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There have been some pretty egregious misuses of eminent domain in the past, but using it for infrastructure is pretty much the quintessential justification. Th
by MostlyStable 3mo ago
There have been some pretty egregious misuses of eminent domain in the past, but using it for infrastructure is pretty much the quintessential justification. That's basically the only reason to have eminent domain at all. Arguing against it when that's how it's being used is, in my opinion, essentially arguing against the very concept of eminent domain. Which one can totally choose to do! But they should be up front about it, if that's what's going on.
As for the title, I would go further than you do. This is not a misleading title. It is a lying title. I'm usually a pretty big believer in Scott Alexander's Bounded Distrust [0] concept for the media where they very rarely actually, technically lie. This title (although not the article itself), in my opinion crosses that line.
[0] https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/bounded-distrust https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/bounded-distrust
- deleted 3mo ago[deleted]
- makeitdouble 3mo ago> Arguing against it when that's how it's being used is, in my opinion, essentially arguing against the very concept of eminent domain You're giving a blank check to use it as long as it's infrastructure, and as any simple rule, it's prone to get abused way beyond it's primary goal. IMHO the issue is nuance and balance, we should accept that whether it's applicable is an "it depends" matter. Keeping it too simple and black and white means companies can now strategically place data centers and get the local government to seize all the land leading to it, and vice versa, local govs can nudge companies to target specific places to seize wherever they want. Especially as the plans aren't required to come to fruition.
- oliwarner 3mo agoIt should be used for essential infrastructure for public use. Power lines to a private DC seem to miss on both counts.
- jaredklewis 3mo agoWe run power lines to everything else: houses, offices, commercial buildings, factories, and so on. Any particular reasons we should have a special exception where we don't run them to data centers? Where I live pretty much every piece of land has some sort of easement on it: for water, power, or something else. Seems weird to me if we can insist that now everything needs to be frozen and no more infrastructure upgrades.
- matwood 3mo agoAgreed. Since most land is already owned by private individuals do we freeze everything as is and do no further changes [1]? The last house I lived in had an easement along the back property line. I built my fence on the easement knowing full well they would tear it up if they needed to access anything. I live in a denser town now where the power comes from the street to my house, wraps around my house, then lines to the next building over. I guess I should tell those people in the other building to figure out a different way to get power. [1] Also feels a bit like the arguments against wind power.
- lenkite 3mo agoA blank cheque on corpo infrastructure just means that billionaires win and everyone else loses. At that point, just paint "Peasant Slave" on your forehead if you don't have a multi-million lobbying group at the state and federal level. "All your base are belong to us" => Billionaires of USA When that happens rename the nation to Corporate States of America as well.
- DecoySalamander 3mo agoThe only losers are foreign adversaries who would prefer it if your country didn't develop high-tech infrastructure and businesses.
- lenkite 3mo agoALL High-tech Infra that leverages "eminent domain" SHOULD be held in the name of the nation state for public good not by the billionaire or his corpo. All these private data centers that leverage eminent domain to grab land should be property of the state and only temporarily leased to the corpo.