yep: untrustworthy behavior by one of low character...
it is one thing to conduct friendly banter here. it is quite another thing to spread slanderous, libelous rumors that could affect ones livelihood...
an back: here is your recent post up in the regular forum that prompted me respect you enough to send you a private message regarding your potentially libelous posts here:
I'm not sure "one of Ed's best customers" and "long term investment firearms portfolio" really go together.
I've looked at lots of your ads over the years Ed, and forgetting all the issues that get raised here about the quality of restoration work that may have been done, even a relative newbie like me knows you aren't in the investment grade collectible business. At least not with shotguns.
_________________________
The world cries out for such:he is needed, & needed badly- the man who can carry a message to Garcia
that sounds libelous to me...enough is enough, already...fair warning has been given.
Ed, of all the things I have said recently, I am most surprised you took offense to this. ( That's not true. I would have been more surprised if you took offense to my post in your Christmas video thread.) Mostly because I wasn't trying to denigrate the quality of firearms I have seen listed by you. I was making an observation of what category the shotguns I had seen, listed by you, would fall into.
In any market there are sellers that offer similar wares that are differentiated by quality and price. Think Honda and Mercedes. Both are well respected car companies but everyone knows they cater to different markets.
I tend to think of the offerings I have seen from you as fitting the Honda end of the market, not the Mercedes end of the market. And when anyone references "long term investment firearms portfolio" I think we are talking about high condition and high grade American collectibles as well as some of the better London and Continental names. While a few of these guns may have passed through your hands, it has been my observation that these are not your bread and butter offerings.
Admittedly I don't regularly scour the American auction sites you frequently list on. At least not as much as I did a few years ago. So maybe I have missed your high end stuff. But I did see recently you had a trader rating (100% BTW) of around 550. So obviously through that site you've moved a good number of guns over the years. I have seen maybe 30 or 40 listed by you. They typically are what I would call medium to lower original quality (Fox A grades or Sterlingworths etc.) and are selling in the $500 to $3500 range. In fact, they seem to be just the group of guns and price range I am typically looking at purchasing for myself.
And you may remember reading I specifically said I was making no reference whatsoever to the always contentious subject here of restoration work your gunsmith ol' Ed Landers has performed.
I am in no way backing off my earlier comments and if you feel they are deserving of legal action, have at it. But I don't like being misunderstood. The comments you referenced were in no way intended as a slight, they were an attempt to categorize the shotguns I have seen you offer. Not Barney's or Sak's, more like Sears, Penny and Target.
If you took it as a slight, then I unequivocally apologize because that time, I did not mean it to be.
I also appreciate you finally being direct with me about what you found offensive. I don't like vague or hazy.
James
