Moral to protect your home to the death?

[RationalBiker]

To add to my previous post, here is a quote that is particularly sickening to me:

JUSTICE SCALIA: No. I just want to take

25 property from people who are paying less taxes and

1 give it to people who are paying more taxes. That

2 would be a public use, wouldn't it?

3 JUSTICE O'CONNOR: For example, Motel 6

4 and the city thinks, well, if we had a Ritz-Carlton,

5 we would have higher taxes. Now, is that okay?

6 MR. HORTON: Yes, Your Honor. That would

7 be okay. I -- because otherwise you're in the

8 position of drawing the line. I mean, there is,

9 there is a limit. I mean -

Now, I suspect Scalia and O'Connor are playing devil's advocate to test the position of the municipality, but the municipality's position appears to be that no line should be drawn in determining when it's acceptable to take private property for public use. I have just crossed New London off my list of places I would ever want to live.

[softwareNerd]

Reading the documents submitted in the Kelo vs. New London case was interesting. Thanks for the link.

Here is my summary of the current situation:

The last clause of the 5th amendment to the U.S. Constitution says: "...nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation. "

Eminent domain has long been upheld by the courts. The courts allow governmental "takings"; they merely insist that the private owner be compensated.

Past rulings also indicate that the courts will allow the government to take property and give it to a private entity for a so-called "public use": like a electric power plant or a road. Past rulings have also stretched the definition to allow the taking of property designated as "blighted". In this case, it is not a "public use", rather the removal of the blight is the objective, a.k.a., the "public benefit".

The current case will test whether the court will impose any limit on the type of situation where the government can take property, or if it will merely insist on just compensation.

[gags]

For older property owners, the spectre of losing it all to the government is just too much to bear. I myself am a very material person. I have possessions that could not be had in a multiple unit housing complex. My needs are for a place out in the country, with lots of land and distance between me and the neighbors.

If I were to lose it all, I doubt that I would be able to attain this level of personal wealth again due to age, failing health, energy levels, etc. In fact, I probably would be reduced to an existence akin to peasants prior to the French Revolution. It would not be a life worth living, at least from my frame of consciousness.

If I were alone, it would not be a difficult choice to make. The plan would be simple: to create as much damage and destruction and kill as many of the bastards as possible. (I already thought about collateral damage, and realized that any taxpaying neighbor would be a supporter of the monstrous enemy that would be taking my property, and would therefore not be entitled to any special protection.)

But the reality is, I have a wife and kid (I know, started out late in life) am about to retire and am stuck with property taxes that equal 50% of my net income now. I can't sell, and can't move (and even if I could, the problem would simply reocur somewhere else) and all I can do is get politically active. I'm even thinking of starting a philosophy show on cable public access, but I have been actively writing in the local newspaper for the past 6 years. But I can see the writing on the wall. Taxes are rising and my income is decreasing. Even so, I find few individuals who share my sentiments. It is a very difficult road to travel, when there is no other country to flee to.

I can certainly see where you're coming from. Until I purchased a house, I really wasn't aware that in this country landowners simply rent their property from the government. If you don't pay their rent (in the form of outrageous property taxes), they'll take away your land and your home. Oh, and if you're foolish enough to improve your property, they increase the rent. It's quite a system.

[softwareNerd]

Something I had not considered: a state could pass a law that limited the exercise of eminent domain within that state. It appears (link) that Utah has passed such a law.

[softwareNerd]

Ask yourself what Kira would have done if there were no better place than Soviet Russia in the world.

Why not! Let me take a shot at it:

If she thought there was a chance that she could change things, she would have done what it took. If not, she would probably have "shrugged" in some way: retreated into a life where she was acheiving whatever little values she could continue to acheive.

What do you think she'd have done?

[mweiss]

I can certainly see where you're coming from.  Until I purchased a house, I really wasn't aware that in this country landowners simply rent their property from the government.  If you don't pay their rent (in the form of outrageous property taxes), they'll take away your land and your home.  Oh, and if you're foolish enough to improve your property, they increase the rent.  It's quite a system.

Yes, it's an insidious step on the ladder to Communism, as it's one of the rungs on the ladder of the Communist Manifesto. It seems that the atmosphere of government and people brainwashing is toward a totalitarian "nanny" state.

In many ways, we are sliding down the slippery slope and unlike in revolutionary times, the populace does not have the weaponry to challenge the federal troops.

Oh, and it looks like the "Thompson Harmonizer" or some incarnation of it, was just born. Apparently we were going to test it in Iraq:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8644374/

Israel is already using such technology:

JERUSALEM — Israel is considering using an unusual new weapon against Jewish settlers who resist this summer's Gaza Strip evacuation — a device that emits penetrating bursts of sound that leaves targets reeling with dizziness and nausea.

Just think when you and I decide to resist paying our property taxes (I just paid mine this past week and now I can't make my car payment, the electric or the phone payments and I'm selling some of my photographic gear just to get bill money--it gets worse every year) we will be facing all sorts of technology that the Sheeple helped fund with their tax dollars and it won't be a fair fight. It won't be 'musket for musket' like it was in 1860, it will be shotgun for tactical nuke or other megabuck high tech weapon. How we could resist this trend I do not know.