BrianGarst.com

In the latest incident highlighting the utter contempt and disdain with which the American government holds its citizens, roving bands of government thugs harassed and intimidated visitors at Yellowstone in a petty, vindictive effort to exact pain on the American people in hopes of achieving political gain in the course of a routine fiscal disagreement between branches of government (Hat-tip: Yid With Lid).

Vaillancourt was one of thousands of people who found themselves in a national park as the federal government shutdown went into effect on Oct. 1. For many hours her tour group, which included senior citizen visitors from Japan, Australia, Canada and the United States, were locked in a Yellowstone National Park hotel under armed guard.

The tourists were treated harshly by armed park employees, she said, so much so that some of the foreign tourists with limited English skills thought they were under arrest.

When finally allowed to leave, the bus was not allowed to halt at all along the 2.5-hour trip out of the park, not even to stop at private bathrooms that were open along the route.

Lest you think there is some innocuous explanation for this unnecessary harassment, consider this exchange:

The bus stopped along a road when a large herd of bison passed nearby, and seniors filed out to take photos. Almost immediately, an armed ranger came by and ordered them to get back in, saying they couldn’t “recreate.” The tour guide, who had paid a $300 fee the day before to bring the group into the park, argued that the seniors weren’t “recreating,” just taking photos.

How are cameras expected to work with only 83% of our precious government open? What madness is this?

The seniors quickly filed back onboard and the bus went to the Old Faithful Inn, the park’s premier lodge located adjacent to the park’s most famous site, Old Faithful geyser. That was as close as they could get to the famous site — barricades were erected around Old Faithful, and the seniors were locked inside the hotel, where armed rangers stayed at the door.

“They looked like Hulk Hogans, armed. They told us you can’t go outside,” she said. “Some of the Asians who were on the tour said, ‘Oh my God, are we under arrest?’ They felt like they were criminals.”

…The bus trip made headlines in Livingston, where the local newspaper Livingston Enterprise interviewed the tour guide, Gordon Hodgson, who accused the park service of “Gestapo tactics.”

“The national parks belong to the people,” he told the Enterprise. “This isn’t right.”

…Many of the foreign visitors were shocked and dismayed by what had happened and how they were treated, Vaillancourt said.

“A lot of people who were foreign said they wouldn’t come back (to America),” she said.

If I were overseas and subjected to similar harassment and intimidation by a foreign government, I wouldn’t want to return there either. This sort of nonsense ought to outrage any American who takes seriously the ideals upon which our government is supposedly based. It is abundantly clear that the American government has gone completely rogue, and no longer putting up even a the pretense of understanding that it operates under the authority of the people.