Shad Olson: the Anwar al-Awlaki of South Dakota; bison to ESA?

"Standing for our sovereignty?"

The sovereign movement is zombie politics. It resurrects a dead issue to rouse the marginalized rabble to violent overthrow. In his rants to the red state right, Shad Olson incites his readers and listeners to kill medical providers with this Turner Diaries-like piece of prose:

Just like an underwater tea party...he noticed a newly arrived figure emerging from the milky stillness...She had her mother’s golden locks and the same set of dramatically arching cheekbones and pearly-perfect teeth...see the figure that had approached from out of the milky stillness, beyond. It was a young boy of maybe 7 or 8. He had sandy blond hair, cut pageboy style, framing a face that was to Grandy, both angelic and oddly familiar. His eyes, though blue and clear, seemed impossibly ancient and wise...his tow-headed companion, who was still leading him forward, deeper into the milky stillness of a dream...floating like dandelion seeds...like the gauzy tail of a comet...by children dressed in white...The creamy-cool goodness of a vanilla ice cream cone...his wife’s sugar-sweet kiss...the snowy-white wisps of a dandelion dream, brought to life inside the mind of God.

Holy Shit Ona Shingle! This is an ode to a White God that commands Predator drones to rain bombs on children of color and demands that sovereigns strap on explosive vests then walk into daycare centers full of Muslim kids.

Happy Earth Day, hipneck:




The readers of interested party who are not familiar with Michael Feldman's Whad'Ya Know should seek out the four disclaimers, especially the last sentence of the first disclaimer.

Copied from the comment section of a story in the Montana Standard:

Eadreon said on: April 22, 2011, 12:58 am
Estimated number of wolves in Idaho last year: 705
In Montana: 566
Wyoming: 343
Wolves documented in eastern Oregon today: 23
In eastern Washington: 16
Confirmed cattle killed by wolves throughout the Northern Rockies last year: 199
Confirmed sheep kills: 249
Dogs: 2
Number of wolves killed by wildlife officials or private citizens last year: 260
Number of cows/calves killed by wolves in Montana last year: 84
Total number of cattle in Montana last year: 2.5 million
Number of confirmed Montana sheep killed by wolves: 67
Number sheep producers reported lost from other causes (i.e. disease, weather): 49,000
Number they reported lost to all predators: 17,800
Number of sheep deaths blamed on coyotes: 12,100
On eagles: 800

The neighbors are headed for appeal:

District Judge Jeffrey Sherlock noted in a decision dated Tuesday that the state government grants its gay employees the same employment-related benefits for their same-sex partners. And he pointed out that the Montana Supreme Court has previously decided that that the state university system’s past policy of barring such benefits to gay employees violated the equal protection provisions of the Montana Constitution. The judge said, despite sympathy for the plaintiffs, that it would be an inappropriate breach of separation of powers for him to order the Legislature to enact “a domestic partnership or civil union arrangement” as sought by the gay couples. He said forcing the lawmakers to draw up new laws goes much farther than asking him to declare one of their statutes unconstitutional. “This court finds plaintiffs’ proposal, although appealing, to be unprecedented and uncharted in Montana law,” Sherlock wrote.

The Center for Biological Diversity filed an intent to sue to place the Plains Bison under the protection of the Endangered Species Act. These are the genetically pure survivors, not the mass-produced hybrids in feedlots.

A blue state sees the light:

Reason and justice prevailed this week in Massachusetts, where the Commonwealth’s highest court ruled by a 5-1 margin in Commonwealth v. Cruz that police can no longer search or seize someone they suspect of possessing a small amount of marijuana. The basis for this ACLU victory was the Massachusetts ballot measure known as Question 2, which made possession of an ounce or less of marijuana a civil infraction instead of a crime. Massachusetts voters overwhelmingly approved Question 2 with 65 percent of the vote in November 2008.