War against America: KELO & Wal-Mart

The War against Surburbia

Suburbia, the preferred way of life across the advanced capitalist world, is under an unprecedented attack -- one that seeks to replace single-family residences and shopping centers with an "anti-sprawl" model beloved of planners and environmental activists. The latest battleground is Los Angeles, which gave birth to the suburban metropolis. Many in the political, planning and media elites are itching to use the regulatory process to turn L.A. from a sprawling collection of low-rise communities into a dense, multistory metropolis on the order of New York or Chicago. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa has outlined this vision, and it does not conform to the way that most Angelenos prefer to live: "This old concept that all of us are going to live in a three-bedroom home, you know this 2,500 square feet, with a big frontyard and a big backyard -- well, that's an old concept."

Land seize for animal shelter to go to donor developer here.

A year after Los Angeles seized three acres from a private company to construct a public building, a city councilman wants to sell the land to another private firm for a commercial development. Hat tip Daryl S

City attorney Rocky Delgadillo, whose office must provide legal justification for the change in the project, has received $13,600 in contributions from two Cisco Bros. executives in the last five years, including a $5,600 check in June to his campaign for state attorney general.

Wake up America!

The War against Business

AMERICAN BUSINESS has few whipping boys so irresistibly whippable as Wal-Mart Stores Inc., whose treatment of employees, competitors and suppliers conjures cold-eyed corporate heartlessness.  But state lawmakers in Maryland are preparing to impose legislation on the retailer so arbitrary that it may achieve the near-impossible feat of casting Wal-Mart as the victim.

This is very bad for business. And if it's bad for business, it's bad for you and me. That's a fact. Business creates jobs, creates wealth, creates is the operative word.

Legislators, OTOH, create nothing. Legislators steal. These social parasites tax, spend and punish those who contribute the most to society. Most of them have have rarely worked an honest day in their "collective" lives.

The Maryland bill is a legislative mugging masquerading as an act of benevolent social engineering.

Other thoughts here and Below the Beltway blog does a great job here and here.  I liked Bruce's take as well over at The Democracy Project.

Legislators want to do something meaningful about healthcare. How about tacklng the thorny issue of illegal aliens exploiting healthcare systems to fiscal death and having family members come in on "tourist visas" to have major surgeries costing hundreds of thousands of dollars. And while your at it, have a chat with all those hospitals on the TexMex border..........they'll open up your eyes.

My position on Wal-mart is here. Walmart's position? Sober and rational,

These bills will do nothing to address the enormous number of uninsured or control the soaring cost of health care in America. 1.3 million Americans work at Wal-Mart. According to one study, 86% of Wal-Mart associates are insured through the company, a spouse’s plan or Medicare. There are 46 million uninsured Americans.

Wal-Mart is deeply committed to finding solutions to the health care challenges facing our associates, our communities, and our company. Every associate, full and part-time, can become eligible for plans that cost less than $25 per month for individuals, $37 per month for a single parent and child, and $65 per month for a family. None of our health plans come with a lifetime maximum – protecting associates and their families from catastrophic costs.

We need  guys like these  running the country..........

Wall Street Journal poll here;
Is Wal-Mart's presence mostly good or mostly bad for a community?

• Mostly good 2131 votes (51%)
• Equally good and bad 814 votes (20%)
• Mostly bad 1214 votes (29%)

The Wal-mart movement is a political fraud.

In a fully free economy, all development is controlled by individuals. That is my ideal. 

The anti Wal-mart movements are dangerous. Big union backed, they represent the tendency to move toward dictatorship policy and collectivism, and away from freedom.

Their weapon of choice is guilt. Guilt is used by the establishment as a means of social control. Guilt is isolated as a tool that keeps individuals tied to the parasitic elements of the community.  Well I aint having none of it, thank you very much.

It is interesting to note that—contrary to the popular misconception—the great sin of the Sodomites was not sexual perversion but collectivism. According to the Talmudic account, Sodom's egalitarian government institutionalized envy, even forbidding private charity because some recipients might get more than others. The judicial system was perverted into an instrument for expropriating the wealthy and successful. The ultimate crime for which the Sodomites were destroyed was placing envy and equality above benevolence and justice.

UPDATE January 16:  HillaryCare Returns in the Wall Street Journal here, read it all:

Unions and Democrats argue that companies must be commanded to do this because employees without health insurance often turn up on Medicaid, which is busting state budgets. But rather than reform Medicaid to control its costs or stop its rampant fraud, the politicians find it easier to sock it to private business. One result will be that companies will create fewer new jobs, as in Old Europe.

As for Wal-Mart, it is hardly an ogre as an employer for 1.3 million Americans. It now offers an array of health plans to all full and part-time employees with monthly premiums as low as $23 for an individual and $65 for a family anywhere in the country (less in some areas). Employees can also choose to set up health savings accounts with Wal-Mart matching contributions up to $1,000

Wal-Mart hasn't said how it will respond to the new Maryland law, but we'd suggest at a minimum that it cancel its plans for a new regional distribution center in the state that would create about 800 jobs. Maryland's politicians need to understand that policies punishing business have bad economic consequences. Let a more enlightened state benefit from Wal-Mart's prosperity.

I second that.

Comments

[Rancher]

If Wal-Mart was a strong contributor to unions you can bet this wouldn’t be happening. Most Wal-Mart workers recognize that that their company is very pro employee, with certain isolated exceptions that go against the company model. The final say in a capitalist society is the consumer, and guess what, we shop at Wal-Mart!

[Tom at BizzyBlog]

Outstanding Job, Pamela. I might need to make you an honorary BizzyBloger or have a BizzyBlog seal of approval, because you'd be the first non-specialist to get one!

I was going to blog on both of these items today, but only got around to Wal-Mart at the first part of this post:

This Weekend's Unanswered Questions (011406)

I'll carry my three Wal-Mart points from that post into this comment:
1. Depending on how much over the threshold they are (an “activist” web site says Wal-Mart had 14,301 employees in 2004), the company could “solve” their problem by reducing state employment below 10,000. How this would benefit the state of Maryland is a mystery.
2. Does anyone believe that the state will spend the money on healthcare for the working uninsured and underinsured? Sure, like the states used their tobacco-settlement money for its intended purposes. (/sarcasm)
3. Who is going to reimburse Wal-Mart shareholders for the $1.5 billion in market value (read: wealth) destroyed in the first 90 minutes of trading when news of the bill was known on the trading floor (per Don Luskin at poorandstupid.com)? By the way, many of thoses affected by the price drop are the very Wal-Mart employees the legislature is supposedly trying to protect (who own Wal-Mart stock either in their 401(k) or their stock purchase plan).

[Pamela Geller]

3. Who is going to reimburse Wal-Mart shareholders for the $1.5 billion in market value (read: wealth) destroyed in the first 90 minutes of trading when news of the bill was known on the trading floor (per Don Luskin at poorandstupid.com)? By the way, many of thoses affected by the price drop are the very Wal-Mart employees the legislature is supposedly trying to protect (who own Wal-Mart stock either in their 401(k) or their stock purchase plan).

Tom, who is going to reimburse the overly taxed Wal-Mart shopper on whose shoulders this is going to fall?

[penxv]

Damn it Pam... why can't you learn to live directly on top of all of your neighbors in GOD AWEFUL POVERTY like all of the good socialists

[Rol at Rolville USA]

Great post, Pamela. You make Ayn Rand proud!

You clearly have pretty sharp readers, too. Some of these comments are excellent.

I blog at http://rolville.blogspot.com

Haven't figured out how to trackback to you from Blogger.com, so probably just easier to send you a couple of links that might be of interest:

Re: Wal-Mart:
http://rolville.blogspot.com/2006/01/peoples-republic-of-maryland-chapter.html

http://rolville.blogspot.com/2005/12/wal-mart-rocks.html

And referring to Atlas Shrugs:
http://rolville.blogspot.com/2005/12/wheres-outrage.html
http://rolville.blogspot.com/2005/12/atlas-shrugs-with-john-ashcroft.html
http://rolville.blogspot.com/2005/11/i-just-found-great-site.html

Once you're on the blog, just do a search in the site for Atlas Shrugs or Wal-Mart to see all the posts raving about Atlas Shrugs or ranting about Wal-Mart.

I've been a fan since finding you & have referred lots of people to you. In turn you've referred me to excellent sites like Dr. Zin's Regime Change Iran, which I appreciate. Guess that's how it's supposed to work, huh?

Keep up the good work & let us know any time we can do anything for you (other than vote for you early & often, which we do, anyway).

[Grant]

High rises in shaky town, what a good idea. I'm even more glad than ever I moved out of Smell A as soon as I hit 18 years old.

[adron]

The only problem with this assertion is that suburbia is as subsidized and "planned" by the Government as cities. Cities where orginally developed under no such silly manipulation, but of the two, Suburbia was created 100% by zoning and Government Subsidization. Something to the tune of 100 Billion in state funds a year go to roadways (that is about 30 billion in gas tax and 70 Billion ADDITION to the gas tax), 30-40 Billion a year from federal funds from the General "Fund", and even more on the local level, and rarely, sometimes, not very often, a private developer actually makes the effort and builds the roads themselves.

No you tell me, a city spends multiple billions per year to maintain a suburban infrastructure or they wise up & spend about 1/3 of that on a city infrastructure.

Two prime examples. Jacksonville Florida is a great example of sprawl, Portland Oregon is a great example of smartly limiting your expenditures and not over allocating "zones" the size of mini-malls.

You ask the people of those two cities what is preferable. I gaurantee you'll have a land slide in favor of Portland Oregon vs. the crime plagued mess that is Jacksonville. ...and don't give me mess about different tax levels, the burden is about the same for both areas, totalling a difference of about 1-2% out of the 40-45% of one's income that is eaten up by the Federal, STate, and Local Governments.