[robfine]

Just my opinion but I saw nothing political in James’ posting. It was a vendor telling his customers (like me) that his prices will be going up and why. He did not take a position on whether tariffs are good or bad or how he otherwise feels about them. During the boom before the bust, China was buying up a huge amount of the world’s supply of copper to feed its construction boom which sent the price of copper soaring. If a manufacturer said its retail prices are going up because China was buying up so much of the US’s copper, that, by itself is not political. If they editorialized about China sucking up all of our copper that would be political. But just saying the prices are going up because of the China buying a lot of copper is not political. Just like my electrician letting me know when I was building my house (during that time period) why the wiring cost jumped 20%. (The electrician later did make some very political statements about it).

I am a long time buyer and owner of Bryston equipment (oldest, an original 3B. Newest, BDP-2). If Bryston prices go up an average of say 3% each year and this year, when I may be looking to buy again they go up 20%, I would want to know why and appreciate that they told me. James certainly could have made his statement political but in my opinion, he didn’t do that here.