Berg Sportswear raided by government agents

Samadams - I have edited your threadline, to replace the word "thugs" with the word "agents."

Please see your PM's, and thank you.

I'm willing to bet that nothing they may be charged with was a crime 90 years ago. Sounds like overkill deluxe, per usual. Hope we don't lose this fine Maine business!

I live about 11 miles away from there and go by it all the time. He has an elaborate set of old henhouses all connected by runways and so on, with storage trailers around. Kind of a messy looking place. I met him years ago when he first started and was peddling tee shirts out of the back of his car. When we worked at the Airline Snack Bar in Beddington he used to come by delivering stuff there on occasion.

I think he has built up a pretty good business with all the touristy places in Maine handling his stuff.

From the names of the various agencies involved it sounds like illegal immigrant labor and maybe problems with the tax man. On second thought, if he has illegals employed there he is automatically in trouble with the tax man as he is not paying witholding or unemployment on "illegals".

If he has illegal labor employed there then he has no sympathy from my house. An employer hiring illegals is stealing jobs from Americans and those who are here legally.

The only way they will ever stop it is to stop the guys that hire them.

But all this may be premature as I am making assumptions. Let's wait a bit and see what the charges are.

I am glad these guys are not after me as they can put you away for a long time if they want you bad enough.

WC

woodcanoe, I'm sorry too to see this happen to this local business, but with all these agencies involved it sounds serioius. The Bergs have been doing business in central Maine for years, from earlier (and some colorful) days in the Brownville/Milo area. I'd hate to see jobs lost from this.

I'm not positive but I think that this is the outfit that makes up special T-shirts for WRKO's Howie Carr, a popular New England conservative talk show host.

Yeah; we'd better watch our rhetoric here, or else a group of heavily armed public servants will be rummaging around in AMG's stuff. Insensitive posters might even come up among the missing.
We live in such interesting times...

I'm not positive but I think that this is the outfit that makes up special T-shirts for WRKO's Howie Carr

Uncle Jacque, you're right. One and the same company.

Posted in the comments on BDN by "borninmaine": "I got busted by the FBI, DEA, and Homeland Security and all I got was this lousy t-shirt."

Sam

Thanks for posting this raid because it reminded me that it was time to pay the quarterly taxes due the fed and state, just in time.

The fact that there are two IRS-CID agents at the door supervising the loading of what appears to be a filing cabinet is evidence that there is an Audit going on.

Terror in Corinna.

Homeland Security, drug agents mum about search of Corinna business
1/13/11 01:25 pm Updated: 1/14/11 11:00 am
By Christopher Cousins
BDN Staff

CORINNA, Maine — Authorities were tight-lipped Thursday about why numerous state and federal agents appeared to be searching a Corinna business and removing a large amount of material from the building.

... Berg Sportswear on Route 7 in Corinna, was the scene of considerable activity for much of the day Thursday as officers wearing insignia from numerous agencies shuffled into and out of the building.

Source

An employer hiring illegals is stealing jobs from Americans and those who are here legally.

Dear Woodcanoe - I find your posts extremely well written and thought provoking, but stealing jobs IN DEXTER?

Half the town is on some form of welfare. I doubt if you could hire a teenager there to rob your house for $10 an hour - at least not on the books. There are scores of strapping teenaged males in the Dexter area on food stamps, so they can divert their important cash reserves to priority items like wine coolers and cigs.

IF Berg tried (and you can bet he did - IF this is what happened) to depend on local labor to fill his expanding orders, and found he couldn't do it, he had 3 choices: a) move the business to a non welfare distorted southern state or: b) refuse new orders, or: c) go outside the recently enacted regulations to use imported, non welfare subsidized labor.

Roxanne Quimby chose (a). She is worth hundreds of millions now, and Maine is poorer. Bad menu of choices all around.

Dear Thrasybulus - I find your posts extremely well written and thought provoking, but the idea that unemployed Mainers will not take $10/hr jobs and thus illegals must be available for labor is bogus.

Dear Thrasybulus - I find your posts extremely well written and thought provoking, but the idea that unemployed Mainers will not take $10/hr jobs and thus illegals must be available for labor is bogus.

You don't know what your talking about and need to get out in the REAL world...I PERSONALLY know for a FACT that there are several good paying jobs with benefits that are unfilled right at this moment..They can't even get people to apply and the FEW who have applied failed the drug test...As long as you can collect unemployment indefinitly and welfare is just thrown around with NO accountability those jobs will continue to be open...

Earl, I am just wondering, what do consider a good wage?

Well PM me with those jobs Earl, my 24 year old college educated son is looking and willing.

Earl, I am just wondering, what do consider a good wage?

8 to 10 to START...Mike , tell your boy to apply at Walmart..It may be beneath him but it is a survival job and might get him out of the basement and off the Playstation and who knows who he might meet once he is out and about meeting people...Most jobs aren't advertised and you only hear of them by word of mouth.....Though IF he had been really looking he might have landed the Assistant Manager job that was just filled from a transplant from Hannaford...Maybe they need a new Assistant Manager there now...LOL.......What is his degree in ??? Business Managment??? A college education in and of itself is meaningless unless it is something usefull to a particular business...A Liberal Arts or History degree isn't worth much in the business world ...

4 years UMO Bachelor of Science Biology major, he doesn't live with me.

He has applied to Walmart, is that done on a store by store application, or can you apply statewide?

Has Howie mentioned this on his show? He seems to spend a lot of time talking about illegal aliens and he does a fair job of promoting this particular business.

Howie hasn't been around since the raid. Even if he was, I am sure he is limited on what he could say.

If Berg hired illegals that would be a embarrassment for Howie and I think would/should end his connection with Berg. Same true if drugs were involved. The IRS might be a different story. I don't understand why so many different federal and state agencies were involved.

charlie

Store by store Mike..I was talking about Rockland...Good major...Nothing in the medical field ??? I thought that was the only growing sector with Maine being the oldest state...Maybe once Maine starts paying them they will start hiring...Good Luck...

I don't want to derail this discussion, but I'm keenly interested in the employment situation right now. I worked for Stinson Seafood, and we all know what happened there. I worked for Lockheed-Martin until the Navy's own budget crisis eliminated that job.

Is there a thread somewhere that would be more appropriate to a discussion on job availability?

Given the huge mass of laws and regulations I suspect that 90% of Maine's businesses are vulnerable to investigation. We will never know why Berg was singled out. Guilty or innocent, the business will be damaged and damaged without reference to judge of jury. The damage is inflicted by administrative decision and that alone.

THRASYBULUS knows something about the labor (and welfare) market in the area. If it turns out that Berg has hired illegal aliens it will be relevant to discover what they were being paid per hour. This will have decisive bearing on Thrasybulus's argument. At this point we have NO grounds for the a priori assumptions made here.

Does anyone find it interesting that Berg makes teeshirts that ridicule Obama and the Democrats--and he gets raided by the government?

VikingStar. Given the number of choices available for investigation, the selection made raises questions in my mind. But these questions will never be answered.

Earl,

You were asked to divulge these good-paying jobs with benefits that you said cannot be filled. You then suggested the young man apply to WalMart. Are you seriously knowledgable of unfilled positions or was that an untruthful claim made to support your argument?

Many young people in Maine grow up poor and/or on the system. Through a combination of cultural forces, personal choices, and bad breaks (ie no connections who can help) they get discouraged and don't get educated and don't want to face the tough fight in this state to make an honest, good living. A lifetime of poverty is often the result. These are the guys that could start at WalMart and make a slow, positive change in their lives...but it is hard-its much easier to feel bad for oneself and take advantage of the system.

However, many people like myself and the young 24-yr old mentioned are in a good position with good families, good educations, and we know people but are not willing to stay in Maine if WalMart is the type of work we most likely will have to undertake for years.

You are muddling two different situations.

Further, you are inconsistent. When we debated LePage you claimed that resumes mean nothing. If that is the case than the young man's degree wouldn't matter. While liberal arts degrees are somewhat less useful, a degree is only part of the package that ultimately leads to a good job. Many businesses don't want kids who think they know everything about business and finance just because that was their major. Usually, they just want to see a 4-yr. degree.

Many business owners are self-starters and didn't get a degree before attempting their endeavors; they therefore want employees willing to learn how their business works. It is ironic that the kid's major was bio...wasn't that Lauren LePage's degree? Well I guess she is unqualified because she didn't get a degree in economics or government.

Earl,

Please tell us how the "REAL WORLD" works. While we all know that most jobs are filled via networking and recruiting not the classifieds, JobsInME, etc. wouldn't it stand to reason that these phantom jobs you know, which they can't fill because all the uneducated kids don't want them or failed drug tests would eventually go up on a public posting such as those mentioned above?

If they weren't posted in the first place did someone at this "business" you know try filling the jobs via "word-of-mouth" but only went after the kids who fail drug tests? This sounds very contradictory and suspect.

Why do you talk down to everyone? Why did you assume this guy's kid was on the couch and playing the playstation? You are confusing two groups of unemployed Mainers (as I mentioned above).

Now that I have destroyed your logic stop being mean and maybe help the guy and his good kid get a decent job. Your grandstanding, anger, preaching and insults have all been proven to rest upon faulty logic and just a frustration towards the world.

You don't even know who angers you anymore apparently.

Anyone hear anything new on this. I listen to Howie Carr when I'm on the road and he's on and I've not heard him mention anything, nor offer any free shirts from Berg Enterprises. He use to mention them daily.

charlie

Not a thing.

Look dipstick , number one you are responding to a post 2 weeks old between MikeG and myself that doesn't concern you..2 , IF you had read the post in which I was responding instead of shooting off your blowhole you would know that..So you don't have to look for it here it is..
Dear Thrasybulus - I find your posts extremely well written and thought provoking, but the idea that unemployed Mainers will not take $10/hr jobs and thus illegals must be available for labor is bogus.
The jobs WERE at Walmart but I guess your reading comprension isn't good. If you're gonna jump into a thread ATLEAST read the whole thing...Jesh...What a nit wit...
Now crawl back under your bridge...

Howie read a statement from Berg a few days ago.
It was carefully worded, said that they are open for business as usual
and that no charges have been filed or even hinted at.
Howie said that under the circumstances he was not going to try
a live interview.