Posted on 02/02/2014 1:02:51 AM PST by sheikdetailfeather
In 2011, the Department of Justice conducted raids on the Tennessee facilities of the famed Gibson Guitar company and confiscated large quantities of tonewood that had been imported from India and Madagascar. The action included armed SWAT teams, with automatic weapons, who apparently feared being garroted with a guitar string by an enraged Gibson employee. These raids were conducted due to the Lacey Act, which bans the importing of certain woods. The issue at hand was not that the wood was endangered or illegally harvested, but that it was not of the proper thickness that would have meant that some labor had been performed on it by workers in India and Madagascar. This was the law in Madagascar and India as a nod to the unions in those countries. Gibson, who hand-makes its guitars, cannot guarantee the craftsmanship of its products if a portion of the work is done outside their facilities.
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
If you don't have pull with the inner party, you don't have any rights or your rights are greatly diminished. Gibson guitars is mocking the Regime. There will be a further strike back and it will be more violent and destructive than the first. The USA is no longer a Republic or a democracy. It is now a disguised dictatorship and people need to think about how to deal with the New Mussolini.
...“Sure it is but the real point is what if you or I had to defend ourselves from the government? Could we do it? Thats my point.”...
I suspect they are already coming at private citizens through the IRS but if their victims are few in number, no one is the wiser except those who suffer. If the person fingered for persecution is courageous enough or has some connections, they can make enough noise to get media attention, at least from FOX and talk radio. That might help to alert the rest of the country to what is coming down.
>>one of the very few good ideas put forth in Obamacare,
>>even though it will fall on its face is nobody should go
>>bankrupt over an illness.
Please show me where this law guarantees that nobody can go bankrupt over an illness.
I think I would have made a presentation grad “Out House” with it. Put it on wheels and drop it off in front of the White House as a ‘gift’.....inside would be fresh rolls of Obama Toilet Paper.
The wording of the article leads me to believe that the government paid the 300k fine, not Gibson. Can someone clear that up?
They ARE mocking the government Nazis -
Compare that eagle to the Nazis!
I detest these statists:
“...this same kind of tonewood is used by other guitar makers such as CF Martin and Company and Fender. Those other companies were not raided. The principle difference seems to be that those companies contributed to Democratic candidates, while Henry Juszkiewicz, the CEO of Gibson, gives openly to Republicans, and Gibson has plants in a right-to-work state.”
Scoutmaster has gone to the trouble to read the leal pleadings, followed the case, etc., and has a firm grasp on the facts of the incident.
It really is too bad that the media sucks as bad as it does, but there is a very thin connection between public press accounts, and "the facts of the matter." I assume any press account (on any story, not referring to the Gibson rosewood incident) is misleading at best. When a story stirs enough of my personal interest, I always look for underlying evidence, something other than news stories. It is hard work, but absolutely necessary if one wants to know what really happened.
I bet Ted Nugent will buy one. He has no love lost for our tyranny-wannabe government.
Two quick points:
In 2011, the Department of Justice conducted raids on the Tennessee facilities of the famed Gibson Guitar company and confiscated large quantities of tonewood that had been imported from India and Madagascar.
No. Gibson was raided twice.
The Madagascar ebony was confiscated in 2010, from Gibson in Nashville.
The East Indian Rosewood and East Indian Ebony was primarily confiscated from the Dallas airport, which was the place of import into the U.S. The import papers showed Luthier's Mercantile as the importer, Theodor Nagel Gmbh as the ultimate consignee, and included a request to ship to Red Arrow Delivery Service's warehouse in Nashville. Gibson's name did not appear on the import papers and Gibson had not paid for the wood.
The issue at hand was not that the wood was endangered or illegally harvested, but that it was not of the proper thickness that would have meant that some labor had been performed on it by workers in India and Madagascar.No. That was one of the issues in the import of East Indian Rosewood and East Indian Ebony. It has nothing to do with the Madagascar Ebony.
Malagasy law prohibits any export of raw Madagascar Ebony except in accordance with its (corrupt) government-run system, in which certain lumber barons are permitted from time to time to cut trees, which are tracked by the Malagasy government from felling through cutting and sale.
The Madagascar Ebony Gibson bought was from Roger Thunam, a convicted lumber trafficker, through Theodor Nagel Gmbh, after Gibson employee Gene Nix visited Thunam's workplace and reported to Gibson by email that all of Thunam's wood was under seizure and there was no legal source to obtain it.
Journalists writing about the Gibson confiscations either get their sources from other journalists, Gibson PR releases, or whole cloth. They need to go to www.pacer.com and download the 70+ affidavits, legal pleading (with attached exhibits), and judges' orders for U.S. v Ebony Wood in Various Forms, Civil No. 3:10cv00747 (U.S. Dist. Ct. Mid. Dist. Tenn.), and U.S. v. 25 Bundles of Indian Ebony Wood, Civil No. 3:11-cv-00913 (U.S. Dist. Ct. Mid. Dist. Tenn).
Interesting posts following this article.
Republicans? Check www.opensecrets.com.
By the time of the second raid, Henry J. had made exactly one political contribution to a Republican.
At the same time, Henry J. was a co-founder of the Rainforest Alliance. Gibson (owned by Henry J. and Dave Berryman) was a near-charter member of the Clinton Global Initiative. Henry J. was a presenter at the MTV Rock the Vote where Barack Obama was honored and Bill Clinton was given a lifetime achievement award. Clinton opened the White House for Gibson's 100th Anniversary celebration. Henry J. supported a program to support diversity which included training programs in public schools, and poetry jams on diversity.
I barely touched on the issues in those posts from yesterday.
Another error in this article?
Also, even if Gibson had been guilty, this would have been a civil, not a criminal matter.
First, the two legal actions brought by the government were civil actions. They were actions in rem brought by the government against the items seized Customs and FIsh & Wildlife agents in Dallas and Nashville for violating Customs and Lacey Act laws.
Just read the style of the cases:
U.S. v Ebony Wood in Various Forms, Civil No. 3:10cv00747 (U.S. Dist. Ct. Mid. Dist. Tenn.), and U.S. v. 25 Bundles of Indian Ebony Wood, Civil No. 3:11-cv-00913 (U.S. Dist. Ct. Mid. Dist. Tenn).
The civil actions weren't against any party, they were forfeiture actions against Ebony Wood and 25 Bundles of Indian Ebony Wood.
Second, there could have been two actions, a criminal action against Gibson (and Luthier's Mercantile, Theodor Nagel Gmbh, and possibly the Red Arrow Delivery Service), and a civil action in rem against the items considered to be contraband by U.S. Customs and Fish and Wildlife.
In fact, the two forfeiture cases were subjected to a judicial stay at the request of the U.S. Department of Justice, Environmental Crimes Division pursuant to a sealed affidavit, related to an investigation of illegal trafficking of exotic woods in the U.S. The DOJ believed that continued public discovery in the civil cases would jeopardize its criminal investigation.
It that Arlo Gutherie, Socialist Pig?
Probably the two best acoustics Gibson ever made and the two best Gibson makes today.
It’s Bob Dylan.
“Nice tidy looking axe.”
Eh,,,, fugly color! And Strats do rule!
“So now the US government is deciding other nations’ laws for them? “
Eggs Ackley!
Imported woods bad! illegal immigration good!
Hey, isn’t that little Bobby Zimmerman?
American Thinker deleted my reply in which I pointed out a few errors (such as the fact that the tonewood in question was NOT returned to Gibson, and that the issue with the Madagascar ebony was buying from an illegal source, not the thickness of the wood), and suggested the author and those interested read the legal documents for the two cases at www.pacer.gov.
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