Killing of an Oregon wildlife refuge occupier has re-energized protesters

[jpak]

Source: Washington Post

BURNS, Ore. — BJ Soper has never supported the nearly month-long occupation of a national wildlife refuge by armed anti-government activists. He sympathized with their frustrations about the federal government, but he thought calm negotiation was a better strategy.

Then on Tuesday, an Oregon state trooper shot and killed LaVoy Finicum, a cowboy-hat-wearing grandfather who acted as the occupiers’ spokesman.

Now Soper is furious, and he’s calling for people from all over the country to come to Burns to show their outrage at Finicum’s “ambush.”

“I’m angry,” Soper, 39, said late Friday, joining two dozen protesters in a light sleet outside the Harney County Courthouse. “We’ve got a man that’s dead. Over what? I don’t want to see any more bloodshed, and that’s not what I’m condoning. But at some point when American people keep getting killed by their government, people are going to fight back.”

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Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/killing-of-an-oregon-wildlife-refuge-occupier-has-re-energized-protesters/2016/01/30/1dca4cd6-c6fb-11e5-8965-0607e0e265ce_story.html

[dhill926]

1. hardly an ambush....

ya moo-ron. He basically asked for it...

[IronLionZion]

24. He literally asked for it

many times he said he'd rather die than go to prison. It was suicide by cop.

[Elmer S. E. Dump]

27. And he knew exactly what he was doing

He reached for his weapon twice, the first time he seemed surprised nothing happened, so he did it again. He wanted to go out.

[William Seger]

2. This has always been like dealing with heavily armed 6-year-olds (n/t)

[trillion]

25. You just nailed my thoughts about the entire tea party.

[cheapdate]

3. "Over what?" He tried to pull a gun on Oregon State police officer, you fool!

[sinkingfeeling]

4. Wonder how many 'Black Lives Matter' protests he's gone to?

I think he's only concerned about militia type or white rancher lives.

[cstanleytech]

5. It might be time for Soper to get a CAT scan done before its to late. nt

[Gregorian]

6. This might explain why they took so long so arrest.

Now what.

[Roy Rolling]

7. This is What Happens

This is what happens when you stick a moron in front of a TV camera or microphone and ask their opinion. Why this is broadcast as newsworthy is scraping the bottom of the barrel for news outlets.

[mpcamb]

23. I agree. And a shameless excuse for journalism.

[Old Codger]

8. Someone makes

The highly published remark that he would rather be dead than in a concrete room, then attempts to pull something out of his waistband while a trooper has a rifle aimed at him is attempting suicide by cop...and succeeding may I add..They are not required to give him the first shot nor are they required at that point to tell him they will shoot if he does not stop...

[KT2000]

14. suicide by virtue

the night he was shot, an MSNBC reporter (the one who interviewed Finicum many times) said prior to the work he was doing now he did a lot of work on suicide. He said that suicide by virtue is when people decide their death will have more meaning than their life. He thought this fit the situation.

[Old Codger]

20. Actually

From my point of view anyway, it was an attempt at martyrdom

[KT2000]

21. yes - I think that was what

the reporter was getting at.

[Wibly]

9. Faulty headline writing

How does one fool suddenly getting upset, based on non factual information, constitute a "re-energizing" of a protest.
The headline writers are really over the top.

[loudsue]

17. The corporate media doesn't care who or what is over the top. They are anti-America, and

anti-decency and anti-intelligence in every way, as far as I've been able to tell.

Case in point: the 24/7 commercial for Donald Trump.

[hollysmom]

10. yet he did not speak out with the video of he cop shooting that man in the back

planting evidence than claiming hte man attacked him - wait, the shot man was black, so that must be OK, to shoot someone at a traffic stop when you still have their car. Like you could not find him later.

[CanonRay]

11. Washington Post: Please change "Protesters" to "Domestic Terrorists"

Thank you. That is all.

[Xipe Totec]

13. Or Dumb Assed Terrorists. nt

[Fairgo]

12. BJ Soper is a trope

The world is full of BJ Sopers.

He is of a generation raised on propaganda, denied critical thinking skills, armed and entitled all of his life. He and his ilk have been cultivated by proto-fascists to don the camo-brown shirts. They are not angered; they are engorged. They are not driven by intellectual conflict but by primitive drives to fuck and kill and eat. They appropriate any simple meme that clears their simple minds of doubt. Their personal philosophy is primitive: they are looking for an excuse to prove the power of their ignorance, and the superiority of their "race". It is a meme that makes them useful idiots to their corporate masters. They are the zombie apocalypse inc., brain dead and hungry puppets. Malheur was not a protest, it was an outbreak of an infection. There will be more and more because their is a business plan that requires it. It's not a movement, its a disease. It is what happens to the body politik when democracy is replaced by an inverted totalitarian state, when the public weal has been appropriated by the new corporate kings. And it has always been with us.

The civil war was the dialectic of democracy and aristocracy, writ bloody large. The engine of Democracy is community. The engine of Aristocracy is slavery. There was no resolution to this existential conundrum, just the end of battles. The slaves were never fully freed and the aristocracy did not fully cede its wealth and power. The disease that raises armies of BJ Sopers has always been with us; it cannot be excised. Ignorance and greed are genetic propensities of our species. Democracy is learned behaviour. Creating and maintaining a socially just and fair society requires that we treat the condition, and fight the powers that strive, always, to leverage that human flaw for personal gain.

Poor BJ Soper. He is a foot soldier in the war against his own soul.

[flamingdem]

28. You nailed it Fairgo

Poor BJ Soper, and the rest.

[Zorra]

15. I wish everyone would start calling them armed militants instead of occupiers.

armed (adjective)

equipped with or carrying a weapon or weapons.

militant (adjective)

combative and aggressive in support of a political or social cause, and typically favoring extreme, violent, or confrontational methods.

militant (noun)

a militant person.

[left-of-center2012]

16. It was suicide by cop

He had previously said he'd prefer death to a jail cell.

[Plucketeer]

18. Dunce-speak....

" I don’t want to see any more bloodshed, and that’s not what I’m condoning. But at some point when American people keep getting killed by their government, people are going to fight back.”

So, bring more guns 'n ammo 'n plenty of French Vanilla creamer so we can try this again.

[SwankyXomb]

19. Traitors pay a traitor's price

Step up, Mr. Soper, if you want the same.

[SCantiGOP]

22. Come on Wash Post

Title is way over the top. Sounds like a revolution is starting till you get to the fact that a guy who was already a member of a "patriot" group is now angry and stood in front of the courthouse with 2 dozen other people.

[saltpoint]

26. Good time to invest in the snack industry,

ladies and gentlemen.

Snacks and dildos. An unbeatable combination.

[Kennah]

29. Was it a light blue sleet? n/t

[Kennah]

30. Remember Blue!