Many of you will have noticed the stand-off that developed in the middle of April 2014 between the family and supporters of Cliven Bundy, a veteran Nevada rancher, and the Bureau of Land Management.
The stand-off, which occurred while BLM agents were attempting to take possession of a number of cattle belonging to Bundy, generated a lot of light heat and sound in the media. In particular, the media outlets hostile to the Federal government and the current administration have been dining out on the crisis, extolling the courage of Bundy as another "little guy" being trampled under the jackboot of Big Gubmint.
Except that the affair is not that simple.
Well, on one level it is quite simple. On other levels, it is symptomatic of other long-standing issues that exist in the relationship between a central government and its citizens scattered across multiple quasi-independent states.
Firstly, we need to start with the simple stuff. Cliven Bundy is not a valiant hero fighting the Evil Feds. He is a perennial and consistent scofflaw. This article from a Nevada blogger, himself a lawyer and also a Mormon (which is Bundy's birth religion) explains very cogently why Bundy is not the heroic little guy that he and his supporters sell as his public image. It is also clear that Bundy is not highly thought of locally in Nevada, either within his own religious community, or within the farming and ranching communities. This ranching and cattle raising blog contains a bunch of comments from ranchers who clearly see Bundy as a scofflaw. Bundy has been succesfully avoiding over $1m in fines and penalties imposed on him for grazing cattle without valid permits for over 20 years. That is money that is due to us, the taxpayers. He has been bilking the government and gaining an unfair commercial advantage compared to ranchers who do pay for grazing rights. His assertion that he does not recognize most Federal laws is merely a post-hoc rationalization for his wilful failure to obey the law. There is a good reason why the Nevada cattle ranchers association currently wants nothing to do with him.
Secondly, Cliven Bundy's persistent contempt for and defiance of the Federal Government is part of a whole broader spectrum of anti-Federalism activism within the USA. This activism comprises a number of distinct but overlapping threads.
Bundy is being publicly supported by Richard Mack, a self-appointed leader of the Constitutional Sheriffs and Peace Officers Association, a collection of current and former law enforcement officials who argue that all law enforcement belongs at the local level, and the Federal Government has no role to play.
There is a local and state-level political dimension to this whole affair, which can be seen in the form of various local Nevada political representatives (including, rather incredibly, a candidate for State Attorney General) making all sorts of contorted and mind-bogglingly stupid statements of support for Bundy. Some of these bloviations are rooted in long-standing resentments in the American West against what is seen as heavy-handed, insensitive central government intrusion. A lot of the resentments stem from Federal management of public lands (Google "Sagebrush Rebellion" for some idea of the history). For historical reasons related to their acquisition, large percentages of a number of Western states, including Nevada, are comprised of public lands managed by the Federal government.
More recently, border patrol checkpoints have become a lightning rod for resentments. See Photography Is Not A Crime for the details.
Those of us who have followed the Sovereign Citizen movement also recognize elements of that movement's beliefs in Bundy's categorical assertions (rejected by courts since 1993) that the Federal Government has no jurisdiction over his grazing rights. SovCits, as a general rule, like to imagine the legal landscape as they think it should be, not as it actually is. They utilize this approach most often to claim that the Federal Government has no right to tax them or regulate them. It is, in summary, a "Wild West" mindset, where people are free (as they see it) from government tyranny. The rationalization is derived from the whole process which gave rise to the United States. In the SovCit world, citizens are superior to government and are in no way subjects, and the Federal Government has no legitimacy.
As a number of SovCits have discovered, the court system has no sympathy for this interesting worldview when it clashes with local and federal laws. A number of Sovcits are serving prison sentences for various felonies, including tax evasion. Unfortunately, law enforcement bodies in the USA have also discovered that a number of SovCits are not only hostile to the idea of central government; they are also prepared to commit violent acts, including murders and kidnappings.
Law enforcement and the legal system are having to deal with some people who are not sociable, properly adjusted members of society. That image showing a man lying on an overbridge aiming an AR-15 towards the scene of the stand-off? That is an Idaho militia member, not a government employee.
So, when you read (as you inevitably will) more outpourings about Cliven Bundy, remember two things.
1. he is not a heroic figure, valiantly fighting the Feds, he is basically a freeloader who thinks that Federal Laws mostly do not apply to him
2. he has a significant base of support, ranging from pandering local politicians through to some (likely) sinister people who may just be prepared to engage in violence as part of thir campaign to overthrow the Federal Government and install their dystopian new version of the USA.
You may or may not regard the Federal government as a positive force for good, but...those guys you see in the images pointing guns from bridges? They are not our friends either.

UPDATE - As this article makes clear, Cliven Bundy is far from the first rancher in the West to lock horns (excuse the pun) with the Federal government over grazing rights. Several predecessors also seemed to be spoiling for fights with the legal system, and they all lost. This article also explains that the deal that ranchers get for grazing rights is extremely generous, since it relies in part on a formula for cattle costs from...1966.

UPDATE 2 - This thread from Quatloos has more explanations in it about the chronology of the affair. One of the key nuggets of information is that Bundy missed out on a major payout to retire his grazing rights because he had allowed his permit to expire in 1993. He is the only rancher left in that area of Nevada as a result.
UPDATE 3 - This news article reveals that Cliven Bundy's family, as far as can be traced, have NOT been settled in Nevada since the 1870s, as Bundy has been claiming. His parents only moved to the Bundy Ranch in the late 1940's. This fact was revealed in one of the court cases that Bundy lost in the 1990's (which he refuses to comply with the judgement of).
Cliven Bundy's "little heroic cowboy" fantasy, complete with his posing with the US flag, is nothing more than pseudo-patriotic grandstanding backed up by BS.