What if the squatters occupying a bird sanctuary in Oregon were black? Or what if they called themselves members of Occupy Wall Street? What if they were just the lone teen girl who wouldn't leave her classroom to report to the principal after looking at her cellphone before she was thrown across the room by a school resource officer?
But there is a major difference for what some - including New York Times columnist Timothy Egan - call the "Y'all Qaeda." The difference is that these thieves of taxpayer land are middle-aged and white and wrapping themselves in "patriot" capes.
Yet they are anything but patriots. The reality is that they are deadbeats, squatters, welfare-ranchers.
Much of the national media refers to anarchy leader Ammon Bundy, in his cowboy hat and plaid jacket, as the "son of rancher Cliven Bundy, who owes more than $1 million in unpaid grazing fees" - like he's a defender/avenger of a wronged sire.
Well, that's not the real story. In 1998, a federal judge permanently banned the elder Bundy from grazing his livestock on a swath of federal land known as the Bunkerville Allotment and ordered him to remove his cattle by the end of the month. Bundy didn't.
Put this in local perspective. What if John Bubba Doe suddenly decided to turn a herd of horses and cattle onto the Southeast Tennessee portion of the Cherokee National Forest or even the state-managed Hiwassee Wildlife Refuge. And what if Doe, the squatter/rancher, set up corrals and water tanks in various places there for his cattle - clarifying that they didn't just wander there - they were being deliberately kept and fattened there.
The elder Bundy's response to the judge's order was to allow his cattle to graze on even broader areas of federal land run by the Bureau of Land Management and the National Park Service. So, 14 years later, in May 2012, federal attorneys finally sued Bundy to stop his "unauthorized and unlawful" grazing of livestock on federal lands, which - like Hiwassee and the Cherokee National Forest - contain archaeological sites, sensitive and rare plants, and threatened and protected species of animals.
Rightly, a federal judge in 2013 again ruled against Bundy, but this time gave federal officials the power to seize Bundy's livestock to enforce the law (like when federal officials are given permission to seize the transport vehicles and profit-making property of white-collar criminals or drug dealers). That prompted the now-famed 2013 Cliven Bundy armed protest and staredown between Bundy's buddies and federal agents in Nevada. There both sides had guns at the ready, and photographers captured at least one Bundy supporter aiming his rifle at agents.
But federal agents, flashing back to Waco, blinked. Officials said they would release the cattle because of "our serious concern about the safety of employees and members of the public."
BLM Director Neil Kornze added: "After 20 years and multiple court orders to remove the trespass cattle, Mr. Bundy owes the American taxpayers in excess of $1 million."
Thus, Bundy was fined - for trespassing and damaging federal property. He still hasn't paid up.
Now his son and some cronies have injected themselves, their guns and this same lame squatter mentality onto the 187,757-acre Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, about 30 miles south of the small town of Burns, Ore. They first claimed to be speaking for locals, but locals have denounced them.
The Malheur Wildlife Refuge was established in 1908 by President Theodore Roosevelt to preserve the Malheur, Mud and Harney lakes as a preserve and breeding ground for native birds of the Pacific flyway.
The refuge - like our smaller Hiwassee Refuge - is a bird-watching tourism destination extraordinaire.
Except now it's closed until further notice, according to the Malheur/U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service website: "An unknown number of armed individuals have broken into and occupied the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge facility. (T)he main concern is employee and public safety. "
At its heart, this is a sad tale about yet another conservative, extremist, anti-government and apparently anti-social group of moochers and grifters - this one trying to play on Americans' Old West and frontier fantasies.
The Bundy clan has claimed not to recognize the United States government, though the younger one - Ammon - certainly didn't mind recognizing it enough to accept a half-million-dollar low-interest federal business loan in 2010.
Now, who's a thug? And who's a welfare queen?