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A Government Land Grab
the Media Can Love
ABC News casts Wal-Mart as “Goliath”
when town tries to seize its land, but Kelo ruling works against
little guys, too.
By Ken Shepherd
Business & Media Institute
May 25, 2006
ABC’s “World News Tonight” presented a small California
city’s efforts to seize privately-owned property as a “David versus
Goliath” struggle with the city in the role of David.
Yet nowhere in its reporting did ABC raise questions
about government’s abuse of power -- or the fact that the Wal-Mart
whose land was being grabbed was just like any individual city
resident when it comes to eminent domain.
“Hercules, California still doesn’t have a Wal-Mart and
it doesn’t want one,” anchor Elizabeth Vargas informed viewers of
the May 24 “World News Tonight” as she set up correspondent
Brian Rooney’s report entitled
“People v. Wal-Mart.”
“Last night during a sometimes raucous meeting, the
city council voted unanimously to take Wal-Mart’s land by power of
eminent domain, the right to take private property for public use,”
Rooney reported.
Wal-Mart simply was not welcome in Hercules, Rooney
added, noting that the 17 acres Wal-Mart owns are instead envisioned
by the city for “new homes and new buildings with an old look:
apartments upstairs and offices, stores, and restaurants on the
ground floor.”
Simply put, the city of Hercules plans on capitalizing
on the
Supreme Court’s precedent in Kelo
v. New London.
That high court ruling justified local governments seizing private
property, even private residences, to turn over to other private
developers. ABC’s Rooney described it as a “nervy move by the city,”
which could “become a battle, Hercules against the giant. The giant
retailer.”
After Rooney signed off, Vargas quipped that the story
was maybe more “David versus Goliath.”
Yet nowhere in his report did Rooney mention that the
Kelo
ruling could
be used not only to fell corporate giants but also “the little guy”
as was the case in Kelo.
Simply put, the same residents Rooney showed cheering
their city’s Wal-Mart land grab could one day be jeering their
city’s designs on their own houses or businesses.
The Business & Media Institute has
previously documented
media attacks on Wal-Mart.
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