Another Ruby Ridge in the making?

[LRRPF52]

http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2013/sep...feds-land/

Bundy believes big government is trying to sabotage his plans to one day hand over the ranch’s reins to his son by stripping Bundy of land-use rights his family spent a century earning. He says overregulation has already driven scores of fellow ranchers out of business in sprawling Clark County, leaving him as the last man standing.

For two decades, Bundy has waged a one-man range war with federal officials over his cattle’s grazing on 150 square miles of scrub desert overseen by the Bureau of Land Management. Since 1993, he’s refused to pay BLM grazing fees. He claims he “fired the BLM,” vowing not to give one dime to an agency that’s plotting his demise. The back fees exceed $300,000, he said.

Now a showdown looms, one with a hint of possible violence.

Officials say Bundy and his son are illegally running cattle in the 500,000-acre Gold Butte area, a habitat of the protected desert tortoise. In July, U.S. District Court Judge Lloyd George ruled that if Bundy did not remove his cattle by Aug. 23, they could be seized by the BLM.