Land grab around the ol’ campfire — or — git along li’l DOGE

Nighthawks whirled around the ol’ campfire, as the last of the sunset faded in the west. Tuckered cowboys drifted into the circle of firelight from the four corners of the Big Empty. Each wore a confused look on his dusty face.

“What in hell’s happenin’ out there?” Sweetwater Slim queried Cookie as he dismounted. “I rode the whole damn alkali pasture, an’ I don’t recognize a damn thing. New roads all over the place, an’ fences with ‘No Trespassing’ signs.”

Cookie waved his greasy spoon at Slim, and was about to answer when Panhandle trotted up on his lathered horse and growled, “There’s yuppie scum crawlin’ all over the summer range! They’s drivin’ them weird lookin’ ‘lectric trucks, an’ wearin’ goofy red hats. They scattered the cattle, an’ I can’t find a single head.”

“Simmer down,” Cookie told them. “Y’all didn’t read the memo, didja? Elon Musk an’ his DOGE boys done sold off all the BLM land in these parts to bring down the national debt or invest in crypto or some damn thing.”

“Sold it to who?” Goshen Gus was in a foul mood as he led his exhausted pony to the campfire.

“To whoever has the most money,” Cookie answered, pedantically. “Some Saudi princes bought that rocky section down by the river, the one with the big prairie dog town. They’s gonna use it to train their falcons to hunt.”

Rawhide Ricky from Rawlins limped into the firelight. “I rode that country today,” he said, “an’ there’s a buncha fellers in white dresses siccin’ hawks on anything that moves. Them goddam birds spooked all the cattle outa the country, an’ chased me ‘til my horse bucked me off. Then they ran my horse off.”

Tired cowpunchers sat in a desultory circle around the ol’ campfire, discussing this disturbing new turn of events as their compadres trickled back to camp. Each broncpeeler had a story more bizarre than the last.

Sourdough sputtered and showed a bullet hole in his sweaty Stetson. “Some assholes put up a chainlink fence around that good grass along the creek bottom. There’s a sign that says ‘Site of the new RFK Jr. Ivermectin Mine,’ an’ when I got too close, the bastids took a shot at me!”  

Cookie stirred the simmering cauldron of beans and told the confused crew, “My cousin cooks fer a big outfit near Wamsutter, an’ he says that Russian oligarchs have bought up all the public land in the Red Desert.” He licked the spoon, then stuck it back in the steaming frijoles.

“They’s buildin’ a huge casino in ‘Dobe Town fer high-rollers. Limos, helipad, soiled doves from Vegas, the whole shebang. An’ on another section, they’s puttin’ in a nuclear-powered bitcoin mine where one o’ them ol’ shearin’ pens used to be.”

Sparks corkscrewed from the campfire into the dark sky. The gathered crew heard the slow clop-clop of a tired horse riding in. Doc from Dayton dismounted and spat a stream of Copenhagen juice into the coals. “Know what I seen? Y’all ain’t gonna believe it. There’s bulldozers down by the river, an’ they’s shovin’ dirt around to make a golf course. A golf course!”

Into the uncertain circle of cowboys strode the Trail Boss. “Boys, times is a’changin’,” he said. “Take a deep seat an’ grab a tight rein. Trump has declared public land to be an under-performin’ asset, and he’s sold it all on the auction block. What you saw is just the beginnin’.”

Trail Boss explained that grazing, camping, hunting, fishing and generally goofing off on public land wasn’t bringing in enough revenue to satisfy the new administration, so the public domain had been liquidated for cold, hard cash.

“Better punch another hole in yer belts fellers, we’re fixin’ to see some lean times for cowboys.” 

“But we can still graze our private land,” Trail Boss added. “All we gotta do is train our cows to step over them section corners an’ not put a hoof on what used to be public land. Shouldn’t be too hard a chore.”

At this, the crew scratched their noggins and muttered angrily about corner-crossing cows and rich MAGA bureaucrats. Before the debate could get out of hand, Cookie waved his spoon and hollered, “Come an’ get it, boys. These beans ain’t gonna eat themselves.”