, otherwise there is no liability. Bundy is claiming that the BLM has not maintained their fences and a local law argument may have some legs in the original Taylor Grazing Act 1934.

NRS 568.300  Herding or grazing of livestock on land of another without consent unlawful; liability for damages; attachment.

3.  This section shall not apply to any livestock running at large on the ranges or commons.

I'm also thinking that we should try to be thorough because if there is an article split, all of these ref name="" tags might be problematic because things are being moved around so much.

I added the 1993 - 1998 section because it is really hard to find that stuff, if a drive-by editor happens to have it, I thought it would be good to have a dedicated place for quick drop-offs. 009o9 (talk) 09:38, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

The Supremacy Clause is quite clear - state law cannot overrule federal law. As the United States District Court for the District of Nevada has noted, Nevada law is inapplicable where federal laws relating to public land management supersedes it. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 22:49, 27 April 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose - The section heading is correct and NPOV in that there exist multiple enforceable federal court judgments against Bundy which have not been stayed or overturned by any competent appellate court. It is crystal-balling to presuppose that any appeals would be successful. Are there even any appeals underway? There are no sources which state that there are. There is no need for the BLM to take anything "back to court" - they already have enforceable court judgments that can be levied upon at any time or place. There is no expiration date on federal warrants or injunctions and the ruling remains valid forever. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 22:46, 27 April 2014 (UTC)

Vandalism?

any particular reason my inquiry "Party Affiliation?" was deleted from the talk page??

not the article, mind u, but the TALK page! what gives?! 209.172.25.218 (talk) 05:35, 28 April 2014 (UTC)

bundy standoff requires Cliven Bundy offshoot for allegedly racist and other views of CB

Shouldn't Cliven Bundy's (alleged) racism be on a page devoted to Cliven Bundy? The man is distinct from the standoff. If we had a separate page for the man, we might better be able to distinguish the two subjects. As it is, I feel it is becoming an uncomfortable and unproductive digression to a page about a standoff.66.225.161.37 (talk) 13:45, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

We've already established a consensus on that and have determined that there is no need for an additional separate article. Bundy isn't notable for anything other than the standoff, and the topic/issue involves much more than just Bundy, so it would be inappropriate to have a separate biography for this individual. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 16:38, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

The split-discussion to which you point was a "legal case" and "April 2014 standoff" split. This is a completely different split, GW. 66.225.161.37 (talk) 21:01, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

That doesn't change whether or not his comments are relevant to the standoff. For now I've moved them away from the lead section, where they certainly do not belong, into one of the reactions sections. Elassint ^Hi 18:22, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

The previous split discussion is just about 40 hours old at this point and still under discussion. Sparkie82 (t•c) 22:53, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

The wp:splitting guidelines on splitting an article are: 1) it's long, 2) the content seems to cover multiple topics. This article seems to fit both of those. It's difficult for readers to comfortably navigate the article, this talk page is unwieldy, and there are two distinct content areas: the standoff, and Cliven Bundy's personal views which were revealed some time after the standoff was ended. 66.225.161.37 (talk) 21:07, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

the "personal views" would be unknown were it not for the standoff. it deserves a section, but hardly a separate page. if these lawsuits are so big that the cases were known before the standoff, i'd say okay, "cliven bundy land fight" or something might be a better starting point. but it still doesn't warrant cliven bundy, THE MAN, having his own page; in fact, i'd push for "bunkersville land fight" as a better page name.

in any case, "personal views" deserves a section...including his PRO-AMNESTY rant! why is that getting the bum's rush in the media?! i have a sneaking suspicion this guy is actually a DEMOCRAT...a la FRED PHELPS.... 209.172.25.218 (talk) 05:37, 28 April 2014 (UTC)

The guidelines which may apply here are WP:N, WP:N(E), WP:BLP1E, and WP:BIO1E. I suggest (re)reading those. They suggest not creating bio pages for people who are notable only for one event. The question here is whether he's only notable for one event. Until the protests, he was only known for the dispute and the resulting court case, which may or may not have been notable at that time. When the standoff happened, there was significant coverage in association with that event and the press also widely covered the preceding court case, etc. His recent comments were unrelated to the dispute and standoff, but had significant coverage. His recent comment would not have had significant coverage if he were not known for the standoff/dispute, however, the motivations as to why the press cover a story are really not relevant for determining that there has been significant coverage. I think as far as notability, he probably meets the criterion outlined in the WP guidelines I cited. There may be other reasons not to create a bio page for him though. Sparkie82 (t•c) 22:53, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

I suggest reading WP:ALIVE before creating an Bio article to specifically attack Bundy on his purported racial views. There are some local references to this event beginning to be called the Sagebrush rebellion II. 009o9 (talk) 23:11, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

Ok, guys and gals, the section on "Cliven Bundy's worldviews" is soooo not pertinent to the "Bundy standoff" that it needs to either be vaporized, or placed onto a new "Cliven Bundy" page. Cliven Bundy is notable for at least three things: 1) legal battle since 1993; 2) Bundy standoff; 3) racist views. I nominate Sparkie82 to create a "Cliven Bundy" page, as s/he has admirably laid out the case for one. 66.225.161.37 (talk) 03:32, 28 April 2014 (UTC)

I don't know for sure whether we need a whole separate biography of Cliven Bundy yet, but I'm leaning in that direction - I agree that the article structure is increasingly unwieldy and muddled. Willing to listen to the arguments. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 05:58, 28 April 2014 (UTC)

Confrontations and Protests

Cites are needed in the Confrontations and Protests section. At the present time, there is a lot of material in it that may be true, although some of it is badly biased. But, in any case, there needs to be some cites added to back up the statements, because otherwise the unsubstantiated stuff won't be believed a year from now. Please cite some reputable newspaper instead of tabloid style web lunacy. There are a lot of good newspaper reports covering the events, so it shouldn't be too difficult to find. Search is your friend. Baleywik (talk) 20:21, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

This article should be renamed "Battle of Bunkerville" as it is becoming popularly known as. Citations have been added within the article to reflect this. 209.33.216.162 (talk) 22:47, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

Additionally, the opening paragraph of this section is biased, insinuating protesters who were armed were "not peaceful" simply because they carried weapons:

"Armed individuals and private militia members from across the United States joined peaceful protesters against the trespass cattle roundup in what has become known punningly as the Battle of Bunkerville.[3][25][26][27][28][29] There was no armed battle and no shots were fired in the incident."

It should rather read "Peaceful armed individuals and private militia members from across the United States joined peaceful unarmed protesters..." or something similar that's perhaps not as wordy. 209.33.216.162 (talk) 22:56, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

Very few sources even mention the town of Bunkerville. And the protestors lost the right to be called "peaceful" when they attacked a construction site. Their own video shows them violently harassing local police and construction workers. 173.153.5.233 (talk) 23:31, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

Verbal harassment in civil disobedience is not exclusive of being peaceful. My opinion is that 'peaceful' means no physical violence towards people or property damage. As for the construction site, I am not finding links to support that claim, but was it armed militia members or the aforementioned 'peaceful' (in the article) protestors? 209.33.216.162 (talk) 02:55, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

The Guardian's article shows a militia man with a sniper rifle aiming at rangers. That isn't peaceful. 173.153.6.148 (talk) 04:03, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

The Guardian's article did not show a sniper rifle aimed at rangers during the construction zone confrontation.Awick556 (talk) 19:03, 18 April 2014 (UTC)

Armed individuals are by definition not peaceful. Individuals prepared for violence, whether they actually do violence or not, are not peaceful. (This is both the logical and the legal definition.) It doesn't matter what or who they're confronting, or why; whether they're trying to invade something, or defending their familes from invaders, or rob a bank, or defend that bank, or shoot school children, or defend those school children. By definition, an armed person is not peaceful. Laodah (talk) 21:17, 24 April 2014 (UTC)

That's the worst made-up definition I've ever heard. Every "peace officer" in the U.S is armed. The peaceful, neutral Switzerland has an assault rifle in every male's closet. Peace is a condition of relationships, not a count of inanimate objects. OWS rallies were not peaceful counting injuries, rapes, pepper spray, etc, yet no firearms were used. Bundy was indeed peaceful even though LE showed up with guns and Bundy supporters followed. The reality is that this is a civil matter and was handled civilly. There doesn't appear to be a warrant for Bundy which is why LE backed down. --DHeyward (talk) 06:01, 25 April 2014 (UTC)

[18] This is the picture from the Guardian. That is not peaceful. The other shots in other papers show him aiming at the dozen rangers down below. "Police Officers" are "Officers of the Peace," not "Peace Officers." The difference is they keep the peace, not are peaceful. Civil matter would mean that it was handled in court and there were no criminal charges. Your words aren't being used correctly. The rangers backed down because guys like I pictured were aiming their weapons at them and threatening their lives. The BLM has very few people and aren't heavily armed. 173.153.2.89 (talk) 13:29, 25 April 2014 (UTC)

What criminal charges? Peace Officer is the term used nearly everywhere, whence our article for it. From that picture you have no idea where the rifle is pointed and he clearly has his finger off the trigger. Peace Officers do not back down from criminal warrants and BLM doesn't execute criminal warrants. If you don't think there were peace officer snipers doing the exact same thing then you have much to learn. That photo is not proof that it wasn't peaceful. Lack of gunshots, injuries and arrests is proof that it was peaceful. This was an eviction, a civil process, with no criminal complaint. I don't believe there are any criminal warrants or it would be the U.S. Marshal's or the FBI. Note the difference between Waco and Ruby Ridge. They backed off at Bundy because civil disagreements over money, land and cows aren't worth the risk of hurting anyone. BLM has no primary criminal jurisdiction. The next step would be a criminal complaint and grand jury followed by a very rapid arrest of people, not a roundup of cows and certainly not just on scene disorderly conduct arrests. --DHeyward (talk) 21:20, 25 April 2014 (UTC)

To add, if the Government does want to arrest him for contempt of court or criminal tax charge, it is very likely that a Grand Jury has been convened (always in secret) or that a civil contempt of court arrest warrant has been issued (most likely sealed). His arrest, if that's what the U.S. Government is now planning, it will be a no-knock, night warrant execution by U.S. Marshals (likely their SOG group). It will be started and ended in 10 minutes. If it gets violent then, the backlash will be tremendous because cows, land and money are not worth lives. --DHeyward (talk) 21:30, 25 April 2014 (UTC)

I know that we've been going back and forth between original source cites and secondary sources on commentary and propose this as a more neutral post of what transpired.

We'll look to administrators to even things out, but the snapshot of the current edition has incomplete or broken references and only gives a glossed over quote from a news commentator reported second hand information from a news site that hardly covered the story until later.

On April 10, protesters crowded around a construction site to find out why a dump truck was being used at a nearby location. After repeatedly blocking BLM vehicles and screaming at local law enforcement officers, Bundy's sister was taken to the ground by a law enforcement officer. Officers protecting the civilian truck driver had Tasers and police dogs. Officers gave several warnings and requests to Bundy's son to move his ATV after he drove the ATV into the dump truck. Video footage of the incident taken by the protestors and posted online has been widely seen. The video shows the protesters failing to heed these warnings from BLM agents. The K9 handler nearest the ATV points at the son's chest, and immediately the K9 dog lunged at the son’s leg. He jerked his leg away and kicked the dog, after which the officers then tasered him. The protesters angrily confronted the rangers. After clearing some of the protesters from blocking their vehicles the BLM agents went back to their vehicles and drove away. Awick556 (talk) 18:56, 18 April 2014 (UTC)

We shouldn't assume the uploader of the video didn't edit the video. Maybe there's another video from a youtube channel by a reliable news organization. Also, the fox news source doesn't say that Bundy's sister was blocking vehicles or screaming at officers before she was pulled to the ground. KinkyLipids (talk) 05:25, 20 April 2014 (UTC)

Neither of the referenced sources describe the event in chronological order and there was more than one of Bundy's sisters (Bundy Jr.'s aunts) at the scene. Additionally, there is no mention of a construction "site." The person shooting the footage from a hand held camera can be seen handing a News 8 microphone to Bundy Jr's aunt, to make a statement while he was calling for medical assistance for her, that microphone is attached to a second cameraman with a professional looking shoulder held video rig. I'd like to know what happened to the video shot by that professional cameraman.009o9 (talk) 15:00, 20 April 2014 (UTC)

The importance of the misquoted of "construction site" is relevant because (it appears) there is an attempt to spin it into an unreferenced Bundy attack on a local business. This was a roadblock, commonly used by protesters, the Bundy's thought that there were slaughtered animals in the dump truck. Instead, the protesters found that the dump truck contained destroyed irrigation equipment. I don't know if the court order allowed this action or not. (The source is Info Wars, reference police won't allow it here.)009o9 (talk) 15:25, 20 April 2014 (UTC)

Edit Revert War in Protest Section, Article Lockdown 18Apr-28Apr

In the Confrontations and Protests section. It appears that an edit-revert content war erupted on 18 April, when an editor at IP address 70.8.153.27 tried to make edits on opinion or transcribed/intepreted commentary from a Youtube and/or CNN video about the protest confrontations. This talk page appears to have a discussion attempt by the editor IP address 70.8.153.27 contemporaneously but about another subject. It appears that the same editor at IP address 70.8.153.27 complained to admins after getting edits reverted, which resulted in the Article Protection lockdown of the article editing page at 16:50UTC 18 April. Protection information is as follows: 16:50, 18 April 2014? Barek (talk | contribs)(57,400 bytes)(0)(Protected Bundy standoff: Edit warring / content dispute ([Edit=Allow only administrators] (expires 16:50, 28 April 2014 (UTC)) [Move=Allow only administrators] (expires 16:50, 28 April 2014 (UTC)).

Please don't shoot the messenger. Baleywik (talk) 19:18, 18 April 2014 (UTC)

No mention of Fox News direct involvement, especially Sean Hannity's.

No mention of Fox News direct involvement, especially Sean Hannity's. There is a multitude of sources to verify the incitement of Fox News' sensationalism surrounding the entire issue until completely bailing out on Mr Bundy immediately following his racist remarks. It is important to label this for what it is, and that does involve specific actions by media sources.

There is something about Hannity in the section Bundy_standoff#Cliven_Bundy_worldviews. You are welcome to add more. Cwobeel (talk) 02:52, 27 April 2014 (UTC)

I can't add any without sounding biased. Seems to be no mention of the incitement brought on by media outlets as the reason for the comments made, ie, why one day Hannity was an ardent supporter and the next day calling him repugnant. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Evanbroox (talk • contribs) 17:12, 28 April 2014 (UTC)

IP edit not supported by the source

I have partially reverted this edit by an unknown IP user, as the edit introduces original research which is not supported by the source. The claim is made that "common-law system of easements" existed and that the law created an "easement bureaucracy." This is entirely unsupported by the citation given — the word "easement" appears only three times in the article and is not attached to any statement or claim that easements existed or that the act creates any easements. Original research is not permitted on Wikipedia.

The Cornell Legal Information Institute states that the definition of an easement is the grant of a nonpossessory property interest that grants the easement holder permission to use another person's land. The Taylor Grazing Act, as implemented in the CFR, states unequivocally that Grazing permits or leases convey no right, title, or interest held by the United States in any lands or resources. They are, under the law, revocable permits to use land, not legal interests in property. The word "easement" appears nowhere in the text of the law or the implementing CFR sections.

Before the claim that permits issued under the Taylor Grazing Act are "easements" is reinserted, it must be supported by a reliable source, preferably a legal court opinion stating such. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 05:47, 28 April 2014 (UTC)

that the history pre-dated the TGA was indicated by verb tense. I am sorry if NbySB is unable to understand proper English. I have found a source to back my claims. The use of duelling credentials is not what wiki is about, and I'm sorry that this childishness has been allowed to degrade the wiki. 66.225.161.37 (talk) 11:25, 28 April 2014 (UTC)

It's entirely inappropriate to mention an editor's name in wikispace. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 14:55, 28 April 2014 (UTC)

no shit, sherlock 66.225.161.37 (talk) 16:00, 28 April 2014 (UTC)

You keep using sources to say things that aren't in the source. I have read the source. Nowhere does it claim that any sort of enforceable legal right existed to graze on federal land. Grazing was allowed, clearly, but that's not the same as having legal rights to do so indefinitely. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 16:02, 28 April 2014 (UTC)

Finally, in 1934, the Taylor Grazing Act put an end to the old free-grass system that allowed nomadic flockmasters to graze their sheep wherever they could. Note the use of the word allowed which is not indicative of any legal right, but of permissive use. Congress revoked that permission in 1934. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 16:12, 28 April 2014 (UTC)

There is nothing in the statement, "Grazing permits or leases convey no right, title, or interest held by the United States in any lands or resources." that implies that the permit extinguishes prior easements, what it says is that holding a grazing permit does not create an easement or encumbrance. Prior to TGA the range was open to everyone and it was the landowner's responsibility to fence out unwanted livestock (Nevada Open Range Law 1893). This is where Bundy sought the Sheriff's help at the onset of the roundup.009o9 (talk) 18:11, 28 April 2014 (UTC)

Easements and permits are granted by law. They do not exist before hand. Regardless, your claims about him having ownership have already been thoroughly debunked. His farm came after the BLM was established. Stop with the nonsense and using an IP get around being blocked for edit warring. 184.199.178.75 (talk) 18:18, 28 April 2014 (UTC)

Easements are are granted by use, easements and land patents are transfered with the sale of the land. 009o9 (talk) 18:34, 28 April 2014 (UTC)

Incorrect. Easements are a legal contract for one individual to move through another individual's property. They are only transferable if allowed in the original contract. By definition, claiming to have an easement is an admission that someone else owns the land. The use of land patent is inappropriate because there would be no such thing for that land. The only legal document that Bundy has is a title to a piece of property many miles away purchased after the BLM existed. 184.199.178.75 (talk) 19:23, 28 April 2014 (UTC)

Please refresh your understanding of WP:NOR. We will not be publishing any information in this article that has not been reported by secondary and reliable sources, so this discussion may not be useful. Cwobeel (talk) 20:33, 28 April 2014 (UTC)

Incorrect. Easements can also be granted through long repeated usage, 184.199. You and oo909 are both correct. 66.225.161.37 (talk) 00:28, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

I'm got some questions about the source being used to support the statement about the right to graze on public domain land. At a minimum, it's being attributed poorly. Right now it says Samuel Western at the University of Wyoming. Per the bio on the page, Western is a freelance writer. Adding the university is not warranted. I'm also not totally sure about the statement being totally supported by the source. There's not much discussion about the legal rights, just a handful of passing mentions. Ravensfire (talk) 01:00, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

Then surely you can provide reliable legal sources which state that these so-called "easements" exist in the context of grazing on federal land. Of course, you can't, because they don't exist. Federal courts have repeatedly ruled that Bundy has no easement or any other right to graze his cattle on the property in question. He and his father have held a grazing permit since 1954 and nothing more.

Prescriptive easements and adverse possession cannot operate against the United States (hornbook law, discussed in this interesting case). Moreover, because grazing use prior to 1934 was allowed by law, it cannot be said to be "adverse" even if they did. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 02:43, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

Property clause "contradiction"

The second sentence below is clearly false, and original research not supported by any cited source. The Property Clause refers to "Territory or other Property belonging to the United States", not "land within individual states" generally, and the enclave clause refers to ports and bases.

"Bundy also believes that grazing land in Nevada belongs only to Nevada, not the federal government. This is a contradiction, because the Constitution contains the Property Clause and Enclave Clause, both of which empower the federal government to manage and control land within individual states."

I'm deleting it now (second sentence above only), since it's not NPOV, unsourced, obviously false, and about a living person. Perhaps a sourced statement about federal ownership of that land could replace it if desired. Al Bunker (talk) 23:52, 27 April 2014 (UTC)

It isn't false. The Supreme Court has ruled on it before. Admin really need to start blocking people. 173.153.6.31 (talk) 00:48, 28 April 2014 (UTC)

What I was calling false was the assertion that Bundy's claim was a contradiction for the reason stated, not merely saying that Bundy's claim was wrong. And that the Constitution empowers congress to control all "land within individual states" instead of just federally owned land. The statement removed was false regardless of whether Bundy's claim is true or false. Al Bunker (talk) 07:50, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

Yep, agreed. The Constitution is clear that general police power is reserved to the states. The Property Clause gives Congress police power (plenary power, actually) only over federally-owned lands. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 07:56, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

Good call, Al Bunker. Cwobeel (talk) 01:08, 28 April 2014 (UTC)

I think the issue is confusion over what Bundy is arguing there. Per the source, he's arguing that federally-owned grazing land is actually owned by Nevada. That claim is objectively false, but if we're going to have a section with nothing but Bundy's worldview, the rebuttal belongs elsewhere. I think that section needs to be restructured because we shouldn't have a section with nothing but Bundy's claims, but I concur with the edit for now, as it makes sense with the current structure. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 01:28, 28 April 2014 (UTC)

Disclaimer clause declaratory

The Nevada disclaimer clause is essentially irrelevant, and extensive discussion of it is unnecessary.

As per U.S. v. Gardner, 107 F.3d 1314 (9th Circuit, 1997)

When Congress invited Nevada to join the Union in 1864, it mandated that the Nevada constitutional convention pass an act promising that Nevada would "forever disclaim all right and title to the unappropriated public lands lying within said territory, and that the same shall be and remain at the sole and entire disposition of the United States...." Nevada Statehood Act of March 21, 1864, 13 Stat. 30, 31 § 4. The state constitutional convention did so. Ordinance of the Nevada Constitution.[5]

Gardners claim that this clause is invalid and unconstitutional as an attempt to divest Nevada of its title to the unappropriated lands within its boundaries. Gardners cite to Van Brocklin v. Tennessee, 117 U.S. 151, 167, 6 S.Ct. 670, 679, 29 L.Ed. 845 (1886) for the premise that such disclaimer clauses "are but declaratory, and confer no new right or power upon the United States." Therefore, Gardners argue, Nevada could not have given the United States title to the public lands within its boundaries through the disclaimer clause.

Gardners are correct in their argument that the disclaimer is declaratory. However, the United States did not need the disclaimer clause to gain title to the public lands in Nevada. The United States already had title to those lands through the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, and the disclaimer clause was merely a recognition of the preexisting United States title, as opposed to a grant of title from Nevada to the United States.

As aforementioned, Congress' power under the Property Clause to administer its own property is virtually unlimited. See, e.g., Kleppe, 426 U.S. at 539, 96 S.Ct. at 2291-92. Indeed, the United States retains title to the public lands within states such as Nevada not due to "any agreement or compact with the proposed new State," but rather "solely because the power of Congress extend[s] to the subject." Coyle, 221 U.S. at 574, 31 S.Ct. at 693. The disclaimer clause, then, is declaratory of the right already held by the United States under the Constitution to administer its property, and as such is valid under the United States Constitution. Van Brocklin, 117 U.S. at 167, 6 S.Ct. at 679.

This is cited in the July 2013 ruling against Bundy - Bundy is incorrect in claiming that the Disclaimer Clause of the Nevada Constitution carries no legal force. See Gardner, 107 F.3d at 1320.

It is original research to suggest that removing the clause post facto changes anything about the status of lands owned and possessed by the federal government since 1848 - no such argument appears in any of the cited sources. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 05:07, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

I hear you on the OR, but only displaying the original passage without the current passage goes to WP:BALANCE and may lead the reader to believe that the original version, is the current version.

1. Bundy's argument he claims he is a citizen of the State of Nevada not the Territory of Nevada. The Territory of Nevada ceased to exist many years ago, but after many revision the law still references the territory. If other parts of the Constitution and the permissible use of the public land can be changes, why can't this clause be changed? In either case, the ownership is not question at hand. (Anecdotally, I don't recall seeing the Federal Government claiming ownership until the FPLMA (I'm sure Hage's book deals with this, but it is $600.00 for a new copy).

2. It is Bundy's opinion, as it is with the State of Nevada, that the management of public lands and law enforcement within the state is better served by the local authorities and courts. Bundy has repeatedly called upon the Sheriff to intercede and has stated that the Fed has no business sending in paramilitary units over a trespassing charge. Put in context, "range war" and "doing whatever it takes" are not threats of violence.

Additionally, the Federal Courts should not be hearing cases that involve Federal land and Federal fees -- the impartial court in this case would be the County Court. The Legislature of Nevada is pretty much in agreement with Bundy and they have been waiting 18 years to be heard on this before Congress.

I wouldn't want to add the opinion to an article that is too large and I'm waiting for everyone to get past their crucification complex before trying to add balance. 009o9 (talk) 11:19, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

NRS 321.596 Legislative findings.

NRS 321.596 Legislative findings. The Legislature finds that: 1. The State of Nevada has a strong moral claim upon the public land retained by the Federal Government within Nevada’s borders because (a) On October 31, 1864, the Territory of Nevada was admitted to statehood on the condition that it forever disclaim all right and title to unappropriated public land within its boundaries; (b) From 1850 to 1894, newly admitted states received 2 sections of each township for the benefit of common schools, which in Nevada amounted to 3.9 million acres; (c) In 1880 Nevada agreed to exchange its 3.9-million-acre school grant for 2 million acres of its own selection from public land in Nevada held by the Federal Government; (d) At the time the exchange was deemed necessary because of an immediate need for public school revenues and because the majority of the original federal land grant for common schools remained unsurveyed and unsold; (e) Unlike certain other states, such as New Mexico, Nevada received no land grants from the Federal Government when Nevada was a territory; (f) Nevada received no land grants for insane asylums, schools of mines, schools for the blind and deaf and dumb, normal schools, miners’ hospitals or a governor’s residence as did states such as New Mexico; and (g) Nevada thus received the least amount of land, 2,572,478 acres, and the smallest percentage of its total area, 3.9 percent, of the land grant states in the Far West admitted after 1864, while states of comparable location and soil, namely Arizona, New Mexico and Utah, received approximately 11 percent of their total area in federal land grants. 2. The State of Nevada has a legal claim to the public land retained by the Federal Government within Nevada’s borders because (a) In the case of the State of Alabama, a renunciation of any claim to unappropriated lands similar to that contained in the ordinance adopted by the Nevada constitutional convention was held by the Supreme Court of the United States to be “void and inoperative” because it denied to Alabama “an equal footing with the original states” in Pollard v. Hagan, 44 U.S. (3 How.) 212 (1845); (b) The State of Texas, when admitted to the Union in 1845, retained ownership of all unappropriated land within its borders, setting a further precedent which inured to the benefit of all states admitted later “on an equal footing”; and (c) The Northwest Ordinance of 1787, adopted into the Constitution of the United States by the reference of Article VI to prior engagements of the Confederation, first proclaimed the “equal footing” doctrine, and the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, by which the territory including Nevada was acquired from Mexico and which is “the supreme law of the land” by virtue of Article VI, affirms it expressly as to the new states to be organized therein. 3. The exercise of broader control by the State of Nevada over the public lands within its borders would be of great public benefit because (a) Federal holdings in the State of Nevada constitute 86.7 percent of the area of the State, and in Esmeralda, Lincoln, Mineral, Nye and White Pine counties the Federal Government controls from 97 to 99 percent of the land; (b) Federal jurisdiction over the public domain is shared among 17 federal agencies or departments which adds to problems of proper management of land and disrupts the normal relationship between a state, its residents and its property; (c) None of the federal lands in Nevada are taxable and Federal Government activities are extensive and create a tax burden for the private property owners of Nevada who must meet the needs of children of Federal Government employees, as well as provide other public services; (d) Under general land laws only 2.1 percent of federal lands in Nevada have moved from federal control to private ownership; (e) Federal administration of the retained public lands, which are vital to the livestock and mining industries of the State and essential to meet the recreational and other various uses of its citizens, has been of uneven quality and sometimes arbitrary and capricious; and (f) Federal administration of the retained public lands has not been consistent with the public interest of the people of Nevada because the Federal Government has used those lands for armament and nuclear testing thereby rendering many parts of the land unusable and unsuited for other uses and endangering the public health and welfare. 4. The intent of the framers of the Constitution of the United States was to guarantee to each of the states sovereignty over all matters within its boundaries except for those powers specifically granted to the United States as agent of the states. 5. The attempted imposition upon the State of Nevada by the Congress of the United States of a requirement in the enabling act that Nevada “disclaim all right and title to the unappropriated public lands lying within said territory,” as a condition precedent to acceptance of Nevada into the Union, was an act beyond the power of the Congress of the United States and is thus void. 6. The purported right of ownership and control of the public lands within the State of Nevada by the United States is without foundation and violates the clear intent of the Constitution of the United States. 7. The exercise of such dominion and control of the public lands within the State of Nevada by the United States works a severe, continuous and debilitating hardship upon the people of the State of Nevada. (Added to NRS by 1979, 1362)

We don't need full passages in the article. Just summarize the points as reported in secondary sources and avoid WP:NOR. Cwobeel (talk) 13:51, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

@009o9:Of course, you can add Bundy's opinion based on what he has publicly said, not what you believe he has said. As for the purported "crucification complex" (sic) of contributors to this article, it would be better you avoid these type of characterizations and personal comments. This is not a forum. Cwobeel (talk) 13:56, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

Basically, despite our beliefs and understanding of the law and the dispute, we can only describe what secondary and reliable sources say about this subject. Cwobeel (talk) 14:55, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

The federal government has asserted ownership of the public domain since shortly after the creation of the nation — even predating the Constitution, as you can go back to the 1787 Northwest Ordinance in which the nascent nation asserted ownership of all lands outside existing states and established the public domain. The Supreme Court has repeatedly upheld Congressional action under the Property Clause, which gives broad and unambiguous authority to Congress to make rules about land the federal government owns. See Cameron v. United States, Cappaert v. United States, etc.

The Constitution explicitly states that cases involving the federal government shall be litigated only in the federal court system. The judicial Power shall extend... to Controversies to which the United States shall be a Party.

Bundy's legal claims are documented in this article, as are the clear and unambiguous federal court rulings that his claims are unfounded. His statements about preferring less federal land ownership are political opinions, and are also documented.

Political opinions cannot be proven true or false. They stand judged in a court of public opinion. Legal claims, on the other hand, are subject to test in courts of law. It is NPOV to report that those courts have ruled against him. We can also note that he doesn't like those rulings. We can't assert that those rulings are wrong or that some other ruling would be better.

Your thoughts as to what you think the laws should be are interesting, but they don't belong in this article. They're original research, and you should use a personal website to publish them, not Wikipedia. As noted, we can only publish viewpoints that are verifiable from reliable sources. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 16:10, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

Because we don't have the US v. Bundy exhibits, I don't think there is an understanding what Bundy is getting at. Congress can just as easily assign management of the public lands to the state the same way it has to the BLM. Moreover, this case is not about the ownership of the public lands, it is about the stewardship of the land. Bundy has stated he has no problem with paying grazing fees, he has refused to pay them to an Executive branch agency that has empowered itself with rule-making.

Besides the 11 Western States, there are other related reasons why Congress should entertain Bundy. These articles mights be an interesting read.009o9 (talk) 18:29, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

• • Unincorporated territories of the United States
  • Insular_Cases#Criticism (the insular cases may be rooted in racism)
  • Territories of the United States

Congress could do that. But again, that is a political opinion. I express no opinion either way as to the rightness or wrongness of that opinion. But it is not relevant to the legal case against Bundy, which is rooted in the facts and laws as they stand today. We do not engage in speculation about what might be of what someone thinks should be, unless that opinion is expressed in a reliable source. Where those opinions conflict, we note each competing claim with due weight given to claims in accordance with their prevalence in reliable sources. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 18:54, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

Agree, I would be very interested to see if Bundy was addressing ownership or management and oversight. Too bad we don't have the exhibits. 009o9 (talk) 20:39, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

"Party Affiliation?"

cud someone pls restore this section from the history files -- i do not know how to do it myself.

it was a legitimate enquiry on the talk page -- why on earth was it removed in the first place?! 209.172.25.201 (talk) 02:18, 30 April 2014 (UTC)