Saturday, August 27, 2011

Weekend Newsbites: Sat. & Sun., August 27 & 28, 2011


I betchya Mayor Bloomberg hates this song...

People... remember who we are! Remember who we were... who we can be again!

Government is out of control and we've gotta regain control of this country...!!!

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5 comments:

William R. Barker said...

* TWO-PARTER... (Part 1 of 2)

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111904787404576530520471223268.html

* FOLKS... (*PAUSE*)... IF YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND THAT THIS IS "SOFT TYRANNY" THAN I HAVE ONLY CONTEMPT FOR YOU:

Federal agents swooped in on Gibson Guitar Wednesday, raiding factories and offices in Memphis and Nashville, seizing several pallets of wood, electronic files and guitars.

The Feds are keeping mum, but in a statement yesterday Gibson's chairman and CEO, Henry Juszkiewicz, defended his company's manufacturing policies, accusing the Justice Department of bullying the company. "The wood the government seized Wednesday is from a Forest Stewardship Council certified supplier," he said, suggesting the Feds are using the aggressive enforcement of overly broad laws to make the company cry uncle.

It isn't the first time that agents of the Fish and Wildlife Service have come knocking at the storied maker of such iconic instruments as the Les Paul electric guitar, the J-160E acoustic-electric John Lennon played, and essential jazz-boxes such as Charlie Christian's ES-150. In 2009 the Feds seized several guitars and pallets of wood from a Gibson factory, and both sides have been wrangling over the goods in a case with the delightful name "United States of America v. Ebony Wood in Various Forms."

(*HEAD ABOUT TO EXPLODE*)

The question in the first raid seemed to be whether Gibson had been buying illegally harvested hardwoods from protected forests, such as the Madagascar ebony that makes for such lovely fretboards. And if Gibson did knowingly import illegally harvested ebony from Madagascar, that wouldn't be a negligible offense. Peter Lowry, ebony and rosewood expert at the Missouri Botanical Garden, calls the Madagascar wood trade the "equivalent of Africa's blood diamonds." But with the new raid, the government seems to be questioning whether some wood sourced from India met every regulatory jot and tittle.

* AH... BUT THIS ISN'T SIMPLY ABOUT POSSIBLE CORPORATE LAWBREAKING... THIS ISN'T ABOUT REGULATING BIG BAD BUSINESS...

* READ ON, FOLKS... READ ON!

* To be continued...

August 27, 2011 at 10:45 AM
William R. Barker said...

* CONCLUDING... (Part 2 of 2)

It isn't just Gibson that is sweating. Musicians who play vintage guitars and other instruments made of environmentally protected materials are worried the authorities may be coming for them next.

If you are the lucky owner of a 1920s Martin guitar, it may well be made, in part, of Brazilian rosewood. Cross an international border with an instrument made of that now-restricted wood, and you better have correct and complete documentation proving the age of the instrument. Otherwise, you could lose it to a zealous customs agent - not to mention face fines and prosecution.

It's not enough to know that the body of your old guitar is made of spruce and maple: What's the bridge made of? If it's ebony, do you have the paperwork to show when and where that wood was harvested and when and where it was made into a bridge? Is the nut holding the strings at the guitar's headstock bone, or could it be ivory? "Even if you have no knowledge - despite Herculean efforts to obtain it - that some piece of your guitar, no matter how small, was obtained illegally, you lose your guitar forever," Prof. John Thomas, a law professor at Quinnipiac University and a blues and ragtime guitarist has written. "Oh, and you'll be fined $250 for that false (or missing) information in your Lacey Act Import Declaration."

* OH... BUT WAIT... THIS AIN'T THEORETICAL, FOLKS... (READ ON!)

Consider the recent experience of Pascal Vieillard, whose Atlanta-area company, A-440 Pianos, imported several antique Bösendorfers. Mr. Vieillard asked officials at the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species how to fill out the correct paperwork - which simply encouraged them to alert U.S. Customs to give his shipment added scrutiny. There was never any question that the instruments were old enough to have grandfathered ivory keys. But Mr. Vieillard didn't have his paperwork straight when two-dozen federal agents came calling.

* READ ON...!!!

Facing criminal charges that might have put him in prison for years, Mr. Vieillard pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor count of violating the Lacey Act, and was handed a $17,500 fine and three years probation.

(*HEAD EXPLODING*)

August 27, 2011 at 10:45 AM
William R. Barker said...

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011/08/27/perry-bills-feds-34m-for-incarcerating-illegals/

Texas Gov. Rick Perry has asked the U.S. Department of Homeland Security for nearly $350 million to cover the costs he says Texas has incurred incarcerating illegal immigrants in state prisons and county jails.

(*SINCERE CLAP-CLAP-CLAP*)

In a letter to Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, Perry reiterated a claim he's often leveled against the federal government: that it's not doing enough to secure the border with Mexico and as a result, has allowed illegal immigrants to enter the U.S. and use taxpayer-funded resources, including the prison system.

* WELL, YEAH...!!!

Unlike fellow GOP presidential hopeful Rep. Michele Bachmann, Perry does not think the U.S. should build a wall spanning the entire Mexican border.

* AND HE MAY WELL BE CORRECT. THERE MAY BE AREAS OF THE BORDER WHICH ARE SIMPLY SO INACCESSABLE AS TO NOT MEET THE COST/BENEFIT CRITERIA.

Perry also has supported discounted tuition rates for the children of illegal immigrants at Texas universities...

* FOR THE CITIZEN CHILDREN OR THE NON-CITIZEN CHILDREN? IF IT'S THE FORMER I HAVE NO PROBLEM BUT IF IT'S THE LATTER...

(*SHRUG*)

As governor, Perry was one of the first to talk about immigration by breaking out the issue of border security, a move that has won him support from conservative Hispanics. But he angered Hispanic leaders in June by endorsing legislation that would have prohibited cities from adopting "sanctuary" rules for handling suspected immigrants.

* AGAIN... SOUNDS REASONABLE.

In his two-page letter to Napolitano, Perry described the formula used to come up with his $349.2 million bill, including $94.4 million to cover costs incurred by county jails.

(*HUGE FRIGG'N GRIN*) (*CHUCKLING*)

Texas counties are being asked to cover more than $94.4 million in direct costs related to housing illegal immigrants while the state has been left to cover more than $254.8 million in such costs." (He included a memo from Comptroller Susan Combs in which she supports his calculations but warns that the estimates are conservative.)

Perry is not the first governor to try to bill the federal government for the costs of incarcerating illegal immigrants. ... Janet Napolitano herself, who preceded Jan Brewer as Arizona governor, regularly sent the Justice Department invoices seeking such reimbursement before she became Homeland Security secretary.

(*SNICKER*)

August 27, 2011 at 11:04 AM
William R. Barker said...

http://www.wtsp.com/news/topstories/article/207550/250/FHP-sued-for-giving-out-illegal-tickets

* I'D LIKE TO BUY THIS GUY A BEER!

When the Florida Highway Patrol pulls someone over on the highway, it's usually because they were speeding.

But Eric Campbell was pulled over and ticketed while he was driving the speed limit.

Campbell says, "I was coming up the Veterans Expressway and I notice two Florida Highway Patrol Cars sitting on the side of the road in the median, with lights off." Campbell says he did what he always does: flashed his lights on and off to warn drivers coming from the other direction that there was speed trap ahead. According to Campbell, 60 seconds after passing the trooper, "They were on my tail and they pulled me over."

Campbell says the FHP trooper wrote him a ticket for improper flashing of high beams. Campbell says the trooper told him what he had done was illegal.

But later Campbell learned that is not the case. He filed a class action suit which says "Florida Statue 316.2397" - under which Campbell was cited - "does not prohibit the flashing of headlights as a means of communications, nor does it in any way reference flashing headlights or the use of high beams."

Campell's lawsuit says the FHP is well aware they are wrongfully applying the state law and they are doing it as a means of generating revenue.

* ONE OF MY PET BUGABOOS! MISUSING POLICE POWER TO RAISE REVENUES RATHER THAN ENFORCE PUBLIC ORDER AND SAFETY IS A SURE WAY OF PUSHING A WEDGE BETWEEN THE PEOPLE AND THE AUTHORITIES.

* OH! AND GET THIS, FOLKS...! (READ ON...)

In 2005, a court order was even issued saying the state law doesn't prohibit the flashing of vehicle headlights.

* SEEMS TO ME THE HEAD OF THE FHP SHOULD BE SUMMARILY FIRED. THIS BLATANT CONTEMPT FOR THE RULE OF LAW IS BEYOND THE PALE.

Since 2005, FHP records show more than 10,429 drivers have been cited under the statute.

* UNFRIGG'NBELIEVEABLE!

Campbell says FHP had no right to ticket him or anyone under the current law and he adds the agency is not being honest when it says it doesn't write tickets to increase revenue or punish people, but rather to get the motorist to slow down on the highway. If that were true, Campbell says the FHP should be delighted with him, because drivers did slow down before troopers could give them a ticket.

(*HUGE FRIGG'N GRIN*) (*HIGH FIVE TO MR. CAMPBELL*)

The suit evolved out the fact that Campbell says "I don't like what the government is dong especially now when most people have a hard time affording gas and now they have to defend themselves against a made up charge that doesn't exist."

The state will have to come up with the money for damages if the suit is successful, and guess where the money is coming from: your taxes.

* LISTEN. THE TICKET PAYMENTS SHOULD BE REIMBURSED ALONG WITH INTEREST AND A LETTER OF APOLOGY AND THE HIGH RANKING FHP OFFICERS WHO ALLOWED THIS ILLEGAL ACTIVITY TO TRANSPIRE SHOULD BE FIRED. PERIOD.

August 27, 2011 at 11:16 AM
William R. Barker said...

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111903596904576516291342561886.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEADTop

Hurricane Irene is sparing Florida as it heads up the U.S. East Coast this weekend, but that doesn't mean the danger is over for the Sunshine State or taxpayers across the country. Florida still faces a fiscal hurricane that is going to hit the state's catastrophic insurance funds when the next big wind blows, and all Americans may end up paying.

(That's the alarm raised last week from none other than Jack Nicholson, chief operating officer of Florida's state-run reinsurer, in an interview with Best's Insurance News. "We would like to be able to say to the legislature that we can pay 100% of our losses, regardless of what happens. Right now, we can't honestly say that we can," he said.)

* FOLKS... (*SIGH*)... IN THE REAL WORLD... (*PAUSE*)... THE MATH MATTERS.

Mr. Nicholson manages the Florida Hurricane Catastrophe Fund, a tax-exempt trust created in 1993 to provide extra reinsurance to private insurers in the hurricane-prone state. The "Cat Fund," as it's known, is funded by premiums charged to insurance companies, by investment earnings, and by the ability to issue bonds after a storm and to tax insurers to pay for them. The fund was supposed to be a safety net, not a reinsurer of first resort.

* FRANKLY... AFTER READING THAT PARAGRAPH... I'M FLUMMOXED AS TO HOW THE STATE CAN CONSTITUTIONALLY FORCE PRIVATE BUSINESS TO PAY FOR THIS FUND.

The CAT Fund became the latter [the reinsurer of first resort] in 2007, when then-Governor Charlie Crist raised the reinsurer's coverage caps.

* F--KING CRIST... (*GRITTING MY TEETH*)

The Cat Fund grew quickly thanks to its pricing advantage and a mandate that all property and casualty companies in Florida - including state-backed Citizens Property Insurance Corp. - purchase reinsurance from it. Citizens is an especially large client because its rates are also set by law below those of private competitors.

(*HUGE MIGRAINE HEADACHE COMING ON*) (*JUST SHAKING MY ACHING HEAD*)

What this means is that this hurricane season the Cat Fund estimates it has $18.6 billion in liabilities but only $7.3 billion in liquid assets, leaving an $11.3 billion financing gap.

* FOLKS... IF A PRIVATE BUSINESS WERE TO TRY THIS SHIT... THE MANAGEMENT AND DIRECTORS WOULD BE FACING JAIL TIME!

The Sarasota Herald-Tribune recently analyzed nine insurance companies that cover two million Floridians and found that only one company could withstand a once-in-20-year storm if the Cat Fund only covers 90% of its claims, potentially leaving some 1.8 million without coverage.

* FOLKS... UNDERSTAND... THIS IS GOVERNMENT!

August 27, 2011 at 11:30 AM

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