Thank you! regards David Sent from my iPhone
On Aug 27, 2011, at 10:10 AM, howard posner <[email protected]> wrote: > On Aug 27, 2011, at 7:12 AM, Stephen Stubbs wrote: > >> Just another example of the Social Justice experiment still going on in USA. >> >> Basically, >> >> Corporations are Bad. >> Social Justice is Good. >> >> The last major Social Justice experiment made it all the way into the USA >> Constitution as the 18th Amendment, (the Prohibition Amendment making it >> very difficult to obtain alcoholic beverages legally) on January 17, 1920. >> >> It took the 21st Amendment on December 5, 1933 to repeal the 18th Amendment. >> >> I don't expect the irrational experiments being done by the current Attorney >> General of the USA (Eric Holder) to continue after the next President and >> Congress take office in January 2013. >> "The Other" Stephen Stubbs >> Champaign, IL > > > I hate to burst your bubble when you've obviously been saving up this little > Republican bumper sticker for the right moment to plaster it on the lute > list, but you got the subject wrong: this is about actions to enforce an > international treaty by the U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service (Interior > Department) and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Department of Homeland > Security). It's the second time in a couple of years that Gibson has been > raided on suspicion of using wood from protected species. > > It has nothing to do with the Attorney General, the Democratic Party, > corporations, or social justice (neither did Prohibition, which was an > attempt to enforce morality; social justice legislation would be something > like the 1964 Civil Rights Act, which is still in effect, even in rural > Illinois, regardless of whether it's considered untoward government > interference to tell a business that it can't exclude customers because of > their skin color). > > The documentation issue is a difficult one. On the one hand, draconian, > inflexible enforcement is unfair. On the other hand, if enforcement > authorities don't demand rigorous documentation it's far too easy to smuggle > illegal substances. This would defeat the purpose of environmental > protection treaties, which are understood to be important by everyone in the > world except members of the Republican Party in the USA. I have owned > pre-CITES instruments made of woods that have since been protected (my > charango made of elephant-tusk ivory, strung with Barbary Sheep gut, in an > rhinoceros-skin case lined with otter fur, comes to mind). In the course of > trying to sell a rosewood instrument a few months ago I made a point of > telling potential buyers there could be problems taking it across borders. A > couple of overseas buyers expressed interest and then disappeared; I don't > whether the CITES problems scared them away. Sometimes we are inconvenienced > by concerns (such as biod! iv! > ersity and deforestation) more important than our own little problems. > > Anyway, if you really needed to offer an off-topic political rant, you should > have saved it for a time when it was actually a propos of the subject. I'm > going back to my morning coffee. You enjoy your tea party. > > > > To get on or off this list see list information at > http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
