The Bundys and the Forest Reserve Standoff

The only person in your story that I believe is not outright exaggerating, falsifying or lying is Timothy McPey. It's plausible that that kind of informal thing was going on without there being any more of a conspiracy than that. The idea of them all sitting around a campfire relating war stories to each other of things that they never did... Totally. That was the whole thing that they were aiming for. And then they succeeded.