My Friend Bob

Back in one of the places I lived, I had a friend named Bob.

Bob had lived there his whole life; his "people" had lived there for more generations than he could name.  

Bob had a simple home and a simple life.  He didn't ask for much.   

Then, one year, the government granted development rights for all of the land around his place.  The next thing he knew, some of the places where he had hunted and fished all his life (and his fathers before him) were off limits at him.  Early on when he went over to see what wildlife was about, the developers had a security guard posted who demanded that he get off the land.  The guard even fired a warning shot over his head to keep him moving towards home.

Before long, the developers were crossing his land with bulldozers to get to some of the development.  When he went out to tell them to stop, things got a little heated.  Yes, he did fire a few shots in the air,  but the contractors brought in their own arms and put a few holes in Bob's barn. 

Over the years, Bob kept finding that corners of his family's property had been taken over by the developers.  Some of their workers even set up camps on his land.  But, when he went to court, he was told that he better live with it; the government had assigned the rights to the developers. 

Now, I wish I could tell you things got better.  But, they did not.  One day Bob found that the developers had cut into his water line and capped it off, leaving him high and dry.  Another day, when his daughter was injured from some lumber that fell down from one of the contractor's sites, the ambulance couldn't get to his house because the road had been plowed over.  Later, his road was back in service, but the main road into which it connected was severed in direction of town.  

He took to planting traps for the developers: their bulldozers tumbled into pits; dead trees fell across their road.  The developers retaliated by building one of those sound walls along the edges of his property.  The shadow on one side blocked the sun in the morning, and the one of the other side blocked it in the evening.  He slowly became a prisoner in his own home.  

Feeling trapped, he began to hurl his garbage over the sound wall.   The next day, his garbage service was cut off by the town.   So, then he began to hurl some of those M-80 fireworks over the wall; the response was a few sticks of dynamite hurled back.  One day, one of his M-80s slightly burned one of the kids in the new homes on the other side of the wall who was playing where his favorite fishing spot had been.  By night time, three Molotov cocktails had reduced his out buildings to cinders.  He was outraged to find out that the gas in those Molotovs had come from the US strategic oil reserves, provided to the developers to help them protect their investment. 

This week, however, things changed.   One of Bob's young cousins who had come to visit thought that Bob had been treated horribly and threw some of those lawn darts over the wall.  One of the darts punctured a swimming pool liner in the backyard of the developer's showcase home; another one slashed a tire on the guards' Hummer parked at the security post; and another one cut the leg of one of the kids in the neighborhood on the other side of the wall.  

As I write this, Bob's home has been reduced to rubble, two of his children are dead, he can't get any medical care for his grandmother who was injured.  This all came right after the developers yelled over the fence "You better watch out . . . or better yet, get out," just  before they launched fire rockets on his property.  In the local newspaper, the developers claimed that Bob, "had made them do it."   The state government sided with the developers, giving a special grant for the added security they needed  to protect themselves from Bob. 

In that local newspaper, an editorial argued that anyone supporting Bob or his family, or criticizing the developers, was anti-prosperity. 

So, the story continues with my friend, Bob.  That's Bob Gaza. If you happen to see him around, I hope you will listen to his story.  As far as I am concerned, trying to sympathize with what has happened to him is not anti-prosperity, only pro-understanding.