American Experience: Ruby Ridge

A stark and terrible example of what happens when the government machine wants to make a point and demands a scalp for its next budget increase.PC misinformation painted a target on Randy Weaver's back. His family was not a physical threat to anyone and should have been left alone. I guess there's a right to privacy as long as your existence, as reported in the newspapers, doesn't embarrass one or more government bureaucracies. That you're religious and don't have much money means there's no paradise where trouble can't intrude.The feds finally eased up but not before three people including a mother of four young children was dead. In PBS' telling, Bo Gritz is heroic, Sara Weaver is earnest and forgiving, Dave Hunt is among the remorseful government people.PBS rightly locates the roots of the tragedy in the farming crisis and law enforcement snitchery. Since those things are ongoing and PC and the administrative state are as powerful as ever the possibility of another Ruby Ridge isn't exactly remote.

Ruby Ridge is a fine, clear film about the deadly and abusive powers of the United States federal government. Randy Weaver, who had done nothing wrong except embrace separatist beliefs, was lured by U. S. agents into committing a trivial federal crime, for which he was prosecuted when he refused to inform on fellow separatists. When he couldn’t post bail, the government deprived him of title to his mountaintop cabin – and, as a result, the completely avoidable slaughter of Weaver’s family members ensued.In this American Experience documentary, Weaver’s eldest daughter serves as an excellent, articulate narrator for what occurred in an eleven-day siege in 1992 in a remote backwoods location at the northern tip of Idaho. The filmmakers, who were apparently restricted to a film length of only an hour, compressed the ending credits into a form that makes them unintelligible. That is the only defect in an otherwise compelling and first-rate presentation.

I lived in the area at the time and remember this situation well. this documentary gives you the facts and where it ventures into speculation they SAY SO. Excellent documentary on a very disturbing incident of government OVERREACH!

Details on how the (((Federal Gov't))) cares so much for the citizenry that it gunned down one man and his whole family because a Fed informant persuaded him to saw the barrel off a shotgun.

When the Government wants to kill you- God help you. Limited government can create only limited mischief. You know the converse.

Having now lived, not 50 miles away, from where this event originally occurred, more than a quarter century, ago - I have gained a greater appreciation, for its impact, and, (resulting) "legacy" !!! .

This was a riveting documentary. We got caught up in the Waco series by Paramount & ended up backing up for a more in-depth story of Ruby Ridge. Waco Episode 1 addresses Ruby Ridge & has some of the same footage, but I felt this version was more informative.

This strikes the right tone, and makes clear what parts of the story will never be known, because of confusion and conflicting reports.