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Cliven Bundy
By Sarah Kupelian
Cliven Bundy doesn’t normally do interviews on Sundays. But this Easter Sunday, the 67-year-old Nevada cattle rancher stepped out of his church, leaned up against the side wall and talked to America about what really matters to him deep down, revealing a side to him not normally seen in media interviews.
The first order of business, of course, was the Nevada standoff that has mesmerized the nation, and his response to Sen. Harry Reid’s incendiary accusation that the Bundy side are a bunch of “domestic terrorists.”
“The thing about what Harry Reid’s saying,” the rancher told radio talker Dianne Linderman on Talk Radio Network’s nationally syndicated
“Everything That Matters” show, is that “he seems to be a warmonger, saying let’s have civil war!”
In fact, Bundy said, “We people are not gonna put up with that no more. We’re not gonna have them guns pointin’ at us anymore. Not when we’re talking about an army of ‘We the People’ against ‘We the People.’ We can’t allow that to happen in America. That’s civil war!”
Bundy confirmed that he and the ranchers and others standing with him, tired of being abused by a government with unlimited power, are ultimately willing to die for their stance. But, he added, “I do respect the United States government. I pledge allegiance to that flag and honor it very much. But [the government] has its place. It doesn’t have its place in the state of Nevada and … Clark County, and that’s where my ranch is. The federal government has no power and no ownership of this land, and they don’t want to accept that.”
Then, maybe because it was Easter Sunday, the interview went in a very different direction.
Asked by Linderman what makes him so unafraid in his current situation, Bundy replied:
“I don’t stand alone. I have all of the prayers from lots of people around the world, and I feel those prayers. And those prayers take the tremble out of my legs. And I can stand strong and straight. And you know the spirit from our heavenly Father, I seek that every morning on my knees. And he gives me some guidance, and I go forth and I actually feel good. My health is good, my spirit is good and I feel strength. I do, I feel strength, I feel even happiness. And I have no idea where I’m going with this. It’s a day-by-day spiritual thing for me.”
Toward the end of the interview, Linderman asked, “One more question: Is there anything you’d like to say to the American people? Because I truly believe you’re a patriot.”
“You know,” replied Bundy, “I woke up, I got out of my house, went down to my trail and watched the sun come up over the hills and the mountains here. And, of course, I thought of Jesus. And then the thought that I thought was that we the people of America, not only of America but of the whole world, what Jesus would want us to do, was forgive. Forgive our enemies, and He’ll take care of all the rest. So my message to the world today is: Forgive your neighbors, forgive your wives, forgive your husbands and children, and feel the love of Jesus. That’s what He suffered for.
“I thank the people for their prayers and, again, I put my faith in my heavenly father and … we’re OK.”
Bundy’s wife, Carol, expressed the same faith to this writer when booking the radio interview: “This is the Lord’s battle,” she said. “He is calling the shots, and we are just standing here.”
Listen to Dianne Linderman’s entire 18-minute Easter interview with Cliven Bundy:
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