Say Anything Blog

Face it, the card is incredibly tacky--especially as a Christmas missive.  That doesn’t alter the fact that the whole Kelo property-taking affair was (and is) a travesty.

The insensitivity of the key players who took/benefited from the affair is as bad as the card.  Fortunately, States are enacting laws to address the inequity of the Supreme Court’s ruling.

Still, in a Cristmas card, tacky...tacky...tacky

Regards…

LTM...That’s why I used the term “Holiday Card” in the title.

What’s going to happen to US industry when the global warming extremists like John McCain double the price of electricity?  I would think all these factories will close and set up in countries where they aren’t scared of technology.

Whistler.  Thanks for using Holiday Card.  This case is a watershed case.  The issue is known.  The solution is to elect conservatives who support property rights and individual investment rights.  If we do not win and turn this around that begun in the 1950 Supreme Court decision we will continue to slide into a communist state.

Communism is evil

Well done, Mrs. Kelo!  The city turned her life upside down for six years, and they’ve got the gall to say that Kelo is the one out of line?

Never mind that the city tried to pay her the 2000 appraisal, and even tried to charge her RENT PLUS INTEREST for living in her own home that she’d paid property tax on.  To complain that she should be happy because she finally got a halfway reasonable price for her home is beyond absurd.

The solution is to elect conservatives who support property rights and individual investment rights.

I think this issue cuts a little deeper than conservative vs. liberal.

In my state, we elect judges, and we have a significant housing boom. On the first issue (electing judges) I’m genuinely ambivilent about, on the second, I’m pro-growth, but I know the community has a genuine problem with real estate developers.

One prominent developer building a luxury development is even trying to build a golf course immediately next to the city’s water reservoir. We’re talking watershed space of 0’ between the fairway and the water supply of half a million people. The tapwater is delicious now, but this scenario is Dasani’s wet dream. Hopefully the county commissioners will show something they haven’t up until now, a spine.

I digress, you can espouse voting for a conservative candidate who says he’s ‘pro-property rights,’ but as for whose property, yours or the real estate developer’s future property, is not certain. On the other hand you can vote for the liberal judge who say’s he’s for ‘protecting the little guy against moneyed interests,’ but at the end of the day, whether the judge on the ballot is progressive or conservative, their stated principles carry much less water than the developer or buisiness entity who cuts the judicial candidate’s checks for the election.

As someone who owns a modest house in a middle class neighborhood that is in an area of town that is getting more and more desirable to live in (and who has seen surrounding neighborhoods loose older homes for multi-unit condos) the Kelo case concerns the heck out of me. It’s bad enough that the DOT can earmark my yard for a highway bypass, but it defies imagination that a private person or entity can slap some county commissioner’s back, flash a few bills, and *poof* turn my plot into some townhouses.

The most telling thing that Whistler has highlited is the dismissive attitude the thieves are taking to the damage they’ve caused this woman. I don’t believe in curses, but I wouldn’t necessarily be celebrating decadent choices the way Reid Burdick is.

This is what happens when the American dream runs aground on the phrase ‘Money talks, bull$^!t walks.

*

Thanks for the thoughtful answer.  Why don’t you review the philosophy’s of the judges who voted against this travesty.

It was the conservative wing that respects individual rights.  Despite all of the Hyperbole from the left, that’s the way it always comes out.

What’s going to happen to US industry when the global warming extremists like John McCain double the price of electricity?  I would think all these factories will close and set up in countries where they aren’t scared of technology.

I agree with you, Whistler, the guys on the right side (the dissenting side of the Kelo case) are on the other side of the ideological fence from myself and the rest of the liberal horde (although Souter was a Republican appointee) and Kennedy (despite his last name) is a conservative Reagan appointee.

I cite both as a counterweight to those who reflexively state that conservatives are generally aligned with the home-owner in issues related to eminent domain. In my county (as well as surrounding counties) most of the commissioners that are in the pocket of the developers have (R)s next to their name on the ballot.

One egregious example of the misuse of eminent domain for the benefit of a private enterprise is associated with a certain obscure politician from Texas that profited hansomely when his obscure baseball franchise convinced the city of Arlington to condemn private homes so as to inexpensively provide land for a new stadium:

http://www.andrewclem.com/Baseball/AmeriquestField.html

When I first heard about this before the 2000 election, I realized that this guy was more than just his father’s son.

Anyway, I cite these as an example of caution for both left and right. Matters of morality and ideology for big-ticket items, like wars and taxes, are very easy to scrutinize for people with superficial understandings of politics. Votes and loyalties change, but you get what you pay/vote for.

On the other hand, small-ticket items, concepts like eminent domain and zoning, (ideas that may in fact have more bearing on our day to day lives) are much easier for a politician or a judge to slip under the rug.

* I would take issue in that Souter and Kennedy are NOT conservative judges.  Yes they were appointed by conservative presidents. 

Generally we feel that they were both a mistake.  Perhaps they had good appellate records, but once they got to make up the Constitution they saw their way to impose their up till then hidden views. 

I wasn’t aware of the eminent domain issues on the Texas stRanger’s stadium.  (And I haven’t read your link yet.) It seems to me to be somewhat less egregious if the stadium were still owned by the government that exercised eminent domain.  I don’t know that’s the case for sure but that’s probably the way it works.

Certainly not an unusual circumstance.  I don’t believe that government should build those huge stadiums to benefit sports teams, but some disagree.

What’s going to happen to US industry when the global warming extremists like John McCain double the price of electricity?  I would think all these factories will close and set up in countries where they aren’t scared of technology.

Whistler, we can go back and forth about whos politics are what on SCOTUS, after December 12th, 2000 and their newfound, temporary, proclivity towards federalism over the right of the state and voter, I’m disinclined to automatically respect any of the justice’s views, be they Stevens or Thomas.

But yeah, regarding the Rangers, I’m not familiar with too many of the specifics, so I won’t cast too many stones at the owners or former owners of the Rangers. Well, not too many more than I have already.

That said, eminent domain, when used for department of transportation or public works benefit, while not exactly palatable, is somewhat digestable.

My grandparents and great-grandparents owned a boarding house in Providence, RI in a neighborhood that was predominantly Italian and poor. 75 years later, there is asphalt where the house was and the neighborhood is bisected by I-95. One can argue that the world is a better place for having removed the house for a 2,000-mile artery that serves the east coast, but I don’t think one could reasonably make the counterclaim that everyone’s interest (save for my ancestors) would have benefited by having I-95 stop on account of my grandparent’s private property. There are probably thousands of families who probably had to make some sort of accomodation that my family did to allow for the easy snowbird migration.

If people need to get to work or school, the road has to go somewhere. If people are going to need to use electricity, the substation is going to have to be placed somewhere. If a housing development goes up with enough units, the elementary school is going to have to be placed somewhere, and if the aldermen or the developer don’t plan right, someone’s property line will probably get the short end of the stick. The caveat of the N.I.M.B.Y. principle is, in a civilized society, someone gets the I.M.B.Y.

The most disturbing thing about Kelo, from a liberal’s perspective is, while the D.O.T., Corps of Engineers, local Education Board, is to some degree accountable to the voter and the private-property owner, and the government is expected to be the heavy handed arbiter of judgement regarding private homeowner displacement, Kelo opens the doors and legitimizes land grabs by private enterprises that are in no way accountable to other private citizens.

And yes, I do consider stadiums built, whether for collegiate or professional clubs and financed by public or private concerns to be superficial, stupendous wastes of money. And I love all sports, from college basketball to curling.

A local state college looked down the road at its rival public university which built a basketball colliseum for $30 million, $6 mil of that financed by taxpayers like yours truly. The boosters at the state college had to have a new stadium as well. Old one was A-Ok, but some alumn just got to keep up with the Joneses.

Whine whine whine whine whine.

Several years later, they got one. Originally it was going to cost $50 mil, all financed through alumn. Ooops, did we say $50 mil? What we meant to say was $160 mil with a 30 mil injection from state/county/city. Ooops, did we say $160 mil? What we meant to say was $220 mil, with an unspecified amount to be paid for with municipal bonds.

Beautiful. Now, most of the alumn from this state college, including many of my friends, are very, very conservative. And I’m very liberal. And they’re arguing with me that this pet project of theirs is to be paid for with MY taxes/money.

Y’all wrap your mind around that.

A year after this monstrosity was built, and 39 years before my community was done paying for it, I heard many of these same ‘conservatives’ complain about the difficulties they had getting to work. The interstate was over-taxed. Well, duh, quite a few people who are paying for your stadium drive on it. Do you think that, maybe, you know, some of the $220 million paid for your pet project might have been better served in the public domain???

So, yeah, while I’m sure some public good might come out building box seats for Ranger’s fans, or someone’s alma matter, (or some developer’s high-rise condo) they’re not necessary, and as such, they should be built with private money and used on private land bought on the free market and not coerced.

I really don’t think this issue is definable as liberal vs conservative, at all. It is more aligned with wealth, responsibility, & common sense; something that conservatives claim to have in spades, but in practice sometimes come up short.

Oh, and the basketball team that was built for the State University the better part of a decade ago?

They still suck.

(can you sense the holiday workweek boredom? It’s Millertime.

Someone hits on the big problem here; Kelo was for a private employer, not a public purpose.  The Rangers stadium is a grey area; publicly owned, but really mostly for the Rangers, a private enterprise.  Roads and such are of course truly publicly owned and used.

I tend to say “OK” somewhat grudgingly for the third category, but “no” for the first two; if it’s such a great business idea, why not go to Wall Street for money?  The answer, of course, is that such plans generally aren’t that great of a business opportunity, and the private sector is quite right not to fund them.

Why didn’t you just have an alumni pay for the whole stadium like we did.

It’s not too bad, marble floors, leather seats (all 11,500).

What’s going to happen to US industry when the global warming extremists like John McCain double the price of electricity?  I would think all these factories will close and set up in countries where they aren’t scared of technology.

Why didn’t you just have an alumni pay for the whole stadium like we did.

Heh, I think that’s what most people not affiliated with this state university were saying.

When my alma mater (Georgia Tech) needed renovations for the ‘96 Games (hosted boxing in the Thrillerdome,) we went to ACOG (probably the most corrupt Olympics after Salt Lake in the history of the games, but no bother) and looked for corporate sponsorships (McDonalds paid out the nose to get their Golden Arches on the floor, as well as a drive-thru on the side of the colliseum, if you could believe that.) The people of Atlanta, Fulton County, & Georgia weren’t opening their wallets for the $20 million in renovations.

Whenever people would rag on me for my team’s having a corporate logo on the court (and it would always come from graduates/attendees of the state university I mentioned previously) I’d remind them their property, sales, & income taxes were not paying down the 1/4 billion price tag, as their new deluxe monstrosity was costing my new community was.

Plus you used to be able to get a McRib during halftime.

My apologies for the poor grammar. I’ve got visions of sugar plums dancing in my head.