Ammon Bundy and six other co-defendants were found not guilty Thursday of federal conspiracy and weapons charges stemming from their armed takeover of a federally owned wildlife sanctuary in Oregon earlier this year.

For 41 days in January and February, members of a militia occupied the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, demanding the federal government give up control of 188,000 acres of public lands. The men made a national call for arms and aid as they controlled the facility near Burns, Oregon, even as police blocked off roads that led to the refuge.

Police officers wearing riot gear have started removing hundreds of people protesting a controversial crude oil pipeline at its construction site in North Dakota on Thursday.

Someone seriously needs to go all Ruby Ridge on these dipshits next time.

If what you say is truly the window into your soul, then you are a very violent person.

Nah, it was just intended as dark humor. I'm actually kind of ambivalent about how law enforcement should handle armed stand-offs that don't involve imminent danger to anyone. On one level, there is a part of me that's viscerally opposed to patiently accommodating people who threaten violence if they don't get their way, but on a less emotional level, I believe the better approach is to just wait them out and then prosecute. It's just frustrating when that "better approach" gets undone by a moronic jury and/or incompetent prosecution.

No no, I'm sure it's all because they were white.

That's definitely part of it. Not because the FBI, etc. are more comfortable killing black people, but because the political and media fallout for killing a bunch of anti-government good ol' boys would be much greater than killing, say, a bunch of armed BLM or NBPP in similar circumstances.

This cartoon pretty accurately captures how a fairly influential segment of the right views the world:
<snip>

"Schindler {one of the defense lawyers} said he believes the jury's verdicts resulted from the difficulty the government had in proving that the "intent'' of the defendants was to conspire against the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and U.S. Bureau of Land Management."

“My client was arrested in a government truck, and he was acquitted of taking that truck,” said defense attorney Matthew Schindler, who still sounded in disbelief Friday morning.

Nah, it was just intended as dark humor. I'm actually kind of ambivalent about how law enforcement should handle armed stand-offs that don't involve imminent danger to anyone. On one level, there is a part of me that's viscerally opposed to patiently accommodating people who threaten violence if they don't get their way, but on a less emotional level, I believe the better approach is to just wait them out and then prosecute. It's just frustrating when that "better approach" gets undone by a moronic jury and/or incompetent prosecution.

Nah, it was just intended as dark humor. I'm actually kind of ambivalent about how law enforcement should handle armed stand-offs that don't involve imminent danger to anyone. On one level, there is a part of me that's viscerally opposed to patiently accommodating people who threaten violence if they don't get their way, but on a less emotional level, I believe the better approach is to just wait them out and then prosecute. It's just frustrating when that "better approach" gets undone by a moronic jury and/or incompetent prosecution.

So, government overreach and vindictiveness saw them go free because they wanted to ensure maximum jail time for the protesters who were objecting to what they considered unfair mandatory minimums in another case. Wow, that's delicious irony.

But... police in riot gear and MRAP vehicles backed with "sonic guns" are dispatched to deal with other protestors... with no guns. On Tribal Lands.

I'd like to think the fact that such obviously guilty idiots went untouched would teach lawyers not to attempt to grossly inflate charges, requests for punishment or compensation, beyond what was reasonable for what happened.

I said "I'd like to think." I'm not that optimistic.