The Department Of (In)Justice Goes After Guns In Further Capital Controls
29TuesdayApr 2014
Posted by Mary W. in 2nd Amendment
The US government is attempting every possible angle to ensure Americans don’t have access to guns. The latest is a new twist on capital controls being instituted by the Department of (In)Justice.
The DOJ is why financial institutions are refusing services to companies as diverse as gun shops, bitcoin businesses, marijuana dispensaries and even the porn industry.
Just last week a gun shop in Florida had an old bank account closed after their local bank was bought out by Wall Street interests.
The Miami News Times writes,
The Libertis’ battle with BankUnited began last month. For seven years, they say, they had no problem with the Miami Lakes-based bank. T.R. had run a gun store in the Garden State, and when he opened Top-Gun Firearms on Calle Ocho, BankUnited operated the account.
But when T.R. decided to retire and let Elizabeth take the store online — under the new name Discount Ammo-N-Guns — the Libertis found themselves suddenly under fire.
A March 12 letter mysteriously informed them that BankUnited was closing their checking account “pursuant to the terms and conditions listed in our Depositor’s Agreement.” It gave the Libertis three days to transfer their cash elsewhere. When the Libertis called BankUnited for an explanation, they were politely informed that none would be forthcoming.
“I was very angry,” Elizabeth says. “They were very inconsiderate. We had all our credit cards going through that bank. All of a sudden, we had to run and find another bank to keep our business going. We shut down for two weeks, and they wouldn’t even tell us why.”
This is normal operating procedure for banks in the United States, according to news of a secretive DOJ operation which broke last week in the Wall Street Journal and American Banker.
It is called Operation Choke Point. It appears as reports of credit card processors, banks, and lending institutions refusing to do business with any business that is legally buying and selling guns. Smaller financial institutions are unable to cater to these owners, under pressure of penalty by the DOJ.
Ironically, Bank of America has led the charge against the gun industry. General Electric Capital began cutting of lending to the gun industry around a year ago. Wells Fargo is being sued by a bank manager for being fired for bringing her gun to work in Tampa, Florida. In the card processing industry, a Visa-owned subsidiary cut off service to a gun shop.
US citizens soon won’t find anywhere to buy guns once this is over with. Forget regulations on what sorts of guns one can buy. Once you’re dead, unless you have a gun trust, which TDV has written about in its newsletter HomeGrown, your gun will end up with the State, and your descendents won’t have any option to buy guns since every gun shop owner will have been run out of business.
BITCOIN BUSINESS ARE TARGETS
Bitcoin businesses have had their accounts shutdown by major banking institutions merely for their involvement in bitcoin. Banks which at one time marketed themselves as bitcoin friendly had to go back on that sentiment, and shut down bitcoin accounts, such as what happened to the Internet Credit Union.
Our recommendation to gun owners and bitcoin advocates is to get together now to transact all firearms transactions in bitcoin before the US government shuts down all retail firearm firms bank accounts.
MARIJUANA BUSINESSES TOO
Marijuana businesses have also been targeted. These small businesses have been forced in Washington and Colorado to deal in cash, a much riskier and expensive form of handling money than credit or even cheque for a business like a marijuana dispensary.
This has created dangerous obstacles for workers and owners, who must transport the cash they’ve been forced to handle. Sure, they might be saving out on certain fees, but sometimes, if you’re handling enough money, cash is not perfect. That is why bitcoin makes much sense for this industry as well.
AND THE PORN INDUSTRY…
And yes, the US government is even going after the porn industry!
