Posted on 01/27/2007 1:36:11 PM PST by tpaine
By Vin Suprynowicz
For years, Garry Watson, 49, of little Bunker, Mo., (population 390) had been squabbling with town officials over the sewage line easement which ran across his property to the adjoining, town-operated sewage lagoon.
Residents say officials grew dissatisfied with their existing easement, and announced they were going to excavate a new sewer line across the landowner's property. Capt. Chris Ricks of the Missouri Highway Patrol reports Watson's wife, Linda, was served with "easement right-of-way papers" on Sept. 6. She gave the papers to Watson when he got home at 5 a.m. the next morning from his job at a car battery recycling plant northeast of Bunker. Watson reportedly went to bed for a short time, but arose about 7 a.m. when the city work crew arrived.
"He told them 'If you come on my land, I'll kill you,' " Bunker resident Gregg Tivnan told me last week. "Then the three city workers showed up with a backhoe, plus a police officer. They'd sent along a cop in a cop car to guard the workers, because they were afraid there might be trouble. Watson had gone inside for a little while, but then he came out and pulled his SKS (semi-automatic rifle) out of his truck, steadied it against the truck, and he shot them."
Killed in the September 7 incident, from a range of about 85 yards, were Rocky B. Gordon, 34, a city maintenance man, and David Thompson, 44, an alderman who supervised public works. City maintenance worker Delmar Eugene Dunn, 51, remained in serious but stable condition the following weekend.
Bunker police Officer Steve Stoops, who drove away from the scene after being shot, was treated and released from a hospital for a bullet wound to his arm and a graze to the neck.
Watson thereupon kissed his wife goodbye, took his rifle, and disappeared into the woods, where his body was found two days later -- dead of an apparently self-inflicted gunshot wound.
Following such incidents, the local papers are inevitably filled with well-meaning but mawkish doggerel about the townsfolk "pulling together" and attempting to "heal" following the "tragedy." There are endless expressions of frustration, pretending to ask how such an otherwise peaceful member of the community could "just snap like that."
In fact, the supposedly elusive explanation is right before our eyes.
"He was pushed," Clarence Rosemann -- manager of the local Bunker convenience store, who'd done some excavation work for Watson -- told the big-city reporters from St. Louis. Another area resident, who didn't want to be identified, told the visiting newsmen, "Most people are understanding why Garry Watson was upset. They are wishing he didn't do it, but they are understanding why he did it."
You see, to most of the people who work in government and the media these days -- especially in our urban centers -- "private property" is a concept out of some dusty, 18th century history book. Oh, sure, "property owners" are allowed to live on their land, so long as they pay rent to the state in the form of "property taxes."
But an actual "right" to be let alone on our land to do whatever we please -- always providing we don't actually endanger the lives or health of our neighbors?
Heavens! If we allowed that, how would we enforce all our wonderful new "environmental protection" laws, or the "zoning codes," or the laws against growing hemp or tobacco or distilling whisky without a license, or any of the endless parade of other malum prohibitum decrees which have multiplied like swarms of flying ants in this nation over the past 87 years?
What does it mean to say we have any "rights" or "freedoms" at all, if we cannot peacefully enjoy that property which we buy with the fruits of our labors?
In his 1985 book "Takings," University of Chicago Law Professor Richard Epstein wrote that, "Private property gives the right to exclude others without the need for any justification.
Indeed, it is the ability to act at will and without need for justification within some domain which is the essence of freedom, be it of speech or of property."
"Unfortunately," replies James Bovard, author of the book "Freedom in Chains: The Rise of the State and the Demise of the Citizen," "federal law enforcement agents and prosecutors are making private property much less private. ...
Park Forest, Ill. in 1994 enacted an ordinance that authorizes warrantless searches of every single-family rental home by a city inspector or police officer, who are authorized to invade rental units 'at all reasonable times.' ... Federal Judge Joan Gottschall struck down the searches as unconstitutional in 1998, but her decision will have little or no effect on the numerous other localities that authorize similar invasions of privacy."
We are now involved in a war in this nation, a last-ditch struggle in which the other side contends only the king's men are allowed to use force or the threat of force to push their way in wherever they please, and that any peasant finally rendered so desperate as to employ the same kind of force routinely employed by our oppressors must surely be a "lone madman" who "snapped for no reason." No, we should not and do not endorse or approve the individual choices of folks like Garry Watson. But we are still obliged to honor their memories and the personal courage it takes to fight and die for a principle, even as we lament both their desperate, misguided actions ... and the systematic erosion of our liberties which gave them rise.
Income level = intelligence/knowledge level?
You cannot be serious.
http://www.hannibal.net/stories/090800/com_0908000007.html http://archives.cnn.com/2000/US/09/07/officer.shot.03.ap/index.html http://www.amarillo.com/stories/090800/usn_mankills.shtml http://archives.cnn.com/2000/US/09/08/officer.shot.ap/index.html http://www.morningsun.net/stories/091000/kan_0910000006.shtml
The feud between Watson, who works for a lead mining company, and the city began about 10 years ago when Watson purchased the vacant lot where the city held an easement, Alderman Rexel Conway said.
Watson initially owned a smaller lot, but bought adjacent property about 10 years ago, alderman Rexel Conway said. That second lot contained an easement allowing city workers to get to and from a sewage lagoon behind Watson's house. Watson has disputed the city's right to cross the property, Conway said. ''He didn't want us on the property,'' Conway said. ''We've had a couple of disputes, but it always got settled.''
Area I am looking at they are leaving due to the Mines being closed, so no good paying jobs.
No problem for me, I will be retired.
It isn't that we don't think our country is great, it's that we don't think it's as free as it used to be. In many countries it is the norm to have to go to the government hat-in-hand and beg for what you need, and risk being killed for doing so. Nonetheless, In this country you didn't used to have to get government permission to do things on your property. If you wanted a deck, you built it; if you wanted everyone to keep out, you posted it and the law upheld it; if you wanted lights on outside, or didn't, you did what you wanted. Compare that to today, where in most placed you need to ask government permission to build a deck (building permits); need government permission to post it (sign ordinances) and can't count on pressing charges against anyone who does trespass; some places you are required to keep a pole light on in front of your house at all times for public safety, while in other places you are prohibited from having outside lights on because of animal habits. That's not the freedom we used to have - the Nanny State was never intended to be here. In a relatively short time (my lifetime, and I'm only 48) we've gone from a presumption that you had the right to your property to a presumption that government should have control of your property. How far will it go? Will we end up as one of the countries where you have to fear for your life when you go to ask the government permission to grow a garden? We are angry at the path we are on.
Please list some locations in the contiguous United States that are not subject to property taxes on any level. I may want to consider such locations for future living.
Thank you.
Anyone who would support or condone cold-blooded murder is a kook, and appears as a kook to any sober citizen.
One time I got them to retract the headline on the top of the fold front page story. It took some work but in the end they admitted that there was nothing in the story that justified the headline and in fact the story actually refuted the headline. (They were just getting in the democratic talking point).
Only problem, retractions are in small print on page 2 and nobody ever reads that.
I once worked with a reporter about why he didn't refer to his subject as a socialist when the subject of his story was a proud, open socialist. He agreed and the next front page story he correctly referred to a person (early 20th century Californian named by a state senator as the inspiration for a bill) as a socialist. Despite the fact that all history books refer to this guy as a socialist, this reporter was relagated to the 3rd section and it was about a year before he got a front page story again. I felt sorry for what I talked him into doing. I got the word "socialist" on the front page but hurt his career.
Like shooting maintenance men working on a sewer? A sewer that falls directly into "public use" covered by the Constitution that you "libertarians" pretend to uphold?
Read much? I'm defending the sewer workers. -- And, - you calling me a libertarian cinches the fact that you're just another anti-libertarian troll. -- I don't pretend about our Constitution.
Most of us also agree that we can spread our views from behind a computer or a piece of paper in order to try to convince other fools to do the right thing.
Trying to convince others to become the next Drega or Watson isn't the right thing.
How weird. No one here is advocating that.
In fact, it's one of the reasons that we have a Second Amendment in the first place. If violent wacked out freaks think they are going to bully their way into establishing their own warped view of reality, the rest of us have a right to defend ourselves. Suprynowicz and his ilk will find God --
So will you my boy. -- Very soon.
I'm not your boy. And unlike Suprynowicz and his ilk, I know that God exists, and that I ain't him.
You will find a freakers 'god', soon my boy.. Trust me.
--Nonetheless, In this country you didn't used to have to get government permission to do things on your property. If you wanted a deck, you built it; --
Yea. One time we could keep a bunch of rusted junk cars, old tire and woodpiles around. To heck with our neighbors, it was our right!
Realistically, some communities do go overboard but for the most part, we live in these communities because we believe that these regulations enhance our life and improve our property values.
Sure you are. *Rollseyes*
-- And, - you calling me a libertarian cinches the fact that you're just another anti-libertarian troll. --
Ad Hominem.
I don't pretend about our Constitution.
Yes you do. If you didn't, you would be acknowledging that the Constitution allows easements like the one in the story. This isn't about seizing someone's private land to give to another private landowner for developing. This is about a trash trash piece of garbage trying to fight an EXISTING easement, trying to make it so that the rest of the town wouldn't have a functioning sewer system.
Remember. Your rights end where other's begin.
How weird. No one here is advocating that.
More than a few are advocating just that.
You will find a freakers 'god', soon my boy.. Trust me.
Again, I am not your boy. The rest of your comment makes no sense.
Anybody who thinks citizens should passively grab their ankles anytime government comes along to seize their property is a mouse.
Here's PA.
http://www.papropertytaxrelief.com/propertytaxes/cwp/view.asp?a=1126&q=448122
Indiana is pushing a bill for no property tax but it will probably not get fullfilled.
FL is working on raising the homestead exemption to reduce property taxes.
""Will we end up as one of the countries where you have to fear for your life when you go to ask the government permission to grow a garden? We are angry at the path we are on.""
Timothy McVeigh probably thought alot like you do and that was a real blow for freedom was'nt it? Did you celebrate Oklahoma City like they did 9/11 in the streets of Lebanon?
People who feel this strongly should take up their argument with those in charge not the poor drones who simply try to earn a living and go home to their families.
McVeigh was acting out on the kind of anger you possess. All those dead people and what did he change or win for his cause?
You celebrate the murder of two men who probably had families of their own by an obviously mentally deranged man over a sewer line easement?
A real blow for freedom? I think not.
Sick.
You message is gettin old.
Are you another one with reading comprehension problems? Try again:
For years, Garry Watson, 49, of little Bunker, Mo., (population 390) had been squabbling with town officials over the sewage line easement which ran across his property to the adjoining, town-operated sewage lagoon.
Residents say officials grew dissatisfied with their existing easement, and announced they were going to excavate a new sewer line across the landowner's property. Capt. Chris Ricks of the Missouri Highway Patrol reports Watson's wife, Linda, was served with "easement right-of-way papers" on Sept. 6. She gave the papers to Watson when he got home at 5 a.m. the next morning from his job at a car battery recycling plant northeast of Bunker. Watson reportedly went to bed for a short time, but arose about 7 a.m. when the city work crew arrived.
The wife is served with papers and the work crew shows up the next day??
Clearly, this is not the most well-written report I ever read and I would love to know more details, but something here (besides the sewage) stinks to high heaven.
Fast Eddie has little desire to buck the wishes of "his" House and Senate.
Corruption, thy name is Ed Rendell.
Which law?
Try reading the posts & using links:
post #195
You were talking about anarchy earlier.
On another thread we are discussing
"government intrusion" on property rights:
Bill would let workers have guns in cars (GA)
Address:http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1773131/posts
You're gettin old. Don't post to me anymore.
Have a nice life.
--The wife is served with papers and the work crew shows up the next day??--
The words you reposted in your post, "For years, ..." indicate this was not a sudden thing.
I went to the link in 195. It seems that the bill agrees very well with the position I posted independently of reading the bill.
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