Illegal Offroading

[opfermanmotors]

The cost of iIlegal off-roading

[opfermanmotors]

A follow up to this video:

[JETZcorp]

$2000 worth of damage?  What in the hell?  And does anyone else find it funny that he was busted by a logger?  You simply can't try and tell me that all the 4x4s and quads and dirt bikes throughout the entire history of the planet have managed to do as much damage as the humble chainsaw.

Where's the Phantom Duck of the Desert when you need him?!

One of the times I go riding next, I plan on doing a video about the environment and such.  I intend to show the world the difference between the "damage" caused by bikes and quads, and the damage caused by the National Forest Service in their attempts to keep the bikes and quads out.  They've sawed down 60 year-old trees to block a road, and then continued cutting for an eighth of a mile to make sure no one can get in and damage the roots of those trees.  And then they go in with bulldozers, and dig massive trenches and stack mud four feet high in this big ugly heap, to keep the environment nice and beautiful.  And meanwhile, if you even dare to ride around without a spark arrestor, they stack on a big hefty fine.  Nevermind that in order to do so, they had to drive their Jeep over some highly flammable dry yellow grass, with headers and catalytic converter glowing orange with heat and pressed against the tinder!  It's all ridiculous.

[2stroke250]

He's like, "this is total bullpoo....stupid video, I learned nothing and just want to go on with my life." Come on, this guy doesnt care about the animals, he probably hunts anything that moves and hangs the heads on his bedroom walls. Any idiot knows not to go around a gate, or shred up state land.

[MXLord327]

I don't care what they say, State land belongs to the people that pay taxes in that state, not the beaurocrats running it!!  Riding or 4 wheeling should not be illegal in the first place!!

[JETZcorp]

Okay, it's story time!  I would like to point out ahead of time (for imagined legal purposes) that I did not write this, SuperHunky did.  This tale begins on page 321 of Monkey Butt.

THE TRUE STORY OF THE PHANTOM DUCK

Did you ever sit around and daydream about taking on a big corporation that just wronged you?  Or maybe getting even with a company that just ripped you off?  How about the ultimate?  Taking on the Internal Revenue Service!  And winning!  We'd all like to have the time, money, and energy to fight the Battle Royal, but, in the course of earning a living and just getting along, day by day, we somehow never seem to get up the steam to actually realize that dream.

One man did.

He goes by the name of The Phantom Duck of the Desert, and, single-handedly, has taken on the Mighty Bureau of Land Management, or the BLM, as we have come to know it.

If you ride a dirt bike of any kind, on any land other than a private park, anywhere, at any time, you are not doing it by the will of the Lord.  Nope.  You are doing it because the BLM, in their infinite goodness, has not yet closed that land down.

However, we must face up to the rather alarming fact that most of the people who ride, are riding illegally, most of the time, most of the places.  Why?

Simple.  We don't have any other places to ride.  Here in the vast Southwest, we have literally millions of acres of wasteland that bears the name "desert."  Much of this land is owned by the railroad, more by other private industry, but, by and large, most of the land is owned by us.  That's right.  Us.  You and me.

"Hey," you say, "that makes it nice.  It's our land.  Therefore, we can ride cycles and off-road vehicles on it, right?"

Wrong, dead wrong.  Standing between us and the rational use of our land, is the aforementioned BLM.  The very name sends spasms of disgust up this writer's spine.  The Bureau of Land Management.And I'll leave the story there for now and we can pick it up later.  Perhaps tomorrow.  I intend to get the entire saga of this thing written down here, right through to the '90s.

[JETZcorp]

Did anybody read what I posted?  If people are interested I'll keep putting it up here, but if they're not then I won't bother.  It's okay if you didn't, that's a lot of material to go through.

[TMKIWI]

Yep i read it.
But only because my subscription to the porn channel has expired. 

[Coop]

Did anybody read what I posted?  If people are interested I'll keep putting it up here, but if they're not then I won't bother.  It's okay if you didn't, that's a lot of material to go through.

I have the book and have read it at least 5 times since I got it ten years ago.

[Hondacrrider]

I read it, please keep posting.

[JETZcorp]

It was clearly impossible.  To complicate things even more, (Note from JETZ:  Super Hunky revealed more details on the Coliseum Gorge incident in his interview on the Steve Matthes show.  I recommend listening to the whole thing at some point, but the relevant bit starts at the 1:19:00 mark or so.  The link is http://www.pulpmx.com/moto_show/archives/podcasts/100120_Hunky.mp3)

[eprovenzano]

Thanks for posting the article JETZ   

[JETZcorp]

Oh, there's still more!  Now, there's a piece where Super Hunky does a dystopian fiction about the state of riding in the future.  It's not strictly along the lines of this true story here, but it is a very good story nonetheless.  You guys want me to post it here, make a new topic, or just forget about it?  Either way, here's the next chunk of the Phantom Duck story proper.


LEGAL STUFF WITH THE PHANTOM DUCK

I was sitting here, looking at a stack of papers almost three inches thick.  My name was on those papers.  So was the name of the Phantom Duck of the Desert and his right-hand man, Al Fols.  This stack of papers, upon closer examination, said that the three of us were being sued by the Bureau of Land Management, through the office of the US Attorney.They do anything they damned well want to, until a judge tells them no!

Right after the first of the year, Louis McKey, Al Fols and I formed a corporation called The Phantom Duck of the Desert, mostly to cover our asses.  Shortly after that, we announced that one of the goals of our new corporation was to go after the dirty laundry of the BLM and to try to get their act straightened out.

The results of that intent-to-pursue justice were now sitting right next to a can of beer.  In an almost knee-jerk reaction, the BLM went for our throats.  They wanted up behind bars!).  Remember that stack of paper we mentioned that was three inches thick?  Do you have any idea how many man-hours were in that?  At [three] hundred per!

You see, the BLM was asking the judge to make us pay for the expenses they incurred during prosecuting us.  And the more they spent, the more they could try to burn us for.  And if they lost, hey, so what?  It was just taxpayer money.

On February 12th, in the Los Angeles Times, there appeared the following little piece on page two of section one:

hand-delivered

[TMKIWI]

That reminds me of a guy here called Dave Henderson.
He upset 1 guy at the tax department over comments made to his secretary.
He went in for a tax refund and ended up with a $1m dollar bill.
They went after him and bankrupted him.
He lost his girl friend , house and everything. But he would not give up.
It took him 10 years to clear his name.
In the end he managed to make back alot of money and he bought the tax department offices, renamed it "Henderson House", then evicted them when the lease was up 
When government oficials have it in for you it's pretty hard to win.
It's great when the little man does.

They made a film about it. Bloody interesting.
The movie was called "We're here to help". Yeh right !
Heres a link.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/inland-revenue/news/article.cfm?o_id=89&objectid=10382813

[Hondacrrider]

This is kind of interesting. Where I live, as long as you are riding on dirt, you are good, there will be signs up that say, No trespassing, but those signs are only there so you can not sue the city. The city could really care less if you are there. If you get hurt on someones property, and try to sue, the defendant can simply state that you were trespassing. A local track has signs up that say No trespassing, yet there is a motocross track there, and it has been there for 40 years, if the city didn't want you trespassing, they would take the track down. Anyways, it kinda sucks that all your guys' riding area is being taken away, I guess I am lucky because I walk for 2 mins with my bike, and I have access to unlimited trails.