Newt's newsletter about the Gibson Guitar raid

(All the news the last few days pushed this back.)

Out of Tune and Out of Touch:

When I first read last week about dozens of federal agents descending on an admired American business with automatic weapons drawn, I thought the story was bizarre.

When I learned that what prompted this attack was the Justice Department’s interpretation of an Indian law, in a way that even India doesn’t interpret it, I could hardly believe it was true.

The government’s actions are so outside normal behavior, so lacking in common sense and such an outrage against the freedom of every American that it sounds like a scene from a dystopian novel.

...

Gibson Guitar makes very high quality guitars and attracts customers and tourists from all over the world.

Amazingly, this was the second assault on this small business. In 2009, federal agents seized six guitars, which they have not returned despite filing no charges in the investigation.

It is so bizarre it bears repeating. In 2009, armed federal agents seized six guitars.

...

The U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service apparently believes Gibson made inappropriate use of foreign wood under a 1900 law designed to ban materials illegally exported from other countries.

Gibson Guitar maintains it has papers from Madagascar in 2009 and India in 2011 proving the wood from both countries is legal, but hasn’t been given the opportunity to defend itself in court since the government has filed no charges.

There were apparently 26 armed federal agents assaulting Gibson Guitar in pursuit of endangered wood.

The Obama administration could use 26 armed agents to 1) help control the border; 2) fight drug cartels; or 3) hunt down terrorists.

But given the hard left bias of President Obama and his appointees, endangered wood from India was a higher priority.

...

Gibson Guitar’s CEO Henry Juszkiewicz has said that federal agents actually told Gibson its problems would go away if the company just moved its operations to Madagascar.

This is beyond ideology.

It is insanity.

Congress should investigate these bizarre events and the Obama appointees responsible for the abuse should lose their jobs.

Here is the local story about the government attack: Federal agents close Gibson Guitar plant in Memphis in search for ebony.

Between the National Labor Relations Board harassing Boeing about moving to Charleston, South Carolina -- but being perfectly okay if they moved to Beijing -- and now federal agents telling Gibson their problems would be over if they moved to a foreign country, is there any doubt why we have so many unemployed and underemployed?

Newt, it needs to be said, was the first to bring up the NLRB abuse at the CNN debate and the first to bring up the Gibson case at Monday's Palmetto Freedom Forum.

That is Leadership Now.