Ignorance is no
excuse
It's disturbing
to listen to a candidate, any candidate, spout election year drivel which he
(or she) knows, or should know, to
be false. It reveals two, possibly
three, tragic realities surrounding the American campaign circus. In the first instance, it reveals either that
the candidate is a deliberate liar or, perhaps even more troubling, ignorant of
the realities and circumstance related to of the issue. The third, and saddest part of the equation is that, in far
too many such cases, the electorate is either too stupid or too unconcerned to
bother to determine which is the operative explanation in the issue at hand.
A prime
purveyor of this type of rhetoric is Rafael Eduardo (AKA Ted for vote garnering
in the non-Hispanic community) Cruz . One
such recent blast of unadulterated garbage has been his commentary during the
Nevada primary campaign, allying himself with that other stalwart Constitutional
scholar, Cliven Bundy, re: federal lands.
You really have
to read Cruz' comments between the lines to get the message. He said, campaigning
in Nevada, "I believe we should
transfer as much federal land as possible back to the states and ideally back to the
people," speaking on the record to the Las Vegas Review-Journal in December. For a time Cruz supported Nevada rancher (and tax scofflaw
for 20 years) Cliven Bundy’s and his now
incarcerated sons' standoff with the
federal government over his unpaid public land grazing fees. Like Sean Hannity,
as Bundy's racism and generally unsavory nature revealed itself, Cruz quietly scuttled
backwards. Many of the Texas senator’s
Nevada supporters pushed for a failed bill in the state Legislature that
"would lay claim to almost all federally managed public lands and water
rights in the state."
What has passed
relatively unnoticed in all this kerfuffle is the one overriding simple fact
which Cruz should know and either has ignored or of which he has simply chosen to feign
ignorance of. The land in question has NEVER been the property of the state of
Nevada or of its residents. Even the State constitution recognizes that fact,
stating that: "That the people
inhabiting said territory do agree and declare, that they 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." This is far from recent, having been ratified and approved by Nevada citizens
in 1864. That's 152 years ago, well
before even Cliven Bundy's father was alive.
Cruz's promise
to give back what has never been theirs to the citizens of Nevada in exchange
for votes is simply one more shining example of the moral and/or mental bankruptcy
of so many Republican candidates this
election season. If they were on South OBT we'd simply dismiss them as whores.
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