If the jackboot fits
Remember when National Rifle Association President Wayne LaPierre’s Godwin’s Law comment about “jackbooted government thugs” was the worst thing ever?
I think Wayne was quoting Dingell. Aside from that, read the whole bit on accusations of intimidation.
August 20th, 2009 at 1:47 pm
While Dingell caught plenty of flack about that comment, as far as I know the first to call BAT agents “jackbooted thugs” was Mississippi’s Congressman Bill Colmer. As I remember, that was the winter of 1972, while Colmer was Rules Committee chairman.
A rural 5th district barber kept loose change in an old wooden shotgun shell box. BAT heard of it, and raided the shop. They forced the nearly 80 YO barber to lie on the ground while they gutted the place, looking for something more incriminating than 1943 pennies. Which they did not find.
Colmer was, to say the least, incensed.
Stranger