… and boy is it fucked up. The beginning of the end of the open marketplace has begun with Kelo. John Cole found the skinny, thanks to Kevin Drum’s excellent article.

This is the future, people. Forget going into business, anywhere, anywhen. Are you a farmer? Forget it. If you’re anywhere near a town, sell the land, get out now. Some developer’s going to come through one day and go “wow, I bet I could put a LOT of homes on that field.” So he’ll run down to the county courthouse, get in with the right people, grease the right palms, and next thing you know, you’re an ex-farmer. And a right selfish bastard for wanting to keep your land and deny the county all those wonderful property taxes, too. Not near a town? That’s ok. It’ll probably be some consortium of eco-freaks wanting to put wind generators on your land. Or a big utility figuring that out in the middle of nowhere would be a great place to put a power plant, since the neighbors won’t complain.

Left unchecked, you’re not going to be able to open a fucking donut shop without greasing the right palms beforehand. Or hey, maybe try importing some Russian mafia moguls. They understand doing this kind of business with the Party, comrade.