Archive for June, 2005

I usually tend to be quicker to write an entry about my complaints, rather than compliments, but this one really needs to be said.

I’m an ST for a White Wolf Vampire LARP. We run our game on the Mind’s Eye Theater system, using the Revised Edition of Laws of the Night. Anybody who has ever gone looking for a good copy of the Revised Laws of the Night knows that they’ve been hard as hell to find since they went out of print.

Hey, wait, I can complain! Damn you, White Wolf, for decomissioning the Laws of the Night!

Back to reality. I found a hard-cover copy of the LotN book on Amazon, used. The seller, “jesantschi”, listed the book as “New.” Now, of course, the instant any human being touches a book long enough to carry it out of the store or take it out of its box, it ain’t new anymore, Toto. Nevertheless, they were obviously trying to say that it was a new as you could get in the used book section, so I decided to give them a try.

Even for a hardcover LotN, $50 was a bit of a gamble … and boy oh boy did it ever pay off!

A couple little nicks in the silver leafing on the top-side edges of the pages! THAT WAS IT! Holy crap, do they know how to take care of their books or what? I was so pleased that if I had a camera, I’d take a couple shots just so show you all why I’m so damned happy.

Find “jesantschi” on Amazon! Buy their stuff! They rock!

WOO HOO!

Ammendment XXVIII

Section 1. Eminent Domain shall hereby be defined as the right of a municipal, county, or state government, or of the federal government, to seize any privately owned property within its jurisdiction, in exchange for the payment of the fair market value of the property (as judged by an independant appraiser) to the owner of the property. There shall henceforth exist no other lawful definition of the term Eminent Domain.

Section 2. Neither Congress, nor the governments of the Several States, nor the governments of the counties or municipalities therein, shall have the power to sieze through right of Eminent Domain any privately owned property for any reason except for a project of construction where the populace within the jurisdiction stands to benefit as a whole.

Section 3. If the federal government wishes to sieze a privately owned property through right of Eminent Domain, it must first prove in a Federal court that the project of contruction for which the seizure is intended will in fact benefit all citizens of the United States of America. Such a project must begin within 360 days of the date of the seizure, and must be completed within a reasonable time; failure to do so shall result in the returning of said property to the most recent owner, and the price paid to said owner shall not be refunded.

Section 4. If a state government wishes to sieze a privately owned property through right of Eminent Domain, it must first prove in a court of the jurisdiction that the project of contruction for which the seizure is intended will in fact benefit all citizens of the state. Such a project must begin within 360 days of the date of the seizure, and must be completed within a reasonable time; failure to do so shall result in the returning of said property to the most recent owner, and the price paid to said owner shall not be refunded.

Section 5. If a county government wishes to sieze a privately owned property through right of Eminent Domain, it must first prove in a court of the jurisdiction that the project of contruction for which the seizure is intended will in fact benefit all citizens of the county. Such a project must begin within 360 days of the date of the seizure, and must be completed within a reasonable time; failure to do so shall result in the returning of said property to the most recent owner, and the price paid to said owner shall not be refunded.

Section 6. If a municipal government wishes to sieze a privately owned property through right of Eminent Domain, it must first prove in a court of the jurisdiction that the project of contruction for which the seizure is intended will in fact benefit all citizens of the municipality. Such a project must begin within 360 days of the date of the seizure, and must be completed within a reasonable time; failure to do so shall result in the returning of said property to the most recent owner, and the price paid to said owner shall not be refunded.

Section 7. After such time as a seizure by right of Eminent Domain has been approved by the appropriate court (per sections 2-5 of this Ammendment), the fair market value of the property to be seized must be determined. This determination must be made by an independant appraiser, whose fee shall be paid by the government wishing to sieze the property.

Section 8. The owner of the property to be seized by right of Eminent Domain must be paid in full for said property prior to seizure.

Section 9. If at any time a municipal, county, state or federal government in posession of a property seized by right of Eminent Domain should decide to sell said property, the sale price of said property will be the exact price paid at the time of seizure, adjusted by the recognized rate of inflation. No expenses, nor expense of improvements, may be recouped through the sale of a property seized by right of Eminent Domain.

Section 10. No property seized by right of Eminent Domain may be re-sold by the seizing government for any reason for a period of at least a period of 20 years after the date of seizure. Once the government sells said property, the property may be bought and sold as normal, subject to all applicable laws and regulations.

Section 11. The Congress shall have power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.

Well, it’s official. Private property isn’t privately owned anymore. Observe:

• AP: Supreme Court Rules Cities May Seize Homes
• Full Text of Decision: KELO et al. v. CITY OF NEW LONDON et al., 04-108

For all intents and purposes, you are not the owner of property. You are holding it in trust, and paying taxes and fees upon that trust for the priviledge of holding it. That’s the case only until such time as the government decides to recind that trust for whatever dollar ammount it feels like paying you in gratitude for your stewardship.

I used to think, rather bitterly I might add, that owning a house didn’t exempt you from paying rent to the State in the form of property taxes. This ruling, of course, changes my entire understanding of the subject of ownership.

As I research the issue, I’m finding more and more cases of townships siezing an underassessed property, then turning around and selling it for a profit to a developer. The logic behind this, the officials will tell you, is that the town needs more property tax revenue. Seizing private property from its owner and selling it to a developer expands the tax base by taking an existing property and making it more valuable.

I can grudgingly see the argument for seizing private property for a new highway, or a new government facility, or some other needful project aimed solely at serving the public. I don’t like it, but I can at least see that the Fifth Ammendment allows for such seizures, provided that the fair market value is paid for the propety. I can also see the argument in favor of seizing an abandonned property and turning it into a park, or some other facility geared towards serving the public.

Again, I don’t like it one bit, but I can see the argument for it. In these cases we’re talking about an overall quality-of-life issue that affects the community as a whole.

Seizing a property at an underappraised value and then selling it to a private developer for a profit, simply so that you can additionally profit from increased sales tax revenue, is legalized theft. Moreso than income taxes, moreso than sin taxes, moreso than just about any arbitrary tax or fee charged by the government. This is the government deciding to kick you out of your own home or vacation spot and sell it to a developer simply because the sale will net them an instant profit and the resulting improvements will net them an increase in property tax revenue in the long term.

This, to me, is unconscionable. There is no defense for this practice. “We need more property tax revenue” is not a sufficient defense. “We want our community to look nicer” is also not a sufficient defense, because in the end any local politician making that kind of statement is really saying that they want more property tax revenue.

Maybe, if you’re resorting to stealing and reselling private property in order to line your pockets, you’re spending too much on non-essential services. Maybe you need to spend less money. Yeah, I know it hurts, but that’s what the rest of us have to do. We don’t have the luxery of robbing a bank with impunity when we’re late with the rent.

Or the property taxes. Whoops, sorry, same thing.

About 4 years ago, I joined this forum called MysticWicks . It started out mainly as a place devoted to discussion of the various Pagan paths. It has since branched out, as such things often do, and it’s now a fairly high-traffic community that talks about just about everything.

Ever since I joined, I’ve stuck almost exclusively to Political Pagan. There I’ve started firey threads or thrown gasoline on flames kindled by others. Sometimes I did it for ammusement, sometimes I did it because I was angry, and virtually every time I did it because I felt that my argument was one being read. Hell, sometimes I posted the total opposite of my view, just to throw people off and make them scratch their heads. I used to spend anywhere between 2-5 hours a night after I got off work just rebutting other people’s opinions and unleashing the unholy wrath of Bob when I felt it was deserved.

Being one of a handful of conservatives on that forum gave me a lot to write about. My wife was starting to get jealous.

Then I created this journal. I didn’t do it because I felt my thoughts were worth being read, I did it to help me flush out some frustration, which probably makes this a very boring read. Only a couple of times has there been a thread on Political Pagan that so aggrivates me I simply had to write about it here.

Lately, I’ve backed right the hell out of Political Pagan. Whereas I used to feel a certain obligation to my more conservative compatriots to jump into the fray whenever they were being mobbed by the other members, I don’t anymore. I’ve found myself making posts more geared towards diffusing a tense situation with humor than with cold logic. I still stop by several times a day to glance at what’s being said, but it just doesn’t hold my interest for more than 30 seconds.

A couple years back I took a hiatus because the veins in my neck were going to explode if I continued to throw myself into thread after thread, getting into heated arguments with people I’ve never met (and most likely never will meet). I had developed a small circle of people who cheered me on, but it just wasn’t enough to lower my blood pressure, so I had to let it go.

Now I’m wondering if I should simply because I’ve lost interest. It seems like very damn day, it’s the same subjects:

• Government sucks
• Republicans suck
• Bush sucks
• Bush stole the election
• We shouldn’t be in Iraq
• Iraq is all about oil
• Iraq had no WMD
• America isn’t a free country

… and so on, ad nauseum. I’m getting sick of it.

I realize that America has a lot of problems, and that Bush barely defensible anymore (even to a conservative like myself). At the same time, that forum is mainly dominated by liberally-minded thinkers who stick to bashing Bush when it is the government of America as a whole that is largely corrupt.