Thoughts on the GLOCK VP firing

[jar]

I have noticed many people that seem to believe that some great victory was won when the GLOCK VP resigned. I don't quite see it that way.

For me, the issue was never the VP, not even what he said, but the corporate position shared by many gun manufacturers that some sort of National Gun Registry is enevitable, reasonable and even needed.

If you look at what that person has done in the past, until the 60 Minutes interview he would have been classified as one of the major supports of gun owners.

When you step back a ways and look at the incident, the results are that a very capable handgun proponent has been marginalized and yet the very basic issue, whether or not Gun Manufacturers must take a stand opposing any for of National Gun Registration, was never addressed. In fact, his firing actually is providing additional ammunition for those proposing a National Ballistics Registry.

While I believe that it is necessary to oppose any statement from any gun manufacturer that seems to approve of or promote any National Gun Registry of any sort, I believe that getting him fired was counter to our best intrest.

IMHO, we, as the general gun owning public, should be criticising GLOCK as much for firing him as for his statement. IMHO we need to get the word through to ALL gun manufacturers that the problem was the Message, not the Messenger.

 

[Hkmp5sd]

From my viewpoint, I'm not glad to see him go. He has a very strong record for opposing gun control. It would have been nice if they had planned ahead not to make any comments like that during the interview. But since they did, the best way to handle this would have been for Glock to issue a statement clarifying their position and commenting on the various studies and facts that prove that ballistic fingerprinting is not viable.

Unlike the Civil Rights groups that want to lynch anyone making a comment they disagree with (unless of course, you happen to be a Democrat), I much prefer educating the individual and/or company and keeping them on our side. Coming out name calling or demanding an across the board boycott of their products is nothing more than extortion in my opinion. The exact same thing the NAACP and Rainbow Coalition do. Try to sort out the differences and reach an agreement suitable to both sides before resorting to boycotts. From the anti-gun side, they must love to see gun owners break from major manufactures. If they cannot get laws to ban guns, getting voluntary boycotts by the buyers is the next best thing. Everyone suffers.

I know several people that were convinced during the publicity surrounding the two idiots riding around shooting people last year, that a firearm has a distinct and permanent "finger print" just like a human hand. After providing them with the correct information, some became very angry and contacted the media sources and complained about being lied to.

 

[mack]

I'd almost be for a ballistic registry if:

1. It would get rid of serial numbers on guns - no need you see since each gun has a ballistic finger print; just record the guns ballistic finger print and then assign it a number - no identifying marks on the gun needed - you would just shoot it and then match the infallible finger print - then track it like you would using the serial number today, (manufacturer to distributor to retailer to initial purchaser).

2. If there was no central database other that the actual ballistic finger print itself connected only to the manufacturer – such that firearm traces would work like they do today except with a ballistic finger print number instead of a serial number.

3. If since the finger print can change over time, all records, (ballistic finger prints and reference tracking numbers), were purged after 10 years to aid in both the reliability of the system and since the vast majority of guns used in crimes are newer guns.

Think the gun control fans would sign on?

 

[10-Ring]

Did he even leave the company? or was he just made a sacraficial lamb & repositioned w/in Glock as a "consultant"?

Corporate gamesmanship!

 

[Sven]

Who _really_ knows what the politics behind this were - the ballistic fingerprinting thing might have been the straw that broke the camels back, but there might be more to the story... more than we will ever know.

Lets hope for a good replacement.

 

[Yohan]

Glocks are ugly- Um- So I don't care if someone who was blind enough to work for them got fired. Sux to be him though, lol

 

[Waitone]

The latest Glock faux pax and the previous S&W meltdown both point to the reality of the gun business in the USofA. All gun companies (either manufacturers or US representative organizations) must satisfy the needs of two separate and distinct markets: institutional markets and retail markets. Instututional markets include LE, the military and poultry inspectors. Retail markets have their own channels of distribution; their own master distributors and ultimately a storefront.

When faced with multiple customers a manufacturer, any manufacturer, will tend to pay more attention to those customes and channels that provide the most fixed cost absorption. I would suspect in the case of gun manufacturers they would pay closer attention to institutional customers. Unit price is most likely lower but the volume is higher. Such a combo permits a company to pay salaries and turn on the lights. Retail sales at a higher unit price generate margin dollars.

As long as gun manufacturers troll for institutional business there will be a tendency to mouth the BF public relations lines. One could easily predict this is how pressure will be applied in the absence legislative actions. I would love to see the raw footage of the Glock VP's interview. I would love to hear the question he was responding to when he made his BF comment.

So those of us in the retail channel have to decide how we are going to respond to the inevitable comments. Screaming "boycott" will lose its effectiveness sooner or later. However. . . .there is something quite therapeutic for corporate decision makers to step over a corporate body on the way to the parking lot at the end of the day. It tends to focus the mind and clear away the cobwebs.

 

[Dean Speir]

Errata

I have noticed many people that seem to believe that some great victory was won when the GLOCK VP resigned.

For openers, there was no "victory" of any sort, since Paul Jannuzzo did not resign. He and his fiancée, Glock Inc.'s Human Resources Manager Monica Berecky, were fired after a incident at SHOT Show that was completely unrelated to that 60 Minutes interview. The "timing" certainly is suspicious, but when I interviewed him on Thursday, 13 February, he seemed to know it was coming.

Six days later I learned that he had long been tight with Forensic Technology, the company (also interviewed on that 60 Minutes segment) which has been pioneering the Ibis "ballistic DNA" system, so it wouldn't surprise me if Jannuzzo surfaces there before too long.

But the one thing no one here has touched on relates to the genuineness of Glock, Inc.'s second statement in relation to this from ATF almost three years ago:

ATF is currently conducting a pilot project with Glock, wherein they will capture digital image a test fire shell casing for handgun they manufacture. That image will be associated with the serial number of the firearm in a computer database. Later if a shell casing is recovered at a crime scene it could be compared against the Glock database.

I recall Jannuzzo and Glock, along with Taurus, being very outspoken three years ago when S&W entered into that dreadful HUD agreement… they were against it! Now, however, I wonder about just how truthful that second statement is.

 

[Boom Vang]

Thanks for the info Dean and good points as well!

Many, like myself, have been trying to make that same point that Glock's recent statement is in conflict with BATF's statement as to Glock maintaining a databse. However, we have been making it over at a well-known Glock forum, the moderators of which appear to wish this whole thing would just be forgotten so they can go on discussing how Glock is the greatest thing sinced sliced white bread.