Posted on 06/09/2016 4:43:25 PM PDT by jazusamo
A North Carolina gun seller won a duel with his local bank, after the lender denied his web-based business its services, erroneously citing a controversial banking regulation, he told FoxNews.com Thursday.
For months, Luke Lichterman had tried to get his Hometrust Bank branch to process purchases, but officials told him a 2013 Department of Justice regulation dubbed “Operation Choke Point” barred them from serving a “risky” business, he said.
"When I asked the bank representative what other businesses are considered 'risky,' the first word out of his mouth was 'pornography,’” Lichterman, who is 75 and disabled from a serious car accident, told FoxNews.com. “I was both deeply offended and highly amused by that.”
Lichterman’s online store, http://www.huntinganddefense.com, takes digital payments, but without his bank’s help he would have been forced to used costly transaction services that would have taken a huge bite out of his already-thin profit margins, he said.
"I was aware of Operation Choke Point and that it was intended to make it impossible for people with a fraudulent business to do banking,” Lichterman said. “But I sell firearms, which is constitutionally protected, and am licensed by the federal government to sell firearms.”
Fortunately for Lichterman, after several discussions with bank officials, some negative publicity and pressure from Second Amendment advocacy groups, the bank reversed its position.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
But ‘they’ testified to Congress that “Choke Point” never happened.
In all fairness, I think the Republicans should *keep* operation choke point. Just change its targets. Imagine, for example, if banks were told to deny banking services to Planned Parenthood?
And how about to hundreds of leftist organizations that engage in a lot of mischief? The Southern Poverty Law Center? PETA? Greenpeace? etc.
If done fast enough and hard enough, it could cripple much of the antisocial leftist agenda in the US.
Sounds like a great idea to me, I love to leftists heads exploding.
And that’s why we have stupid laws.
Nice to see the bank’s neck was put into choke point :-)
Actually, it’s a way to get rid of stupid laws. Leftists are always happy to do unconstitutional, unconscionable things, as long as the victims are not leftists.
But when those laws are turned around and applied to leftists, they lose their marbles, while never mentioning that they were the ones who made the bad laws in the first place.
For a great start in equality before the law, let’s try “hate crimes”. Imagine how many black racialist’s heads would explode if they were charged with hate crimes for spouting off racial hatred at others?
“But...but...but...black people *can’t* be racists!!!”
Guess again.
And how about having the IRS go through all the leftist NGOs and churches with a fine toothed comb? This might even turn into a RICO charge against George Soros and Te-RAY-sa Heinz Kerry, along with a lot of leftist foundation boards of directors.
That’s one of the troubles with leftist organizations. They hate having paper trails. However, without them, the IRS can just savage you.
Conversely, conservatives should do leftists a big favor by scrubbing one of their “prison America” ideas. That is, make it very easy for Americans to renounce their citizenship, as long as another country offers citizenship to them. Unless there are red flags for outstanding warrants or ongoing criminal investigations, outstanding taxes or debts, or a few other things, they should be able to leave America within a month, taking most of their assets with them. Buh-bye.
Being miserable people, they will likely be just as miserable in their new country, but “no backsies”.
People are more than willing to have these laws on the books because they know that at least half of time “their side” is in power and will wield them like a cudgel against the “other side”. And we want that. Until they’re used agains us, then we whine and moan. There is no principle involved, it’s just human nature.
That’s not entirely correct. Democrats have long pushed such civil rights offenses; but Republicans have fought to stop them. This includes everything from segregation to corrupt voting practices, the FCC “fairness” rules that excluded conservatives, Lois Lerner’s IRS, etc., etc., even Harry Reid’s abusive use of the senate rules.
In the latter case, even before he was reelected, McConnell said that once again, when the Republicans control the senate, they will show the Democrats fairness that they have never shown to Republicans.
At some point, wanting to continue to play fair against someone who cheats at every opportunity gets tired. And while you have killed a particular cheat they used, they have still profited from it. So it is like telling a bank robber that they are no longer permitted to rob banks, but they can keep the money they have stolen. So the next day they rob jewelry stores.
So continuing to use “choke point” actually hits the “bank robbers” where it hurts. The legitimate businesses they have attacked are almost always fastidious with their books and behavior; but the equivalent Democrat businesses and NGO are rife with corruption, double dealing and tax evasion. So when the light is shined on them, the cockroaches flee.
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