U.S.A. –(Ammoland.com)- “Levi Strauss & Co. is stepping up our support for gun violence prevention,” CEO Chip Bergh stated in a Tuesday opinion piece for Fortune. “So today, on top of our previous actions, Levi Strauss & Co. is lending its support for gun violence prevention in three new areas.”
Those areas include:
- Establishing a “Safer Tomorrow Fund” to finance anti-gun “nonprofits and youth activists.”
- Partnering with Michael Bloomberg “to form Everytown Business Leaders for Gun Safety.”
- Matching employee contributions to gun-grab groups aligned with the fund and providing them with five hours per month paid time off to “volunteer … to include political activism.”
In other words, Levi Strauss intends to enable further Hogglike behavior, to lay down more Astroturf and to empower more “progressive” politicians to enact edicts further eviscerating the right to keep and bear arms.
“I’m not here to suggest we repeal the Second Amendment or to suggest that gun owners aren’t responsible,” Bergh weasel-worded. “In fact, as a former U.S. Army officer, I took a solemn oath to support and defend the Constitution of the United States. But as retired four-star general Michael Hayden once said, ‘There are some weapons out there that frankly nobody should have access to. And actually, there are some people out there who should never have access to any weapons.’”
Bergh is right on one count: there are people who can’t be trusted with a gun. Those people should be called “prisoners” or “inmates” after full due process has proven them ineligible to be trusted without a custodian.
As for the rest of his disingenuous prattle, he, Hayden and Gungrabby Gabby’s Benedict Arnold Brigade are spitting on that oath. The Founders intended a militia of the whole people to keep and bear “every terrible implement of the soldier,” and no amount of “progressive” rationalization (that is, lies) will ever change that demonstrable truth.
It’s hardly the first time Levi Strauss & Co. has shown its hostility to the Second Amendment. A couple years back this column detailed some of the ways it has disparaged gun owner rights and pushed a “progressive” agenda over time.
Bergh is evidently confident his bottom line won’t suffer despite Americans having plenty of other brands to choose from that are not working against their interests. Perhaps “expand[ing] into untapped markets including Russia, China and India,” prioritizing an increase in sales to women and ingratiating himself with “progressive” millennials has convinced Bergh that “heritage Americans” are expendable customers.
In any case, why any gun owner who values the right to keep and bear arms would patronize Levi Strauss is a fair question to ask. Why would anyone give aid and comfort to an enemy that has consistently gone out of its way to initiate hostilities, to alienate and to criminalize them?
We’ll see in coming months if Bergh’s strategy yields targeted profits, and likewise if other companies joining his Bloomberg business collaborators skate without repercussions. One other thing to watch: The mayor’s coalition became a joke with all the corrupt members that couldn’t seem to stay out of jail. It will be instructive keeping an eye on the “ Everytown Business Leaders” to see who among them will be first and then next to make the wrong kind of headlines.
About David Codrea:
David Codrea is the winner of multiple journalist awards for investigating / defending the RKBA and a long-time gun owner rights advocate who defiantly challenges the folly of citizen disarmament.
In addition to being a field editor/columnist at GUNS Magazine and associate editor for Oath Keepers, he blogs at “The War on Guns: Notes from the Resistance,” and posts on Twitter: @dcodrea and Facebook.