Is Haley Barbour Really A Republican?

I'll make this quick for now with a longer update to follow in the next few days. Let me just say, though, that Governor Haley Barbour's endorsement of emminent domain is a travesty. Here we have, once again, a prominent member of the Grand Old Party, the side supposedly FOR property rights, saying that such rights can be thrown out the window if a new, unproven economic project comes down the pike.

Like the late Governor Kirk Fordice, I had strong reservations about the giveaways we threw to Nissan to land that project. Touted as a major catalyst for "job creation," the truth is that jobs actually just "shifted": people left their existing jobs for a few bucks more at Nissan. No jobs were really created: people merely departed existing positions (mainly from local companies) to go with the new company. And all of those spin-off companies that were going to come into being from Nissan? Well, many are now closed.

While local companies and businesses struggle to survive while battling all the regulations, red tape and high taxes they must deal with, the Nissans and Toyotas of the world are invited in on red carpet with lavish incentives and exemptions that we local business people can only dream of.

Now, the Governor of our state says that private property and land should be no obstacle to "economic growth." Love your land? Love that property that's been in your family for generations? Well, if a big, sexy, foreign automaker wants it, you're just out of luck according to the theory of emminent domain.

Governor Barbour is wrong on this. Really wrong. Plus he is betraying the conservative credo by advocating the violation of property rights, a major and logical extension of the sacred rights of individuals. I wish he would pick up a copy of University of Chicago law professor Richard Epstein's seminal work on the damage caused by emminent domain,"Takings," but he won't.

Let's hope members of the state Senate do the right thing, like their counterparts in the House, and oppose emminent domain.