From David French at National Review:
In April 2014, America was transfixed by an armed standoff in the Nevada desert. On one side was a collection of dangerous, out-of-control armed men who were deliberately provocative, prone to saying unhinged things in a single-minded quest to destroy their enemies, and who lied time and again to cover their misdeeds.
On the other side was Cliven Bundy.
How bad did the feds get that National Review is dismissing armed resistance to the government? Pretty bad, if you read any of the whistleblower documents.
I confess, my initial reaction was that Bundy and friends were outside a useful area. But the analogy to how Patriots prevented operation of royal courts in Massachusetts in the weeks before Lexington is very strong.
The thing is, this is common in government. What is rare is that it comes out and they lose a case because of it.
I think you need a comma in there. “How bad did the feds get, that National Review is dismissing armed resistance to the government?†I had to read the sentence a few times to figure it out.
I try to not be “that guy,†but, in this case, I’ll make an exception.
Do we have, in this case, a contemporary example of a:
– “well regulated militia” serving to inhibit a tyranny
– in furtherance of the end of “the security of a free state”?
If so, then we also have just such a case vindicated by the Judicial branch of our system of government. That would be historic.
I think my question is one which deserves a thorough analysis.
Eh…
What I’ve read of the ruling makes this an indictment of the government entities involved in the LE action and subsequent prosecution, and not really an endorsement of the Bundy clan or the militia group(s) that came to their defense.
The case wasn’t tossed due to lack of merit, it was tossed because the government’s actions made it impossible for the Bundy clan to receive a fair trial for the alleged crimes (or perhaps more realistically, a trial that they could have at least claimed was fair).
Ultimately, the judge recognized that dismissal with prejudice was the minimum acceptable remedy: Anything less would have been an endorsement of the kind of gross prosecutorial misconduct that would normally have the ACLU quoted in the headlines for weeks.