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The company proposing to pipe crude oil across eastern South Dakota from Canada to Illinois is beginning condemnation proceedings on some property, a rural water system official says.
TransCanada, the company proposing the Keystone Pipeline from Hardisty, Alberta, to Wood River and Patoka, Ill., filed a notice of condemnation on property on which BDM Rural Water System has its own easement, BDM Manager David Wade of Britton said Thursday.
If negotiations with landowners fail to get an easement, right of eminent domain gives TransCanada the ability to take landowners to court. In court, a fair price would be set for the easement or to take the property.
"It's a surprise. I didn't know we (rural water) could get a condemnation against us," Wade said. He said the rural water system received "a sort of complementary filing," because it held an easement on property the oil pipeline wants to cross.
Oil versus water -- oh, the metaphorical import of it all....
Interesting how you get so irate when the government coercively takes property via eminent domain, but not when the government coercively takes capital via taxes.
ReplyDeleteYou detest when land is stolen and given to a pipeline company, but applaud when money is stolen and given to teachers.
I wish I understood the philosophy behind your tangled politics... it all seems like contradictions to me.
Let me cut through the tangle for you: I don't like paying taxes, but I can live with it because the government, which is us, is taking money to provide social benefit and use that the free market can't (or won't). Transcanada is a private company (and a foreign one, at that!) trying to take private property for its own benefit and use.
ReplyDeleteIt's just like the Zaniya version of the Massachusetts plan [off-topic alert!]: Romney and Rounds want to force us to give our money to private companies. Bonk! If the government is going to coerce a transfer of anything (income, land, capital), it should keep transfer the valuables to a program it administers itself, not select profiteers like Mike Rounds's insurance agency.
"the government, which is us"
ReplyDeleteSo when I write a check to the IRS, I am sending money from "me" and giving it to "us"? (Yeah, I'm giving money to the US, but that's different from giving money to us.) Except that "our" programs involve giving "our" money to non-"me" members of "us". So... pretty much it is "my" money going to someone else. Against my will. Which is usually called stealing.
"is taking money to provide social benefit and use that the free market can't (or won't)."
"Social benefit" is an interesting phrase. It's soft-sounding and implies providing things that everyone desires. But who determines "social benefit" and how is it different from an individual determining his own "individual benefit"?
No one likes it when someone forces their opinions or prejudices on another. Consider:
"Drink this coffee, you'll love it!"
"But I don't like coffee."
"You have to drink it or I'll throw you in prison."
That might seem ridiculous, but just how is it different from:
"Pay for this government health plan, you'll love it!"
"But I don't want a health plan (especially not one where I pay more than the next guy for the same coverage)."
"You have to buy it or I'll throw you in prison."
"Social benefit" will almost always cash out as a certain politician's, voting bloc's, or special interest group's prejudiced interpretation of what they think is good for everyone... which is usually what's good for themselves. ie An insurance-minded governor thinks universal private health insurance is socially beneficial.
In some cases (police, fire, roads, cheap water) there is unanimous assent to the idea... but wherever assent isn't unanimous, taxes equate to theft. And if you suggest that this kind of theft is necessary or expedient... well that's what every tyrant has said all the way back to the Pharaohs building a "socially beneficial" empire on the expedient labor of the slaves.
You are absolutely correct coralhei!
ReplyDeleteThanks, Cris!
ReplyDeleteDavid, government (i.e. we) isn't perfect, but it's better than unaccountable, unelected, and in this case foreign corporations taking our property for their very private and profitable use. Fit the foreign Pharaoh! Say no to TransCanada!
"David, government (i.e. we) isn't perfect, but it's better than unaccountable, unelected, and in this case foreign corporations taking our property for their very private and profitable use."
ReplyDeleteEminent domain is a government concept, not a corporate concept. Transcanada could not take the land by force except by the powers vested in the state. You're saying that Transcanada is bad for wanting the land for free (and they are), but I'm saying the state is worse because it tells us that in some circumstances it actually will take the land. Were it not for this capability, Transcanada would have to negotiate with each landowner to their satisfaction.
It's not the free market, but the government and it's judgments on what constitute a "social benefit" that get us in these predicaments. And your concern that the legislature or governor might declare an oil pipeline as socially beneficial is exactly the same concern I have about our governor or legislature determining that a mandatory health plan is socially beneficial.
Unless something is actually unanimously agreed upon as being socially beneficial, it belongs in the free market where citizens have the liberty to negotiate and pay for only the things they want. Otherwise "we" (the government) are not treating all of "us" (the citizens) fairly and equally. We're shafting some of us at the whimsy of bureaucrats.