Then you'll hear from OUR lawyers; Dewey, Cheatem and Howe!
Posted on 06/07/2014 8:44:33 AM PDT by Bratch
An heirloom bronze elephant with ivory tusks, great-grandmother's piano with ivory keys, a vintage ivory chess set or an antique silver teapot with a small ivory inset in the handle to keep it cool may be "endangered" by proposed laws that could be in place sometime in June. Buying, selling or importing ivory from recently killed African elephants already is illegal and has been for about 25 years.
But an executive order issued by President Barack Obama would extend the ban to include all antique ivory harvested from elephants that died before 1914. There would be a law forbidding sales, even gifts to museums, of any ivory, including antique pieces. This affects antiques dealers and collectors, knife makers and collectors, Inuit craftsmen, owners of mahjong and chess sets, and manufacturers of musical instruments, including guitars and violins — the list could go on. And those in favor of strong endangered species laws want to also insist that all confiscated antique carved ivory art be destroyed — not even given to a museum.
Already thousands of pounds of ivory art objects have been destroyed. This will cause huge losses to companies, collectors and museums. Express your opinion in this controversy.
There's still time to contact your U.S. senator, representative or the Fish & Wildlife Service to make your thoughts known. For links to more detailed information, go to www.kovels.com/latest-news/new-ivory-ban.html.
(Excerpt) Read more at journalnow.com ...
I assure you it is not satire.
Don't be -- that's the first good laugh I've had all week.
This is a satire-filled time. If contrary to actual law it will probably get mowed down in court, but there’s more expense and trouble involved. It is another Obama distraction bomb.
Remember how incensed the world was when Muslims dynamited the old Buddha statues (which nobody actually worshiped, even the Buddhists who built them).
Anything that elevates the spirit is hated by these bullies!
I even see whale ivory from time to time (blotches of irregular color).
You just need to know what to look for.
Then you'll hear from OUR lawyers; Dewey, Cheatem and Howe!
If contrary to actual law it will probably get mowed down in court...
-PJ
I THOUGHT I had heard that wild elephant herd protection measures had become good enough that the populations were now prevailing against the remaining poachers.
It would seem to me that radiocarbon dating could help identify the approximate age of a piece of ivory, if there is a serious question about its being antique or new. And I could see requiring new ivory to have certifications to its legitimacy, if poaching remained a serious problem.
But going head over heels for environmentalism seems to be a hallmark of our modern liberals.
And a wild hair suddenly becomes the law of the land for every situation and every case?
At their heart, Liberals can't stand that there is a single activity, hobby, or action that is not A. regulated and B. provides enjoyment. (
Just how is destroying a pre-War tea set with ivory handles going to improve the life of an elephant that has been dead for 100 years? Oh, and by the way, those ivory handled pistols carried by Gen. George Patton would have to be destroyed.
“What difference, at this point, does it make?”
Weird jags that single out property, rather than evil acts, for opprobrium, are nothing new! FDR and gold anybody? Alcohol prohibition? Crazy gun bans?
It’s lazy and usually counterproductive to go down such roads.
Well, unless you can come up with a cheap, accurate, carbon-14 dating machine, its impossible to tell “new” ivory from old ivory. Ive seen a lot of “old” ivory WINK WINK sold in souvenir shops when on vacation. Needless to say, I didn’t buy any. I have very mixed feeling about such a law (NOTE: I SAID, LAW). Not what passes for a law these days.
The galling part of this, is that for Westerners, anyway, the value of ivory is not in the material, but the craftsmanship of the work that went into carving it. I believe that the Japanese came up with a material YEARS AGO that duplicates perfectly the carving and material properties of ivory (they did large aquatic mammal teeth for scrimshaw, too). There is no good reason for anyone to make anything whatsoever anymore out of the real materials, period.
Don't forget the 'flash bang grenades' and the deliberate killing of the family pet. Obama and his brown shirts.
I’d envision some sort of lab that would take samples of the kind that could be scraped off a hidden area with a knife, if it had to be done.
If it’s part of an antique then it’s reasonable to presume it’s antique itself.
I learned piano on a piano that had actual ivories. There is something to be said for the touch. The porosity tends to absorb small amounts of moisture. Sweaty pianist fingers on a modern plastic keyed instrument can build up to a slippery, grimy problem.
If the any governmental entity in the US was required to pay fair value to the property owner for ANY taking of private property or private property rights...for the common good as it is usually described...it would happen far less and only for more important reasons.
DK
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