Gun Control and 3D Printing: The Genie is Almost Out of the Bottle

Newtown.  Columbine.  Jonesboro.  Virginia Tech.  Gun control.  Just do a Google search; you will get millions of hits.  Now search this:  3D printed gun parts.  It’s true: it’s a possibility.  A group of hobbyists is working on designs now and has already fabricated a few key components.  Here’s a link at The Verge that tells more.

The short version: it’s possible and already being prototyped.  All you need is a 3D printer: $10,000 for one ready to go, or for the really creative you can build your own for a thousand dollars or two worth of parts.  The article I linked to discussed a receiver, one key part that is regulated in automatic weapons.  All of the other parts can be bought today and are legal to purchase.  However, my prediction is that once a receiver is built it won’t be long until the other required parts can be fabricated or repurposed from other intended uses.  For instance, if you want to build a firearm to be used in close quarters you don’t really need a long barrel with rifling, just a tube.  And only the first few inches next to the receiver require any reinforcing (duct tape, anyone?); the rest is just to guide the bullet and help aim.  And will be just as easy to fabricate a clip with a 3d printer as a receiver, likely easier.

How far have these builders come?  The prototype in the article was able to fire 6 rounds before cracking.  However, it is believed that as these hobbyists gain skill their builds will become more robust.  In a matter of weeks or months they will be able to build a receiver that will last for hundreds or thousands of rounds, and when it breaks they can print another for … ten dollars?  Five?  All they need are the raw materials and a bit of time.

Why does this matter?  For starters, how will you control who can and can’t build the parts?  How will gun control be handled when you can literally print a gun in the privacy of your own home or workshop?  How can you control weapons when anyone with access to $10,000 of computer hardware can just build one?  The cork is being removed as we speak; the genie’s smoke is already rising.

For sake of disclosure, I must say I do not own a handgun, though I do own several rifles and shotguns and carry a valid hunting license.  I will not engage in any debate about the right to bear arms, or hunt, or why I believe or not in this practice.  However, the ultimate point I would make is this: the quantity and technologies for making guns are so widely available in this country it would take years or even decades to gather them all even if another one was never made or imported again.  Until we address why the finger on the trigger wants to pull it, we are just wasting time.  Do I believe gun control will help?  For some types of crimes, certainly, and for other crimes not in the least.  But in the long run our failure as a society to fix this is due to much more than how easy it is to find a gun here.  Until we figure out how to fix the mind behind the gun, the trigger will continue to be pulled.

The Best Political Example

The day after a political race is always interesting.  Some people quietly breathe a sigh of relief.  Some people are sad.  Some stand in front of the world and scream “Take that!  And you deserve it, you idiots!”  Today we see some people gloating, some hiding, and some forgetting they promised to leave the country if their candidate lost…!  But for me, there is a different example I want to remember and remind you about.

I remember a family that lived near us.  Their children were my friends and schoolmates and we attended the same church, so it was natural to spend time at their house.  Mr. and Mrs. Young always made us feel welcome at their place.  One day a number of us were there, visiting and having a good time.  I noticed Mr. Young sitting in his big easy chair, and just behind him was a bookcase of family pictures, mementos, and books.  One of the pictures caught my eye: it was Jimmy Carter, the President of the United States of America.  As best I remember it showed him standing next to his wife, Rosalyn.  I was surprised; I never though of Mr. Young as being the least bit political.  I asked him “Is that the president?  Why do you have his picture?  Did you vote for him?”  I will never forget what he told me.

“Well, I don’t talk much about my vote, but we wrote to the White House and asked for a picture.  I put it there to remind us to pray for him and his people every day”.  He went on to explain to me the importance of supporting the president with our prayers, and even if we don’t agree with everything he does, we should be respectful and decent.  We may debate the wisdom of his actions, but personal criticisms were not acceptable.  I never heard if he voted for the man or not, but sure enough, when Ronald Reagan was elected a new picture was put up, and a new name was added to their prayer list.

My thoughts for you: whether you believe in God or not, please consider the example of Mr. and Mrs. Young, who prayed for the president just because he was the president.  What a great example to set for all of us!

Bye-bye to the Dell Mini 10v

I have written in the past about my experience with the Dell Mini 10v. I have enjoyed the hackintosh experience with it, but I’m moving on. My boss bought me a new iPad with 3G, so I no longer need to netbook, so… time to sell! The Dell Mini 10v I have includes the original 160 Gb drive with a Microsoft OS, plus a 250 Gb drive (installed!) that is already hackintosh’d and running OSX 10.6.7. I will also include a nice nylon carrying bag, the charger, and all of the original paperwork for $200 US. I’ll give this one week, then it’s off to eBay!

Comment to me with any questions and I’ll be notified ASAP. I will pay to ship anywhere in the continental US with a UPS or USPS shipping. Don’t wait too long!

John

The Big 5-0: Time to be Thankful

Today I turned 50. While at face value it would seem like a fun day, I’ve never been a big fan of birthday celebrations. As a child a birthday was usually more likely to disappoint, what with the high expectations that children often get. You know the scene: child walks into party, everyone yells happy birthday, then someone drops his cake, the “birthday pony” turns into a package of underwear that don’t fit, and then a spanking is given because even though it’s your party, you cannot actually cry if you want to. Even my best celebration ever (age 40) seemed to sour over time: most of the friends that came to that party don’t even speak with me now after a nasty church split happened a couple of years later (to be blogged at a later date…much later!). Believe me, I do not look forward to the annual celebration.

Maybe the disappointments from the early birthdays have helped the presents matter less and less? I have been known to go pick out my own so my wife and kids know exactly what to get me. This year I got a nice watch (Japanese: I would feel uncomfortable and pretentious with a Swiss timepiece) and some clothes that were on sale when we were in Branson a couple of weeks ago. Maybe I’m becoming more practical, too? I think about some of the other gifts I have had in previous years, and my favorite is an electric guitar kit my wife bought me. I still have that guitar, and while my assembly could have been more skilled, it means a lot to me because she and my kids got it for me, and since we are all musicians it has greater meaning for me.

One of my favorite ways to celebrate usually involves just trying to be alone. Magnum P.I. had the best way to celebrate: get up early, grab the surf/sail board, get dropped 5 miles out at sea, and then spend the rest of the day paddling around in circles to avoid everyone else! Sometimes I do this, but in my own way: I drive out early to the river and fly fish alone, enjoying the quiet and solitude while smoking a cigar (lighten up: it’s the one time or place I smoke). Being alone on this day allows me to look inward, reflect, and think about the stuff that matters most to me. Yes, it’s a bit selfish, but hey, it’s my birthday! Dinner will be had later in the day either just with my wife and kids and perhaps my brother. This year we will meet my folks for dinner somewhere early, then head back home to wrap up the day.

Spending time alone on my birthday gives me a chance to look back at the previous 12 months, and this year is no exception. Work goes well, and though some things in my department could be going better I recognize that my team is doing a very good job. My church continues to grow which is especially comforting to me. The church split I mentioned led to our former pastor recruiting almost every person under the age of 40 away to a new startup, and it’s taken a few years for growth to begin again; it’s good to move on. Looking back for a bit helps me look forward, and thinking about what was helps me resolve to work on what could be.

It’s also nice to think about the people and situations that have taken me to today. The advent of Facebook has given me a chance to reconnect with some of these old friends, and I’m very appreciate to have these people back in my life. Carol and Janice are part of a rotating lunch crew that meets every month or so, and they knew me from “back in the day” when we were all in high school. They do a good job of keeping me grounded if I should get a little too uppity…! Randy is a coworker who I also went to high school with. I’m a manager in my current job, but Randy has a way of reminding me of what I was like in high school, when he and our friend James could beat me up!

Facebook has also allowed me to reconnect with old college and church friends. Connie went to my high school, but I also knew her from my old church in South West Little Rock and because she was friends with my “first best friend”, Melinda (she and I met when we were in diapers!). I wish I was more like Connie. She is fighting cancer again, but never lets it bring her down, at least not for very long. Her posts on Facebook always seem to lift me up somehow, even when she is suffering. If anyone has the right to complain it would be her, but she is the first to say “Get over it”, and does.

I would be remiss if I didn’t say a bit more about Melinda. My first memory of having a friend over as a child was her. Since her mother and mine were good friends we got to spend time together, and since we went to the same church we just always seemed to be around. As we moved up a few grades there were times we ran in different circles, but after spending 10 minutes together we always seemed to pick right back up from where we were before. Even now it still happens: we sat next to each other at a funeral, and in between the tears over a friend’s passing we were laughing and giggling! Never, EVER sit next to Melinda and I at a funeral!

Looking back to appreciate the good friends usually leads me to think about my family, starting with my wife. I am the first person to admit “I married up!”, and anyone who knows her would agree…! My boys, the twins, also do a good job of helping me be me. Unfortunately, they have inherited my gift of snark: their sense of humor and sarcasm is developing all too quickly.

I think this might be a good time to post a picture of one of the other gifts I got today on my 50th birthday from my wife and sons. I would remind them “Paybacks are hell!”.

A Grammar Nazi!

I try to avoid posts that merely link back to another writer’s post, but I couldn’t resist on this one.

http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2012/07/i_wont_hire_people_who_use_poo.html

I am not quite as severe about grammar as this fellow, but I have to admit that bad grammar can make you look stupid. Enjoy!

Stories from the Road to Yellville

My parents are getting older. They are fiercely independent, but once in a while they call and need or want something, and since I’m the older son those calls often come to me. A couple of weeks ago that call came from my father: “Your great aunt has passed, and we were hoping you could drive us to the funeral”. What’s a son to say?

The day started at 8 AM. I drove to their house and we all loaded in Dad’s car, then headed over to pick up my uncle before starting the 3 hour drive to Yellville. It’s one of those towns that has to be a destination for you, because you aren’t going to just happen upon it on the way to somewhere else: it’s as close to the end of the road as it gets. The drive is scenic and typical of the northern Arkansas countryside, and even though we’ve had little rain all summer it was still a pretty drive, though very dry. The funeral was well attended, and since my great aunt had dementia for a period of years the funeral was not as sad as some are. It’s also pretty rare that I see my uncle these days, so I decided to take advantage of the situation and ask him and my father everything I could think of about their childhood together and growing up in rural Arkansas in the 1930′s.

I heard stories about animals, picking cotton, and what I’m sure were some terrible, lean times in the Great Depression. They lived in a time when most people there still did not have electricity and indoor plumbing, when no one had any money, but most folks at least had a garden and the ability to feed themselves. One of my dad’s more revealing memories was about the hobos, tramps, and homeless folk that sometimes showed up at their house near the railroad outside of Little Rock. Every morning his mother would fix the family breakfast, usually consisting of homemade biscuits and gravy and eggs. The family would eat and head on their way, and leftovers would be set aside to eat later. Sometimes the hobos would come knock on the door at the porch and ask if there was any food to be spared. My dad said that my grandmother would do her best to sound stern, but most times a plate of that mornings leftovers would get handed through the screen door to a hungry man who would eat out in the yard while my dad and aunt would watch. I remember my Grandmommie and this sounds typical of her: she could sound tough when she wanted but would help if she could.

My uncle had a good story or two as well. “Daddy and our family lived for a while at a dairy. Daddy ran the dairy, and in return he got free rent and a plot of ground to garden, plus $5-10 a week. Back then nobody had a tractor for plowing. You had to have either a mule or a horse to pull a plow. Daddy needed a mule, so one Saturday he went to town to the livestock sale barn to bid on something. He brought home a good mule, and it was a fine looking animal. It was young and strong, and broke to the plow. I think it probably cost $40 or more, and that was a lot of money back then.”

“He got home late that Saturday and didn’t have time to plow, so on Sunday morning he got up to get his plowing done. Everyone else was getting ready for church, and Momma saw what he was doing and started to get on him about it. She said ‘Floyd! What are you doing? It’s time to go to church!’, but Daddy kept on getting ready to plow. Momma was always faithful to make it to church, and expected everyone else to go, too. So Daddy put on his overhauls and work boots, hitched up the mule to the plow, pointed it down the row, snapped the reins at the mule, and they started plowing. They made it about 50 feet down the row, then the mule stopped. Next thing I knew, it fell over, twitched, and died!” (He later said it probably had the distemper). “My momma went straight up to Daddy and got up close to him and yelled at him ‘Floyd! I told you not to plow on Sunday!’ After that she always told everybody that the mule died because Daddy plowed on Sunday!”

Together my dad and uncle talked about other times when they were growing up, about the animals, living out in the country, and what life was like. There were hard times and they had no money, but with their farming ability they were almost always able to grow what they needed and take care of their own. I am amazed to hear about these times; it makes me realize how easy we have things now. And it was good to imagine my father as a boy and a young man, trying to figure out how to make it in the world. The stories from the road to Yellville were good ones, and turned the day into a treasured memory.

Graduation Speeches: What Would I Say?

Last night I found myself sitting in a graduation ceremony. The high school has outgrown the school auditorium, so we were inside the local college’s basketball venue. There were a number of speeches given by graduates who spoke of encouragement, looking forward, fond memories, and the usual things that you hear at graduations in speeches given by students who perhaps don’t have a lot of life experience. Kind, well-meaning speeches, to be sure, but… they are what they are.

It occurred to me that I have things to say to these students. The problem is that I am neither rich, famous, or associated even remotely with the school, other than I myself am the parent of twins who will hopefully graduate themselves in a few years, so it’s not likely that I will be asked to give the speech. So I’m going to write it down and blog (and if you steal this to use at your commencement, you darn well better give me credit for it!) What exactly would I say?

Here it is: Good evening graduates, parents, families, and friends! You are all here tonight because your child, grandchild, relative, friend or neighbor is on the verge of the rest of their life. While we are all wishing them the best, there are things they should know, and as an older and hopefully wiser adult, here is what I would tell you.

1) Take some time off (I’m stealing this straight from Guy Kawasaki: look it up!). You have worked your butt off for a period of years… or maybe you slacked all the way through, I don’t know. Either way, whether you like it or not, you will find yourself becoming more responsible very soon. If there is any way you can make it happen, you need to go have some fun: this summer, or maybe between semesters, but do it. You may not get another chance. Some of you are headed to college for four years, followed by graduate school, or law school, or medical school, or to the military and boot camp, or to a mind-numbingly boring job, so the next four/six/eight/ten years of your life will be spent with your head in a book, or a lab, or a practice room, a kitchen, a fox hole, or somewhere that is not very fun. Go do something fun. Not something stupid, or ill-advised, or illegal, but something fun. Get a backpack and knock around Europe for a month. Go to New York City and take in a half dozen Broadway shows. Spend every penny you can get from your parents, grandparents, relatives, friends and neighbors. You need to do this because you may not get to do it again. You should do it because this will give you perspective, a life experience, and a good memory that may carry you through dark times in the future. So enjoy it, and don’t feel guilty about asking your mom, dad, grandparents, etc. to let you do it. I wish I were you, and trust me: they do, too!

2) I have words of wisdom for you that don’t involve traveling, slacking, partying, or backpacking, too! Here are the first: Some of the best lessons you will ever learn will not be in a classroom. (This is the part that makes the educators in the room mad. But they know it’s true and will get over it). You will learn these lessons by doing what we older adults call “living”. While “living”, you will learn by failing. You will learn by screwing up. You will learn by doing. You will learn by making choices. And the smartest of you will learn by watching others, and seeing them fail, screw up, and doing. This is OK. As you live your lives, you will make choices, and then hopefully have to live with those choices. I say “hopefully” because some of you are severely protected by your parents, grandparents, relatives, friends, and neighbors. You make decisions and when bad things happen, these loved ones bail you out so you don’t have to live with the consequences of your decisions. That may seem like a good thing now, but sooner or later it will be bad, because no matter how much these people love and care for you, they won’t always be there. Sooner or later your decisions will come back to haunt you, and the older you get, the bigger those decisions become. What is the best thing? This is the hard part for the parents and loved ones: let your children make decisions, and make them deal with the fallout and the aftermath of those decisions. The sooner your kids learn personal responsibility, the sooner they make good decisions, and the better they get at it. Also, when they learn this sooner the bad consequences are usually much smaller than when they learn them later. Yes, it’s hard to let your kid screw up, but it’s much harder when they are thirty, or forty, or fifty.

3) Graduates: failure will come. You will encounter things in life that you can’t overcome, or run into things that will get to you or mess up your life’s plans. That’s ok: you can learn from failure. Failure represents opportunity, too. Michael Jordan (he was an NBA basketball player, kids) missed more shots than most other players, but he made more, too. Babe Ruth (baseball player; your grandparents knew all about him) struck out a lot back in the day, but he also created a home run record that stood unmatched for decades. What’s the point here? Trying begats failure, but also begats success, and success can’t come unless you try. So keep trying. One more tired sports analogy: you can’t win if you sit out the game. You can be carried by others, but you personally do not win.

4) Luck can come to anyone, but it comes most often to those who work their butts off for it. It also comes to those who have a good plan, who follow through on the plan, and who work hard to execute their plan. Armand Hammer once said “When I work fourteen hours a day seven days a week I get lucky”. Edna Mode in the movie The Incredibles said “Luck favors the prepared”. Yes, sometimes you will fail (see item 3 above), but sometimes you succeed. And if you don’t try, you get nothing. Don’t settle for nothing. And here is some more good news: this whole planning thing? It can be taught. It can be learned. It can be practised. It can be a habit. What does that say about luck? I think that is saying: You can make your own luck. Luck can be many things, but at some point luck is a choice.

5) However you got to wherever you are right now doesn’t mean you can’t be somewhere better tomorrow. The decisions you made in the past have certainly influenced your path, but you can make better decisions, starting right now. Maybe you wait until the night before to study for your test? How did that work out for you? The smart ones make different choices the next time. Making the same decisions the same way over and over and expecting a different result is insanity, so…be sane.

6) Never, ever stop learning. None of you is going to die one day and get a tombstone that says “I wish I had watched more TV”, or “I should have played more video games”, or “I wish I had worked more hours a week”. I’m not saying these things are bad, but learning will expand your mind and keep you moving forward more than these other things will. I was once told “You either are growing or you are dying”. Your mind is the same way: keep expanding it. Keep thinking. Keep trying new things, considering new ideas, and challenging what you believe you know. William James once said “A great many people think they are thinking when they are merely rearranging their prejudices.” Open your minds and honestly consider other ideas… but when you see they are wrong, don’t be afraid to reject them. Just make sure you do it in a way that leaves dignity and respect with those that have other ideas and cultural backgrounds than you do: in the end we all still have to get along and share this earth. And hey, that trip and fun stuff I told you to do way back at the beginning of this little talk? Those are also ways to learn (and another great reason to ask for that money!) Never stop learning.

7) Give back to mankind. In the course of your lifetime, some of you will earn millions and millions of dollars, maybe more. Don’t do this by stepping on those around you. Find ways to be compassionate and caring. Yes, you will want to win in life, but winning is useless if you are alone and hated. That boy or girl sitting next to you? They are a soul. They are just like you, but different. They have hopes and dreams and fears, though maybe not all of the same ones you do. Don’t be afraid to help someone else meet their hopes and dreams and escape their fears; it will make you a better person, too. And in ten, or twenty or thirty years when you get back together for the big high school reunion? The best of you will not be bragging about your money, or houses, or cars. And if anyone does, most people won’t want to hear it. Trust me; wait and see.

There is so much more I would tell you graduates, but it’s very likely that by now you are already thinking about tonight’s party, or hopefully tomorrow’s big trip. The last thing I will tell you: this room is full of people who care about you. If you ever need help, these are most likely the people who will do it. Try not to need it, but don’t be afraid to ask if you do. And congratulations! And take some time off, maybe go on a trip…?