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To: edwords; FreePaul; John H K; Mini-14
IT WAS NOT A SCAM!!!!!

Scam is, when you try to defraud people -- they identified themselves as being from the NRA and were soliciting donations FOR the NRA, they did NOT promise to give you anything in return. Scam is when they ask you to pay for something and they don't deliver.

At WORST it was a SLIGHT MISTAKE, and it wasn't much, if any of that either, and I question Mini14-s agenda. Just READ his statements.

Let's take the first statement Mini14 ALLEGES the NRA caller made:

"The President of the NRA, has written a book titled Shooting Straight: Telling the Truth About Guns in America, which the telemarketer alleged has been blacklisted by booksellers and the media."

There is absolutely NO evidence, that the above statement is not 100% correct, yet Mini14, feels the need to add "telemarketer alleged". Mini14 also offers NO evidence, nor any further discussion as to why he disputes this statement.

Mini14 further ALLEGES, that the NRA caller said:

"The NRA is working with the "National Library Association" to get the book into libraries."

Since it was a call, not mail, the NRA may have been referring to "the national library association" with SMALL letters, not caps, which would be referring to the American Library Association, see my post 11.

Then Mini14 makes the statement:

"I responded by telling him that my experience with libraries is that they never agree to accept to donated materials, and that they only agree to consider a donation."

I posted the official policy, see my post 14, which DIRECTLY contradicted Mini14's statement -- then he proceeded to claim that he didn't say what he said.

"never agree to accept to donated materials" is NOT the same as "Most public libraries in the United States accept gift books with the proviso that the library is free to decide whether to keep the book in the library's collection, put it in a book sale to raise funds for the library, or discard it." (from source in my post 14, which was the American Library Association). Mini14 said they NEVER accept book donations, the policy says they DO, IN FACT ACCEPT BOOK DONATIONS, they just want to be free to keep them or not.

What we have is Mini14 either deliberately being incorrect, or vastly overreacting, and it seems that others are more than happy to jump on the bandwagon to attack the NRA.

34 posted on 02/28/2004 11:05:18 AM PST by FairOpinion ("America will never seek a permission slip to defend the security of our country." --- G. W. Bush)
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To: FairOpinion
Scam is, when you try to defraud people -- they identified themselves as being from the NRA and were soliciting donations FOR the NRA, they did NOT promise to give you anything in return. Scam is when they ask you to pay for something and they don't deliver.

Yes it was a scam.  The implied expectation of the telemarketer was that the book would end up on the library shelf.  Donated books RARELY end up in the circulation collection of the public library.  Most of them end up in book sales.

At WORST it was a SLIGHT MISTAKE, and it wasn't much, if any of that either, and I question Mini14-s agenda. Just READ his statements.

There is absolutely NO evidence, that the above statement is not 100% correct, yet Mini14, feels the need to add "telemarketer alleged". Mini14 also offers NO evidence, nor any further discussion as to why he disputes this statement.

Booksellers do no "blacklist" books.  Booksellers sell books that they think they can resell.  Amazon resells this book.  The media cannot "blacklist" books because the media does not sell books.

Since it was a call, not mail, the NRA may have been referring to "the national library association" with SMALL letters, not caps, which would be referring to the American Library Association, see my post 11.

I asked the telemarketer to identify the location of the "National Library Association's" headquarters.  The supervisor admitted that no such organization existed.  If the NRA had said "the American Library Association  which is located in Chicago", the NRA would have run into a lawsuit from ALA.  

Should I contact ALA and let them know about this?

"I responded by telling him that my experience with libraries is that they never agree to accept to donated materials, and that they only agree to consider a donation."  I posted the official policy, see my post 14, which DIRECTLY contradicted Mini14's statement -- then he proceeded to claim that he didn't say what he said.

You chopped off half of my quote.

"never agree to accept to donated materials" is NOT the same as "Most public libraries in the United States accept gift books with the proviso that the library is free to decide whether to keep the book in the library's collection, put it in a book sale to raise funds for the library, or discard it." (from source in my post 14, which was the American Library Association). Mini14 said they NEVER accept book donations, the policy says they DO, IN FACT ACCEPT BOOK DONATIONS, they just want to be free to keep them or not.

  1. You are quoting from ALA, not your local public library's official policy statement. 
  2. When patrons offered to donate books to my library I made them sign a consent form that acknowledged the books would not necessarily be added to the collection.  You apply a different meaning to the word "accept" than the meaning that donors use.  If a donor requests a library to "accept" a book, the donor means "add the library to the collection".  You mean "take physical delivery".  Donors generally assume that if a library takes physical delivery of the book, that the book will be circulated to the public. 

36 posted on 02/28/2004 11:22:39 AM PST by Mini-14
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To: FairOpinion
There is absolutely NO evidence, that the above statement is not 100% correct, yet Mini14, feels the need to add "telemarketer alleged". Mini14 also offers NO evidence, nor any further discussion as to why he disputes this statement.

The fact that you can buy it on Amazon would seem to be prima facia evidence that it has not been "blacklisted by booksellers" You can also get it on Barnes and Nobel, thebookserve.com, in addition to Amazon and A bunch of other places

42 posted on 02/28/2004 12:36:13 PM PST by El Gato (Federal Judges can twist the Constitution into anything.. Or so they think.)
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To: FairOpinion
Trust, but VERIFY. That's what Mini did and you are jumping on him for it!

I'm the guy who doesn't trust the NRA, jump on me.
49 posted on 02/28/2004 1:48:37 PM PST by B4Ranch (Nobody can make you feel inferior without your consent.--Eleanor Roosevelt)
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To: FairOpinion
A scam is someone asking for a $45.00 donation for a $19.57 book which may be donated to a library. If the telephone exchange was accurately described this may be closer to fraud than scam. Unless there is something very unusual about this scam the telemarketer is going to get most of the money "donated" to whatever cause. If an organization lends themselves to this kind of operation then they are part of the scam. My first thought would have been that this was not connected to the NRA and I would have called them to find out. If they were involved I would have told them what I thought of their scam.

Before we started monitoring our calls we were regularly solicited by telemarketers representing police agencies, alleged charitible organizations and others. These were scams where the telemarketer kept ninety percent or more of the gross revenue. In some cases the agency lending their name to these scams got nothing.

51 posted on 02/28/2004 3:22:00 PM PST by FreePaul
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To: FairOpinion
Yeah, well, one of my definitions of a scam is receiving an unsolicited video and then letters demanding payment. I belong to numerous trade groups, hobby groups and so on, but the NRA is the only one to pull a stunt like that on me. Shame on them for abusing members who simply want their voices heard on an important issue.
52 posted on 02/28/2004 4:01:10 PM PST by edwords
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