A friend sent me an email asking whether he can bring his 10-year-old son to the Armed Defense Training Association event on May 3.
He and his son have been watching “Top Shot” since the show’s second season and have been cheering for Federal Way Police Cmdr. Kyle Sumpter this season.
I told my friend that the ADTA is still discussing ways for youth to get involved in actual shooting events. Meanwhile, we encourage parents to bring kids of all ages to hear our local “Top Shot” contestant talk about his experience on the popular History Channel program.
I expect that some members of the community will object to the idea of even talking to kids about guns. Movies like “The Hunger Games” and “Star Wars” deal with violent conflict.
But there is a difference in the minds of many of us. Maybe the difference is that bow and arrow, swords and light sabers have a certain mythical quality?
On the other hand, firearms are a hard reality on the streets of our cities and even in our schools. The fact that many people only see guns in movies is another factor that might cause many soccer moms to say “I don’t want my kids learning about guns.” Many action movies feature more blood and gore than most combat veterans see during their tours of duty.
As one school principal in Federal Way stated to me, “We don’t want to send the wrong message to our kids”. So why do we want to have our youth listening to a top police officer talk to the community about competing with all kinds of weapons, including military assault weapons and pistols that are designed not for hunting and other sports, but primarily to kill human beings?
I will use Dustin Ellermann as Exhibit A to make my point. Ellermann was the winner last season on “Top Shot.” According to “Top Shot” host Colby Donaldson, “Dustin may be the best shooter we ever had.” Everyone agrees that Dustin’s character made Season 3 very dramatic. The 28-year-old from Zavalla, Texas, probably has contributed a great deal to the show becoming one of the more popular programs on television.
Dustin taught himself to shoot at Camp His Way, a summer Christian kids’ camp where he is the director. He and his wife are foster parents and have three children of their own. The fact that he taught himself to shoot raises the question of how Dustin was so successful competing against the some of the world’s best shooters, including Navy Seals, USPSA champions and some elite law enforcement types. “Shooting is fun to me,” Dustin stated at one point. “I thank the Lord for the opportunity to be on ‘Top Shot’ and to now be able to share my passion for shooting.”
Dustin wasn’t just giving the kind of lip service to God that you often see on Monday Night Football or when Oscars and Emmy Awards are being handed out. Dustin’s demeanor and conversation on television were all about his commitment to the value of faith. Watch Dustin shoot and you will witness the discipline and sheer joy that he now wants to impart by organizing clinics for youth shooters.
The same combination of gentle strength and steady focus is apparent when you watch Kyle Sumpter leading his Red Team through various ordeals and challenges.
As you watch “Top Shot,” it soon becomes apparent that the study of character and group dynamics is a more important reason for the show’s success than flash and bang.
Think about how many movies and television shows feature the flash and bang formula — and how few ever attract a real audience. Yes, “Dancing With the Stars” also displays the character of the contestants.
Soccer, karate and other sports develop character and also put leadership on display. Teaching your son or daughter to handle a gun safely and effectively, however, will create confidence that in many ways is more practical than the alternatives.
If training with guns is not practical and important, why do taxpayers get so upset every time the politicians tell us they are going to cut down on the number of officers patrolling our streets?
The free public meeting was hosted by Jim Petrelli in his classroom at Genesis Real Estate School in Federal Way.
Over 100 of our neighbors attended. See more photos at Ed Streit Images.
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Republished from the Firearms Lawyer/Federal Way Mirror
This year, the day after Thanksgiving saw Americans finally getting back to the business Americans love: Shopping!
FBI statistics show that a new record was set during that one Friday for background check requests from gun buyers. There were 129,166 requests to the NICS. That was a third more than the previous all-time record of 97,848 on Black Friday 2008. On Black Friday last year, there were 87,061 requests.
Some of the buyers believe that stockpiling guns is a better way to prepare for hard times than gold. Nevertheless, many of those shopping for guns at several gun stores in the Federal Way area were almost certainly women purchasing guns for their own protection.
Federal Way’s local Armed Defense Training Association has been in contact with an instructor named Jennie at Rivendell Sales and Consulting in Kent. Jennie teaches women how to shoot. She owns and operates a store that markets to women who shoot.
I asked her what ladies need to know when they first decide to buy a gun. The first consideration, she stated, is not to let someone at a gun shop — or a well-meaning significant other — sell you a small gun that “you shoot once, it hurts and you put it away.”
Jennie said a woman needs her own gun that fits. “I have seen too many ladies with a gun that does not fit their hand, one that is too large a caliber for a beginner, or they are told at some gun shop that the itty-bitty gun is just the one for them. The gun that does not fit you right just goes unused and sits on a shelf.”
Jennie encourages her students to consciously make the decision to defend their own life. “If you are killed or severely injured, how will your family function without you?”
Of course, hardly anyone ever actually states that his or her own life is not worth defending. But, despite all the philosophical and political arguments, take the steps to get trained and actually get a gun into your hands. This demonstrates that you are prepared to fight back.
Jennie demystifies the “danger” of guns. She told me, “I have seen many ladies not even sure they want to touch a gun. Her students learn quickly that a gun does not go off by itself. Once a woman realizes that she can effectively and safely operate the efficient little safety device, fear goes away and smiles start to appear.”
However, too many women take a beginner class and think that they are ready to go out on the street and deal with all the legal, physical and emotional things that go with armed self-defense.
“In order to carry for self-defense, you have to make the commitment to train and practice,” Jennie explains. “Training generally teaches you a skill and how to practice that skill; practice needs to continue on a regular basis.” Jennie recommends competition to test skills, keep skills sharp and make training interesting and fun.
“The holster that fits a slim man will usually not work for a curvy lady.” Men behind the gun counter, who have absolutely no idea what a lady needs for shooting gear, are the reason why Jennie became an instructor and opened her gun shop. Apparently, in the world of women’s self-defense, most of the old wives’ tales are perpetuated by men.
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Last year three armed men followed a woman in her 60s into her garage when she was returning home to her home in Seattle. The robbers stole her jewelry and car keys in broad daylight.
The day before that robbery, a man was harassing other passengers on a Metro bus.He began arguing, pushing and kicking one of the passengers. The victim tried to ignore the assault. Then a woman that was with the assailant began hitting some of the victim’s family members. The victim defended himself and his family. The assailant allegedly stabbed the victim and caused him to endure a short stay in the hospital.
Earlier the same week, an armed contractor with a CPL arrived at a home on the North End of Tacoma and saw a vehicle in the driveway. The contractor arrived shortly after 11 a.m. and saw household goods, including a television and weapons, in the driveway. The contractor was armed and blocked the driveway with his truck. The burglar walked out, saw the pickup truck blocking the driveway and decided that the best way to get away was to ram the truck with his minivan.
After the contractor fired one shot that wounded the suspect, the police apprehended the alleged burglar, 32, and took him to Tacoma General Hospital for treatment and criminal charges. In Tacoma during 2011 Jamarr Johnson, 19, died when he unlawfully entered a home and the homeowner shot Jamarr dead through a door.
The following month, a homeowner shot Anthony Len McDougald, 36, when Anthony and another man broke into a home on South D Street. The homeowner confronted the two inside his garage, they charged and the homeowner shot them. The other assailant was only injured. And within about a month, a Tacoma police officer shot and injured a suspected burglar after a confrontation outside a South Tacoma home where the man had crashed his car.
Most of these armed citizens took the risk of being prosecuted or branded as vigilantes, possibly even as racist, like George Zimmerman in Florida. Contrary to the perception fostered by certain parties, full investigations have been ongoing and only reckless disregard for public safety would cause anyone to go around giving opinions as to what happened in Sanford, Florida between Mr. Martin and Mr. Zimmerman. Nevertheless, many of the so-called facts appear quite different than initial media reports caused many to believe.
When you are confronted by a serious possibility of death or grave bodily harm, the risk is worth taking. All these armed citizens are likely to have experienced some kind of intense trauma, just like the syndrome normally experienced by police officers in similar situations. Such individuals are not going to be applauded; nor will they be held in high regard by their neighbors.
And the Spring of 2012 seems to promise another year in which citizens are overcoming chaos. One intruder was shot dead during a home invasion in Puyallup involving three men and a woman .
The police determined that the homeowner, a retired police officer, was threatened with deadly force in his home. One of the attackers was brandishing a crowbar. The homeowner was justified in using deadly force, the police said, when he suddenly found himself confronting two men in his hallway after he heard pounding on his door.
Two of the suspects are in custody and the homeowner probably wounded another member of the gang, Joshua Baker, who escaped and is still at large.
It seems worth noting that, had the homeowner been subject to a duty to retreat, he might have been in some kind of legal jeopardy (and vulnerable to being brained from behind with the crowbar) for “standing his ground“. Florida used to be a state that required a victim to retreat if possible, before deploying deadly force. Stand Your Ground laws have been a hot topic in the news lately.
Another recent justified shooting occurred in North Bend. The King County Sheriff’s Office reported that a 30 year old North Bend man was shot and killed after he broke into a couple’s home:
A couple had been sleeping when they woke up to the sound of glass breaking. The suspect had broken the rear sliding glass door, entered the house and then started “trashing the house.” The couple, a 46 year old man and his girlfriend, hid in a bedroom as they talked to the 911 operator.
The suspect was yelling, “Where are you? I’m going to kill you!” The man living at the home retrieved a handgun from his nightstand and yelled numerous times, “I have a pistol. Get out of my house!” The couple locked themselves in a bedroom as they continued to hear the suspect ransack the house and yell that he was coming after them.
After the suspect kicked down the couple’s bedroom door, the homeowner shot him and deputies found the suspect, who was not known by the couple, dead outside of the bedroom.
Almost the same day, Bonney Lake and Gig Harbor saw two attempted home invasions involving armed citizens protecting themselves from home invasions. In Bonney Lake, a homeowner heard someone kicking the door, grabbed a shotgun and confronted the intruder. The suspect took off in a pickup truck.
In the other attempted home invasion in Gig Harbor, the Pierce County Sheriff’s Department said two teenagers tried to get in through a doggie door. The woman, at home alone, grabbed a gun and showed it to the teens. The kids took off.
Dave Workman reports that:
A check with the Department of Licensing Thursday revealed that a new record number of Concealed Pistol Licenses are now active in Washington. As of Thursday morning, 357,782 CPLs are now in circulation. March showed a stunning volume of activity, according to a DOL source, with some 12,000 renewals, first-time applications and replacements being processed.
Each one of us has to decide how to deal with the risk of becoming a victim of violence. Many adults of all ages all around the U.S.- including many women- have decided to make a firearm part of their personal protection plan. While weighing the facts, keep in mind that statistics about people that have been killed with firearms can be deceptive when it comes to identifying the circumstances of the deaths.
How many of the victims of gun violence, reported in supposedly scientific studies of gun violence and published as statistical evidence in the mainstream news, have died by suicide or while engaging in deadly assaults against innocent people?
They all deserve our sympathy to varying degrees, but what if it is a choice between you and a suspect that decides that your family will be his next victims? To willingly surrender the means to protect yourself and your loved ones is a step toward suicide that violates the core principle of providing for one’s own.
Most Americans understand the reality of what we are discussing herein and that is why so many are becoming licensed to carry. Some of the worse instances of violence are barely reported by the media.
Many families are choosing to get trained at professional schools for armed citizens. The Armed Defense Training Association is not a school but we are already bringing quality trainers and armed citizens together in Federal Way and at local ranges.
We are also providing regular opportunities to practice what we are learning with methods that are geared toward the reality of home defense and what can happen when we leave our homes in a world that is getting more dangerous every day.
The Armed Defense Training Association (ADTA) is exploring ways to work with many of the existing ranges in the area — and the new ranges — in order to encourage all community members to work together in fostering responsible and productive shooting events, including safety and training. We even hope to sponsor and organize various shooting competitions.
Plan to attend a special program by the ADTA at 6:30 p.m. May 3. The free public meeting will be held at Genesis Realty, 32014 32nd Ave. S. in Federal Way. Guest speaker will be FWPD Cmdr. Kyle Sumpter, our local “Top Shot” contestant. Sumpter is responsible for FWPD firearms training. He will be speaking on his experience as a competitor on “Top Shot,” which airs Tuesdays on The History Channel. It could be informative to ask Sumpter how a new Federal Way shooting range may impact Federal Way police training activities.
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So what about the economy in Federal Way? According to a book I am reading, there is an upper-class in America that is totally different than anyone most of us have ever met. These new upper-class folks are people that usually went to the right schools and come from families where both parents also went to the right schools. Just getting into their schools requires an IQ that is higher than the IQ of other good universities.
According to Charles Murray, this was not the case when Baby-Boomers like me were growing up. In fact, until recently, many successful people were pretty much like the rest of us. They might have lived in a bigger home but they were never obsessed about getting into the right schools. The experiences and values of the rich were similar to those of most other Americans.
“COMING APART” shows how certain super zip codes contain high percentages of residents earning more than 95% of other Americans. Seattle has a few zip codes like that and so do several other places in the country. The people that live in such places are usually involved with professions in the upper levels of media, law, finance, journalism and the world of academics. The rest of the nation is just trying to maintain a modicum of what we used to enjoy while many communities are sinking fast!
Many of the New Upper-Class have never been to a Kiwanis or a Rotary meeting. Their kids go to private schools so they never get involved with local schools. Some of them live in super zip codes in places like Chicago or Seattle. But the majority of the elite five percent folks live in just four metropolitan areas: New York City, Washington, DC, San Francisco and LA.
The Big Four contain conglomerates of super zip codes in which many square miles of the super affluent have developed a culture that is not even recognized by most Americans. In other words, I might not get my grits served at Denny’s without driving several miles in certain parts of Northern Virginia or Maryland just outside of DC. The upper 5% in the Big Four metropolitan areas vote for solidly Progressive or even extremely Liberal congressional candidates. Elites in smaller super-zips, on the other hand, tend to be Conservative and Liberal and everything in between.
Author Charles Murray is a Libertarian and refrains from making any judgments about the upper 5%. He simply reports that we cannot understand emerging cultural trends without understanding the fact thata new culture is emerging within certain areas containing residents that exert the most influence on media, government and public opinion.
Washington, DC and its suburbs contain the biggest enclave of super zip codes. These upper-class zip codes are surrounded by other areas where the residents are almost as affluent as the upper five-percent. You may well be asking, “So what?” The rich will always be with us, right?
The denizens of the super zips tend to stay married more than the other people, work longer hours and raise kids that tend to be creative. They are decent people but just don’t relate to things that are accepted by most Americans. Nevertheless, our American culture often seems to be coming apart because of the fundamental lack of understanding that much of the New Upper-Class demonstrates concerning how the rest of us live and think.
It is of utmost importance to understand how the rest of us are being shaped by this new culture that has barely even been identified. Much of what is considered by the rest of us to be valuable and right is compromised or even negated by the opinions and cultural milieu of the politically correct elite! The cultural core of the New Upper-Class are the families that live in close proximity to the East and West Coast quadrants where political opinions are shaped and where the levers of the media and financial machinery are located.
Most members of the New Upper-Class have never known an Evangelical Christian. They listen to NPR and have little experience of anything that has to do with the military or law enforcement other than to occasionally rub elbows with a few high ranking officers or other government officials.
I hardly know anyone in Federal Way that meets Murray’s description of the New Upper-Class. But I meet many people that seem to have recognized that the values of the upper-class are the key to being accepted as one of the right kind of people- the people that get elected to office or promoted in corporate environments.
Upper-Class people have often never set foot in a factory or worked at a job that made them feel physical pain when they climb into bed at night. They often think of manufacturing as something far below the world of abstract thinking, analysis and creativity. Shooting guns, hunting and fishing may even seem distasteful to the Upper-Class.
Many have never even shot a gun and some of the men would be embarrassed to admit how unnerved they get at the very thought of handling firearms. No wonder they seem disinterested at the thought of pistol training and self-defense for everyday working people. Just for law enforcement, right?
But Federal Way and most of Western Washington outside of Seattle is full of people that are familiar with handling weapons- possibly because we are located so close to JBLM. Our Washington State Constitution and other state laws reinforce our commitment to self-defense:
SECTION 24 RIGHT TO BEAR ARMS. The right of the individual citizen to bear arms in defense of himself, or the state, shall not be impaired, but nothing in this section shall be construed as authorizing individuals or corporations to organize, maintain or employ an armed body of men.
Federal Way is in a transition that may determine whether we thrive or become a bedroom community for the new under-class. Ironically, the demographics of Federal Way are such that the quickest way of sinking into despair may be to follow the nostrums of the elite cadres dwelling in places like Manhattan, Beverly Hills or Palo Alto.
The good news is that there now seem to be at least two developers that are prepared to build gun ranges in Federal Way. A new range is likely to be under construction very soon. There is also likely to be at least one new gun store in Federal Way in the very near future.
Our business community should welcome this news and expect to see shooting competitions, schools for armed citizens and businesses that cater to shooters and law enforcement as a result of what a few local entrepreneurs have planned.
Please plan to attend a special program announced by the Armed Defense Training Association for May 3rd at 6:30 PM. We will hold the free public meeting at Genesis Realty, 32014-32nd Avenue South in Federal Way just off of 320th on the opposite side of I-5 from the Commons Mall. Our speaker will be FWPD Commander Kyle Sumpter, our local Top Shot contestant.
Commander Sumpter is responsible for FWPD firearms training and he will tell us about his experience competing on Top Shot. More details about the range plans should soon be available and it will be interesting to ask Commander Sumpter how a new Federal Way shooting range may impact FWPD training activities.
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Anti-gun groups and politicians regularly exploit accidents involving children and guns. For example, anti-gun state Senator Adam Kline (D-37) and two other state Senators were primed and ready to propose new legislation (SB 6628)immediately following the incident in which a nine-year old boy recently brought a gun to a Bremerton elementary school. The gun accidentally discharged resulting in another student suffering serious gunshot wounds. Saul Alinsky was the Chicago radical that urged his fellow Socialists to exploit every crisis in order to advance the cause of total government control.
Unfortunately, subsequent events have transpired since the tragedy in Bremerton that seem to indicate that parents are leaving guns around where their kids can find them. While people all over the state were still discussing the Bremerton school incident, an off-duty Marysville police Officer parked his van near Stanwood City Hall.
The officer’s son, left alone in the vehicle, found the officer’s gun in the glove compartment and shot his 7-year-old sister. The girl died from her injuries. So much for the idea that law enforcement officers are more trustworthy when it comes to firearms responsibility!
To make things worse, a 3-year-old boy fatally shot himself with a gun he found in the family car while his family stopped for gas in Tacoma. The mom’s boyfriend put a pistol under the seat of the car and got out to pump gas while the mom went into the convenience store, leaving the boy and his baby sister in the car. The boy climbed out of his child seat, fished out the gun from under the seat and shot himself in the head.
Whenever episodes of gun mayhem get play in the media, Sen. Kline usually finds his way into the news. In the past, he has proposed new state laws prohibiting certain kinds of rifles that he thinks are too much like military weapons.
Despite the fact that the Founding Fathers exhorted Americans that preparing Americans to use militarily useful weapons was their objective when drafting the Second Amendment, Adam Kline wants to ban guns that seem scary; i.e., most guns- if the truth be known.
Kline’s newly proposed SB 6628 would now provide new language to the existing RECKLESS ENDANGERMENT statute making it a crime to let a child obtain access to a loaded firearm. The trouble is that prosecutors already utilize Washington State’s RECKLESS ENDANGERMENT statute to prosecute folks that leave guns in places where children are likely to get hold of them. The “new” provision contains no new penalties and is apparently window dressing to make Kline look like he is doing something about a problem that may not even exist.
While fatal firearm accidents are at an all-time low, poisoning, suffocation and choking on small objects cause many more accidental deaths to children than firearms. In fact, about one accidental firearm death of a child each year is typical in our state, according to state health statistics gathered between 2007 and 2010.
The biggest question about the recent spate of gun accidents is why folks obtain concealed pistol licenses and then leave their guns behind when going about in public. That one time that you are outside your vehicle pumping gas could just be the time that you need the weapon.
But even if you never need to protect yourself or your family, the best way to keep a pistol out of reach of children is to have it on your person. Otherwise, it should be unloaded and properly stored.
A Seattle anti-gun advocacy group is placing signs on buses to persuade Seattle residents and commuters that gun ownership is more dangerous to family members or loved ones than it will be to a predatory criminal. The Washington State Supreme Court has consistently championed firearms rights and the right to self-defense is deeply engrained in our state’s laws, including numerous case law precedents. Adam Kline, on the other hand, is reportedly a former radical and still seems to favor governmental solutions over individual responsibility.
I am constantly amazed when I hear the children of the Sixties railing against gun ownership. These are often the very folks that went around U.S. campuses inveighing against capitalism and chanting, “All political power comes from the barrel of a gun!” Chairman Mao, the tyrant that cheerfully murdered over 60 million of his fellow Chinese citizens, coined that catchy little dictum.
After he marched across China and took control, the first thing Mao did was ban guns, depriving the people under his control from possessing the means to defend themselves against numerous Maoist purges. But, notwithstanding the fact that all tyrants ban possession of firearms by their own citizens, lock up your guns when you are not using them! And keep firearms out of the hands of unsupervised children.
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Anti-gun groups and politicians regularly exploit accidents involving children and guns. For example, anti-gun state Senator Adam Kline (D-37) and two other state Senators were primed and ready to propose new legislation (SB 6628)immediately following the incident in which a nine-year old boy recently brought a gun to a Bremerton elementary school. The gun accidentally discharged resulting in another student suffering serious gunshot wounds. Saul Alinsky was the Chicago radical that urged his fellow Socialists to exploit every crisis in order to advance the cause of total government control.
Unfortunately, subsequent events have transpired since the tragedy in Bremerton that seem to indicate that parents are leaving guns around where their kids can find them. While people all over the state were still discussing the Bremerton school incident, an off-duty Marysville police Officer parked his van near Stanwood City Hall. The officer’s son, left alone in the vehicle, found the officer’s gun in the glove compartment and shot his 7-year-old sister. The girl died from her injuries. So much for the idea that law enforcement officers are more trustworthy when it comes to firearms responsibility!
To make things worse, a 3-year-old boy fatally shot himself with a gun he found in the family car while his family stopped for gas in Tacoma. The mom’s boyfriend put a pistol under the seat of the car and got out to pump gas while the mom went into the convenience store, leaving the boy and his baby sister in the car. The boy climbed out of his child seat, fished out the gun from under the seat and shot himself in the head.
Whenever episodes of gun mayhem get play in the media, Sen. Kline usually finds his way into the news. In the past, he has proposed new state laws prohibiting certain kinds of rifles that he thinks are too much like military weapons. Despite the fact that the Founding Fathers exhorted Americans that militarily useful weapons were the subject of the Second Amendment, Adam Kline wants to ban guns that seem scary; i.e., most guns- if the truth be known.
Kline’s newly proposed SB 6628 would now provide new language to the existing RECKLESS ENDANGERMENT statute making it a crime to let a child obtain access to a loaded firearm. The trouble is that prosecutors already utilize Washington State’s RECKLESS ENDANGERMENT statute to prosecute folks that leave guns in places where children are likely to get hold of them. The “new” provision contains no new penalties and is apparently window dressing to make Kline look like he is doing something about a problem that may not even exist.
While fatal firearm accidents are at an all-time low, poisoning, suffocation and choking on small objects cause many more accidental deaths to children than firearms. In fact, about one accidental firearm death of a child each year is typical in our state, according to state health statistics gathered between 2007 and 2010.
The biggest question about the recent spate of gun accidents is why folks obtain concealed pistol licenses and then leave their guns behind when going about in public. That one time that you are outside your vehicle pumping gas could just be the time that you need the weapon.
But even if you never need to protect yourself or your family, the best way to keep a pistol out of reach of children is to have it on your person. Otherwise, it should be unloaded and properly stored.
A Seattle anti-gun advocacy group is placing signs on buses to persuade Seattle residents and commuters that gun ownership is more dangerous to family members or loved ones than it will be to a predatory criminal. The Washington State Supreme Court has consistently championed firearms rights and the right to self-defense is deeply engrained in our state’s laws, including numerous case law precedents. Adam Kline, on the other hand, is reportedly a former radical and still seems to favor governmental solutions over individual responsibility.
I am constantly amazed when I hear the children of the Sixties railing against gun ownership. These are often the very folks that went around U.S. campuses inveighing against capitalism and chanting, “All political power comes from the barrel of a gun!” Chairman Mao, the tyrant that cheerfully murdered over 60 million of his fellow Chinese citizens, coined that catchy little dictum.
After he marched across China and took control, the first thing Mao did was ban guns, depriving the people under his control from possessing the means to defend themselves against numerous Maoist purges. But, notwithstanding the fact that all tyrants ban possession of firearms by their own citizens, lock up your guns when you are not using them! And keep firearms out of the hands of unsupervised children.
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The Seattle Black Panther Party, founded in 1968, was an armed defense group that holds a controversial record in modern American history. The Seattle Black Panthers was the first BPP chapter formed outside California. The Black Panthers based its armed defense for the black community on an understanding of the U.S. Constitution that sometimes led to violent encounters with law enforcement. Nevertheless, the Seattle Panthers avoided the shootouts with police that were often associated with Panthers who also were known for providing lunches to school kids and other worthwhile community service.
On one occasion, several Black Panthers grabbed their guns and drove to Rainier Beach. The Panthers walked into Seattle’s Rainier Beach High School with their weapons and told the principal that he needed to start protecting Black students from being harassed or the Panthers would return. The police arrived but the Panthers left with no further problems.
In 1967, thirty Oakland Black Panthers, concerned that the California state legislature was about to outlaw the public display of guns, had appeared in full paramilitary regalia in front of the capital building- all fully armed! The fact that they were arrested for conspiracy to disturb the peace did not deter the Seattle Panthers.
After the incident at the Rainier Beach High, Seattle Mayor, J.D. Braman pushed to have a gun law passed that would put restrictions upon firearms in the city. In February, 1969, legislators in Olympia were also passing a new law that would make it a gross misdemeanor to exhibit firearms or other weapons in a manner manifesting intent to intimidate others. The Panthers stood on the capitol steps with rifles and shotguns to protest the pending gun legislation. Washington State Patrol officers just told the Panthers to put the guns away. The Panthers complied and no arrests resulted because no laws had been broken.
Some legislators and citizens reacted by proclaiming that the Panthers had demonstrated “open and active anarchy and rebellion.” Governor Evans promoted restraint during the incident and rebuked Lieutenant Governor Cherberg for calling in the state patrol during the Governor’s absence. The Bellevue High School even invited the Panthers to come to a Civics class where the Panthers were able to explain their philosophy of self-defense to the students.
The law enacted at that time by the Washington State Legislature- still in effect- prohibits display of a weapon in “a manner, under circumstances, and at a time and place that either manifests an intent to intimidate another or that warrants alarm for the safety of other persons.”
The legislature apparently included the language pertaining to display that “warrants alarm for the safety of other persons” in order to discourage further displays of armed force at the state capitol. Lawyers have challenged that language for being vague and arbitrary. In the 1994 case of STATE V. SPENCER, the Washington courts upheld a conviction under RCW 9.41.270 when a man with an AK-47 slung over his shoulder and a loaded magazine walked through a residential area just North of Federal Way with his head down avoiding eye contact.
Like the quotation that came out of one famous U.S. Supreme Court obscenity case- the justices knew obscenity when they saw it- the judges in Washington state seemed to know display warranting alarm when they saw it and held that Spencer had unlawfully displayed his weapon. But every time there is a new attempt to ban certain firearms, some gun advocates come openly armed to the Capitol Building in Olympia. The Washington State Patrol still acknowledges the citizens’ First Amendment and Second Amendment rights and refuses to harass armed citizens sitting and standing in the hearing rooms and corridors of our state legislature. Maybe we can thank the Black Panthers for paving the way!
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In his recent State of the Union Address, President Obama raised an issue about which I have been passionate for almost 40 years. In his 1992 presidential campaign, President Bill Clinton was also talking a great deal about creating partnerships between private industries and public education.
The idea of training that prepares high school students to obtain apprenticeships in specialized tool making and other crafts really fires my imagination. Maybe it is because I dropped out of high school and then got back on track with an apprenticeship as an Ironworker with Local 377 in San Franciso.
I remember reading an article in 1991 about Clinton’s proposals regarding many U.S. employers that were unable to locate the specialized machinists and precision tool makers that Germany produces and how even then employers could not fill the high paying jobs that required technical mechanical skills.
So I voted for Bill Clinton in 1992. After he was elected, there was nothing more said about employer driven training programs. I soon found out that was the price we had to pay to open the door to other priorities that were high on Willie’s ideologically driven wish list.
I have not subsequently heard that kind of discussion about vocational training partnerships for students in the U.S. Not until President Obama proposed the idea for colleges. But why not have such partnerships at the high school level?
Washington state already has the occupational skills centers and vocational training at the community college level. Most of the discussion about high schools seems to emphasize academic programs and getting students into colleges. Many students would develop career interests in high school classes if more opportunities were to become available to work in partnership with employers like Boeing that hire workers skilled in specialized crafts.
Some observers have suggested that vocational education might encourage more young men and women not to drop out. Learning to repair any machinery, like cars and trucks, requires math skills. Math is not so difficult once a student taps into his or her interests.
Bill Stafford, a president of the Trade Development Alliance for 20 years, reminds students and the rest of us that cooks need to read and do math, too. The best vocational programs were once at the high school level. Now maybe many of the folks proposing this are actually modern day adherents to John Dewey’s Progressive educational theories that Dewey called “Industrial Democracy". Dewey advocated dumbing kids down so they could become cogs to be moved around by technocratic social planners.
But according to Mr. Stafford, Edison Technical School was started in 1946 to help World War II vets who wanted to finish high school. Twenty years later, it morphed into Seattle Community College. Vocational education in Seattle is now mostly for students after they are out of high school.
If educators want to begin thinking creatively, they should think about all the occupations that involve precision machining.
Like firearms! It is easy to forget that Boeing is in the weapon system business.
Gun sales have been higher than ever before all over the U.S. and gunsmiths are in extremely short supply. Hillsdale College and 40 other colleges, including Harvard University, Harvard Law, Yale and MIT, just received grants for shooting programs.
One school, Montgomery Community College of Troy, N.C., developed a shooting program and also offers gunsmithing and hunting and shooting sports management programs. The grants came from the National Shooting Sports Foundation, the trade association for the firearms industry.
Gunsmithing is just one example of the kind of partnerships that educators should be discussing. Many educators don’t like talking about guns except in connection with gun-free zones. But who would you rather meet in a dark alley?
A graduate from a gunsmithing program or an armed graduate from one of our state’s largest vocational schools supervised by the Department of Corrections?
Students that get work experience in high school are likely to stay in school, graduate and get a good job. “College for All” is only achieved by one out of three high school students. According to at least one study, “College for All” seems to be the dream of elite educators.
The United States has the highest dropout rate in the industrialized world, according to Harvard Graduate School of Education’s “Pathways to Prosperity.” Many high school students apparently believe high school is not relevant in finding the path to what they seek.
Washington’s achievement gap in education is tragic. Even more tragic is the fact that many educators and school board members are focused almost exclusively on the academic-university educational paradigm. One school board member I know describes proposals for vocational training that partners employers with high schools as Alinskyism!
But the training that would lead directly to high paying jobs right out of high school requires computer programming, math and other serious academic skills so no one is proposing to deprive students of academic excellence. Most of the machinists I meet are as smart or smarter than your average school teacher or lawyer. They just lack the know-it-all attitude that takes some of us years to acquire.
Thus, the technical jobs that are begging to be filled right now can become an incentive to learn metallurgy, electrical theory and chemistry. And the vocational students will develop the ability to read technical manuals and work with very precise mathematical equations.
Apparently, Alinskyism is a reference to the author of “Rules for Radicals"! In other words, giving kids an option to by-pass college (remember- vast percentages don’t even graduate from high school) is the same as consigning our kids to a Soviet collective factory operating under the lash of the Commissars.
I can’t help but think I might be mistaken for a sugar beet that just fell off a Kulak’s turnip truck when a school board member tells me that I have become aligned with the forces of Alinskyism. The same local school board member asked me how I know that Microsoft will be here in 75 years if we let Bill and Melinda Gates come into our Federal Way public schools and start calling the shots!
I am worried now that I have identified with a cause that I apparently share with the 30th District Democrats, some of whom actually are self described community organizers ala Saul Alinsky. I am from Chicago just like Alinsky. And I used to be a bit of a radical.
Before long I will get my credentials yanked as a card carrying member of the Religious Right. Maybe the Ironworkers will give me back my union card and I can man the barricades when Occupy Wall Street begins its reign of terror this coming summer.
Boeing stated recently that it will have 20,000 retirements in the next 10 years. Would Boeing and some of its vendors be willing to partner with local school districts to create new vocational schools in Washington state?
It could be cheaper than the recently failed $110,000.000.00 levy for Federal Way High School — and more profitable.
I now understand that I should have voted for the construction levy because all our local leaders are Conservatives and so we could have trusted school officials to spend the money frugally even though they never told Federal Way why a new Federal Way High School had to cost $110 million dollars! Such “Conservative” principles sound too much like the Beltway principles from which we need to be delivered.
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Many law enforcement agencies choose to contract with the Washington State Patrol for radio communications. They have had coverage problems, according to my sources. The WSP previously built their system to cover the freeways, not the woods or other areas that are covered by State Park Rangers, local agencies and sheriff’s departments or the Washington Department of Fish and Game.
After 9/11 the Feds wanted to increase inter-operability–a nightmare. There were UHF, VHF, trunked systems and digital. Without a lot of hardware these systems can’t talk to each other. So the Feds created a standard, P25 digital, and some agencies purchased radios capable of the standard. The WSP could never quite seem to catch up and never went digital. Nevertheless, the WSP became very interested in becoming the radio communications provider for law enforcement.
Thus, the WSP has been very aggressive about trying to take over all radio spectrum and communications as a single provider for law enforcement in Washington. But some members of the law enforcement community have suggested that management at the WSP has had problems grasping the complexity and needs of their users. The WSP could not or would not upgrade their repeaters to eliminate coverage gaps and poor service to non-WSP users was the result. WDFW is trying to develop their own system to get out from under the WSP costs and lack of service.
Many agencies are presently at the mercy of Motorola because of Motorola’s monopoly built upon its proprietary technology. Even if Motorola allows other radio manufacturers to utilize its technology on behalf of various law enforcement agencies, the preliminary word is that this may still cost thousands per radio for software and equipment to “re-flash” or re-program radios. Non-dedicated but supposedly compatible radios from different manufacturers may work with flash program changes, but not perfectly. There are often volume and other differences that are quite frustrating to the officers–they seem trivial; but in the field when an officer can’t hear, “minor frustrations” can be life threatening. Remember how compatibility issues between New York City’s law enforcement and fire fighting personnel became an issue in the aftermath of the attack on the World Trade Center?
Sometime in 2011, the FCC gave the Washington State Patrol and other agencies a deadline to free up large swaths of the air waves. The WSP was desperate to comply with the new Federal Communications Commission regulations. The FCC gave law enforcement a deadline- January 1, 2013- for state and local agencies to free up space on the airwaves for more users or risk losing reception in nearly one-third of the state.
The WSP thought it could quickly replace its radio system for at least $12 million less than expected by signing a no-bid contract with Motorola Solutions- a plan that sidestepped the competitive bidding process. State officials claimed at the time that the partnership with the Department of Justice would lower the cost of the technology upgrade to $41 million.
At least one WSP commander was exuberant in expressing the feelings shared by many in Olympia and the federal government when he crowed, “It’s an opportunity we can’t pass up that saves us a lot of money and gets us where we need to be!” The Legislature agreed that interfacing with the new DOJ system would be quick fix, preventing the loss of coverage areas expected as a result of the FCC’s new regulations. The legislature gave WSP $40 million with more anticipated in 2013.
The Department of Justice came calling on the WSP last September with the message, “DON’T BUILD YOUR OWN, JOIN US!” The state was apparently already connecting some of its radios to the DOJ system but there were limits as to how to connect agencies not involved in law enforcement.
The Federal Way Police Department and Valley Communications are not part of the WSP Radio network system. Valley Communications utilized a “patch” system via the LERN network in the event local agencies need to communicate directly with WSP or Federal agencies. WSP’s system will not impact the 800 MHz system in King County.
The WSP’s priority was to meet the FCC’s deadline to free up space on the airwaves. The federal system required Motorola equipment and software. Details on the cost of radios were not expected until after contracts were signed and some folks had questions about the plan. But after all, converting to the new system was a mere $26 million- with $9 million for other work. Motorola offered a large discount and besides- the WSP already had $32 million in its budget for the contract.
But one of the critics complained, “Seems to me that sole-sourcing essentially locks them into that one vendor and they’re not going to have any options.”
Nevertheless, one of the WSP’s point men, Bob Schwent, assured lawmakers “interoperability” would actually improve! Motorola still would not answer questions- at least from the media- until after the contract was signed.
Now it turns out there are big problems with the Washington State Patrol’s $41 million and counting plan. A new federal audit has described the DOJ Network as “having an uncertain future”. In fact, the DOJ inspector general is now questioning what the agency has to show after 13 years of upgrading its law enforcement radios and spending $356 million. See IG Report.
The Obama administration wants to cancel the program!
Implications for the State Patrol are unclear. Bob Schwent, commander of the State Patrol’s electronic services division claims the system in the Northwest actually continues to work well. “It’s just that they’re not going to fund any expansion of it,” he said.
One state lawmaker says the audit raises “serious questions” about the State Patrol’s move onto a system controlled by the federal government. Since the program has already been shelved nationally, he questions whether it can survive.
According to the TNT, Rep. Reuven Carlyle, a Seattle Democrat, believes that it is likely the feds will be canceling the program- or offering the network to the state to maintain. Schwent admits that possibility.
“The WSP could continue operating,” he said. “We’d have some reductions in what we can do and how we continue to do it.” And maybe just a little additional expense?
The Department of Justice has already decided not to expand its law enforcement radio network because the design might not handle “significant advances in new technologies.” Exactly what the critics were saying to the WSP while the DOJ was quietly abandoning the project!
The DOJ now has concerns about the costs due to not being able to purchase equipment from Motorola’s competition, according to the audit. Again, exactly what some critics in Washington state were maintaining all along. When the State Patrol signed the $26 million no-bid contract with Motorola, it claimed that partnering with the federal system was some $12 million cheaper than building its own.
Did the DOJ know all this when they persuaded ed our state lawmakers to come on board? The Washington Attorney General’s office needs to look into various causes of action against the federal government or tell the people of our state why it is not doing so!
Just a few months after the WSP entered into the contract, the IG was warning that delays in the system are potentially jeopardizing the lives of law enforcement and emergency personnel- and the public! The audit stated that it is impossible to determine the true cost of the IWN program!
The WSP is keeping an optimistic face on things, however, and apparently still claims that it saved some $12 million by linking to the federal radio network. Some law enforcement agencies might have to retrofit or buy new radios in order to communicate with the Motorola system. The Department of Fish and Wildlife will have to purchase new radios at a cost of $1.5 million but that does not include the other Motorola proprietary equipment and software that is required to make things work.
The State Patrol is reportedly paying Motorola an average of $5,800 per radio for 2,400 radios. For agencies with less money to spend, replacing radios with Motorola equipment might not be necessary. But that depends on whether Motorola is willing to let its competitors use Motorola technology. It all makes you wonder whether any of these problems developed because of something to do with state and national politics. You think campaign contributions might have had anything to do with it?
As we publish this article EU Merger regulators just cleared a historical merger of Motorola Mobility (smart phones) and Google. At the same time, the DOJ’s Antitrust Division is approving the Google-Motorola deal while expressing significant concerns about how Google uses some of its proprietary technology. Google just received approval from the US Department of Justice for its $12.5 billion acquisition of Motorola Mobility.
Read more here.
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Keys to a safer Federal Way
By MARK KNAPP
Federal Way Mirror · The Firearms Lawyer
January 6, 2012
Every once in a while, we showcase a Federal Way volunteer that is an example for the rest of us.
I first met Dan Goede at one of the city’s emergency preparedness classes at Federal Way City Hall. Dan is one of many volunteers in our community who is involved in a variety of critical responsibilities, including emergency preparedness and working with the Federal Way Police Department. I have the privilege of working with Dan and getting to know him through the Armed Defense Training Association, where we are both members.
Dan served four years in the Air Force, including a year in Vietnam, where he maintained aircraft. Dan is an informal leader among those of us that have gone through CERT training. Dan and I met for coffee recently, and I asked him whether his military background has anything to with his commitment to emergency preparedness.
Dan told me he kept his AR15 close while repairing aircraft in various remote locations in Vietnam.
The habit of being ready for things that most of us don’t often think about developed from Dan’s experiences in Vietnam. He said the habits developed while working under a chain of command still motivate him to get additional training and work with others who value being prepared, even when it means sacrificing his own time.
Dan completed training with the Federal Way Citizen’s Academy and participates in CERT Advanced Team, a more specialized level of preparedness that comes after classes to become certified with Federal Way’s Community Emergency Response Team. Dan is licensed as a Ham radio technician. Ham radio operation is critical to maintaining communications during any emergency that knocks out electrical and telephone grids.
I have met many of the Federal Way police and CERT volunteers. Many of them have their Concealed Pistol Licenses and have told me that natural emergencies like earthquakes can present threats of violence. Some people who are unprepared for an emergency will often try to take what they need from those who have set aside some extra food and water. There are also opportunists that will use an emergency as an excuse to create chaos.
Dan and 50-75 volunteers know that it makes a difference in how you feel about your city to work with law enforcement officers in making the community safe.
We discussed ways in which Federal Way may be different when we create the proposed “Center for the Shooting Arts.”
We also discussed the ways in which the proposed gun range has the potential to be a “third place” — i.e., one of those places where we can all get to know each other better and interact in order to make Federal Way vibrate with productive friendships and opportunities for growth.
There will be various training groups from in and out of law enforcement working together in collaboration with each other to host events and make the shooting facility a success. Volunteers like Dan Goede are the key to making things work during the tough times when the shortage of funds creates a series of budget emergencies — inside and outside of government. The steps volunteers like Dan take today may also determine how you and I survive in the future.
The next CERT training begins Feb. 9. There is also training for the Neighborhood Emergency Team program scheduled for March 29. For information about these and other emergency training programs, go to www.cityoffederalway.com/prepare or email FWEM@cityoffederalway.com.
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