WASHINGTON (AP) -- -- The Supreme Court on Thursday ruled that local governments may seize people's homes and businesses -- even against their will -- for private economic development.
For the entire existence of our country, the laws and the courts existed for the purpose of protecting the individual from the excesses and impositions of the government. The Constitution (and the Bill of Rights) go to incredible lengths to detail the very narrow and specific areas of individual life into which government was allowed to intrude.
We shrugged when the concept of imminent domain was introduced, but we accepted that the government might make use of private areas for the public good, and since the government was - ostensibly - by the people, for the people, if the government (the people) is depriving one person of property, it must be for the greater good, right?
Well now the court says that the "greater good" might not be "by the people, for the people" but rather "by some random individual, designated by some people's representatives, for some of, maybe most of, but not likely all, the people." We've not codified a system by which individuals can have their property removed from their posssession, with minimal, if any, renumeration, for the economic gain of the other individuals in the community. Bad, bad, bad, bad, bad, bad, bad. Bad.
Bad.
Really bad.
If we're going to run roughshod over the rights of Americans, why are we maintaining the fiction that this is even America anymore? The nation shrugs over the PATRIOT Act, sucks up unreasonable searches and seizures every time we take our shoes off in an airport, shirks the First Amendment by passing anti-flag-burning legislation, and now allows the deprivation of private property for the economic gain of another private person.
We're not just going to hell, we're climbing in the handbasket and clamoring for the front row seat.
Posts
0 comments:
Post a Comment