Feds shut down Gibson Guitar's US factories

[oladub]

Swat teams were sent to Gibson Guitar's factories to confiscate wood and Gibson cannot now ship guitars. The US government insists that Madagascar law requires that the work be completed on fingerboards in Madagascar. Also there were charges that wood was being imported illegally but Gibson's CEO says that India has to ok shipments of wood leaving India. Gibson is the last major manufacturer of guitars in the US. It has added over 500 new US jobs in the last few years and exports much of it's product. The CEO told everyone to get back to work and has written the justice department that he will take all responsibility for his action.
YouTube
Gibson Guitar Corp. Responds to Federal Raid The first five minutes sets this up.
Gibson Guitars raid "madness" 24th August 2011 Has footage from inside a Gibson factory.

[Maof]

just saw this on the news.....the second time this has happened i guess.

[Bigb23]

How about we send about 10,000 H1B guys back to India first?

“The federal bureaucracy is just out of hand,” Juszkiewicz said. “And it seems to me there’s almost a class warfare of companies versus people, rich versus poor, Republicans versus Democrats … and there’s just a lack of somebody that stands up and says, ‘I’m about everyone. I’m really about America and doing what’s good for the country and not fighting these little battles.’

Nice catch, Oladub.

[Mikeg]

How about Holder's DoJ enforcing the US laws before they commit resources to enforce other country's laws?

[Bigb23]

^^^^^^
Oh well -

[Gannon]

Gibson is the last major manufacturer of guitars in the US.

You've got to be kidding me.


Have you never heard of TAYLOR?


Unless Southern CA/San Diego has finally been annexed by Mexico...

[Mikeg]

Why Gibson?

The C.F. Martin & Co. in Nazareth, PA manufactures guitars with the same imported wood as does Gibson, yet they weren't raided by the Feds.

Andrew Lawton at the Landmark Report puts forth a plausible answer to that question.

[Gannon]

Thanks Mikeg. Curious.

I'd like to learn what Bob Taylor's politics are...I've been a supporter of his for years, even before he directed me to find a parking space in his lot before the last factory tour I took! LOL...

He seesm like too nice a guy to be Republican, so they're probably safe. Heh.

Cheers

[Mikeg]

Iowahawk totally skewers the incompetent Eric Holder and his Department of Justice:

New Scandal at DoJ as Illegal Guitars End Up In Hands of Mexican Drug Lords

[Gannon]

I guess they don't use the IRS any longer for their political spankings?!

Maybe they couldn't find anything else on this guy...what a bunch of crap.

[Bigb23]

Iowahawk totally skewers the incompetent Eric Holder and his Department of Justice:

New Scandal at DoJ as Illegal Guitars End Up In Hands of Mexican Drug Lords

Ahh - the power of the internut.

"Usually these guys are armed with Mexican Strats and Squires, Epiphones, small caliber stuff like that," said Pedro Ochoa, 36, an eye witness to the sonic melee. "This time they were packing the heavy firepower."

[Roq]

I guess they don't use the IRS any longer for their political spankings?!

Maybe they couldn't find anything else on this guy...what a bunch of crap.

A-fucking-men. This is what they're worried about? For reals? Great use of tax dollars here.

[Gannon]

One thing is for sure...I am now also a Gibson guy, after over twenty years of being devoted to Taylor guitars and their approach to consistency of manufacture.

Still not even curious about Martin, but who knows...this could open my repertoire of guitar-owning a bit, LOL!


Cheers

[oladub]

Maybe these Hershey Chocolate workers could get a job in Madagascar. Funny how the US government has a programs to bring in cheap labor in to replace US union labor while striving to move Gibson jobs overseas.

[TKshreve]

Another good, reputable U.S. guitar company:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heritage_Guitars

[oladub]

The Teamsters' Union is suing the Obama administration for giving away their work to Mexicans.http://www.teamster.org/content/team...can-truck-plan

The article also mentions the Obama administration's proposed free-trade deals with South Korea, Colombia and Panama. Put this all together and the Obama administration is fighting to save guitar jobs in Madagascar, allows guest workers to displace union workers at the hershey plant, overrides a vote of Congress to replace Teamsters with Mexicans, and is setting cutting tariffs for three other countries. Solution: make a speech about creating new jobs to replace the jobs we keep losing.

[firstandten]

Put this all together and the Obama administration is fighting to save guitar jobs in Madagascar.

http://www.science20.com/science_20/..._misused-82210

This is kinda long to explain but this is based on the misuse of the lacey act. This is an act designed to help companies like Gibson and they lobbled for the act.

allows guest workers to displace union workers at the hershey plant,

The Summer Work Travel program for students was widely exposed when three hundred J-1 student guestworkers from China, Turkey, Ukraine and other countries walked out of a Hershey’s packing plant in Palmyra, Pennsylvania August 17. Why ?

The Palmyra J-1 workers packed and lifted 65 pound boxes of candy at breakneck speed, many on night shift. They complained of severe back pain, bruising, and numbness in their arms.
Workers were subjected to camera surveillance and were told they would be fired if they didn’t keep up the pace. Zhao Huijiao, a 20-year-old international relations student from China, said managers pushed them, “work, work faster, work.” Students said they were threatened with deportation if they didn’t keep up

overrides a vote of Congress to replace Teamsters with Mexicans,

The North American Free Trade Agreement, signed in 1994, called for allowing Mexican truckers into the U.S., but the International Brotherhood of Teamsters and Democratic allies in Congress repeatedly used legislation to block access. Nafta ruled in the late 1990s that Mexico could impose punitive tariffs, which it did in 2009, affecting $2.4 billion in U.S. goods annually.

That was an agreement to stop the above

and is setting cutting tariffs for three other countries .

The South Korea, Colombia and Panama trade agreements mean jobs and a stronger economy for America. They will have a clear impact in Northern California,” Engler said. “Congress needs to act now, on behalf of American businesses and workers, to increase market access and help ensure fairness in global trade.”

Hey if John Engler said it , it must be true !!

http://www.businesswire.com/news/hom...ade-Agreements

Solution: make a speech about creating new jobs to replace the jobs we keep losing.

Solution: do whats in the long term best interest of the US and follow the law

[oladub]

firstandten:http://www.science20.com/science_20/..._misused-82210

This is kinda long to explain but this is based on the misuse of the lacey act. This is an act designed to help companies like Gibson and they lobbled for the act.

Good article. I read somewhere else that the the government was struggling in the first trial against Gibson to the point that it asked the judge to stay the case. One thing that bothers me is the selectivity of which laws the Justice Department chooses to enforce or ignore. I think that on August 18, the Justice Department announced that it would no longer deporting illegal aliens who were not criminals because they just didn't have the resources to do so which is sort of what Arizona was saying. While illegal aliens are finding jobs in the US and unemployment remains above 9% in the US, the Justice Department has plenty of money to be interpreting Madagascar laws to the detriment of US workers.

The Summer Work Travel program for students was widely exposed when three hundred J-1 student guestworkers from China, Turkey, Ukraine and other countries walked out of a Hershey’s packing plant in Palmyra, Pennsylvania August 17. Why ?

The Palmyra J-1 workers packed and lifted 65 pound boxes of candy at breakneck speed, many on night shift. They complained of severe back pain, bruising, and numbness in their arms.
Workers were subjected to camera surveillance and were told they would be fired if they didn’t keep up the pace. Zhao Huijiao, a 20-year-old international relations student from China, said managers pushed them, “work, work faster, work.” Students said they were threatened with deportation if they didn’t keep up

What's your point? Union workers used to get that work done before the government created this cheap foreign labor loophole.

The North American Free Trade Agreement, signed in 1994, called for allowing Mexican truckers into the U.S., but the International Brotherhood of Teamsters and Democratic allies in Congress repeatedly used legislation to block access. Nafta ruled in the late 1990s that Mexico could impose punitive tariffs, which it did in 2009, affecting $2.4 billion in U.S. goods annually.

That was an agreement to stop the above

Congress voted 441 to 3 in the House and 75 to 23 in the Senate AGAINST letting them in. But Secretary LaHood went to Mexico and signed the agreement with no advance notice or warning to the public or Congress. My understanding of government is that Congress makes the laws; in this case a veto proof law outlawing Mexican trucks. Since when does Secretary LaHood get to ignore laws?

The South Korea, Colombia and Panama trade agreements mean jobs and a stronger economy for America. They will have a clear impact in Northern California,” Engler said. “Congress needs to act now, on behalf of American businesses and workers, to increase market access and help ensure fairness in global trade.”

The fools or corporatist tools who created NAFTA set it up so Americans would lose either way. We know by now that NAFTA has hurt American workers by putting them into direct hourly competition with foreign labor. That treaty should be
scraped and Mexico should be hit back so hard with tariffs, that Mexico would never try that again. Instead, we have the Obama administration rolling over, piddling, and serving corporate and Mexican interests instead of US workers.

No, it's worse than that. Obama is further assaulting US workers by expanding NAFTA like treaties to three other countries.

Solution: do whats in the long term best interest of the US and follow the law

Obama should try that sometime.