Soapbox Time.

Update: The Land Grab Has Begun. I hope your house isn't located somewhere valuable.

All is not well.

I know I don't have many readers but this needs to be said to every voice that will listen.

Neil Boortz has written an editorial I need you to read.

I know most of my readers don't follow the links I post here, but please please please, if you only follow one of my links all year, make it this one.

The supreme court ruled yesterday that eminent domain applied for private enterprises acting in the public trust.

You need to understand how terrifying this situation has just become.

If you didn't get that: The supreme court just decided that your local government can take your property from you at 'market value' and then hand it over to a developer.

Private Property Law is one of the cornerstones of the US constitution, and this amounts to complete reversal of any concept of private property. Every piece of property your family controls you now keep in your possession only at the pleasure of the government.

Let us use a personal example: My family owns one acre of land. We have talked, off-and-on, about investing the money sometime in the future to split the land in half and built a house on the resulting half-acre where our "garden" now sits. However, at this time we have no intention of doing so and won't for many years.

Now, imagine that a private land developer comes to Tallassee, sees our property, and offers us market value for the half acre lot. We would refuse the offer because we don't want to sell the property and the value of it as an undeveloped lot is quite low.

Under the supreme court's ruling, he can go to the local government and convince them that they will earn greater property taxes and therefore increase public revenue if he can develop a house on that land. Based on this argument, the local government can then force us to sell, at market value, that lot, and then turn around and sell (or hand over) the land to the developer.

That should scare you shitless. If it doesn't, you're a fool.

Please, go read Boortz's editorial. Once you've read that, go and visit the Institue for Justice and the Castle Coalition. There are ways that we can defend the right to private property and make our voices heard. All is not lost.