EMINENT DOMAIN 2: THE QUICKENING

[rone]

The Supreme Court on Thursday ruled that local governments may seize people's homes and businesses -- even against their will -- for private economic development.

    [...]

Susette Kelo and several other homeowners in a working-class neighborhood in New London, Connecticut, filed suit after city officials announced plans to raze their homes for a riverfront hotel, health club and offices.

It's finally happened: i'm on the same side of a decision as Rehnquist, Scalia, and Thomas.  Time to join a golf course and buy a luxury car.

Comments

[ratphooey.livejournal.com]

Wake me when the world is right side up again.

[erikred.livejournal.com]

It's finally happened: i'm on the same side of a decision as Rehnquist, Scalia, and Thomas. Time to join a golf course and buy a luxury car.

If you can afford a luxury car and a golf course, you're already on the same side as Rehnquist, Scalia, and Thomas.

This is so goddamn frustrating.

[tongodeon.livejournal.com]

From your comment it's not clear whether you read this, but Rehnquist, Scalia, and Thomas dissented from the ruling.

[twillis.livejournal.com]

OH GOD I CAN'T WAKE UP SOMEBODY WAKE ME UP



You know, if I spend the next twenty years building up and developing my farm, I'm going to be pretty annoyed if THE MAN tries to steal it to expand the race track or something equally stupid.

[erikred.livejournal.com]

I apologize for the ambiguity.

Rehnquist, Scalia, and Thomas are country-club-belonging, Cuban-cigar smoking, Bush's-balls-licking filthy rich bastards, regardless of how they came down on this decision; if you own a luxury car and are a member of a golf-course, odds are you're on your way there too (or you're hoping to get there some day).

[erikred.livejournal.com]

A PDF version of the Connecticut State Supreme Court's decision on the appeal:
http://csua.org/u/che (300k)
This is LONG, and I'm not going to summarize. It bears reading, as the appellants' challenge has a lot to do with interpretation of the phrasing of state law.

A large number of documents were filed on this case:
http://csua.org/u/chf (Findlaw.com)

[kodi]

You're such a hypocrite - without this decision, there wouldn't BE any golf courses! Just residential development after residential development, as far as the eye can see. And out in the country, family farmers greedily hoard their fields and pastures... Why, the only golf courses would be in international waters!

And nobody likes a soggy sand trap.

[ptomblin-lj.livejournal.com]

Whereas in my life I've become more of a union-supporting, donating to good causes, died in the wool liberal/socialist the older and richer I become.

[erikred.livejournal.com]

Damn it, would you stop poking holes in my outrageous and utterly ridiculous generalizations?

[wisn.livejournal.com]

A golf course or McMansion complex is considerably less likely to be claimed by eminent domain for a Wal-Mart. So it works for you both as an investor and as a landowner. Double-score!

[glitter-ninja.livejournal.com]

For the first time in days, I read something with my jaw literally hanging open. And then I had to read it again. And then my brain switched off, to protect itself.

I'm astonished, yet nauseated.

[sanspoof.livejournal.com]

This is superbad. States' rights, don't fail us now.

We can build them!

[sunburn.livejournal.com]

WE HAVE THE TECHNOLOGY. (http://www.cnisbelieving.com/floating_green.html)

The first time?

[vardissakheli.livejournal.com]

You didn't read about the flag-burning amendment supported by 77 Democratic Congressmen just before this?

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

Oh, no, dear, that's old news. This is the fifth time that thing has passed the House with similar support each time.

I suspect that if one was black, it wasn't news.

[mouseworks.livejournal.com]

The urban renewel schemes in Roanoke involved tearing houses down because they were not located in the right places and were a blight, and then selling the land to people who would build Howard Johnsons or such on it.

At least in Roanoke, a Republican sided with the poor property owners who were losing their homes, even if he couldn't do anything to stop it.

Never heard of them doing rural renewal...

[mouseworks.livejournal.com]

...even when those houses are so much below the grade of the city homes that get whacked it's not funny. Rural blight is merely picturesque -- and the worst of them are tenant houses on proper people's land.