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Obama today will declare about 500,000 acres as the Organ Mountains-Desert Peaks National Monument. About half of that land is expected to be set aside as wilderness, meaning it will be closed to vehicles and construction. Though completely legal, it is a slap in the face of the local ranchers, especially Cliven Bundy.
The point is that Obama is a sore loser. Instead of accepting the loss at the Bundy ranch, he again acts like a spoiled despot and does whatever he wants, despite the implications.
Local ranchers say it’s a land grab that will interfere with their grazing rights, and border security advocates said the move will make it tougher for federal agents and local police to patrol the land, leaving a security gap that Mexican smuggling cartels will exploit.
“This is about opposing so many thousands of acres that is going to create nothing more than a pathway for criminals to get into this country to do their criminal acts,” Dona Ana County Sheriff Todd Garrison told The Washington Times in a telephone interview Monday.
The monument has been in the works for some time and has been controversial from the start. But land rights advocates said it is the precursor to more conflicts like the recent standoff in Nevada, where a rancher refused to comply with a court order that he stop grazing on Bureau of Land Management property, prompting the BLM to confiscate his cattle. The BLM, which is part of the Interior Department, will administer the national monument.
The land contains five mountain ranges with fragile landscapes, prehistoric rock art and more recent historic sites such as a training area for the Apollo astronauts.
The monument would cover hundreds of thousands of acres right next to the Mexican border.
If you haven’t felt as if the president has become tyrannical, this should be the final straw.
