[ImJustAnotherOkie]

If I played guitar, I'd play only Gibson, and haul it around in my gunrack on Ford Pickup.

[Mercat]

Already posted twice. Go to the Gibson website and read the comments. Lots of useful idiots.

[rktman]

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/3118413/posts

[Rusty0604]

I love it!

[reg45]

Their competitors must have contributed big sums to 0bama.

[A_Former_Democrat]

I dreamed of those glossy Cherry Red Gibson’s pegged on the wall of the music stores as a kid

Maybe it’s time for me to finally buy a guitar

[Texas Eagle]

Ignore the this-has-already-been-posted Nazis.

Some of us aren't able to sit around all day and see every single thread that is posted.

Except for the Mods, that is.

As for the guitar, it can't be a government guitar. It looks like it works.

Oh. Wait. It LOOKS like it works. Now I get it.

[Lawgvr1955]

I don’t play guitar, but if they’d named the series “Obama Sucks” or something similar, I’d buy one.

[Mrs. Don-o]

So many people, even moreso than this Gibson manufacturer, have been ruined, just comprehensively and irrecoverably ruined, by the Obama Regulatory Extermination of Small Business policies.

Someday they will fight back. And won't be by ironically renaming their product.

[diverteach]

So I wonder if these government series guitars are heavy, too big, bloated, and complicated to work. If they have a milspec number they’ll cost 400 times more than an identical model without the milspec number.

[SJackson]

Middle East and terrorism, occasional political and Jewish issues Ping List. High Volume

If you’d like to be on or off, please FR mail me.

..................

[GBA]

Wahoo! I think I need one of those.

In 1994, my home was robbed and "they" decided they needed my late 70s wine red Les Paul Deluxe and a few more things more than I did. Unfortunately, I couldn't afford to replace it.

GuvCo did a similar thing when they raided Gibson a couple of times and confiscated their supply of ebony, forcing them to find something else to make their fretboards with.

So, on the last day of 2011, obama "forced" me to buy one of the last Gibson Les Paul Customs with an ebony fingerboard before they switched to Richlite.

I don't really need another guitar, but I sure do love my Les Paul and Gibson's attitude.

I might just have to have one of their "Government Series" guitars...as a matter of principle, doncha know.
(Rationalization is a handy thing to have when you're shopping for something you want but don't need.)

[Dubh_Ghlase]

Here's the new Gibson spokesman with the new Gibson Guitar!

[VR-21]

I'm no fan of Woodie Guthrie, but a graphic on them saying..."This Machine Kills Fascists" would be a plus.

[Colorado Doug]

he settled with the Department of Justice by agreeing to pay a penalty of $300,000 and a $50,000 community service payment to the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation.

So basically, all the money will get funneled into democrat, eco, wacko groups to further destroy our economy.

[Yardstick]

This thing has been hotly debated in the guitar forums and unfortunately the anti-Gibson side (invariably liberals) has come out on top, at least on the question of whether Gibson broke the law. It looks like Gibson did violate the Lacey Act and probably did so knowingly. The question of whether Gibson was targeted for political reasons is still out there, but without more solid evidence those who make the argument don’t have much to fire back with when they are dismissed as conspiracy theorists.

What’s funny is how arguing about Gibson is a direct proxy for arguing politics on musical instrument forums. After a big hot Gibson thread you pretty much know everyone’s politics.

[St_Thomas_Aquinas]

Saw the president of Gibson being interviewed on Fox today. He said a 30 member SWAT, in full battle dress, and armed with automatic weapons invaded his business.

This proves beyond a doubt that Holder a d Obama are capable of anything.

[left that other site]

I can only play ONE Les Paul at a time...but just DAy-yum! I want one o’ those! LOL!

[sauropod]

Even though I hate Les Pauls, I may just go ahead and get one of these...

[logi_cal869]

There's another thread on this. See here. My comment there:

Kudos to Gibson.
I hadn't been following this story as closely as I'd like. What I find shameful is that there was little action on the part of Tennessee Congressional Representatives in either defense of Gibson or to fix the Lacey Act. Lamar Alexander (R-TN) co-sponsored the Amendment to the Lacey Act in 2008 that included wood in its wording. Government agencies then interpreted this as a violation due to a clerical error on the part of the company that imported the wood for Gibson. The larger issues here, for me, are the outrageous government response to what has been coined a 'civil matter' and the fact that neither can I find any action on the part of Congress to fix the Lacey Act nor any action on the part of Tennessee Congressmen on the part of Gibson. Gibson may very well have been on both sides of the fence, politically (smart business), but the result seems to have left then out in the cold.
I wait with bated breath the outing of this Special Edition guitar on a nationally-televised musical event. (color me 'blue')

Seeing the additional posts and reading comments, I went back to dig a bit. I found the following:

Gibson Guitar Corp. Responds to Federal Raid

Gibson Les Paul Guitars With Less Ebony

Gibson Guitar Corporation admits to importing endangered wood

India import led to probe at 2 Tenn. Gibson Guitar plants

Gibson guitars set to miss Indian notes as raids in US and Europe on Gibson's facilities continue

Now The Gibson Guitar Raids Make SenseNow The Gibson Guitar Raids Make Sense 

In my opinion, I think it's clear that things are 'not clear'. I leave it to someone else with more time than I to wade through all the BS, but hold to my opinion above. There is also the apparently UNRESOLVED ISSUE of 'possession of endangered woods'; you all know what that means.

"Now there are 4,500 laws and hundreds of thousands of regulations that no one, not even a lawyer, not a judge, could possibly know. Furthermore, there is no central location or website that an average citizen can go to find out what the federal crimes are. And that matters when intent does not have to be proven to be convicted," Paul Larkin, senior legal research fellow at the Heritage Foundation, told Newsmax.

From here:

Last year, Blackburn and fellow U.S. Reps. Jim Cooper of Nashville, a Democrat, introduced legislation they said would protect people from charges for unknowingly possessing illegally imported wood, and would require the federal government to establish a database of forbidden wood sources.

Last October: US reps seek new law after raids at Gibson guitars

Officials with the U.S. Justice Department and the Interior Department in a letter to members of Congress last month said it is not a crime to "unknowingly possess" such instruments, and that prosecutors would target only "those who are removing protected species from the wild and making a profit by trafficking in them." Blackburn said the bill would make that approach the law. "We don't want individuals to have to depend on the language of that letter," she said.

Well, the only legislation 'I' can find at congress.gov is H.R.3280, and it's languishing in Committee...

[sauropod]

Well, the news is, that the guitars are sold out.

Yesterday an e-mail went out from Gibson to dealers telling them not to call for these, they don’t have any more. Any that are to be had are already in the pipeline to various stores.

I went looking yesterday. Personally visited a couple of stores and called 4 more. The last store i called told me that their company was getting 11 of them. I placed an order right then and there for an Explorer.

Just my little act of civil disobedience ;-)