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Donald Trump and Eminent Domain (Hail to the Thief?)
National Review ^ | APRIL 19, 2011

Posted on 04/19/2011 1:58:36 PM PDT by nickcarraway

In a free market, there’s a pretty simple process for dealing with the situation that arises when one person covets another’s belongings: The coveter makes an offer to purchase them. If the offer is rebuffed, the coveter can make a new proposal, but he cannot simply take what he wants. It’s an effective way of recognizing the impracticality of the Tenth Commandment while enforcing the Eighth.

Donald Trump’s covetous nature is not in dispute, but what many may forget is that he’s no great respecter of the admonition not to steal, either: The man has a track record of using the government as a hired thug to take other people’s property.

This is called, of course, “eminent domain.” The Constitution’s Fifth Amendment allows the government to take private property for “public use,” so long as “just compensation” is paid. In the infamous 2005 Kelo decision, the Supreme Court held that “public use” could include, well, private use, so long as the new property owner paid more in taxes than the previous one. In other words, it allowed developers and the government to gang up on homeowners. The developer gets more land, the government gets more tax money. The only losers are the original owner and his property rights.

A decade and a half ago, it was fresh on everyone’s mind that Donald Trump is one of the leading users of this form of state-sanctioned thievery. It was all over the news. In perhaps the most-remembered example, John Stossel got the toupéed one to sputter about how, if he wasn’t allowed to steal an elderly widow’s house to expand an Atlantic City casino, the government would get less tax money, and seniors like her would get less “this and that.” Today, however, it takes a push from the Club for Growth to remind us of Trump’s lack of respect for property rights.

The problem dates back to at least 1994. That year, Trump promised to turn Bridgeport, Conn., into“a national tourist destination by building a $350 million combined amusement park, shipping terminal and seaport village and office complex on the east side of the harbor,” reported the Hartford Courant. “At a press conference during which almost every statement contained the term ‘world class,’ Trump and Mayor Joseph Ganim lavished praise on one another and the development project and spoke of restoring Bridgeport to its glory days.”

The wrinkle? “Five businesses and the city-owned Pleasure Beach now occupy the land,” as the Courant put it. The solution? “The city would become a partner with Trump Connecticut Inc. and obtain the land through its powers of condemnation. Trump would in turn buy the land from the city.”

Here’s how the story concluded: “The entire development would cost the city nothing, Trump said, and no private homeowners would be affected because there are no dwellings on the land. Trump would own everything.”

That brings us to the story of the aforementioned elderly widow in Atlantic City, which starts at about the same time. The woman, Vera Coking, had owned property near the Trump Plaza Hotel for three decades, and didn’t want to move. Trump thought the land was better suited for use as a park, a parking lot, and a waiting area for limousines.

He tried to negotiate, at one point offering Coking $1 million for the land. But she wasn’t budging. So New Jersey’s Casino Reinvestment Development Authority filed a lawsuit, instructing Coking to leave within 90 days and offering compensation of only $251,000.

Perhaps the only upside to this story is that in neither case did Trump succeed. The Bridgeport plan fizzled. Coking fought in court, and — in part because these were the days before Kelo was decided, no doubt — she was lucky enough to win. In 1998, a judge threw out the case.

In 2005, however, Trump was delighted to find that the Supreme Court had okayed the brand of government-abetted theft that he’d twice attempted. “I happen to agree with it 100 percent,” he told Fox News’s Neil Cavuto of the Kelo decision.

Can Republicans support someone with so little regard for the property of others? Let’s hope not.


TOPICS: Extended News; Government; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: donaldtrump; eminentdomain; trojanhorse; trumpconservative

1 posted on 04/19/2011 1:58:38 PM PDT by nickcarraway
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To: nickcarraway

Bttt


2 posted on 04/19/2011 2:00:12 PM PDT by novemberslady
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To: nickcarraway

Can Republicans support someone with so little regard for the property of others?

———————————————————>

If property includes my tax dollars, I already know what most of the GOP good ole boys in DC support and I don’t care for it at all.


3 posted on 04/19/2011 2:06:18 PM PDT by not2worry (WHAT GOES AROUND COMES AROUND)
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To: nickcarraway
“Can Republicans support someone with so little regard for the property of others?”
Sure.
As long as he feeds red meat to the people more concerned over the fact that his birth certificate might or might not exist than concerned over the fact that a person with his documented views and verified history got nominated and elected, Trump could run over puppies with his limo.
Anyone who considers Trump anything more than a criminal and a huckster is no conservative.
Obama is laughing is arse off; the people so obsessively hating Obama that they can't think straight as soon as anyone attacks him for anything,are falling right into the trap of making that jerk Trump the face of the opposition.
4 posted on 04/19/2011 2:07:07 PM PDT by RedStateRocker (Nuke Mecca, Deport all illegals, abolish the IRS, DEA and ATF.)
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To: RedStateRocker
Obama is laughing is arse off; the people so obsessively hating Obama that they can't think straight as soon as anyone attacks him for anything,are falling right into the trap of making that jerk Trump the face of the opposition.

True up!
5 posted on 04/19/2011 2:11:05 PM PDT by McKayopectate
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To: nickcarraway

I like Trump so far. He’s doing his nation a great service right now by forcing a discussion on a few important issues.

Also, unlike most of the GOP field, most of his skeletons are already out there, including this.

However, if he’s serious, I want to hear him address this to my satisfaction.


6 posted on 04/19/2011 2:13:05 PM PDT by RockinRight (Trump's "fake" conservatism is still better than the "real" conservatism of most of the GOP.)
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To: nickcarraway; P-Marlowe; blue-duncan; Dr. Eckleburg; onyx; wmfights

Anti-Palin, Anti-Bachman, Anti-Trump, anti-anti, and the media will turn against the republican they like best once the nominees are actually chosen.

they will prefer someone, probably daniels or some safe republican like him. Then they’ll blow him up.

Some might say that Trump was a businessman using every angle to make something happen. If he could do it with rocks, he’d do it with rocks. IF with cash, then with cash. If with lobbyists, then lobbyists. AND, if with courts, then to the courts he’d go. It’s what they do.

But, the best thing that Trump has done is to point out the ultimate reason for using the Obama Birth issue for any Republican politician.

He said today, “You, MEDIA, can see my financials when I see Obama’s birth certificate.”

That is absolute GENIUS if that’s what he’s been building toward all along.

I am more and more drifting into a Sarah Palin camp, though. She is a long-time anti-abortion advocate and she is probably Deborah to our gelded generation.

She couldn’t find a better hatchet man for VP as D. Trump, a converted pro-lifer, but he’d probably not play 2nd fiddle to anyone. Too bad.

That would be the political version of Slash and Burn.


7 posted on 04/19/2011 2:15:13 PM PDT by xzins (Retired Army Chaplain & proud of it: Truly Supporting the Troops means praying for their Victory!)
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To: nickcarraway

Whoa! Forgot about this one!


8 posted on 04/19/2011 2:33:28 PM PDT by miss marmelstein (.)
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To: RockinRight

I don’t think all of his skeletons are out yet. He has both social, business, and legal connections with Soros. Those bear further illumination.


9 posted on 04/19/2011 2:40:00 PM PDT by Springfield Reformer (Winston Churchill: No Peace Till Victory!)
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To: novemberslady

To all our Trump happy friends, this will be the least of it.


10 posted on 04/19/2011 2:43:27 PM PDT by DaxtonBrown (HARRY: Money Mob & Influence (See my Expose on Reid on amazon.com written by me!))
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To: RockinRight

Trump is a liberal Democrat.


11 posted on 04/19/2011 3:14:42 PM PDT by 9YearLurker
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To: xzins

The media has been pretty pro-Trump. They don’t want him vetted, just like in the case of Obama.


12 posted on 04/19/2011 3:29:27 PM PDT by nickcarraway
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To: xzins; nickcarraway; P-Marlowe; blue-duncan; Dr. Eckleburg; onyx
Some might say that Trump was a businessman using every angle to make something happen. If he could do it with rocks, he’d do it with rocks. IF with cash, then with cash. If with lobbyists, then lobbyists. AND, if with courts, then to the courts he’d go. It’s what they do.

I'm a businessmen, this is how things get done. Figure out what the playing field is and work from there.

I think your analysis is pretty good.

I wonder if the New York businessmen that Trump is so close to have gotten fed up with obama as well.

13 posted on 04/19/2011 3:36:24 PM PDT by wmfights (If you want change support SenateConservatives.com)
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To: nickcarraway
This and National Healthcare make him unqualified for the GOP nod.

However, I have a great deal of appreciation and admiration for the good work he is doing exposing Obama.

14 posted on 04/19/2011 4:09:32 PM PDT by Mariner (USS Tarawa, VQ3, USS Benjamin Stoddert, NAVCAMS WestPac, 7th Fleet, Navcommsta Puget Sound)
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To: xzins; wmfights
I can't begin to imagine Trump turning his business empire over to a consortium or to his adult children so, I think he's ripping the Marxist to shreds right now, and more bruttally than Sarah Palin has been doing for the past two years.

I am for Sarah Palin all the way to the WH, as most everyone here already knows.

GAME ON! FIGHT LIKE A GIRL!
15 posted on 04/19/2011 4:32:04 PM PDT by onyx (If you truly support Sarah Palin and want to be on her busy ping list, let me know!)
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To: nickcarraway
Trump and Obama's Brittle Narrative

I don't trust Trump as far as he can throw Obama. If he can weaken Obama, let him do that. America can't take four more years of this foolery.

16 posted on 04/19/2011 5:26:57 PM PDT by neverdem (Xin loi minh oi)
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To: neverdem

What if he strengthens Obama?


17 posted on 04/19/2011 8:01:34 PM PDT by nickcarraway
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To: nickcarraway

Maybe with Obama’s base, but I doubt it affects any other voting demographic. I consider Obams’s failure to produce a birth certificate a major act of disrespect to America.


18 posted on 04/19/2011 10:32:07 PM PDT by neverdem (Xin loi minh oi)
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To: nickcarraway

Maybe with Obama’s base, but I doubt it affects any other voting demographic. I consider Obams’s failure to produce a birth certificate a major act of disrespect to America.


19 posted on 04/19/2011 10:32:12 PM PDT by neverdem (Xin loi minh oi)
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To: nickcarraway
I see that this thread hasn't been very busy.
I want to thank you for posting it.

Mr. Trump is saying so many things that I want to hear.
It's sometimes easy to forget that he's a friend of Nancy Pelosi, and a supporter of Hillary Clinton.

These sort of facts can't be ignored though.
Imo, if someone advocates taking away a person's home, they should never be trusted.
20 posted on 04/20/2011 3:58:41 AM PDT by novemberslady
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