by Steven
Greenhut,
Human Events 10/31/2011,
and special to the SF Examiner
Rural Rebellion Brewing
SACRAMENTO, Calif. –
The nearly five-hour drive from the Sacramento area to
Yreka, in Siskiyou County by the Oregon border, was a
reminder not just of the immense size and beauty of
California, but of the vast regional and cultural
differences one finds within our 37-million-population
state.
Sacramento is Government Central, a land of overly pensioned
bureaucrats and restaurant discounts for state workers. But
way up in the North State, one finds a small but hard-edged
rural populace that views state and federal officials as the
main obstacles to their quality of life.
Their latest battle is to stop destruction of four
hydroelectric dams along the Klamath River – an action
driven by environmentalists and the Obama administration.
Most locals say the dam-busting will undermine their
property rights and ruin the local farming and ranch
economy, which is all that's left since environmental
regulators destroyed the logging and mining industries.
These used to be wealthy resource-based economies, but now
many of the towns are drying up, with revenue to local
governments evaporating. Unemployment rates are in the
20-percent-and-higher range. Nearly 79 percent of the
county's voters in a recent advisory initiative opposed the
dam removal, but that isn't stopping the authorities from
blasting the dams anyway.
These rural folks, living in the shadow of the majestic
Mount Shasta, believe that they are being driven away so
that their communities can essentially go back to the wild,
to conform to a modern environmentalist ethos that puts
wildlands above humanity. As the locals told it during the
Defend Rural America conference Oct. 22 at the Siskiyou
Golden Fairgrounds, environmental officials are treading on
their liberties, traipsing unannounced on their properties,
confronting ranchers with guns drawn to enforce arcane
regulatory rules and destroying their livelihoods in the
process.
The evening's main event: a panel featuring eight county
sheriffs (seven from California, one from Oregon) who billed
themselves as "Constitution sheriffs." They vowed to stand
up for the residents of their communities against what they
say is an unconstitutional onslaught from regulators in
Sacramento and Washington, D.C. In particular, they took
issue with the federal government's misnamed Travel
Management Plan, which actually is designed to shut down
public travel in the forests.
Plumas County Sheriff Greg Hagwood related the stir he
caused when he said he "will not criminalize citizens for
just accessing public lands." Siskiyou County Sheriff Jon
Lopey reminded the crowd that county sheriffs are sworn to
uphold the Constitution "against all enemies, foreign and
domestic." These are fighting words.
Sheriff Dean Wilson of Del Norte County said he was
"ignorant and naïve about the terrible condition our state
was in." He came to believe that people were being assaulted
by their own government. "I spent a good part of my life
enforcing the penal code but not understanding my oath."
Wilson and other sheriffs said it is their role to defend
the liberties of the people against any encroachments – even
if those encroachments come from other branches of
government.
As someone who has covered law-enforcement issues in urban
Southern California, it's refreshing to hear peace officers
enunciate the proper relationship between themselves and the
people. Increasingly, law enforcement is based on an
authoritarian model, whereby police have nearly unlimited
power, and citizens must obey, period. It's rare to hear
peace officers who are willing to stand up against more
powerful arms of the government in service to their oath to
their state and county and who affirm that their job is to
protect their citizens' inherent rights. It's even rarer to
hear sheriffs complain about the excessive use of force by
fellow officers, which was a theme on the panel when
referencing federal agents.
I could pick nits. For all the complaining about the feds,
Shasta County Sheriff Tom Bosenko had just been quoted in
the newspaper praising the Obama administration for its
crackdown on medical-marijuana clinics, even though
California law clearly allows them. One's either for state
control or not. I'm tired of conservatives who claim to be
for states' rights when it suits them, but against states'
rights on issues such as the drug war. Still, it was clear
whose side the sheriffs were on regarding a battle that goes
beyond the sparsely populated northern regions.
The people in Siskiyou were echoing points I've heard
throughout rural California. As they see it, government
regulators are pursuing controversial policies – i.e.,
diverting water from farms to save a bait fish, the Delta
smelt, clamping down on carbon dioxide emissions to address
global warming even if it means driving food processors out
of the Central Valley, demolishing dams to increase a
population of fish that isn't endangered – without caring
about the costs to rural residents.
When resource-related jobs leave rural areas, there aren't
many other ways for residents to earn a decent living.
Society collapses, and poverty expands. There aren't enough
tourist-oriented gift shops to keep everyone gainfully
employed.
I hadn't been in Yreka long before someone related a popular
joke: A federal agent shows up at a farm and demands to
check out the property. The farmer says OK, but tells him
not to go over to one pasture. Then the agent arrogantly
tells him he has a badge from the federal Environmental
Protection Agency and can go wherever he darn well pleases.
The farmer says OK. A few minutes later, the agent is
running for his life from a bull. The agent calls for help,
so the farmer goes to the fence and yells: "Show him your
badge."
It's funny but anger-inducing. We've got a real sagebrush
rebellion brewing in rural California. Urban legislators can
ignore it at their own peril.
This article was originally
published in the Orange
County Register.
Steven Greenhut is director of the Pacific
Research Institute's Journalism Center (www.calwatchdog.com),
author of 'Plunder!' and a columnist for the Orange County
Register.
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