Nebraska Republican Senate candidate Deb Fischer’s unscrupulous land grab
No good deed goes unpunished, particularly a good deed offered to someone who views life through the lens of naked greed and ambition. Enter Nebraska Republican Senate candidate Deb Fischer, a woman without scruples, neighborly values, or a moral center. We can talk more – all day, in fact – about the reasons honest, honorable Bob Kerrey should be elected, but this story is about his opponent, Deb Fischer, and a land grab that violates pretty much every rule we’ve ever been taught about human values, honesty and compassion.
The back story (and this is an awful story): Like many of us whose grandparents farmed, owned land, and lived their lives with sheer love of the land and pride of ownership, Les and Betty Kime’s grandparents, beginning in the late 1890′s, developed the Snake River Falls Ranch, beautiful land which surrounds the Snake River and includes the largest waterfall in all of Nebraska. Republican Senator Deb Fischer and her husband, Bruce, operate a cattle ranch near the Kimes, and – as Nebraska neighbors are wont to do – the Kimes generously allowed the Fischers to graze their cattle on a part of their land near the Snake River and next to the McKelvie National Forest. Nice picture, yes? Neighbors helping neighbors, cattle grazing placidly on beautiful land, with access to water and in the shadow of the picturesque forest. But above that peaceful optic, a dark cloud of conflict was heading toward Les and Betty Kime, in the form of Deb Fischer and her husband.
Keep in mind, the Kimes didn’t ask the Fischers for anything. They had nothing to gain from their offer to the Fischers to graze their cattle on their land. In fact, as the Fischers’ cattle grazed on the Kimes’ land for free, the Kimes continued to pay taxes on that land, continued to maintain that land, and all should have been well – until the Fischers decided that being on borrowed land wasn’t netting them anything. So they repeatedly urged the Kimes to sell them the land. The 80-year-old couple, Les and Betty, said “no.” And “no” again. Graze your cattle, they said, but this is family land, and we don’t want to sell.
In Nebraska, there’s a legal doctrine called “adverse possession,” which deals with squatter’s rights to land. And the Fischers – Republican Senate candidate Deb Fischer and her equally morally bereft husband – sued the Kimes for their land under “adverse possession.” Apparently, in the Fischers’ mind, the right to graze their cattle on land that didn’t belong to them translated into a right to own that land. For no reason other than that they wanted it, and felt entitled to it. After all, with the arrogance attendant to the type of person Deb Fischer and her husband have shown themselves to be, they wanted the land and they intended to have it, regardless of who, or what, stood in their way.
http://freakoutnation.com/2012/10/15/nebraska-republican-senate-candidate-deb-fischers-unscrupulous-land-grab/
= new reply since forum marked as read
