Obama Thugs Targeted Right Wing Company Gibson Guitar
We know that Obama is a corrupt, Chicago-style politician bent on destroying all his enemies. It isn't just using the IRS to deny tax-exempt status to conservative groups (1) so that fund raising against Obama in the last election became much more difficult; there was also the EPA treating conservative groups shabbily in regard to granting requests for records under the Freedom of Information Act (2); even conservative reporters have been targeted as enemies (3).
Has this man no shame?
I have no doubt that eventually we will discover that this type of behavior has been pervasive throughout every agency of government since he became President. Based on these recent revelations, something that happened two years ago now makes perfect sense:
Investors.com, 23 May 2013, Now The Gibson Guitar Raids Make Sense
IRS Scandal: The inexplicable raid nearly two years ago on a guitar maker for using allegedly illegal wood that its competitors also used was another targeting by this administration of its political enemies.
On Aug. 24, 2011, federal agents executed four search warrants on Gibson Guitar Corp. facilities in Nashville and Memphis, Tenn., and seized several pallets of wood, electronic files and guitars. One of the top makers of acoustic and electric guitars, including the iconic Les Paul introduced in 1952, Gibson was accused of using wood illegally obtained in violation of the century-old Lacey Act, which outlaws trafficking in flora and fauna the harvesting of which had broken foreign laws.
In one raid, the feds hauled away ebony fingerboards, alleging they violated Madagascar law. Gibson responded by obtaining the sworn word of the African island's government that no law had been broken.
In another raid, the feds found materials imported from India, claiming they too moved across the globe in violation of Indian law. Gibson's response was that the feds had simply misinterpreted Indian law.
Interestingly, one of Gibson's leading competitors is C.F. Martin & Co. According to C.F. Martin's catalog, several of their guitars contain "East Indian Rosewood," which is the exact same wood in at least 10 of Gibson's guitars. So why were they not also raided and their inventory of foreign wood seized?
Grossly underreported at the time was the fact that Gibson's chief executive, Henry Juszkiewicz, contributed to Republican politicians. Recent donations have included $2,000 to Rep. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., and $1,500 to Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn.
By contrast, Chris Martin IV, the Martin & Co. CEO, is a long-time Democratic supporter, with $35,400 in contributions to Democratic candidates and the Democratic National Committee over the past couple of election cycles.
"We feel that Gibson was inappropriately targeted," Juszkiewicz said at the time, adding the matter "could have been addressed with a simple contact (from) a caring human being representing the government. Instead, the government used violent and hostile means."
That includes what Gibson described as "two hostile raids on its factories by agents carrying weapons and attired in SWAT gear where employees were forced out of the premises, production was shut down, goods were seized as contraband and threats were made that would have forced the business to close."
Gibson, fearing a bankrupting legal battle, settled and agreed to pay a $300,000 penalty to the U.S. Government. It also agreed to make a "community service payment" of $50,000 to the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation — to be used on research projects or tree-conservation activities.
It's sad that Obama doesn't deploy his skills and the energies of his government against America's greatest enemy: Islam. But he is not out to destroy Islam.
Notes
(1):
HuffPost, 28 May 2013, IRS Scandal Letters: Other Offices Sent Requests To Target Tea Party Groups, NBC News Reports
More evidence has emerged that the IRS' targeting of conservative groups extended beyond a few agents in a single city.
Back on May 14, a 48-page report by the IRS Inspector General cited that a few lower-level staff members from the Cincinnati office
were responsible for the Tea Party flap, acting in an insubordinate fashion.Two weeks later, the scope of questions surrounding the case continues to evolve beyond that one place. NBC News reported Thursday that letters show requests about conservative groups were made by other IRS locations.
(2):
National Review Online, 22 May 2013, The EPA’s Conservative Problem
Surprise: The EPA, too, treats conservatives unfairly.
The EPA has an IRS problem.
The agency has rubber-stamped fee-waiver requests from environmentalist groups seeking information, but it denied similar requests from conservative groups, an extensive examination of EPA correspondence suggests. It’s the latest instance in which federal agencies have used their executive authority against perceived political opponents.
(3):
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 27 May 2013, Press gang: Fox reporter is the latest to have his work targeted
It is no secret that President Barack Obama has little use for the media or respect for its practitioners. So is it any wonder that Mr. Obama gave Eric Holder, a man with even less regard for the press than his boss, a mandate to direct the Department of Justice to crack down on leaks in general and journalists in particular?
Earlier this month, Washington erupted with the news that the Justice Department monitored 20 phone lines belonging to The Associated Press in an attempt to uncover the identity of a government source the Obama administration insisted endangered national security. The administration leans on the Espionage Act of 1917 for its rationale.
As many as 100 AP reporters and their sources may have been compromised as a result of the government's unhindered access to several weeks' worth of phone records. There was no prior warning by the government that gave the AP a chance to appeal such an extreme fishing expedition.
