It takes alot for me to consider actually joining a protest, but the following sickens me into action:
There is a protest this weekend if you’re interested. Info:
This makes my blood boil like just about nothing else on earth.
I wish I lived close enough to join in the protest.
This whole eminent domain issue pisses me off more than almost anything. I’d be happy to cast my vote for either a dem or rep if they’d make this their main campaign issue. Make a law, no, a constitutional admendment to eliminate the abhorrent abuse of power.
How is this Communist?
To answer my own question, it’s Communist just like the corrupt latifundia-connected Latin American regimes were Communist, i.e. puzzlingly far-right.
It’s statist collectivism. What’s so hard to understand?
I’ll never understand how “communists are on the left and fascists are on the right” got to be one of those universally accepted “truths”. They both came from the same Marxist roots, and only differ in methodology.
I once heard someone say that the idea that politics is a straight line, with the “left” on one end of the line and the “right” on the other is a fallacy. The truth is, it’s more like a circle…left and right meet in the place where the state controls everything.
And, you are right…this is definitely communistic. The state takes your land to put it to a “better use” as decreed by the state. What is that if not communism? That is the very definition of communism.
What in the world is you rationale for this bizarre statement?
Me too. My GF’s aunt was put out of her home of some 50 years by this stupid law. She was something like 95 at the time.
It’s tricky, since eminent domain is a useful (in fact, necessary) function. I’d like to see a law that sale by government to private developers is forbidden for at least 25 years. This should still allow the necessary construction of roads and whatnot, but limit the personal enrichment that makes this particularly vile type of corruption tempting.
Why 25 years. Why shldn’t they be obligated to put it to it’s stated “public use” immediately or, you know, keep there greedy little paws off of it?
I think it’s because in practice, totalitarian regimes are functionally identical, regardless of whatever ideological lip-service they pay. Whether your land is confiscated because you’re a Jew or a despot landlord doesn’t matter; it’s just the flimsy excuse the state uses to increase its own power and wealth. In this case, the Piscataway government is simply too lazy to dream up a noble-sounding excuse.
Sale to “private developers” is not public use. Private developers sometimes see a lot of money in primo real-estate, and will tempt the local G-Man with large payoffs if only they’ll seize that land under the guise of “eminent domain” then sell it to said shady developer. (Or at least, that the fear.) The “25 years” plan prevents government lackeys from unethically grabbing up land for sizeable payouts from developer, who in turn build malls or condos, but still allows them to grab it & build a freeway or declare it “protected wetlands” or some such.
So, no sale = no greedy private developer building a new mall, but new freeways when necessary.
Wasn’t this precedent set by Kelo vs City of New London? The Supreme Court case decided by that far-right majority of Stevens, Kennedy, Souter, Ginsburg, and Breyer?
Or is this some other far-right eminent domain issue?
Unfortunately, “immediate” can get kind of slippery. If the government claims the area has toxic waste on it, they’ll claim it requires a cleanup before road building (or whatever) can proceed. Since the budget has other priorities, though, we’ll make a few trivial token efforts like sending out two guys with shovels. Then a few years passes and “We did more tests and it’s okay, but further study shows the road isn’t necessary. Well, we see the original owners have all died or moved away in the meantime, and StripMall inc. is offering of a good deal…”
A lengthy moratorium will hopefully allow a turnover or two of government, distancing the people who make the deal from those who benefit from it.
Or you could devise a list of acceptable uses and require government officials to swear oaths that the land will be put to those uses, under penalties of heavy fines and impeachment/dismissal. Even that may be unworkable, so civil disobedience might be the only way. A Branch Davidian-style standoff could get nationwide attention. Of course, you mnight ahve to kill some people along the way.
OK, so why don’t they eminient domain it when (and only when) the freeway is deemed necessary?
I would have no problem with the OP being phrased “Fascist Pistataway”.
Communism is not about taking from the poor and giving to the rich.
Let me phrase that again. Communism is not about taking from the poor and giving to the rich.
Now, if the property were seized unfairly and used for a public works project or state-owned enterprise, that would be at least Communistic enough to warrant a Pit thread title.
But the entire point of the OP is that the property is most likely being seized not mainly for the ostensible benefit of the people or the government, but to hand it over to private enterprise. I can’t think off the top of my head when the Communists have ever done that, except perhaps in “Communist” China, and to the extent that they do this, they are not Communist but rather a garden-variety Banana Republic or Republican Dictatorship.
I think you’re banking too much on the unsubstantiated, and certainly biased, speculation in the OP and the link. There’s no evidence that the local government is gonna turn around and sell this land to commercial developers.
What’s “biased” and “unsubstantiated” about my OP? Piscataway has already seized land citing similar reasons and has sold to high-density developers. So much for open spaces. Why would they seize a farm outright for the preservation of open spaces when the owners had no intention of developing it? Why would they switch their reasons after the initial one was deemed too absurd?
And Ludovic: for christ’s sake get a grip.