{This article contains opinion and I can not speak to the actual motives of anyone. If you have a different opinion, that is cool.}

I got a tip about Fictionwise which I will not go into. That tip caused me to start searching the internet for business stories on Barnes & Noble. Barnes & Noble bought e-book retailer Fictionwise for $15.7 million back in 2009 as it began to try to play catchup with Amazon in the e-book market.

Barnes & Noble controls about 18% of the book market using the superstore model it used for its book stores back in the 1990's. Barnes & Noble Chairman Leonard Riggio bought Barnes & Noble as a single bookstore in 1971 and is credited with creating the modern bookstore model.

For the quarter that ended Jan. 30, store sales fell 4.7% to $1.4 billion and sales at stores open at least 15 months fell 5.5%. Although online sales were up 32%, spurred by the launch of the Nook, profit declined and the company gave a disappointing outlook for its current quarter.

Now here comes Ron Burkle, a "shrewd" businessman (aka corporate raider) and Democratic fundraiser who built his fortune buying and selling supermarket chains but is better known for his friendships with politicians such as Bill Clinton and Hollywood celebrities. He has a fortune estimated at $3.2 billion. Bill Clinton is employed by The Yucaipa Companies to help identify possible "investment" (corporate raider) opportunities.

Since late last year, Burkle has been aggressively buying Barnes & Noble's shares, prompting the company's board of directors in November to adopt a shareholder rights plan, or "poison pill," designed to thwart hostile takeover attempts.

In typical style of corporate raiders intending to damage a company before coming in to pretend to be a white knight to the rescue, in recent letters sent to Barnes & Noble's board, the supermarket magnate called the company's stock undervalued and slammed the board for rejecting his request to allow his investment firm, Yucaipa Cos., to raise its stake without triggering the poison pill provisions.

Burkle has served as Chairman of the Board and controlling shareholder of numerous companies, including Alliance Entertainment, Golden State Foods, Dominick's, Fred Meyer, Ralphs, and Food4Less. He is currently a member of the board of Occidental Petroleum Corporation, KB Home, and Yahoo!

What is the difference between business people like Chairman Leonard Riggio and Ron Burkle. People like Riggio build companies. People like Ron Burkle make money from ripping companies down. Sometimes this is grounded in true economic motives to make a company leaner and meaner. Often, especially with people so involved in politics, there is politics to the extreme involved.

Barnes & Noble operates 719 stores in 50 states as well as college bookstores and online and publishing divisions. How much of that will be shut down as Ron Bukle gains what seems to be inevitable political power in the board room of Barnes and Noble?

Corporate Raiders who were hitting General Motors, even before the Economic Melt Down, forced General Motors to begin shrinking operations to the benefit of Ford and the very political Ford Foundation. Shrinking a company with large Legacy cost that can not just be swept under the rug is not the way to save a company or profit a company but rather a way to dismantle a company for both political and short term profits at the expense of the larger economy.

{This article contains opinion and I can not speak to the actual motives of anyone. If you have a different opinion, that is cool.}