Environment roundup

  • End of the road at last for Steven Donziger, impresario of Chevron/Ecuador litigation? [Joe Nocera, Bloomberg]
  • Building expensive housing improves housing availability at every income level [Sonja Trauss, Market Urbanism Report]
  • “Ms. Durst did what any law-abiding citizen would do: She demolished the structure and tossed the twigs, moss and shells into the woods…. The fairy house wasn’t up to code.” [Ellen Byron, WSJ, courtesy Regulatory Transparency Project]
  • Last month’s judicial rejection of NYC climate suit came after plenty of foreshadowing [Daniel Fisher (“persuasive authorities” were two overturned court decisions); New York Daily News and New York Post editorials]
  • Ban on smoking in public housing reflects truism that unless you own property, your home isn’t really your castle [Shane Ferro, Above the Law]
  • Obama-era Waters of the U.S. regulations are a power grab asserting EPA control over farmers’ ditches, seasonal moist depressions, and watering holes; one federal court has now reinstated the rules, but the issue is headed to SCOTUS and Congress in any case ought to kill them [Jonathan Adler; Ariel Wittenberg, E&E News; earlier]

2 Comments

  • Even IF you own your home, it is not really YOUR castle. Just try not paying the government its take very year. Just try adding a room on without government permission. Just try adding a wheelchair ramp to the front stoop without government permission. I could go on, but you get the point.

  • usufruct – You don’t actually own it, you merely have use of the thing so long as you pay your yearly tithe to the local lord.

    There was a time when you could let it fall into disrepair if you desired, because it was “yours”. No longer, now the local lord uses eminent domain to take it from you and reassign it another holder who promises to tithe more in future years.