Free Republic

Ahh, how to begin a story about “transgender accommodations” and the government? Well, one could simply look at the issue of “transgender accommodations” as a political economist, and see that the conflict over new rules and laws teaches us something incredibly important about the nature of politics. Let’s take two breaking news items as examples. First, on Aug. 15, Dominic Holden of BuzzFeed reported that the federal General Services Administration (GSA) will post new rules this week commanding 9,200 properties run by the federal government to open their bathrooms to folks according to their “gender identities.” GSA spokesperson Ashley Nash-Hahn told BuzzFeed: This includes all kinds...

Eminent Domain: Four years after the Supreme Court told a Connecticut homeowner that no one's house is safe from developers, Brooklyn homeowners may lose their homes to a pro basketball team. On June 3, 2005, by a 5-4 margin, the U.S. Supreme Court effectively repealed the 5th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, deciding that your constitutional right to be secure in your home didn't matter if your state or community decided your property could produce more revenue as a shopping mall or condominium development. Pfizer coveted Susette Kelo's working-class neighborhood for an office park and condominium complex. The city fathers...

In some countries the use of eminent domain can be a life or death issue. Last June, in the small village of Shengyou, China, six people were killed and 50 injured in a bloody clash between farmers and hundreds of armed thugs sent by government operatives to seize their land. This was just one of thousands of disputes over land appropriation that take place each year in China Fueling these conflicts is the ambiguous nature of property ownership in China. The rights of farmers who hold land collectively are not made clear under Chinese law. Although farmers can acquire property...

Property Ruling Strikes Nerve in House Reacting to high court decision, lawmakers pass amendment that would ban use of federal funds for some seizures of private land. By Maura Reynolds and David G. Savage Times Staff Writers July 1, 2005 WASHINGTON — Angry over a recent Supreme Court decision, the House on Thursday began a legislative drive to roll back the power of local governments to seize homes and other private property for economic development projects. By a vote of 231 to 189, the House approved an amendment forbidding the administration from spending money on local projects that seize private...

Did Pfizer Inc, purchase The Constitution of the United States of America? ***************** Did Pfizer purchase the government of the State of Connecticut? Pfizer's connections with former Connecticut Governor John Rowland are a matter of public record: "John Rowland, Pfizer's agent in Hartford, became Connecticut's first Governor to plead guilty to taking bribes, yet persisted in referring to them as "gratuities." Pfizer drove hundreds from their homes and businesses outside its new research facility. State and local taxpayers got stuck with a massive tab." "Rowland gave Pfizer everything it wanted in New Haven, on land which many had assumed would...

Liberty hangs in a noose, in the name of 'public use' Wednesday, June 29, 2005 Cloaked in justice and disguised by the mind-numbing language of the law, a strange and dangerous hybrid of fascism and socialism came to the United States last week. It was a group of "liberal" Supreme Court justices who gave fasci-socialism the green light, while it was the four conservative justices who stood firm against tyranny in favor of the individual rights of the "little guy." As the nation buzzes this week with news about a potential Supreme Court opening, last week's case of Kelo vs....

IN the late 1980s, an elderly blind widow in Arlington frustrated the city's plans for a grand shopping mall. She refused to surrender the small plot of land where she had lived for decades, choosing to live out her days in the familiar surroundings of her wood-frame house. The mall was built around her property, her faded white home jutting into its parking lot. She held out for years. After she died, developers bought the property and paved it over, melding it into the glaring sameness of suburban retail like the last reluctant piece of a jigsaw puzzle. In light...

...To understand why Kelo is truly horrible, it is necessary to look both at Kelo and the constitutional logic of public use requirement. On the former, the declining economic fortunes of New London spurred the city elders to embark on a general urban development plan, underwritten by $73 million in state money devoted to general planning, physical infrastructure and environmental cleanup. The plan lacked only one ingredient -- some real live developer prepared to risk his own capital to build any office or hotel on part of the 90 or so acres the City already had. Not content with its...

NEW LONDON (AP) — Fifteen houses are all that remain of Fort Trumbull, a once vibrant immigrant neighborhood flattened into expanses of rutted grass and gravel. The homes stand in defiance of New London's plan to pave the way for a riverfront hotel and convention center, offices and upscale condominiums. Refusing the city's efforts to get them to leave, seven families are going before the U.S. Supreme Court tomorrow, arguing that the city has no right to take their private property solely for economic development. The rebellious homeowners include an elderly Italian immigrant, a mechanic and a former deli owner....

DENVER (AP) - The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service on Friday endorsed hiking, hunting and other public use of the former Rocky Flats nuclear weapons plant after it is cleaned up and converted to a wildlife refuge. The agency released its draft management plan and environmental impact statement for the 6,240-acre site outside Denver where the government once made plutonium triggers for nuclear warheads. The plan outlines uses for the site after the $7 billion cleanup, scheduled to be complete in 2006. The agency's preferred option includes hiking, cycling, horseback riding and some hunting. It includes about 16 miles of...