Please explain why the citizens of a town don't have the right to a say over their town's development.

One wonders why Wal-Mart would build a store in a city where nobody wants to shop there. One wonders why they fear that "Wal-Mart is the black hole. It will suck everything from a retail point of view that competes with it out of existence,'' if nobody in the city wants to shop there. Maybe they think all those nasty low income people that will stream into their nice city will shop at Wal-Mart and not at those high-end stores like they otherwise would?

You do realize this makes no sense? Either Wal-Mart is run by idiots, or somebody isn't being forthcoming about motives and reasons.

This isn't a hill I need to die on. Wal-Mart can go somewhere else, and the rich Asians in Hercules can keep their enclave pure.

Private property in California is already pretty much a convenient fiction, considering the power that authorities have over how you can use it. We had a similar deal with a Home Depot in my town, and they were sent packing. Maybe Hercules should hold a referendum like we did.

Eminent domain has now been officially approved to take private property from one private entity, and give it to another private entity, at the whim of politicians. It's all a lot of fun as long as it's at the expense of a hated corporation that threatens to draw riff-raff into your neighborhood.

Today it's Wal-Mart. Tomorrow it might be your business.