I heard people complaining about this yesterday, but it’s exactly what George Washington did at Lexington and Concord:
It was Richard Mack, a former Arizona county sheriff and founder of the Constitutional Sheriffs, who had said Monday that the gathered self-described militia had considered using women as human shields if a gunfight with federal officials erupted. He elaborated on those comments Monday in an interview with radio host Ben Swann.
“It was a tactical plot that I was trying to get them to use,” Mack said in comments flagged by The Raw Story. “If they’re going to start killing people, I’m sorry, but to show the world how ruthless these people are, women needed to be the first ones shot.”
“I’m sorry, that sounds horrible,” he continued. “I would have put my own wife or daughters there, and I would have been screaming bloody murder to watch them die. I would gone next, I would have been the next one to be killed. I’m not afraid to die here. I’m willing to die here.”
The Constitutional Sheriffs would be a good name for a band.
Chyron HR
This must be the GOP’s female outreach I’ve heard so much about.
some guy
to show the world how ruthless “they” are we will sacrifice women.
fucking cowards.
cmorenc
So Sheriff Mack is willing to sacrifice his wife and daughters as shields in a gunfight, in order to defend a thief, a freeloading “taker” who’s stealing from the public. This Bundy guy he’s sticking up for with his big talk is no Robin Hood.
Josie
So…..to prove how ruthless the government is, he is willing to watch his wife and daughter die. Hmmmm.
ETA: some guy got there first.
Linda Featheringill
Oh, my.
Suggesting using women as human shields is cold and cruel but saying that women “need” to be the first ones shot is stupid as well as cruel. What a sound bite!
I suspect that this particular quote will be heard around the world.
Betty Cracker
From what I’ve read, the BLM peeps were wise to extricate themselves from the situation since they’re not really equipped to deal with armed, insane yahoos. But now it’s time for the feds to lace up the jackboots and go stomp these fuckers down.
rea
George Washington was in Philadelphia during Lexington and Concord, but yeah.
MattF
@Betty Cracker: Oooh, so the real black helicopters are coming. I love it.
Judge Crater
I live right next to U.S. park land (Glover Park) here in DC. I’m going to go out and claim a couple of acres and use it for my own purposes – cut down some trees, set up a camp ground and a fire pit, etc. I expect the these rube militias to come and defend me when the Park Police arrive to throw my ass in jail. DC doesn’t even have any representation in the Federal government they despise.
Poopyman
But….?
Paul in KY
@Chyron HR: I wonder if any of their women (yeesh, the poor, deluded ladies) have had time to digest this ‘tactic’ and may now be having 2nd thoughts about staying with their protectors?
Paul in KY
@Josie: He’s also willing to not eat popcorn while watching them die. The inhumanity!
cmorenc
@Betty Cracker:
Which is exactly what Eisenhower by send in the 101st Airborne to deal with arch-segregationists threatening violence against school integration in Little Rock, Ark in 1957.
C.V. Danes
Explain to me again how this does not constitute an armed insurrection? Because if these people had been black or Native American, there would have been blood on the streets.
BC
Wasn’t a woman killed at Ruby Ridge? I kind of remember that the guy who started the standoff in the first place lived to tell about it, but his wife was killed. That happened in 1992 (George H.W. Bush was president, he was, as I recall, a Republican president), so these fuckers have been putting the women out there – or – hiding behind women for a long time.
BC
Wasn’t a woman killed at Ruby Ridge? I kind of remember that the guy who started the standoff in the first place lived to tell about it, but his wife was killed. That happened in 1992 (George H.W. Bush was president, he was, as I recall, a Republican president), so these fuckers have been putting the women out there – or – hiding behind women for a long time.
Paul in KY
@Linda Featheringill: “Women and children (die) first” – Chivalry, the Republican way!
Lavocat
“And, don’t worry ’bout when the goin’ gets tough, cuz I’ll be right BEHIND you.”
These morons are the gift that keeps on giving.
MattF
@C.V. Danes: What part of white = {patriotic, Christian, moral, American} and other = {treasonous, Moooslim, slutty, foreigh} do you not understand?
Iowa Old Lady
I find this event really disturbing, especially the way people rushed there from all over with their guns in hand, eager to see some shooting. They see themselves as the oppressed heroes of the story. It’s scary.
Lavocat
@some guy: I honestly thought this HAD TO BE parody when I first heard about it. How can a person be so un-self-aware when it comes to irony?
Paul in KY
@BC: The woman in that case was the driving force behind the standoff (from what I’ve read about it). At least she was until she was shot dead.
Cailte
Lexington and Concord — totally in New Hampshire!
Belafon
You don’t understand. This is just like Lott being willing to send his daughters to defend the angels from the citizens of Sodom.
sm*t cl*de
There is a lovely photograph over at TPM of these hard-riding sons of freedom proudly rallying around a large US federal flag, which they are brandishing as a symbol of their patriotic struggle against federal authority and federal powers.
It is the strength of their patriotism which forces them not to recognise their country.
big ole hound
All these deranged assholes want is to wear their white cowboy hats and carry guns while on horses in the West. Lets call it the Wyatt Earp Syndrome. These WES’s will attract the media and photo ops of brave muricans. My hope is that all these idiots arrive there and they can be sacrificed in the testing a new weapon so the martyrdom can be complete.
WereBear
I love it when they tell the truth.
Soonergrunt
@Betty Cracker: There’s a ruling from a federal judge. It’s time for the US Marshals Service to go and enforce the court order.
Walker
@BC:
Ruby Ridge was actually a fuck-up on the governments part. The family, though right wingers, were set up by other right wingers. Lots of money was eventually paid to that family.
The woman shot was hit by a sniper (under what were later determined to be unethical rules of engagement) as she opened a door to let the actual target into the house.
MomSense
@sm*t cl*de:
I saw that and was wondering what in the world they were doing flying the symbol of our federal government during a rebellion against the federal government.
Poopyman
@Belafon:
Trent?
DougJ
@Walker:
Ruby Ridge and Waco were both genuine fuck ups on the part of federal authorities.
Baud
Lady Wolverines!
Omnes Omnibus
@Baud: What does this have to do with U of M?
rea
Wasn’t a woman killed at Ruby Ridge?
Shot by a sniper while holding her 10-month old baby in her arms.
The first family member killed was a 14-year old boy, who got into a firefight with federal marshals who had shot his dog.
Horribly, horribly mismanaged by the feds, although the Weaver family were real pieces of work.
Belafon
@Poopyman: Sorry, too many T’s.
Omnes Omnibus
@Belafon: Ren?
Baud
@Omnes Omnibus:
Ha! They know what they did.
RSA
And the Geneva Convention prohibitions on human shields? Screw those effete European rules.
eric
Brave, brave, Sir Robin.
Omnes Omnibus
@RSA:
They are only human shields if they are involuntarily placed there. If they are as batshit crazy as their menfolk and they volunteer, they aren’t human shields as the GC defines them.
AxelFoley
@Betty Cracker:
This.
eric
@Omnes Omnibus: they are women, so………in the eyes of these loons, they are not whole people…they are vessels for receiving and delivering life for them to squander.
cmorenc
@DougJ:
Which is why it was a wise decision by the BLM and the feds to temporarily back off and return with a well-considered tactical plan backed by sufficient force and appropriate tools. Such as, modern crowd-control instruments like infrared pulsed energy or “dazzlers” that causes intense, disabling, but temporary pain. Then round up the clowns, haul ’em to Vegas in a prison bus, and release them after a day or so. But Bundy himself needs to be charged with something sufficient to have to make an appearance in federal court in an orange jumpsuit, doing a perp walk.
gene108
@DougJ:
But in the eyes of the right-wing militias that exonerates the Weavers and the Branch Davidians from any and all wrong doing. They were not squeaky clean, to put it mildly.
D58826
@rea: While I don’t dispute the ‘feds mismanaged’ part, I just wonder how do you manage it better? How do you deal with folks who do not recognize that the way we deal with disputes is in the court not with guns. How do you ‘manage better’ when the people your dealing with do not recognize you as a legitimate authority and view you as the enemy. Waco, Ruby Ridge, the Move confrontations in Philly, none of them happened in the blink of an eye. There were days (or in the Move situation hours) of negotiations. There were mediators who could have guaranteed safe passage. These folks wanted a confrontation and even if the feds had handled it perfectly it would have ended badly. The branch davidians had 80 some days to work out a deal but chose to kill themselves and their kids. How do you reach an understanding with someone who thinks it is a great idea to use his wife and daughters as human shields?
How have we gotten to this point as a country. Sure government isn’t perfect. Never has been never will be but what ever these militias come up with will not be any better. They seem like so many other groups thru history ‘we want freedom as long as we are the top dogs’ .
cleek
Spoon rules
Belafon
@D58826: Because we have a whole group of people that do not accept Democracy unless their people are in charge, in other words, they don’t like Democracy.
rikyrah
@C.V. Danes:
tell the truth and shame the devil.
aimai
@Paul in KY: Thats pretty much not the way people think. If you are married to one of these blowhards the chances are good that you accept his world view in the first place. Secondly, you are used to his brand of logic: “Our enemies are so horrible and our cause so just that we should consider this standoff another Masada. Its a suicide pact.” If you begin with the premise that the standoff isn’t meant to be won, but is just a provocation in a longer war, then the tactic makes its own kind of sense.
Bobby Thomson
@D58826:
Easy. Monday morning quarterbacking means never having to defend a casual accusation of mismanagement. Just some tut tutting will do.
Fuck ’em. Confederates who brandish guns at armed feds and then whine about being shot back at get no sympathy from me.
maximiliano furtive, formerly known as dr. bloor
@rea:
Yup. In high-level meetings with Jesus and Reagan on the wording of the Constitution
Fred
As has been mentioned, armed insurrection or at least assault with a deadly and interfering with federal officers. I will be surprised if some folks aren’t arrested by the by. That’s the way to deal with these nuts. Quietly pick ’em up when they’re down to the Piggly Wiggly for beer ‘n’ smokes. Use their own viral videos as evidence. Give me liberty or give me sixty days in lock up and a hefty fine!
I suspect somebody’s watched Red Dawn on The Late Late Show a couple o’ few times too many. Oh it’s all sooo romantic.
Paul in KY
@D58826: You just have tro wait them out. Put a fence around the place so they can’t get out & a minimal number of guards & let them stew there.
rikyrah
‘And then you go, ‘Uh oh”
04/16/14 08:43 AM—Updated 04/16/14 09:05 AM
By Steve Benen
As became clear late last week and over the weekend, Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy has a core group of supporters, many of whom happen to have weapons they’re willing to bring to a protest. Bundy, who’s been ignoring federal laws and court rulings for many years, also has his champions among conservative media personalities.
But David Nather noted that there seems to be a ceiling on Bundy support among conservatives who ordinarily enjoy railing against “big government,” but who fail to see a “powerful rallying cry” in this story.
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/and-then-you-go-uh-oh
RSA
@Omnes Omnibus:
Right, thanks. I was thinking about this issue after I commented; I had the thought that, in a military situation, if a commander puts (voluntary) fighters on the front line not because they are most effective there but because it will look worse if they are killed… That seems basically wrong. Not human-shield-level wrong, but still wrong.
Paul in KY
@aimai: I’m sure most of them are this way, however, if there ever was a ‘come to Jesus’ moment for them, you’d think it would be these comments.
D58826
@Bobby Thomson: I guess your held to a higher standard when you are the only adult in the room!
Paul in KY
@RSA: Sending Uriah the Hittite to the front line was a type of murder (says the bible).
Sending untrained soldiers to the front line could be considered either lousy tactics or another form of murder (depending upon the reasoning of the commander).
Snarkworth
Love the way he says he would have “put” his wife and daughter out in front.
Not,”My wife would have chosen to march bravely to the front of the crowd to protect her family.”
smith
What an odd bit of strateizing this is. First, it seems to imply that the women put in front would be unarmed — why? Surely women involved enough with militias to be on the spot at the Bundy standoff would also be able to handle a firearm. Certainly whe I see pictures of militia family groupings the women are fondling their guns just as avidly as the men.
Second, If the plan was to stand the women in front unarmed, then this seems like a particularly warped misundertanding of nonviolent resistance to armed force such as was seen in Tianamen Square (I’ve seen some wingnut comparisons to this effect) or the Czech demonstrators who confronted Russian troops in 1968. What part of “nonviolent” don’t these boobs understand? Standing unarmed people in front of armed insurgents will not win you any accolades for courageous resistance in the history books.
Citizen_X
Go ahead and eat a bullet–by your lonesome–if you’ve got such a death wish, you fucking coward. We’re not stopping you.
SFAW
@Paul in KY:
Maybe they could call it the Children’s Crusade?
SFAW
@Baud:
Or, as the late, great gil mann coined: Vulvarines!
Although he was referring to the Fightin’ 101st Keyboarders at the time.
(Although, as far as I know, gil mann still walks among us.)
Paul in KY
@SFAW: Already been done!
Punchy
@Poopyman: Ronnie
SFAW
@Paul in KY:
But not recently.
Plus, the parallels of crusading against the minions of the Head Moooslim, i.e. the one in the
BlackWhite House, make it even better for theBradyBundy Bunch.Mr. Longform
Wouldn’t it be easy enough to lob a couple of grenades over the heads of the wives and daughters? or maybe get through with a candygram? or use the old toll booth trick? these aren’t going to be tactical geniuses we’re dealing with here.
kbuttle
You’re a fking genius, DougJ. That wrap-up thought really does put it all in perspective . . .
SFAW
@Mr. Longform:
Sheriff Bart, sadly, has passed on – Mongo, too, for that matter – and the Land Shark is in retirement (although it did do a cameo in “Sharknado!”)
magurakurin
@rea: Ruby Ridge? Waco? You call that a fuck up? That’s not a fuck up, mate, This is a fuckup. 1985 Phildalphia Move Bombing
drkrick
Vicki Weaver, the woman killed at Ruby Ridge, was the person who escalated the conflict in the first place. After her husband was charged with being dumb enough to agree to sell some sawed-off shotguns to an undercover agent, she started sending violent threatening letters to the US Attorney in charge of Weaver’s case. It’s easy to point out ways that the Feds could have dealt with heavily armed people looking for a shootout better than they did in this case, but it was the Weavers, particularly Vicki, who made it a violent situation in the first place.
Paul in KY
@SFAW: OK, see your logic now. Also think they should use the moniker ‘Bundy Bunch’. About as good as ‘Teabaggers’.
SFAW
@Paul in KY:
“Here’s the story of a man named Bundy,
Who was busy bein’ crazy his own,”
If I were more talented, I could rewrite the whole song.
But I ain’t, so I won’t.
Eric U.
@gene108: I’m no right wing nutjob, and I have thought the Ruby Ridge standoff was a screwup since the time it was happening. And then later it turns out they had plenty of opportunities to arrest Randy Weaver without having a standoff. That’s why he won a multi-million dollar settlement. Apparently the same was true with Koresh. In both cases, the government didn’t have to start a standoff, but they did and then they couldn’t deal in an intelligent way with what happened. Waco was a different case because the Branch Davidians shot first, and then nothing good was going to happen. I blame both cases on the Bush administration, btw.
D58826
@magurakurin: Being from Philly I watched the thing unfold. Move and the Philly cops had a long and hostile history. Race certainly was part of it. The city under Wilson Goode tried to negotiate but Move would not compromise. The neighbors began to pressure the city to resolve the problem. After all it was their block that was being impacted. Move barricaded the common drive, made pets out of rats, and gave long winded speeches at 4am from the roof using a loud speaker.
The cops were convinced that Move had an arsenal so the morning started out with a prolonged shot out. I’m not sure if it was ever resolved whither Move was shooting back or the cops were just shooting at themselves.
A day of negotiations got nowhere and the city was afraid that the Move folks would sneak out under cover of darkness only to set up shop somewhere else, hence the bomb. The plan was to use a mining type explosive that had a lot of concussion but little flash. This was to prevent starting a fire. A rogue cop on the bomb squad, to settle old grudges with Move, mixed in some C4 without telling anyone. Now the entire plan, with or without C4, was the result of stupid desperate improvisation and the city paid huge amounts of money for the mistake.
On the other hand, once the fire did start no one thought that these people would stay in the basement and let the building burn down around them. This is America after all, we don’t do Masada death before surrender type stunts. Obviously every one was wrong. The long and the short of it is that Move could have come out at any time during the day before or after the bomb (as stupid as that plan was) was dropped but choose not to.
From the moment that Waco started I was afraid it was going to end badly because people thought that Move was a one off event.
It still gets back to how do you deal with people who have decided that you are the enemy and death is preferable to surrender or compromise(which in their view is the same as surrender). The idea, suggested up threat, to barricade them in until they surrender was tried in the 1976 Move confrontation and at Waco. Didn’t turn out well either time
Matt McIrvin
@Eric U.: For many years I found that a reliable sign of a wingnut was someone who blamed the Ruby Ridge incident on Bill Clinton and Janet Reno. But it got repeated so often that eventually almost everyone remembered it that way.
SFAW
@Matt McIrvin:
As well they should. Next you’ll be trying to tell us that the 2008 financial meltdown was not the fault of Barack Hussein Obummer.
Goddam hippie/commie.
gbear
@Mr. Longform: I wouldn’t put it past these ‘patriots’ to pick off one of the wives just to give the assholes a ‘reason’ to start shooting. If the battle is worth getting your wife and kids shot first, why not just martyr one of them to the cause?
Amir Khalid
@Betty Cracker:
Interestingly enough, jackboots don’t have laces.
AliceBlue
@rikyrah:
Didja see the sign in the photograph? “Marshall law”.
catclub
1. I just read somewhere that the crazy General (?) Boykin was an advisor to the Waco slaughter.
2. Comparisons to Mohandas Gandhi and civil disobedience by Bundy omit the key part – actually getting arrested for the actual violation of present law.
Phantom 309
@AliceBlue: No doubt referring to that great 1970s teevee show, “Owen Marshall, Counselor at Law.” These jerks seem to get a lot of their legal ideas from teevee in general.
Phantom 309
@catclub: Oh, friggin’ details….
It’s the thought that counts.
DougJ
@cleek:
Glad someone got the reference.
C.V. Danes
@MattF:
My point exactly.
Sloane Ranger
@sm*t cl*de: Thread probably dead but as the quote from Passport to Pimlico has it, “It’s because I’m British that I’m fighting so hard for my right to be Burgundian.
kindness
The Constitutional Sheriffs would be a good name for a band so long as all the band members had brown stains in the seats of their pants.
magurakurin
@D58826: yeah, well, I watched it unfold too. I was born in Roxborough Memorial Hospital in 1962. Yes, the Move fuckers were totally crazy assholes. I read one article were the neighbors described how they would run over the rooftops all night long and that the stench was simply unbearable. But what went down that day was a fuck up of epic proportions. I remember watching the fire chief who was in charge at the scene that day break down into tears at the hearings that were held after. He sobbed as he admitted that in hindsight that his decision to agree with the police request to let the fire burn was a mistake. Frank Rizzo was fascist asshole scumbag, but he did take out a Move stronghold in 78 without burning down an entire fucking city block. I drove into that part of the city after a time and checked out that block. The devastation was shocking. Although, to be honest it was a little hard to tell if from the devastation that decades of urban blight had already wrought on those neighborhoods.
But yeah, like you say, there wasn’t a lot of hope that either Waco or Move was going to end well. But dropping the bomb on the Move house…major fuck up.
dlw32
The cowardice of hiding behind the women doesn’t shock me as much as the romanticizing having you and your family killed by the government.
How can we return these folks to enough sanity to function in modern America?
LAC
@Bobby Thomson: amen to that. We feed this nonsense with our own brand of tut tutting here.
Chris
@some guy:
It’s funny. There’s a conservative meme about marriage that they often trot out when liberals complain about the “wives, submit to your husbands” line in the Bible – that Biblical marriage means the wife should submit to her husband, but also, the husband must be willing to lay down his life for his wife. “So really, WE have the harder job!”
Absent this argument is the fact that “submit to your husbands” is a 24/7/365 job, whereas in this day and age a husband is very unlikely to have to “lay down his life for his wife” and most of them will go their entire lives without having to fulfill that obligation… but these people have actually managed to create a situation where they actually MIGHT have to die for their wives. This is the one chance most husbands in 2014 America will never have to fulfill their part of the Biblical marriage contract.
And what do they do?
Put the wives in front of them and tell the feds to shoot them first.
Give it up for traditional family values, ladies and gentlemen.
SFAW
@D58826:
I am reminded of a Vietnam-vintage ( think) T-shirt saying:
Kill ’em all. Let God sort ’em out.
Given that the expressed sentiment was promoted by the predecessors (as opposed to pre-decease-ors, I guess) of The Modern Wingnut, one might make a comment about karma and such.
J R in WV
@dlw32:
Compulsory administration of anti-psychotic drugs, along with detailed civics and history lessons, for as long as necessary. Then, having been cured of their psychosis, they can be tried for armed insurrection, and put back away where they can’t harm themselves, or anyone else.
These folks aren’t really smart enough to have a mental problem other than simple retardation. To wave an American flag at an insurrection against the American government says it all. Too dumb to be allowed out on their own.
How stupid do you have to be to say what these airheads have been saying? “Put my wife and children out front” to make it more horrible? That’s really crazy. As in “put away in an institution” crazy.
muddy
@Chris: And Jesus said, “Let the women go before you, and thus honor them with the perforations, much as I have been perforated. Let them suffer for your sins as I have done.”
The Other Chuck
@SFAW:
The quote actually goes back a bit farther than that
pseudonymous in nc
Can someone come up with a whackjob theory of, I dunno, Constitutional Mail Carriers?
How about: because the constitution explicitly mandates a system of post roads to the federal government, therefore all mail carriers are empowered with supreme authority to tell “constitutional sheriffs” to shut the fuck up and if necessary run them over with their mail trucks?
Paul in KY
@SFAW: I’m assuming you were using the Beverly Hillbillies melody?
Paul in KY
@gbear: Now that’s true Republican thinking! Sorta PNAC for the desert doofuses
Paul in KY
@Chris: That’s what I was saying up top (and that aimai responded to), complete hypocrisy here & hopefully some of these women will have the scales removed from their eyes.
Paul in KY
@muddy: 2nd Wingnut, Chap 4, verses 3 and 4.
Chris
@DougJ:
I think what rankles is that Ruby Ridge and Waco fuckups were coming on the heels of twenty or twenty five years of hardcore militarization of law enforcement in the inner cities when aimed at “These People,” and that similarly… irregular behavior on the part of law enforcement in these inner cities was anything but unheard of, but usually papered over and ignored. (Tough job, doncha know, keeping those savages in line). Usually all done to the cheers of the same idiots who later howled in protest at how those same Forces of Law Enforcement treated their heroes at Waco and Ruby Ridge.
ETA: or maybe that’s just me. Not really disagreeing, I guess, just that it’s why the insane amount of attention that these incidents received in the U.S. compared to all these previous ones irritates me. If Ruby Ridge and Waco had been hangouts for gangs in Southeast DC, these incidents would never have made the papers.
SFAW
@The Other Chuck:
Hey, I’m old, but not THAT old.
Raven, on the other hand …
But thanks for edumacating me. Not surprised to find out it was not new to the ‘Nam era.
patrick II
The frontman would have to be a woman.
Covers would include “Taxman”, “I shot the sherrif”.
SFAW
@Chris:
That’s because there’s a difference between using black helicopters and and using helicopters to hunt blacks.
Meanie-meanie, tickle a person
Might be interesting to monitor the d-i-v-o-r-c-e filings for the area in the coming months (if possible)…
smedley the uncertain
@rea: This
central texas
“The Constitutional Sheriffs would be a good name for a band.”
Or a brand of cheap laxative.
poptartacus
please proceed
Ron Thompson
Uh, George Washington was at neither Lexington nor Concord. The Continental Army was created after those battles, in response to them.