If (when) America goes full-metal police state, there will still be “good people” critiquing the shine on the jackboots and making sure that doors are only kicked down in compliance with all local noise ordinances. News report from Joe Coscarelli at NYMag:
Today’s Wall Street Journal features hilarious, practically parodic complaints from neighbors of Fed chair Janet Yellen, who just don’t understand why she needs such fat and sloppy security guards. This is a Georgetown gated community, crotchety residents say, and there are rules here (50 pages of them, including a two-pet maximum). And Yellen’s massive security detail, with their visible fast food, giant, leaky vehicles, and “doughnut bellies” are just an eyesore.
According to one neighbor — who was granted anonymity “because she is worried about federal-government reprisals” — “we have this group, overweight, wearing the most ridiculous blue uniforms with the most ridiculous blue caps, and they have guns that are visible.” Meanwhile, their vehicles idle for “approximately 22 minutes daily,” according to an official complaint, and then pull out “speedily … all the while spilling fluid onto the street, which has now left a permanent stain,” against the neighborhood’s explicit “no car fluid stain” rule (seriously)…
From the WSJ article:
… The neighbors now want the FBI, an independent consultant, or the Fed’s inspector general to evaluate “what appears to be an excessive level of [Federal Reserve] security” on Ms. Yellen’s street at “enormous government cost to taxpayers.”…
On June 5, homeowners formed a committee to develop a standardized lease that would bar security operations from renting Hillandale homes. Others argued that too many rules could damage property values in the community, where sale prices can surpass $3 million.
Nonsense, says Mr. Shawn, who is on the new committee. “We need to put in proper safeguards. How are we going to feel if somebody leases to the Taliban?”
(Mildly surprised that the Taliban could pass the security check?)
***********
Apart from agreeing that Home Owners Associations are the worst, what’s on the agenda for the evening?
Belafon
I suspect the security check is “Do you have $3 Million? Can you pay the fees?”
Also, I think an Open Carry group needs to march through there.
Trollhattan
The tyranny of the Beige Paint Mandate.
Roger That
On a different subject- yet another negligent gun show shooting, this one fatal.
srv
You people keep complaining about the gov’t using Blackwater, but a nice neighborhood mow-down would make this all ship-shape.
BGinCHI
With fellow citizens like these, who needs terrorists?
scav
There might be some Texan open carry groups on the next plane out to explain things a little. Especially as they seem to be mocking the excess production of holy exhaust a little earlier.
Bob In Portland
Pipelineistan.
Roger Moore
Not if a Republican could.
Zam
Pretty certain it’s the types of people who show up to rallies like that are the reason she has security in the first place, they might get it into their heads that it is their holy duty to “end the fed.”
bemused
Ridiculous people double as security uniform fashion critics but request anonymity. Hilarious.
Higgs Boson's Mate
I’m not understanding why the Fed chair needs heavy security. All you have to do to rob it is own a half-ass bank.
srv
@bemused: The uniforms appear to just look like NYC cops.
Why can’t the FED have ninjas or something?
ranchandsyrup
There’s an HOA war going on in my community and I’m getting sucked into it. I sided with a neighbor that uses part of their garage as a play-room for their kids. HOA tried to tell them that he couldn’t park cars in his driveway and must use garage. They’re a real nice family and our girls play with their kids so I offered to help him craft a letter pointing out that there is nothing in the CC&R that states that an owner can’t park in their own damn driveway.
So now they’re coming after me and other younger families with kids. For example, thursday is garbage day. I returned home from work last thursday with a note on my garbage cans that I’m being fined for not putting them back quickly enough. Strode over to the HOA prez’s house and let her know that I just came back from work so I couldn’t put them in earlier and pointed out that it was only 6:30 p.m. which isn’t an “unreasonable” (standard in rules) time to still have them out and I would fight the fine tooth and nail.
When the fires were here I helped the HOA prez pack up her car to flee. :/ Mighty “neighborly” to use the tyranny of the HOA to mess with people.
PurpleGirl
Re HOAs: When my friends were first planning the move to Florida, N went to see a house and he liked it very much. While talking to the owner, she told N that having pets was against the rules. (Remember, these are the friends with the menagerie.) N responded that in that case he couldn’t buy the house as he had many pets. The woman began to cry — she told him that she had been unable to sell the house the moment she told potential buyers about the no-pets policy. She further said “And I voted for it!”. Karma is indeed a bitch.
SuperHrefna
Just got a home made pizza into the oven – my asthma is so bad today that I couldn’t bear to do a grocery shop on top of everything else, but I figured out that if I made dough from scratch I could make pizza and coleslaw out of what I already owned.
People like the ones you quoted raise my blood pressure WAY too much. I particularly growled at Anonymous Busybody complaining about the weight of the security guards, as if it would be just so much easier to bear if only the guards were slender.
Morzer
Has Dorothy Rabinowitz chained herself to the bike racks yet?
SuperHrefna
@PurpleGirl: She got what she deserved! HOAs are hotbeds of petty tyrants. I’m glad at least some of them are learning the laws of unintended consequences,
kindness
Well I say we pull Dick Cheney’s security detail and send them over to Yellins to really impress the neighbors.
Then never send them back to Dick’s because he’s just a dick.
SatanicPanic
@ranchandsyrup: Parking a car in the driveway is a bad thing? Man, white people
Mustang Bobby
I’m reminded of the famous Dear Abby letter from some uptight matron who complained bitterly about the new neighbors — two men — who had all sorts of “suspicious” people coming over to their house. She ended the missive by saying, “How can we improve the neighborhood?” Dear Abby’s reply was succinct: “You could move.”
Also, too, this: “The President is … near!”
ranchandsyrup
@SatanicPanic: I tried to have a discussion on the different property rights regarding the sidewalk and the driveway but the elderly contingent didn’t want to hear about it and believe that kids having a well built out play room in a garage harmed their use and enjoyment of their own homes.
These people need hobbies.
Randy P
Remember the Amazon Bic for Women and Veet For Men Hair Removal Gel reviews?
I’m pretty sure I found out about both of those here at BJ. So now allow me to return the favor. I stumbled across another internet outlet for amateur comedy writing. Denizens of BJ, I give you the Recipe for Ice Cubes.
PurpleGirl
@SuperHrefna: Oh, yes, I agree. She did. N loved animals and they loved him. While he doesn’t now have the same number of animals, the current bunch are injured rescued animals. And he has no qualms as to telling people what he thinks. From that point on, he insisted on getting copies of any HOA rules before considering a house.
NotMax
First they came for the fat people…
Mustang Bobby
@ranchandsyrup: Well then, it sounds like they’re ripe for a visit to Hobby Lobby. Their kinda place.
Tiny Tim
I live in an old urban townhouse with no type of condo/hoa association. Sure it means that it’s difficult to resolve genuine disputes with neighbors, but I am fine with that.
Comrade Scrutinizer
@Roger That: Well, they did reschedule the gun show, so there’s that.
Violet
@Roger That:
From the article:
Why? The gun does what it’s designed to do and instead of promoting its success, using the shooting as an advertising opportunity, they shut down the opportunity to sell other guns, . I despair for the state of capitalism.
ranchandsyrup
@Mustang Bobby: Heh indeedy. Lucky for me, there isn’t a Hobby Lobby in my county.
My wife just called and said that the HOA left another letter threatening a fine unless the trees are trimmed “properly”. Fun.
Randy P
@Randy P: A few selected comments (from the Recipe for Ice Cubes)
Suffern ACE
She is a very high government official. I’m not sure why they don’t give her hot n sexy gigolo models for protection. Maybe as a side benefit, they could make cuckholds of the husbands in the neighborhood.
SatanicPanic
@ranchandsyrup: Some poor dude is walking down the street, whistling cause he just got a promotion and then sees a car parked in a driveway and then starts drinking alcohol until he dies. Could totally happen.
dance around in your bones
I’ve never been wealthy enough to live in an HOA kinda neighborhood (thank gawd) but I have heard the stories.
{{{shiver}}}
I’ve just spent the last couple hours listening to Ry Cooder Live at the Catalyst in Santa Cruz in 1987 – it’s really a good concert, check it out if you have the time. It’s about an hour and a half, but there are some awesome musicians and singers of all colors and stripes, besides pasty white Ry. Who is pretty awesome himself.
I love it when musicians are playing and they hit some groove and give each other the side-eye of pleasure/this is fucking hot!
Roger Moore
@ranchandsyrup:
HOAs have a strong tendency to be the place where petty tyrants get to exert their power. I’m lucky to have a decent one, probably because it covers a single building and has real world problems (e.g. plumbing that needs work) to worry about.
Baud
@SuperHrefna:
Today Glendale Acres. Tomorrow the World!
ranchandsyrup
@SatanicPanic: LOL it totally could. I guess that in these days when terms like “tyranny” have lost all meaning, parking in the driveway is tyranny or something.
Roger Moore
@SatanicPanic:
It’s just a step down the slippery slope to front yards full of broken down cars up on blocks with weeds growing through the engine compartments.
ETA: Cleanup on Elon James White’s post below.
Morzer
@SatanicPanic:
My friend knows this one weird trick that lets you look as if you aren’t parking in your own driveway….
Morzer
What is it with the mysterious double postings? Did they learn one weird trick as well?.
Baud
@SatanicPanic:
Isn’t it funny how we park in a driveway and drive in a parkway…..?
ranchandsyrup
@Roger Moore: Agreed. They’re way worse down in TX where the for-profit HOA management outfits have turned them into revenue streams.
I hope yours fixes the structural issues you have and stays sane.
Mandalay
@Mustang Bobby:
From your link, this is what residents at the Ocean Reef Club had to say about the president’s visit:
And this is what employees have to say about the members at the Ocean Reef Club:
Up against the wall motherfuckers!
SatanicPanic
@ranchandsyrup: You’re infringing on my right to only see fake plants in orderly planters! (my Mom actually got in trouble from her HOA for that one the other day)
One thing I’ve always loved about Mexico, Japan and the poorer parts of our state- no one seems to care what their neighbors do with their house. That kind of seems like freedom to me
Randy P
@Roger Moore: One of my all-time favorite X-files episodes was one where the HOA was summoning a demon to eliminate serious offenders, and Mulder went undercover with pink flamingos in the yard and shooting hoops at midnight to bring them out.
Mustang Bobby
@ranchandsyrup: Plant a couple of these trees in your yard and tell the HOA to trim them for you.
Heh.
gogol's wife
@Randy P:
Hilarious!
Morzer
@Randy P:
Arcadia, IIRC.
JPL
@ranchandsyrup: I live in GA and my former neighborhood had a HOA run by a management company. In the spring, you received a todo list on yard maintenance. The neighborhood that I live in now does not have a HOA is better maintained imo.
burnspbesq
The best, and arguably most important, judicial decision of the day.
http://justsecurity.org/12404/fourth-circuit-holds-abu-ghraib-torture-claims-barred-kiobel/
ranchandsyrup
@SatanicPanic: That’s the kind of freedom that “LIBERTY” ppl demand but won’t grant.
@Mustang Bobby: Yikes!
Morzer
@Mustang Bobby:
I always say that you can’t go wrong with triffids…
ranchandsyrup
@JPL: Yeah GA has a bunch of them as well. The ones in GA haven’t gone as forcefully toward the revenue route. The HOA management lobby is purty darn powerful in TX. So you hear stories about evictions and foreclosures for failure to pay penalties.
SatanicPanic
@Morzer: Sounds kinky
Morzer
@SatanicPanic:
If you work on the topiary, you can achieve some quite beautiful shibari effects on the fleeing teabaggers….
SuperHrefna
That WSJ article really is the gift that keeps on giving. Favorite bits include:
“Neighbors say the detail’s leader has offered to dress the force in button-down shirts and chinos, and conceal their weapons and fast-food deliveries.”
And:
“George Hill also lives nearby, and doesn’t mind the officers. “Very intelligent and articulate and expressive people live in neighborhoods like ours, and I think sometimes they over-articulate and over-express,” he says.”
JPL
@ranchandsyrup: The neighborhood that I lived in just put liens on the home,
When I looked for another home, I avoided HOA’s.
Amir Khalid
@Randy P:
Mulder and Scully wore wedding rings in that episode, because their cover story story was that they were newlyweds. They used the names of Dick van Dyke’s and Mary Tyler Moore’s characters from The Dick van Dyke Show: Rob and Laura Petrie. One of “Rob”‘s offensive lawn ornaments was a whirligig with “Made in Malaysia” printed on the side.
cmorenc
@ranchandsyrup:
HOAs would actually be a great idea, if only hyper-control-freak assholes weren’t the sort most strongly inclined to become officers and board members in charge of them.
ranchandsyrup
@JPL: smart move. Next time we’re going no HOA as well.
Patrick
@Mandalay:
These good folks must be some of the most ungrateful human beings on the planet. I doubt there is any group in the US, who has done better under Obama than the one percenters. The SP500 dropped a whopping 40% under Bush between 2001-2009. On the other hand, the same index has increased a stunning 143% since Obama took office. Yet they whine…
D58826
What has always impressed me about HOA’s is that the leaders while waving the Gadsden flag of don’t tread on me are more than happy to tread on others in their little fiefdom. Small pond run by even smaller frogs
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Ugh, Kornacki has Professional Catholic Melinda Henninberger and former “Independent Women’s Forum” President Michelle Berneard (though she seems to have evolved) to discuss the SCOTUS ruling.
Pogonip
I think Janet should put up a clothesline and hang up the bodyguards’ size XXL undies to try. Also put out some geese with seasonal clothes on, and the particleboard fat people bending over to garden.
Baud
@Pogonip:
She should put up her car on cinder blocks while she’s at it.
gene108
@Roger That:
I watched CNN at lunch today, since it was on at the restaurant I was at. There’s a guy, who forgot to drop is 22 month old off at daycare, went straight to work and left the kid in the car all day. Kid died. Dad’s in jail, suspected of murder.
With all the accidental gun deaths of children that do not get prosecuted, because the family has suffered enough already, if you want to kill a really young kid, get them to find your loaded gun and shoot themselves by “mistake”.
Strange how law enforcement forgives negligence for gun safety over other types of parental negligence that can get you in trouble with the law.
Hungry Joe
The talk-radio guy Phil Hendrie, famous for pretending to have guests (voiced by Hendrie) who put forth some patently preposterous position, frequently had a female “guest” who was the head of an HOA. One time “she” complained about a homeowner whose young son had a friend visit him with a scooter that wasn’t a Razor, but some inferior brand; she said she ordered the boy to leave their gated community. Some listeners would buy it, and, outraged, call in to yell at the “guest.” Hendrie’s genius was that he could orchestrate a four-way conversation among the real caller, the fake guest (himself), his producer (himself, different voice), and his real-voiced self.
MattF
I was president of my condo board for a year. The magic words for starting an argument were ‘guest parking’. We had the whole shebang, including secret meetings and talmudic readings of the HOA rules and regulations. I’ll admit that the issue was weirdly complicated, but… still, people’s abilities to argue over small things is pretty amazing.
Violet
@ranchandsyrup: Does your HOA have elections? Can you run against these idiots and get all the young families on board?
raven
@gene108: It’s way more complex than that. He’s not only being held for murder but both he and his wife executed internet searches about kids dying in cars.
ranchandsyrup
@Violet: Yeah. We think we could get enough votes to take it over. Elections aren’t until next year so we have some time. Honestly, I’m hoping that things just calm down. Small chance of that happening though.
Violet
@raven: It’s creepy as hell.
LT
People who unleash wars hassle neighbors like Yellen for laughs.
Lest We Forget: Bill & Hill heartedly endorsed the legislation that permitted Rupert Murdoch (WSJ owner) to set up shop in the United States.
Hungry Joe
@ranchandsyrup: It reminds me of a quote from novelist David Lodge, on why campus departmental battles are, almost invariably, vicious: “Because the stakes are so small.”
⚽️ Martin
@Roger Moore: I have a pretty decent one as well, but it covers about 30,000 people. It might just be big enough to avoid most of the petty problems as it’s really a small city.
Violet
@ranchandsyrup: Maybe just the threat of them losing power would be enough to get them to calm down.
Tiny Tim
If you can’t have sufficent guest parking in neighborhoods which are presumably inaccessible by any other means than car what’s the point of having a big house?
ranchandsyrup
@Hungry Joe: HA! That is perfect, thx.
@Violet: Maybe……..
gene108
@raven:
I heard the part about the internet searches. It is suspicious. I’m just saying that kids hurting themselves with guns does not warrant the same kind of legal action as other kinds of parental negligence, where we assume parents should know better than to endanger kids by ‘x’ action.
raven
@gene108: got it
gene108
@LT:
Rupert bought a controlling interest in 20th Century Fox, in the 1980’s and to comply with U.S. law to expand his activity in the U.S., he became a U.S citizen.
Bill signed the 1996 telecommunications law that has allowed massive consolidation in the communications – TV, newspaper, etc. – industry.
The two are not the same.
Origuy
I was president of our HOA for a while. I live in a townhouse complex with 60 units, clumped into buildings with 4 or 6 units each. For that kind of environment, you really need some kind of organization to keep the place up. The HOA is responsible for the roofs, the outside painting, the streets, the pool, and the landscaping. The best HOAs I’ve seen are the ones where the board hires a professional manager and lets them run the place. It’s when you get the micromanagers who think this is their opportunity to get some power that you have problems.
ETA: The HOAs that are for single family houses make no sense to me.
Hal
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Fucking Kornacki. All last week he kept referencing a Fox news poll showing most Americans thought Lois Lerner’s emails were lost on purpose, as if Fox news is a well of unadulterated truth. I like him and his show, but some of the folks given equal time are such biased trolls it’s hard to listen to them.
Violet
@Tiny Tim: Guests? WTF? Neighborhoods aren’t planned for those.
dance around in your bones
@Hungry Joe: We used to listen to Phil Hendrie on KFI in LA, when we lived in Baja. (We had no TV at the time, so talk radio was kinda it for a while).
He was really funny once you got the joke. But if you just stumbled on the station you might be confused.
@SatanicPanic:
Quoted for truth.
ARoomWithAMoose
Not sure what the state laws are for harassment in your locality, but you need to get the minutes of the HOA board meetings to find out if yours is the only house they are determined to level fines against.
You may need to wave a lawyer at them.
JPL
@raven: I’m awaiting toxicology reports. At this point it’s all circumstantial but it’s possible they were avoiding day care fees. My ex worked at the Home Depot support center after he retired from IBM. What’s amazing to me is that the guy only worked seven hours. My son’s SO works at the support center now and said the day care facility is one of the best in the southeast.
also, the reason I’m interested in the toxicology report is to see if he had something i.e. benadryl in his system. Of course, I’m just speculating.
gene108
@raven:
One example, I can think of is if you drive a kid around and do not put them in a child seat.
You are following all traffic rules, stopping at stop signs, following the speed limit, etc. Someone hits your car. The accident is clearly their fault. No one is seriously injured. You will still get into trouble for not having the kid in a child seat, when the police come to issue a police report.
You’ll get into more legal trouble over this, than if you left a gun lying around your house and your kid shot himself. In the latter case, you’ll get a “you’ve suffered enough” punishment.
In the case of the auto accident, if the kid was seriously injured, you could get into serious trouble.
We’ve mandated child seats because it saves lives. We are not willing to do the same thing for gun safety about the home and just look at accidental gun deaths as the “cost of living in a free society”.
Patricia Kayden
“two-pet maximum”
Well, that effectively rules me out. Sounds like a swell place to live.
JPL
@gene108: The NRA not only interprets the second amendment but now can claim religious exemptions. Your point is taken.
The particular case that you mentioned, I was shocked that the man was jailed without bond, now I don’t know.
Parents that allow their children access to guns, who then shoot themselves, appear to get more sympathy than parents who make a tragic mistake not involving guns.
LT
@gene108: Your point is well taken, yet I will quibble. 1998’s “un-vetoed” massive consolidation of industrialized communication enabled/empowered Murdoch in a far more sinister fashion than his successful bid to gain citizenship a mere decade before.
Bill knew full well the implications of his signing that legislation, just as Hillary understood the full meaning of her support for the Bush/Cheney Big Lie War. And they don’t give a damn about what anyone thinks about it, either.
Violet
@gene108: Yes, it’s shocking when you put it in that light. A direct comparison to something like that–not putting your kid in the car seat–makes the way we treat irresponsible gun owners look horrifyingly and shamefully wrong. Which it is.
Patrick
@gene108:
Yup. It happened a while back where I used to live. On an icy road, a woman’s car fell into a pond. Her kid, who was in the back seat and not in a child seat, died.
A few weeks before that, some idiot was in a restroom of a grocery store and his gun went off by mistake. It apparently scared the customers so much that the store was evacuated.
The poor mother who drove the car was charged for not having her child in child seat. The idiot with the gun was never charged. Our justice system is so laughable.
scav
And let’s not forget all the moves in recent history to allow criminal changes against pregnant women for endangering fetuses by otherwise legal (or illegal too) behavior.
David Koch
Me speaking to a crazy Catholic
Me: can you believe Jehovah Witnesses don’t believe in blood transfusions?
CC: that’s just crazy.
Me: but they’re very religious people.
CC: I don’t care, that’s just nuts.
Me: did you know Christian Scientists reject most modern medicine?
CC: Oh gawd, they’re almost as bad as the loony Amish.
Me: What do you mean, the Amish and Christian Scientists are devout people?
CC: C’mon, using religion to reject medicine is ridiculous and you know it.
Me: But you’re Catholic and you reject contraception
CC: but that’s different, that based on religious beliefs.
Pogonip
@Baud: Right beside a rusty old truck! With the truck’s flat tires being used as planters.
danielx
@Patrick:
Of course they do.
Re Hanauer’s article: very perceptive and very on point. However….I’d be somewhat more impressed if he exerted a little pressure on his good buddy Jeff Bezos to improve pay and working conditions at Amazon warehouses.
MikeJ
@gene108:
If your child is not in a seat, you’re not following all the traffic laws.
Elie
Why would ANYONE want to live in one of those gated, “stepford” like communities where everyone is alike and thinks alike? It gives me the chills. And of course they all have to take a leak on the fire hydrant to show of their big boy/big girl pants. If I were her, I would be looking for another community — what a turn off!
WereBear
You know, I don’t even want to DRIVE through Texas. They are making a hobby of being the most obnoxious state!
Pogonip
In fairness, I can’t criticize landlords, or even Yellen’s nutty neighbors, for the two-pet restriction. I’ve seen what a crazy cat lady can do to a property–the house had to be aired for a year, then pretty much gutted and redone inside. And of course a CCL can appear quite normal–until the neighbors start calling about the smell. That’s when the landlord or the HOA can produce the application she signed swearing she had no, one, or two cats, and it’ll help get her out.
What is the solution for CCLs? I wish I knew. But the first step ought to involve a group-home type treatment plan far out in the country.
Hill Dweller
The Twitter machine is telling me Israel is currently bomb the shit out of Gaza.
danielx
@WereBear:
Florida is trying to compete for that dubious honor, but they’re way behind.
@Elie:
Because conservatives. They’re not comfortable with anyone who looks differently and thinks differently than them, unless Those People are doing the landscaping or something.
JPL
@Hill Dweller: Supposedly training sights.
ET
I call BS on this. I live about three blocks from Bernake and these guys aren’t all that visible and I saw him wandering around in his own one weekend. I doubt the security detail has changes all that much.
As for the rest Georgetown thinks its shit don’t stink that no one cares about that part of much anymore once the tourists and college kids overran it. Now its just tourists looking for Georgetown Cupcake.
Mandalay
@gene108:
Here’s a wacko in England who (deservedly) went to jail for not restraining his kids in the car, and there wasn’t even an accident:
That said, I’m with you all the way on the absurd discrepancy between prosecutions for unrestrained kids in cars, and prosecutions for accidents with guns. IANAL but the law for DUI seems to be “unless you have a really, really good excuse you shall be prosecuted, regardless of whether anything bad happened”. We need to do the same when kids get hold of guns: prosecute the gun owner by default, unless there is a really, really good excuse.
celticdragonchick
@Morzer:
They are never in the same place each time you look and they eat pesky rodents (and your kids, so you have to keep an eye on them)
Of course, they don’t do well with salt water so coastal homes can’t have them…
Pogonip
Another way Janet could show her appreciation of her neighbors is to bring Honey Boo Boo and family for a nice, long visit.
I have only seen about 6 minutes of HBB. I hope that with their newfound wealth the family got the kid treatment for that awful speech impediment and got her into the care of a good dietician.
chris
Too late for the morning thread but these two pieces from the Guardian tie in with the militarization of the police.
Nafeez Ahmad on the weaponisation of the social sciences.
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/earth-insight/2014/jun/12/pentagon-mass-civil-breakdown
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/earth-insight/2014/jun/13/uk-defence-fight-poor-activists-minorities-marxists-commies
Sadly pitchforks are not much use against high altitude killer drones.
PhilbertDesanex
@Roger Moore:
It’s reality but figure me the logic where the petty HOA tyrants and the people with cars on blocks both will for sure vote GOP.
But somewhere in the middle… Oh wait, the what? Sorry I brought that up
@Elie:
long time back an enjoyably poor TV movie: The Stepford Husbands!
Roger Moore
@Origuy:
Those HOAs are basically sub-municipal governments that don’t call themselves that. Because they don’t call themselves governments, they don’t have to obey a lot of the rules that governments do (e.g. one residence one vote rather than one person one vote) and they can easily avoid scrutiny and keep outsiders from taking advantage of municipal services.
Steve in the ATL
Question for current or recent law students or law professors:
How does one teach con law these days? Do you not even pretend that there is valid legal reasoning begind these decisions and just admit that they are nakedly political?
Botsplainer
Consequences for Teabaggers? Whoopsie!
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/mark-mayfield-family-lawsuit-madison-chris-mcdaniel-thad-cochran
SiubhanDuinne
@Pogonip:
Oh good grief, is Honey Boo Boo still around? Never saw the program, but one would have to live under the proverbial rock not to have been aware of her. Hadn’t heard anything about her for a while and I assumed … well, no, I didn’t assume anything, because I never gave her a thought, but if I had thought of her, I would have assumed she was last year’s news. Didn’t realize she was still A Thing.
That said, your suggestion is brilliant! HBB would totally get the attention of Janet’s neighbors. Especially if she toddled up to all their front doors, rang the doorbell, and then hid in the shrubbery! Fun times!
piratedan
@ranchandsyrup: your solution, run for office in the HOA and remove the idiots from the decision making chain
sinnedbackwards
Okay, we all agree HOAs are the worst.
Just to be sure, you did know HOAs are the worst?
And shoot Sununu twice.
Violet
@Botsplainer:
Heh. Sorry, I know it’s terrible for the family that they’ve lose their loved one in such a terrible way. But the irony of that statement is just too much.
Origuy
@Roger Moore:
They are corporations. At least in California, there’s a whole section of the Corporate Law on HOAs. If you have trouble with your HOA, it’s worth boning up on that. Professional managers are supposed to know the law, but not all do. Most board members never bother to research it; the law to them is what they think it should be.
NotMax
@Elie
For some it is mimicking heaven, which in their mythology specifically is a gated community.
Baud
I bet rich people who live in restrictive communities never have to wait hours for a new thread.
FlipYrWhig
@Botsplainer: FFS. All he did was likely commit a crime, and they treated him like a criminal for it!
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Baud: I believe I can hear the fiddler warming up to play the Cole-Ann Laurie Two Post Stomp
FlipYrWhig
@Origuy: Thanks to Samuel Alito, now a HOA can have deeply held _religious_ beliefs about lawn flamingoes.
Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)
@Steve in the ATL: There is a legal philosophy underlying these decisions. It is that the law should serve the interests of the powerful and wealthy. They are interested in resurrecting the Lochner Era.
Just One More Canuck
@ranchandsyrup: Trim your shrubs like this:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/spurmarks/2410041543/
Suzanne
@Origuy: We have a HOA, and we are in a single-family home, although there are also some condos in it, as well. We have some pretty extensive grounds, including walking paths, a community pool, a creek, two lakes, a fountain, and a playground (all in addition to a city park). Basically, it is heaven for dog owners. Our HOA is pretty affordable (under $50/month), and it maintains all of that stuff. When the real estate bubble burst, they also maintained some of the front yards of vacated houses so they didn’t get overgrown and bring scorpions.
However, we have a neighbor who won’t trim his trees because he is psycho and doesn’t want Google to see the front of his house, and it makes the street look like shit and the trees drop pods all over the place that he does not clean up. (This is the same neighbor who complained that my dog was barking. While I was at the hospital. Giving birth.) I actually wouldn’t mind if the HOA got up in his grill a bit. During monsoons, untrimmed trees can be dangerous.
Brandon
The fact that Yellen lives in a gated community IN GEORGETOWN takes her down several, upon several more levels in my esteem. And I’m being quite serious here.
danielx
@Brandon:
Villager heaven.
Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)
@Brandon: Where should she live to satisfy you?
mike with a mic
@ET:
When was Georgetown anything more than drunk college kids and tourists?
Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)
@mike with a mic: Which streets?
gian
it’s how the right wing plays politics in this country. she’s not gung ho enough on curbing “inflation” so try and threaten her personal safety.
it’s just called something else. like “fiscal responsibility”
like how as soon as W was given the presidency in 2000 they raised his salary, it’s ALL partisan shit to them
Scalia and Kennedy are 78 and 77 respectively. Not wishing them ill, but in the event of a Democratic president winning in 2016 will they make it to their mid 80s?
Kyle
Teabaggers, you know that skull-cracking police state you cheer for when it’s unleashed on “bad people”, smugly self-assured that you’re too privileged to ever be a target? It’s going to come to your door eventually.
The Lodger
@FlipYrWhig: If the HOA is Muslim, they’d have to ban lawn flamingos (or any animals, for that matter.)
Pogonip
@The Lodger: You will take my lawn flamingoes when you pry them from my cold dead hands!
Pogonip
@SiubhanDuinne: Or if Mama Boo Boo showed everybody the open, seeping wound on her foot that draws flies (the last thing my TV-watching colleagues mentioned of note on the show). I hope Mama was also able to see a doctor.
low-tech cyclist
There is no ‘gated community’ in Georgetown. Georgetown has a couple of residences big enough to be gated, but there’s no gated community in Georgetown. You just can’t fit one in there.
Lots of people (lots of realtors, especially) like to claim an address is in Georgetown when it isn’t.
Trulia says Hillandale is in the Burleith neighborhood. I’d be willing to concede it’s adjacent to Georgetown. (It extends north and west from 39th and Reservoir.) But it’s definitely not part of Georgetown.
They can take their attitude and stick it up their, um, attitudes.
drkrick
@mike with a mic:
There were a lot of brothels there when the waterfront was still industrial.