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The first time Peter Green died was one night in 1969, in San Francisco. Or possibly New York. Or Los Angeles or Miami or Chicago. Peter could never remember which. He had died a hundred times since, and after a while, all the deaths blurred together. Behind that first death lay 22 years of life, most of it spent as Peter Greenbaum, an obscure lad from Bethnal Green in the east end of London. Aside from jellied eels, rhyming slang, and Jack the Ripper's crime spree 80 years earlier, Bethnal Green wasn't known for much. Nothing in particular augured the...

TITLE: BLM law enforcement director and Dan Love mentor, William Woody, ousted in wake of numerous allegations Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Office of Law Enforcement Services (OLES) director William Woody seems to have followed a path similar to that of his corrupt protege, Dan Love. Woody has been under investigation for numerous apparent abuses of power and mishandling of government funds since the time he retook the position in 2017. According to our source, on Thursday, June 13, Director Woody’s gun and badge were stripped from him and he was escorted out of the Department of the Interior headquarters...

Just decided to restart a thread i made maybe 10 years ago.....Nothing is off limits....gear, favorite players, techniques, amps, effects...you name it, we can all discuss it. I own numerous amps...SS and Tube Eventide effects, Hardwire and Line6.. I am mostly a Fender Telecaster guy but have a jazz box and various other. Carry on!

“Henry. A SWAT team from Homeland Security just raided our factory!” “What? This must be a joke.” “No this is really serious. We got guys with guns, they put all our people out in the parking lot and won’t let us go into the plant.” “Whoa.” “What is happening?” asks Gibson Guitar CEO Henry Juszkiewicz when he arrives at his Nashville factory to question the officers. “We can’t tell you.” “What are you talking about, you can’t tell me, you can’t just come in and …” “We have a warrant!” Well, lemme see the warrant.” “We can’t show that to...

In 2011, the Department of Justice raided Gibson Guitar facilities in Memphis and Nashville, alleging a violation of the so-called Lacey Act, a law that bans the importation of certain kinds of wildlife, plants and wood. At the time of the raid, Gibson Guitars CEO Henry Juszkiewicz told Hugh Hewitt on his radio show that the feds confiscated tonewood imported from India for the guitar Gibson manufacturers which would result in a cost of $2 to $3 million for his company. At a great expense in legal fees and time, Juszkiewicz fought the federal government tooth and nail. But in...

Federal investigators raided the offices of Lumber Liquidators on Thursday, the company and authorities said. Stocks of the hardwood flooring retailer fell sharply on Friday as the news emerged, dropping just over 10% at midday. No arrests were made and the search warrants remain sealed, said Brandon Montgomery, a spokesman for the Department of Homeland Security. He said the search involved special agents from the Immigrations and Customs Enforcement, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the Department of Justice. Lumber Liquidators (LL) suggested the investigation involved its importation of wood products, which come from "approximately 110 domestic and international mills...

Although details were initially sketchy, Lumber Liquidators' (LL) stock price plunged as much as 10% early Friday after a reported raid by federal investigators on its headquarters related to a probe of illegal imports. In a statement, the top flooring retailer with more than 300 stores nationwide, said it would provide to investigators information and documents related to the import of certain products. The Department of Homeland Security, along with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and Department of Justice conducted the raid, acting under a sealed court-issued warrant.

The highly publicized 2011 raid by FBI agents of a plant owned by Gibson Guitar is beginning to look more and more like another outgrowth of the Obama administration’s crackdown on citizens considered to be political “enemies.” By now it is well known that the Obama IRS has been persecuting individuals affiliated with the Tea Party and even religious organizations through audits, federal agency investigations and the denial of the right to form non-profit groups. The Obama Justice Department, too, has engaged in unprecedented seizing of communication records of journalists, including Fox News’s James Rosen, whom the administration has threatened...

An editorial at Investors Business Daily may wind up being filed under how did I miss this one? Following the recent revelations of cases where the administration appears to have used the muscle of the federal government to go after its political enemies, IBD takes a walk down memory lane to the strange case of Gibson Guitars and the federal raids on their facilities for alleged illegal importing of exotic woods used in their products. They reach one provocative conclusion. The inexplicable raid nearly two years ago on a guitar maker for using allegedly illegal wood that its competitors also...

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...

Even mainstream media outlets are running story upon story about President Barack Obama's possible ties to the government grabbing a wire service's phone records and the IRS bullying conservative groups. Those who have been paying attention to the New Media shouldn't be surprised by these headlines. In fact, here are two examples where the Obama administration appeared to use an ideological cudgel to bash both conservatives and free market principles. On Aug. 24, 2011, the Department of Justice sent armed agents into the Gibson Guitar factor in Memphis "confiscating half a million dollars worth of guitar making material is an...

On Thursday, the iconic Gibson Guitar Corporation issued a press release stating that government officials raided their Tennessee manufacturing facility over warrants concerning the legality of the importation of wood purchased from India that they use in their world famous guitars. The wood–which is certified and regulated by the Forest Stewardship Council–is not illegal, but rather subject to a domestic law in India frowns upon the processing of this wood by non-Indians. (Gibson uses American labor for the processing.) Gibson’s press release claims that, while this incident marks the second raid of their facility in around two years, this is...

Gibson Guitar Corp. agreed to settle charges that it illegally purchased and imported ebony wood from Madagascar and rosewood and ebony from India, the Justice Department said today. The company will pay a $300,000 fine under a criminal enforcement agreement that defers prosecution for criminal violations of the Lacey Act. Another $50,000 fine will go to the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation “to be used to promote the conservation, identification and propagation of protected tree species used in the musical instrument industry and the forests where those species are found.” Since May 2008, it has been illegal under the Lacey...

Focus Act testimony of Rand Paul on the Gibson Guitar raid.

t was seven months ago that federal agents with guns drawn raided the Gibson guitar factories in Nashville and Memphis. A half million dollars worth of Indian rosewood and ebony was seized under the premise that it had been imported illegally. The feds also took a number of guitars and computer hard drives. The factory was shut down for the day and employees told to go home. Yet after all this time, the Department of Justice has shown no sign that it will file criminal charges against Gibson. What’s more – it has been almost 3 years since federal agents...

A leading congressional Republican is investigating whether the National Park Service (NPS) committed “scientific misconduct” in its effort to shut down a century-old oyster farm over claims that it threatens the local seal population. Rep. Darrell Issa (R.-Calif.), chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, is demanding that the Interior Department turn over certain documents to his panel to determine whether faulty information will close the Drakes Bay Oyster Company (DBOC), which operates in California’s Point Reyes National Seashore. “It has come to my attention that scientific misconduct by National Park Service personnel may be jeopardizing the right...

What: A Rally and Free Concert to show our support for Gibson Guitar When: Saturday Oct 8 2-4PM Where: Parking Lot of the Scoreboard Restaurant, Nashville (See website for MAP) Website: http://GibsonRally.com Why: Federal agents raided two Gibson factories in August and confiscated part of the production inventory of this 100 year old American Manufacturer and Employer. This abuse of federal power must not go unanswered. We, the citizenswho grant government its power and authority, MUST act to hold government accountable when that power is abused. Please join us on Oct 8 in Nashville and Stand with Gibson.

Federal prosecutors are proving themselves too highly strung. With military precision, the federal officers surrounded the building, donned flak jackets and helmets, readied their weapons, burst in, and forced terrified employees out at gunpoint. Officers ransacked the facility, seizing computers, papers, and materials. It was the second raid in three years by the Fish and Wildlife Service on Gibson, maker of the famous Les Paul guitar. The situation would be laughable, if the consequences for Gibson weren’t so dire. The law that Gibson allegedly violated is the Lacey Act, which bars importation of wildlife or plants if it breaks the...

On the mantle above my fireplace there sits an old picture of my grandfather, Joe Dee Adams, Sr. The picture was taken some time during the Great Depression when he was a professional musician. It was actually his promo picture for the radio show he hosted on WSGN in Birmingham, Alabama. In it, he is holding an old Gibson acoustic guitar. No one in our family has any idea what happened to that old guitar. It was lost along with his purple heart from World War I some time before he passed away in the fall of 1978. His death...

Gibson Guitar Henry Juszkiewicz was invited to Obama’s speech to Congress tonight. (TPM) Gibson Guitar Corp. CEO Henry Juszkiewicz slammed “big liberal” Obama after his partisan speech to Congress tonight. The Corner reported: Henry Juszkiewicz, the chief executive officer of Gibson Guitar Corp., tells National Review Online that President Obama, a “big liberal,” has done “untold damage to business” and should not be applauded for his jobs speech. ”He’s a government fan,” he says. “He has a problem with successful businesses. He thinks they’re the problem, that they shouldn’t be quite as successful.” “He is using the levers of government...