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Saturday, May 5, 2018

Progressives Want Total Gun Confiscation

Democratic Rep. Eric Swalwell Wants To Make ‘Assault Weapons’ Illegal, And ‘Prosecute’ Those Who Won’t Hand Theirs Over

Rep. Eric Swalwell.
Photo by Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call via Getty Images
On Thursday, Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-CA) penned an op-ed for USA Today, titled: "Ban assault weapons, buy them back, go after resisters: Ex-prosecutor in Congress."
In the piece, Swalwell not only argues that the federal "assault weapons ban" should be reinstated, he further demands that the United States government institute a mandatory buyback of semi-automatic rifles. Swalwell then goes even further, stating that if Americans are unwilling to hand over their semi-automatic rifles to the government, they should be sought out and prosecuted:
Reinstating the federal assault weapons ban that was in effect from 1994 to 2004 would prohibit manufacture and sales, but it would not affect weapons already possessed. This would leave millions of assault weapons in our communities for decades to come.
Instead, we should ban possession of military-style semiautomatic assault weapons, we should buy back such weapons from all who choose to abide by the law, and we should criminally prosecute any who choose to defy it by keeping their weapons. The ban would not apply to law enforcement agencies or shooting clubs.
Swalwell notes that Australia’s buyback was a success, adding that while it would cost a great deal of money to do the same in the United States, it would be worth it. He also highlights Newtown, Orlando, Las Vegas, and Parkland as examples to explain why the United States should ban semi-automatic rifles:
Like so many American mass-shooting victims in recent decades, their doom was all but assured by the murderer’s tool.
Using somewhat specious logic, Swalwell goes over why "assault weapons" should be banned from public use:
Trauma surgeons and coroners will tell you the high-velocity bullet fired from a military-style, semiautomatic assault weapon moves almost three times as fast as a 9mm handgun bullet, delivering far more energy. The bullets create cavities through the victim, wrecking a wider swath of tissue, organs and blood vessels. And a low-recoil weapon with a higher-capacity magazine means more of these deadlier bullets can be fired accurately and quickly without reloading.
Here’s the problem — setting aside any constitutional objections (because those are rather obvious), Swalwell’s reasoning is faulty from the word go.
The Congressman mentions recent shootings in which semi-automatic rifles were used, but he doesn’t mention shootings in which handguns were the weapon of choice.
  • In August 2012, a man using a Springfield Armory handgun killed six people as they entered a Sikh temple in Oak Creek, Wisconsin.
  • In April 2012, a man using a .45-caliber handgun killed seven people at Oikos University in Oakland, California.
  • In November 2009, a man using an FN Herstal 5.7 pistol killed 13 people and injured approximately 30 at the Fort Hood military post in Texas.
  • In April 2009, a man using a Beretta 92 FS 9mm pistol and a Beretta PX4 Storm pistol killed 13 people when he opened fire in a civic center in Binghamton, New York.
  • In 2007, a man using a Walther P-22 pistol and a 9mm Glock pistol killed 32 people at Virginia Polytechnic Institute. According to UT Dallas Professor Tomislav Kovandzik and Florida State University Professor of Criminology Gary Kleck: "The Virginia Tech shooter had 17 magazines for his handguns and most were of the ten round variety."
  • In October 1991, a man using using a Glock 17 and a Ruger P89 killed 23 people and injured another 27 when he opened fire in a Luby’s Cafeteria in Killeen, Texas.
  • In August 1986, a man using two .45-caliber pistols and a .22-caliber pistol killed 14 people and injured six more at a post office in Edmond, Oklahoma.
The seven shootings listed above were committed entirely with semi-automatic handguns.
Moreover, between 2010 and 2014, the FBI reports that 30,114 of the 63,061 homicides in the United States were committed using handguns. That’s 47.75%. Meanwhile, rifles were used in 1,530 homicides during the same period. That’s 2.4%. Even if one assumes that all of the "type not stated" firearms listed by the FBI are semi-automatic rifles, that’s 10,758 (17%) — and that’s an extremely generous assumption.
If Rep. Swalwell really wants a safer America via gun confiscation, he should be looking at handguns. However, because semi-automatic rifles are more frightening in appearance, they’re the easy virtue target.
Next Swalwell uses Australia’s 1996 buyback program as an example for the United States. Again, we have a problem.
The Council On Foreign Relations notes that only "one sixth" of Australia's national stock of "assault weapons" were recovered during the buyback:
The National Agreement on Firearms all but prohibited automatic and semiautomatic assault rifles, stiffened licensing and ownership rules, and instituted a temporary gun buyback program that took some 650,000 assault weapons (about one-sixth of the national stock) out of public circulation. Among other things, the law also required licensees to demonstrate a “genuine need” for a particular type of gun and take a firearm safety course.
If the Australian Government truly recovered only one sixth of the national stock, that would be approximately 650,000 "assault weapons" out of 3.9 million. Let us again be generous, and assume they recovered half. That still means that another 650,000 "assault weapons" remained in circulation after the buyback.
Moreover, University of Melbourne’s Wang Sheng-Lee and La Trobe University’s Sandy Suardi came to the conclusion in a 2008 paper that "the NFA [National Firearms Agreement] did not have any large effects on reducing firearm homicide or suicide rates."
They conclude:
Using a battery of structural break tests, there is little evidence to suggest that it [National Firearms Agreement] had any significant effects on firearm homicides and suicides. In addition, there also does not appear to be any substitution effects, that reduced access to firearms may have led those bent on committing homicide or suicide to use alternative methods.
Since the 1996 Port Arthur massacre, two other shooting incidents have attracted much media attention in Australia. An incident on 21 October 2002 at Monash University, in which a gunman killed two people and wounded five, prompted the National Handgun Buyback Act of 2003. Under this scheme that ran from July to December 2003, 70,000 handguns were removed from the community at a cost of approximately A$69 million. Another shooting on 18 June 2007, in which a lone gunman killed a man who had come to the aid of an assault victim and seriously wounded two others in Melbourne's central business district during morning rush hour, renewed calls for tougher gun controls.
Although gun buybacks appear to be a logical and sensible policy that helps to placate the public's fears, the evidence so far suggests that in the Australian context, the high expenditure incurred to fund the 1996 gun buyback has not translated into any tangible reductions in terms of firearm deaths.
While firearm homicides in Australia have plummeted in the years following the NFA, they were already dropping in the decade prior to the buyback, according to Gun Policy:
Additionally, according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, between 2010 and 2014, firearms were used in 15.1% of all murders in which a weapon was utilized. 29.3% of "attempted murders" in which weapons were utilized were committed with firearms.
With his gun confiscation op-ed, Rep. Swalwell is doing two things — he’s virtue signaling, and he’s making false comparisons. Swalwell is showing voters that he can “stand up to the man,” which in 2018 is the NRA, Republicans, President Trump, and anyone who defends the Second Amendment. Swalwell is also using a false comparison in order to make his suggestions sound more credible and feasible than they actually are.
Progressives often use mass shootings to seed resentment toward conservatives and Second Amendment advocates. They employ vague language such as "common sense gun control" as a way to cloud public opinion, while at the same time advocating extreme policies. Many progressives want to see the Second Amendment repealed, and all firearms confiscated — but few will actually say that out loud. Instead, they’ll mock conservatives, repeatedly telling them that "no one is coming to take your precious guns."
Rep. Swalwell, however wrong he may be, seems to be gripping at the threads of the intellectually honest position upon which his colleagues are afraid to stand.

Britain Continues Going Down The Road To Destruction

California's Loss, Idaho's Gain. High Taxes Claim Another Golden State (??) Business



Price Pump to leave

 Sonoma for Idaho



It’s the end of an era. Price Pump has grown and thrived in Sonoma for 70 years. But before the end of this year, the manufacturer of high-tech pumps will pull up stakes and move its headquarters – lock, stock and pump – to Boise, Idaho.
“It has simply become too difficult and too costly to run a manufacturing business in Sonoma Valley,” said Price Pump President Bob Piazza.
“To pick up and move is traumatic,” he acknowledged. “Some of our employees have worked here for 45 years.
Piazza, 74, shares the emotions of his employees. He has lived in California his whole life and he will also move with his wife of 53 years to Idaho.
“I don’t love change,” he said, “But the way things are going, we don’t have a choice.”
Price Pump was founded in 1932 by E. L. Price in Emeryville. During the 1930s and 1940s its focus was on the manufacture of agricultural pumps. The company relocated to Sonoma in 1948. Jack Price, the son of E.L Price, headed the firm during the 1950s. When Leon J. Paul acquired Price Pump in 1962, he retained the Price brand name because it had a good reputation in the business.
By 1979, Price Pump Company had outgrown its 3,600-square-foot rented space on Fourth Street East and moved to a 10,000-square-foot facility on Eighth Street East. In 1989, the company constructed a 32,000-square-foot facility two miles further down Eighth Street East at 1 Pump Way, where it still operates today. For now.
In 1992, Piazza was recruited to head up the company, bringing with him 24 years of pump experience in marketing, operations, engineering and sales.
So, why Boise?
Piazza is one of three shareholders who own the business, and one of his partners is based in Boise, a location that offers a much lower cost of doing business.
Piazza said that employee reaction to the move, including his own, has gone through stages.
“First it was shock… then everybody started getting interested in learning more about Boise,” he said. “Those that haven’t decided or aren’t moving are pretty quiet… and are thinking about the future here.”
For Quality Assurance Technician Ryan Daley, the news felt like déjà vu.
“When the news broke during a meeting, I was shocked that this is happening to me again,” he said. “I had lost a good job in Sonoma around 2007 due to a manufacturer moving outside of the state”
Piazza offered all employees an all-expenses paid trip with their families to Boise to see the area. A dozen employees have taken him up on the offer and the vast majority came back excited to move.
Daley and his wife visited Boise and the surrounding areas in March.
“We both agreed that the Boise area would be a fantastic place to raise our young family and keep the American dream alive,” he said. “Our quality of life will improve. We will surely miss the beauty, community, friends and mostly family here in Sonoma. I have lived most of my four decades in the Sonoma Valley, but my wife and I are ready for a new adventure.”
Piazza said it turned out to be hard to predict who would be excited to move and who wouldn’t.

One of his employees is 66 years old and has never worked anyplace other than Price Pump.
“When he said he would move with us, I was surprised,” said Piazza. “But he explained to me that he had planned to work until 70 and it would be hard to get a different job now, but even more… he realized that when he ran the numbers, he wouldn’t even be able to retire in Sonoma at 70.”
Another employee lost his house during the 2009 recession and he’s moving because, he told Piazza, it will be give him a chance to be a homeowner again.
“He gets to keep the same pay, move someplace less expensive and he’ll get a moving allowance and be able to buy a house,” said Piazza.
Piazza’s employees have been pleased to find that they can buy a house in the Boise area that is comparable to their home in Sonoma for less half the cost.
For those who aren’t moving, Piazza has offered a 10 percent bonus to stay on until the end. He has reached out to both Nelson Staffing and Bolt Staffing to help those employees with next steps.
“One company has already reached out to us and they’re interested in hiring all of them,” he said.
Piazza’s long litany of complaints about the business climate in Sonoma center around hiring, the cost of living in California, taxation and labor laws. He has been getting more and more frustrated with “over-regulation” by the county and state government.
“Over the last few years, I found that I can’t ignore all the good reasons to move any longer,” he said. “We’re certainly not the only local manufacturing company that has fled the area.
“Our competitors are now based in Tennessee, Georgia, Louisiana and overseas,” he said. “Large corporations don’t want to do business here.”
He cited the example of a dishwasher manufacturing company. Stero, that was located for years on the corner of Frates Road and Highway 116 in Petaluma.
“They sold to ITW (Illinois Tool Works) and immediately moved the company to Pennsylvania and sold the building,” he said.
“I knew that I would either need to move the business or sell it,” said Piazza. “If I sold, I realized the new owners would face the same challenges and they also end up moving the business and selling the building.”
He said that paying entry level workers, even high school students in summer jobs, at least $15 an hour is a challenge. While Price Pump is outside the city limits, Piazza needs to match offers being made for jobs inside the city limits.
Meanwhile, he agrees that even $15 isn’t a living wage in Sonoma.
“It’s impossible to hire here as workers can’t afford to live here,” he said.
Price Pump owns its building at 21775 Eighth St. E., and it will go up for sale later this year. Piazza feels confident it will sell quickly.
“We’ve already heard from three folks who are interested,” he said. “Properties on Eighth Street East are at a premium and there isn’t much available like this.”
Piazza was recently invited to speak to the Sonoma County Taxpayers Association about the Price Pump move.
The theme of Piazza’s remarks?

“The government has all these progressive ideas but those measures have consequences… and the consequence here is us moving to Idaho,” he said.
Email Lorna at businessnews@sonomanews.com.