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by Jiro 1643 days ago
>Here's a reason article about several attempts

If you read the article carefully,

-- This is about leases. Leases come with conditions. You're not buying the land.

-- The first example is about someone who lied and made a bid that he had no intention or ability to pay. Turns out that's actually a crime. That's not "power structure opposed to these sort of actions" in a nontrivial sense.

-- There's a very good reason for much of this: Grazing, hunting, and even logging are part of maintaining the land. The owner of the land (the government) doesn't want you to stop maintaining the land and so makes sure the lease requires that you maintain it. And resource extraction comes with paying royalties to the owner, who doesn't want you cheaping out by not extracting any resources and not paying anything.