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Liberal land grabbers are on the march!
by Rod Van Mechelen
Conservative American Indian Republicans—ConservativeAIR.com™
Posted November 28, 2004 9:00AM PST
King County steals land; are reservations for rural landowners next?
I think a time will come when historians will agree that the settlement of the United States by pioneers was largely a liberal movement.
By definition, the doctrine of Manifest Destiny was entirely liberal. Not that conservatives of the day were passive observers in the process, particularly not during the generations of community building that followed, nor in the efforts that made our nation great.
But in the context of the day, the taking of lands was as liberal an undertaking as when, on October 25, 2004, King County adopted an update to the Critical Areas Ordinance that opponents say "steals" their land:
The government of King County, Washington (which is dominated by Seattle) is gearing up to steal 65 percent of the property of landowners in rural King County as the environmental evangelists and their friends in the major media cheer them on. King County is set to pass 500 pages of new regulations that will make rural King County property the most highly restricted property in the United States. — They're stealing our land, by Rodney McFarland, Citizens' Alliance for Property Rights
The biggest problem with the update is that it prohibits certain landowners from using up to 65 percent of their property:
A provision in the new rules requiring rural landowners who haven't already cleared their land to leave between 50 percent and 65 percent of it in a natural state has drawn particular ire. — Rural landowners take to streets: Protest over county rules; but suit filed to head off referendum, by Jennifer Langston, Seattle Post‑Intelligencer, November 24, 2004
According to McFarland, the prohibition prevents landowners from clearing blackberry bushes or even walking on their property, and they want it put to a vote:
A property rights group filed paperwork yesterday to put three recently passed land-use ordinances before a vote of people living in unincorporated King County. … If the referendum qualifies for the ballot, only registered voters in unincorporated King County would vote on it, giving rural landowners more political power, proponents of the idea say. — Group wants land use put to vote: Effort launched to have rules placed on King County ballots, by Jennifer Langston, Seattle Post‑Intelligencer, November 6, 2004
Predictably, environmental extremists are opposing the effort:
As rural landowners protesting new land-use restrictions circled downtown Seattle in pickup trucks and horse trailers, King County and environmental groups sued yesterday to prevent the rules from going to a popular vote. … The lawsuit filed by King County, 1000 Friends of Washington and the Center for Environmental Law and Policy names the grassroots group spearheading the referendum drive—Citizens' Alliance for Property Rights—as the defendant. — Rural landowners take to streets: Protest over county rules; but suit filed to head off referendum, by Jennifer Langston, Seattle Post‑Intelligencer, November 24, 2004
The fundamental point of contention—and a key difference between conservatives and environmentalist liberals—is preservation versus conservation. Conservatives favor conservation, which views the environment as a resource, while environmentalists favor preservation, which views the environment as an end unto itself: like an object in a museum, to be kept just as it is.
Consequently, organizations like 1000 Friends of Washington believe it is imperative to preserve nature in a pristine state. In this, environmentalists typically believe that American Indian tribes are their natural allies. Indians, after all, worshiped nature and lived lightly upon the land. But this romantic notion, being unrealistic and untrue, often puts environmentalist groups at odds with Indian tribes. Such as when members of Greenpeace joined with the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society to oppose the Makah Tribe's whale hunt:
NEAH BAY, Washington—Almost a quarter of a century after their anti‑whaling exploits captivated the world, several founders of Greenpeace will take to the seas again today to stop a whales hunt virtually in their back yard.
But this time, they are sailing under the banner of Canadian Paul Watson's Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, members of whose ecoguerrilla movement have confronted whalers around the globe and who is poised to disrupt a controversial hunt by Washington State's Makah Indians. — Greenpeace Founders Head out to Sea Again: Anti‑whaling expedition recalls '75 campaign, by Larry Pynn, The Ottawa Citizen, October 1, 1998
Of course they had to oppose the Makah Tribe. Wisely being liberal, they know better than anyone else what's good for Indians and best for America. They are the intellectual aristocrats, who use any means at their disposal, including screaming insults, passive protests, rioting in the streets, displays of nudity, violence and, when they're in a position of authority, naked acts of power to force the stupid American peasants to see the world their way.
Which is why the rural citizens of King County now find themselves in a position that every American Indian knows and lives with daily: the taking of their land.
Almost certainly, some Indians are laughing about this. But the irony would be lost on the Citizens' Alliance for Property Rights. Nor would it serve any good purpose: two wrongs don't make a right. Instead, we should see this as common ground.
Our lands were stolen, and then most of us were herded onto reservations. In Washington state, it wasn't that long ago. Many of us are old enough to have known the elders who experienced this. We know the rural landowners of King County won't be herded onto reservations, but like us, they are being dispossessed of their land, and that is a terrible thing.
Knowing the horrible cost and consequences of losing our homeland, we, as tribes, would do well to reach out to support and assist the rural landowners of King County. At the very least, as history's appointed stewards of this land, the tribes could step in to offer moral support.
Preservation is for museums, historical sites, communities and sacred places; conservation is for our forests and waters, the land and the wildlife, and other natural resources. The liberal democrats, who dominate the King County Council, are forcing their rural citizens to pay for a radical environmentalist agenda, and that's not right.
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