According to the Washington Times, Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel is now resorting to a subtle form of extortion to force banks that loan money to gun manufacturers to change their way of doing business with the firearms manufacturers.
Excerpt:
In a letter to TD Bank and Bank of America on Thursday, Mr. Emanuel asked the CEOs to force gun manufacturers they do business with to “find common ground with the vast majority of Americans who support a military weapons and ammunition ban.”
TD Bank provides $60 million in credit to Smith & Wesson; Bank of America provides a $25 million line to Sturm, Ruger & Co.
Public officials and state governments forcing their political views on private businesses, to do the government’s bidding with respect to gun control, is not as farfetched as one might think.
Excerpt:
Mr. Emanuel can’t force the banks to comply, and so far, CEOs haven’t responded, the Boston Globe reports.
But the Chicago pol(itician) did just convince city officials to divest $5 billion in pension fund investments from companies that manufacture guns.
New York and California have stopped pension investments in companies that do business with the gun industry, according to reports.
What do you think about the latest authoritarian Democratic official’s technique of using their ends (gun control) to justify their means (extortion)? IMHO, this is but a first step in their absolute power corrupting absolutely.
On a related note:
25
Jan
GEICO cancels auto insurance because policy holder makes gun parts for a living!
This policy holder received a letter from GEICO cancelling his auto insurance. The letter says his auto insurance is being cancelled because he owns a company that manufactures parts for firearms!
http://topconservativenews.com/2013/01/geico-cancels-auto-insurance-because-policy-holder-makes-gun-parts-for-a-living/
It is funny, since Obama took office gun sales have soared and with it manufacturing jobs.
http://nssf.org/impact/ and I am sure there is also an impact on jobs is the sale and distribution chain.
So one of the few Private industry manufacturers that are seeing growth, Emanuel would like to eliminate.
I see it as there are two ways to slow the sales of arms, one is to put them all out of business Chicago style or for the President to sign a pledge or executive order that firearms will not be banned.
Wilson – I think Obama and Rahm may have finally figured out a way to stimulate the economy – just try to ban something and sales will soar.
A ban on so-called “assault weapons” would cost a lot of Illinois jobs.
See: http://newssun.suntimes.com/business/17553476-418/a-lake-barrington-gunmaker-is-overwhelmed-with-orders-for-now.html
It is ironic that the only way they can create jobs is by accident.
One of our neighbors to the North understands what is going on:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8TCx-sM1vw&feature=player_embedded
If there were no such things as separate pension funds for public unions and employees, there would be no ability for the politicins who benefit from them to hold others hostage to the investments. Time to change this built in extortion capability. And by the use of the word extotion I mean both the use of the funds to hold banks and companies hostage to the will of the politicians as well as the abilty of the public employess and unions to hold the taxpayer hostage to their demands. Time to get everyone on Social Security and 401k plans, not defined penson plans. Public employee and uniuons need to learn to live the same way their employers have to live.
If we didn’t have public sector unions, which were opposed by both FDR and George Meany, then we wouldn’t have this problem at all. There is far too much politically-incestuous behavior going on between public sector unions, and politicians (mostly Democrats).
Yah, I think there are rules in the Constitution that only Democrats can belong to public sector unions and Republicans can’t.