Ray Ban Asks Rand Paul to Stop Using Their Sunglasses. He Responds on the Senate Floor.

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• I have to wear glasses to see what I am doing anyway so I could care less about sunglasses. It only costs about $30 bucks more to get the photo-grey built in so I am good. What surprises me what people are willing to pay for the things. A c note for a pair of sunglasses? No wonder so many Americans have trouble saving money.

  • I used to buy mine at Dollar Tree, for $10 I could last a year.
    Now, since I wear glasses all the time, I went to the eye center in Wal Mart and bought a $7 set of clip on flip ups. The soft cover on the metal spring arms that clip on the lens of my glasses get lost too easily, so I put heat shrink tubing on them and they don't scratch the lens.

    • The next time you get your prescription renewed ask your doc about getting photo grey lenses. They darken almost as soon as you walk out side and lighten almost as quick when you go in. They can also be made to get as dark as you want, although the darker the tint the less they lighten indoors.

      I have been using them for years and love it. I don't have to buy two pairs, one for indoors and night use, one for outside on a sunny day. And, like I said around here it only adds about $30 bucks to the cost of your glasses.

      • I get mine from the VA, they don't offer that option as far as I know.

        • I don't use the VA for glasses, I use local sources. For the pair I have now I went to Walmart for the exam, where I got a 10% discount for being a veteran. I took my prescription to a local optometrist to get my glasses made, with another discount for being a vet. Total cost was $180 bucks for the exam and glasses.

          Check around your local area, you may be able to find the same kind of deal. And don't knock Wallyworld, they have to be board certified optometrists like anyone in private practice.

        • I know that. My VA eye doctor moonlights at Wally World on the weekends!
          What I do have in my favor is that when I get my glasses from the VA, I get a copy of the prescription, so I can always take it somewhere else to get glasses made if I need to.

    • I found some at a store that are reading glasses on the bottom and regular sunglasses on the top, they are split about 60/40, works great. Since I am slowly transforming into an old fart, my arms are too short to read fine print...

      • Hahahaha....Believe me buddy, it gets worse as you get older. I now have lenses the size of a quart jar bottom so they can be split three ways. Trifocals suck, you never know what position your head is supposed to be in so you can see what you are looking at. Right now I'm looking at the wall across the room so I can see through the bottom part of my glasses, so I can read the small print on the 'puter screen.

        • I have bifocals, if I need trifocals, I'll consider laser surgery.

        • I had laser surgery years ago, but it can't help when you need reading glasses....Old age wins damnit....

        • Crap.

• Sunglasses. I had to scrounge around but I finally found the case with my Serengeti sunglasses. I need to put them back in the car. I think it's only the second pair of sunglasses I have ever owned. I still have the first pair. Blue mirrored wire rimmed ovals that I bought at a Katz drug store in Memphis when "Cool Hand Luke" was a big hit. They are too flashy for me now - but I keep them in a safe place.

• Oakleys are a good product but way overpriced. I used to like ten buck supermarket glasses, but decided to buy a decent pair or two and bought Onos. Good glasses with a good warranty and good customer service. I refuse to spend over $100 for good sunglasses.

• Dont own any... i guess wont be owning any... meh...

  • Kimmy

    They are over rated. I prefer Oakley but thats my opinion and we all know what is said about opinions. :)

    • I wore them for quite a while through the 80s when I wore contact lenses, and they were pretty much the standard. Right now I have a pair of Gargoyle Classics -- best known as what Ahhhhnold wore as "The Terminator."

      • Yes, Raybans are over priced, and functionally no better than the ten dollar Panama Jacks I get at WalMart. But Oakleys are pretty much the same, and made by the same company. Nothing special other than the name and the price.

    • I prefer the Four Ninety Fivers at Walgreens. I can't see much difference in any of them, at least looking through them.

• Have to agree with Psycho Dad. Ray Ban has a right to protect their property. I do wonder if hildabeast were doing the same, would Ray Ban have asked her to do the same.

  Hell it looks like dingy harry may be wearing some of their products as well. Ever since he "fell".

  • Fell -- off a brass rail, I keep quipping. But that IS a good point you raise, would they ask others to refrain from diluting their trademark the same way.

  • I'm not a lawyer. If I was I would argue that the sunglasses were RonPaul's sun glasses when he paid for them and if he want's to sign them and sell them that's his business - Not Ray Ban's. They will both make more money the more they bitch at each other... and the world will not stop turning.

• Again the headline is somewhat misleading. Paul was selling personally autographed Raybans on his site. THAT is what they asked him to stop doing, NOT simply wearing them.

  I can see that any company might be a bit protective of their product being altered and sold commercially - copyright/trademark infringement 'n' stuff. But that's me going lawyer on y'all again.

  • I don't think so. He bought them if he wants to put his name on them and sell them I'd say TS to Bausch & Lomb.

    Does B & L require you to sign a contract when you buy sunglasses from them that says you can't modify them? No.

    • No, you can modify them all you want. =Reselling= them that way is a different issue. Now, whether Ray Ban is objecting as a political statement is different, and whether other people or organizations have done the same or similar without specific license from them, I dunno.

      But on the bare facts we have, I would say 1) RayBan is well within their rights to ask RP to cease and desist, and 2) as a libertarian, I would expect the Senator to hold RayBan's property rights as sacrosanct and respect their wishes.

      • What about this as a hypothetical? Can Rand Paul buy the Ray Bans, sign them, and then give them away in return for donations?

      • I don't think so psychodad. That is like Ford telling me I can't paint my pickup titty pink and sell it to Brucey Jenner if I choose to do so. I paid for it, it belongs to me not Ford, I can alter it any way I see fit.

        • That is a private sale. If you were to sell new Fords as Bruce Jenner Editions, you'd have a cease and desist order from your local dealer, Bruce Jenner, and Ford Motior Company.

          Licensing is the key. The owner of the brand has the right to protect it and charge for its use. It is property.

      • So if he orders Hanes t-shirts and has Rand for President printed on them and sells them he needs Hanes permission?

        If he buys coffee mugs puts his name on them and sells them he needs the mug companies permission?

        If he has posters printed he needs the paper companies permission?

        • What I take from a few accounts of this story is Paul is reselling Ray Bans. Luxottica has spent billions building that brand and Paul is leveraging that for his campaign. No company with that kind of expensive and hard fought presence in the market would permit that. His campaign should have tried to get a licensing agreement with Luxottica. I agree with Psychodad.

• Message to the company:

  "'Pound sand, Ray-Ban,' says big fan, of Sen-Rand!"

• One of the lesser reported stories was the news that once the Left found out about Bruce Jenner ' s political leanings , Fruit Of The Loom , has asked him to stop wearing their briefs .

  Reggie Love and his boy toy , Barney Frank's and manly men of that type , breathlessly await compliance.

  • It won't be long before Brucey will stop wearing Fruit of the Looms anyway so why is the company worried about it?

    Unless, of course, they also make thongs and granny panties.

• I refuse to pay the prices for their crap. In my line of work they get lost, broken, fall off when you be chasing the bad guy...I get mine at the local stop and rob, I loose them, nobody cares, I just go get another one. And actually he wanted to sell their brand with his name on them...That might have made them nervous about all of a sudden being part of operation choke point and not being able to continue in business with the IRSS crawling up their ass on President Dickheads orders...