The Biggest Dangers to Your Fiber

ffejie writes "Fred Lawler, SVP of Global Field Services at Level 3 has an amusing look at some strange fiber cuts that he's seen in his days maintaining a large fiber network across the U.S. Whether it's squirrels, vandals, storms or truckers, it seems everyone has a new way to destroy the fiber that keeps the global communications infrastructure afloat."

Comments

Eminent Domain

[dcollins]

FTA -- "Well I’ve saved the best for last. There was a landowner whose property stretched across the border between Georgia and Florida. He was mad at Florida DOT because he didn’t get enough money when they purchased the right-of-way to widen the highway that cut through his property."

Okay, super-raw nerve here... because this is happening to my father's farm even as we speak. (Power company taking a strip directly through the middle of the farm on a state border, used for 5 generations by my family, for an unnecessary power line to nowhere.) The guy is not mad "because he didn't get enough money". He's mad because you threatened him with eminent domain, that he had no capacity to refuse giving up the strip of land, and he's super-mad and frustrated to realize he doesn't actually control what he thought was his own property. And you ruined the use of that property by cutting it in two. And yes, the power company we're dealing with is spewing similar spin in the PR battle. But that doesn't make it so.

He's mad and feeling powerless because you stole something under threat of state violence. Sorry, today I can't laugh at what you thought was your crazy-hilarious "best" punch-line.

Re:Eminent Domain

[Mr. Slippery]

He's mad and feeling powerless because you stole something under threat of state violence.

"Stole something"? Who issued that land deed that turned a section of the planet's surface into "property"?

Property is created by the state. No one in the U.S. has some natural right to land, it's all stolen property. (Except maybe some reservation territory, and much of that was stolen from one tribe by the feds and given to another tribe.) Your "right" to "own" some specific piece of land is dependent on the public good.

Now, certainly eminent domain is sometimes used to fatten the pockets of the powerful rather than for the public good, and sometimes people are not justly compensated. Those are legitimate complaints. But complaining about the existence of eminent domain betrays an ignorance of the nature of property. It has always been the case that private property can be taken for public use, provided that appropriate compensation is made. It's in the Constitution, for cryin' out loud.

Re:Eminent Domain

[wierd_w]

Strange, I was under the impression that there was a constitutional right to prevent such things.. You know, the 5th amendment, which clearly says:

No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

The definition of "Just" in "Just compensation" is debatable, or course--- (In the case of it rendering a farm useless, what would be considered just compensation? Compensation for the loss of production, or just for the base-price of the property itself?) but your view on emminent domain is quite clearly not what was intended by the framers of the constitution.