patriquin was a 1-man show doing that. he was always skeptical of the prevailing wisdom. that is one of the lessons here. the americans are pretty good at that. we need to respect and institutionalize it. that is what patriquin had. on islam and cultural tolerance and understanding other cultures and connecting with them. and intellectual -- being a free spirit and celebrating that in any human endeavor. >> he was successful and maybe they're getting better. >> a learning organization. the military has forgotten cultural understanding to some extent to dealing with local population or learning the language. these are very logical.

they are largely forgotten. the big army had forgotten that and they learned it pretty quickly. general david petraeus came in and there were a lot of lessons learned. we are getting much better at it. i think americans in general have to learn from the american military. what some of these lessons are because they are critical. we have to know these lessons now and expand our thinking and do more homework and think in an intellectually more open way about all these things and to our potential allies are and how to defend america and what real national security is a deliberate ourselves from the cliches we have fallen victim to in the last 9 years in the incredible new world we live in. patriquin shows us how to do that. >> it is an amazing story. the book is "a soldier's dream". thank you, william doyle. thanks for coming and talking with us. [applause]

>> is very non-fiction offer or book you would like to see featured on booktv? send us an e-mail at booktv@c-span.org or tweak as at twitter.com/booktv. >> next on booktv, paul barrett talks about the ubiquitous use of the glock kissel. it is about an hour.

[no audio] >> editor at business week. he is the author of american is long:the struggle of the soul of a religion and a true story of race in america. he also lives right around the corner from book court. please welcome paul barrett. [applause] >> thank you very much for that lovely introduction. i am extremely pleased to be here for a number of reasons. all these wonderful people, friends, family and to be in the neighborhood makes it more

enjoyable. before i get going, for the benefit of your neighbors, turn yourself phones off and all are handguns are unloaded and safely secured. let's begin with gaston glock, the gentleman mentioned in the introduction. after 30 years in manufacturing, gaston glock's industriousness yielded respectable industrial station and without elevating him to the higher ranks of austrian commerce. he dreamed big. the son of an austrian railroad worker managed an inconspicuous car radiator factory outside vienna. in the garage next to his home in suburban. broaden he worked with his wife using a second-hand metal press made in russia produced a modest volume of brass fittings for doors and windows. the metal shop expanded over

time, the reasonable price of which so impressed austria's ministry of defence that glock got a contract to surf field knives to the austrian army. this led to contact with the ministry where glock became an occasional visitor. his eyes and ears open for new opportunity. one day in february 1980 he overheard a hallway conversation between two colonels that jolted his imagination. the army needed a new sidearm to replace the antiquated world war ii p 38. and austrian armsmaker since the 200s offered to sell the military modern pistol but the gun fell short of the stringent >> -- specifications. top generals were running out of patience. glock interrupted. would still be possible for another company the brazil for his company to bid on the pistol contract? the colonels laughed.

in his garage gaston glock made hinges and a curtain rods and now thought he could design a handgun? reserve and manner glock wasn't known for his sense of humor. he was a slender man of average height with a receding hairline, sloping shoulders and long arms. recreational swimmer he had a sinewy physique and unprepossessing looking. he spoke as much as necessary and dressed conservatively in sweaters beneath his dark suit coat. he graduated from a technical institute and received training in mechanical engineering. reworked his way up in manufacturing from an entry-level position to the company that made drills. designing firearms was something far beyond his experience. glock asked the colonel to describe the army's requirements for a new handgun. in his credulous this said it should be difficult to make such an item according to a later official company account. or as gaston glock put it, not that i knew nothing was my

advantage. after years later about his familiarity with weapons in 1980 he admitted it was slight. i had very little trading. i was just a few days in the camps of the german army. born in 1929 in vienna he was conscripted as a teenager. i was very young in those days. 15 or 16 years old but had to undergo some sort of military training. this instruction took place in 1944-1945, he explained with a notable lack of precision. how long had he served? only two or three days. his attempt to play down his connection was not surprising if hardly admirable. many austrians of his generation did the same thing. more relevant to glock's role as an arms desire was his assertion is fires background was exceedingly limited. i saw rifles, kissel hand grenades, was getting acquainted when you pull the trigger.

it makes a boom. gaston glock was essentially a genius general contractor. a brilliant project manager. when he saw this opportunity to design a new gun for the austrian military he gathered together the leading handgun experts of his day and basically said to them tell me what you want in a perfect handgun starting from scratch. these experts, one of whom convenient was the chairman of the austrian army who later went to work for gaston glock in a pattern that would repeat itself many times over the years, told him there were several crucial characteristics for a new pistol in the 1980s. it had to be very light, very durable and had to have a very large ammunition capacity. glock took these characteristics and applied two manufacturing concepts to them and these two

concepts deceived -- achieved the goal, the key to his early success. the first is he made his pistol lot of press deck, not out of wood or blue steel. material handguns had been made of for 150 years. he hired engineers from a defunct camera manufacturer skilled in industrial manufacturer and molding. aplastic gun would be more durable, later and because it is later, he could make it with larger ammunition capacity. second design concept was the absence of a factory. for generations and generations new handguns would be designed to fit the two that already existed in factories already operating. gaston glock designed a gun without a factory and made a factory fit the gun.

he is only the most modern computer-controlled foolish teens and build a factory that was exceedingly efficient allowing huge profit margins from the start. apart from engineering at 11 was in the right place at the right time. he was in the hallway of the defense ministry at the moment people were talking about the ministry's failure to find an adequate design for a new pistol. secondly timing was perfect in connection with the united states as well as austria. and the nodes to glock at the time he started work on the pistol police departments across the united states in the 1980s were experiencing sharply rising crime rates. in particular increasing gun violence related to trafficking and crack cocaine.

it became almost conventional wisdom in 1985-'86 in cities like new york, los angeles, chicago and miami that the police were outgunned. the bad guys had more powerful weapons than the good guys. the cops were using smith and wesson, 5 or 6 round revolvers of the sort they used 75 or 80 years. they needed something new and here came gaston glock with the pistil of the future. in jacksonville a young officer in 1986 was given the assignment to they term which gun should replace the smith and wesson that the sheriff's office had used for generations. his name was john rutherford. let me tell you about the process. he chose the new gun. gun manufacturers from all over the world said the sheriff's

office latest model. a dozen in all. rutherford and braintrust of fellow officers with firearm experience gathered to examine the candidate gunned. we're taking the guns out and looking at them. brennan 92. isn't that pretty? everybody loves that. then i plow this black box and pop it open and here is this gaston glock. it is plastic. there is no hammer on this thing. i literally said we don't want crap like this and swung it over on the couch and put it back in the mix with the other guns. curiosity got the better of lt. rutherford. with a few days he said we were fighting over who was going to get the glock. it is just like shooting a revolver. you pull out, pull the trigger and put it away. that is the beauty of it. rutherford and his colleagues had nostalgia affection for the

standard issue smith and wesson 38 but the 38 caliber revolver had heavy trigger of 14 pounds. shooters who trade regularly can achieve accuracy with a heavy trigger but only a small minority of cops track this diligently. here's a smith out there that all police officers and the new enthusiasts and trade like crazy and shoot all the time. in fact many cops don't take range time seriously and even in high crime cities the vast majority of officers go years or entire career without getting into a gunfight. with the glock because of its light steady trigger pull, pour marksman became adequate. moderately skilled shooters the brazilians called punches near dead center of their targets. the pistol's gender five round trigger doesn't require the muscular squeeze that can cause the user to jerk the gun off target. deron two our presentation to the sheriff rutherford stressed the gun's accuracy and safety advantages and explain the austrian pistol was easier to

maintain because it had only 34 parts. comparable guns had twice or three times as many. you can take 50 glocks apart and put 50 together and after mixing up the parts they all shoot. smith and wesson allowed its manufacturing quality to slip. the store was similar to that of the american auto industry. donemakers and the united states lost ground with more diligence about quality control. toyota sneaked up on general motors. renovation and of 40 new smith and wesson revolvers 3 or four mill function out of the box. the sheriff's decision came quickly. we are buying the glocks, he said. the american police market cheaper to hundreds of thousands of officers in the space of ten years, half of these were buying

gaston glock. in many communities the civilian gun owning population look to the police for guidance. what the local police use is often thought of as being suitable for civilian ownership. the civilian market is even larger by orders of magnitude and more lucrative because the profit margin on the civilian side is greater. if you seek to succeed in selling handguns you want to do it in this country not just because of the size of the country but because guns are woven into american culture. let me read a few words about that topic. in the united states guns are much more than a tool of law enforcement or article of commerce. they are embedded in the country's history. by the time the constitution was framed a tradition of private

firearm ownership was an aspect of daily life and american identity. citizen soldiers defeated the mighty british beginning with the shot heard round world. the second amendment enshrines the principle of an armed populist. folklore nurtured begun tradition. god created all men the same wedge, but sam colt made them equal. to many americans over many generations guns represented freedom, individualism and self-reliance. snub nose 38 revolvers stand for the world weary persistence of pulp fiction detectives in the depression. henry allen, pulitzer prize-winning critic has observed a, a marine veteran who shoot guns recreational. he continued selection on colts are the active view of the cowboys, double barreled shotgun is your -- sticking with a knowing elegance through the brush in search of quayle. a 22 is the essence of

childhood. that spattering noise of the rifle range voice called camp and afterwards the smell of number 9 cleaning salt. the would she's an one invented the common man determination that won world war ii. guns have another darker heritage. one related to this order, crime and murderous violence. depression era gangsters lead to legislation aimed at restricting gun sales and ownership. cheap saturday night specials flooded city streets in the 1970s and became emblems of rising crime rates. in response clint eastwood's dirty harry branded his famous smith and wesson 44 magnum. the glock introduced in the 1980s inherited all aspects of the american firearm heritage. was seen as an instrument of law and security also menace, danger and fear. it became the hand gun of choice for cops and favorite of some

demented mass killers. black plastic and metal construction set it apart from everything else on the market suggesting modernism, and efficiency. that darker side of the american gun tradition in modern times has resulted in the gun control movement. we have a significant section of american society that is very skeptical of gun ownership. efforts to restrict the sale and ownership of handguns were directed at the glock in particular from the moment it arrived in this country. the fact that it had such a large capacity and was material that had not traditionally been used in making guns made it a target for gun control advocates but time and again beginning in the 1980s and continuing to the present, efforts to restrict the glock have backfired. gun-control initiatives that have been applied to the glock

have resulted not in fewer glocks being sold but more glocks being sold and own. let me explain a couple examples. when the gun showed appeared was greeted almost immediately by muckraking newspaper columns, congressional hearings and gun-control activists claiming that the glock, because it was plastic, presented a new threat. that it would become the favorite of hijackers because they could get it through airport screening machines. in fact at times it became common to refer to the glock as the hijackers special. headlines to that effect all over. in new york city, the new york police department which controls regulation of guns in the city banned the glock in five boroughs of new york by name. that company could not sell its guns here.

the problem with this attack on the glock was it was factually incorrect. most airport screening machines or x-ray machines, not magnetometers. large dance piece of plastic shaped like a gun looks like a gun on the screening machine if anyone bothers to look at it. moreover the slide on the glock if you imagine a pistol has a large rectangular piece on top was solid steel in any case. and by wake of the original the glock was mostly metal. so the whole attack was completely misconceived. i interviewed gun control advocates involved in this and they conceded to me we screwed up. a terrible mistake from their point of view because by making the glock notorious improved its image in the eyes of people who

like guns and made it a favorite overnight of the nra which might otherwise have been skeptical of a new import that was challenging the homegrown smith and wesson. in new york, this issue came to a head after a couple years of having been manned, there was a sensational press release. the associated press broke the story and the new york post picked a. it turned out the police commissioner of the time was carrying the glock under his suit coat. the top cop went to the glock but no one else should have one. the new york post with its unique skill at the headline top cop wards off ban on supergun. i interviewed the man named carl walter who was the head -- basically the first salesman in this country and he said could

you imagine a big city newspaper calling my gun supergun? if you had given me a $50 million advertising budget or $100 million advertising budget could have bought a pension like that which spread all across the country so it became seen as the supergun and got this free attention from that point. there are subsequent instances were other laws and initiatives were targeted at the glock and similar counterintuitive results. the glock began a supergun in more ways than one. one thing that set it apart was it was embraced so quickly by hollywood. it became the gun of choice on television and in the movies. this was not something that

happened by mistake and it was not something glock had to pay for. the dark glamour of the gun, it appears that reputation appealed to the men who had the job of choosing which gun going to the actor's hand so let me tell you about one of those men who helped popularize the glock by hollywood. from his company headquarters in downtown neighborhood of manhattan rick washburn supplied movies and television shows with guns, lives, bombs legal ninja furrowing disks and any instrument needed for theatrical violence. he kept his collection behind 888-doors in a basement called invisible to shoppers strolling by. a native of arkansas, washburn came to new york in the 1970s to be an actor and landed minor roles. a hit man in the cotton club in 1984 and fbi agent in mississippi burning in 1988 and

a hit man again in billy basket in 1981. as a boy growing up in the country he had learned a lot about guns and offered advice on the senate to directors who didn't know a revolvers from a semiautomatic pistol. a rough all for is a gun like the smith and wesson 38 that is the cylinder that the bullets going to have the cylinder turns as you pull the trigger. a pistol is a gun that has a magazine, spring loaded box with ammunition that goes into the gun. without getting into the mechanics that is the basic difference. we have an expert in the front row. wreck washburn began charging for guns and and discovered he could make a better living in the proper business than performing. he worked with everyone from our scorsese to arnold schwarzenegger. carl walter's wife mentioned earlier first went to work on

persuading glock's merit in 1986. he ran the whole spiel. did you know it has half of the parts of a regular gun and won't jam when a regular gun would jam? they drop the sound of helicopters and pick them up? at first washburn was skeptical. a devoe day of the colt 9/11 reconsidered it home lee. he was one of those people who believed it is going to be a flash in the pan. he derided the plastic glock, handgun tupperware. carl walters's insistence he finally took carney team to the west side of manhattan. just popping those targets like going out of style. i found it to be handy, easy to

shoot. didn't jam. realized as a carrying guns and military side of this thing would be hard to beat. in arkansas he explained least have a truck gun. the old gun you through in the back of a truck so if you saw a rabbit or squirrel you had something to shoot. stayed in the back of the truck and got beat a. glocks were kind of like that. a truck gun. as nypd officers began carrying glocks he felt was time to give the austrian gun entertainment industry exposure. he was providing prop weapons for television show on cbs called the equalizer which concerned a fictional former cia operative who held the ordinary people deal law and finally with google is illegal drug dealers and rapists. as be fit a suave secret agent he carried a small stain list eagle pencil but late in the primetime run courtesy of washburn, walk on characters

began appearing with glocks. once the police department started using the we started putting them on cops and particularly -- washburn liked helping the company. he realized he could benefit from having an up-and-coming gunmaker supplying an unreasonable terms. he sends a groundswell. you had people buying glocks and using them just because they were -- just because of the notoriety. in the united states he observed the people most against firearms usually end up being the best salesman for firearms. so glock used hollywood as a way to popularized by glock as the company also had a certain genius in marketing directly to its prime customers. the police who remain today the core customer base for the company and to civilian gun dealers who sell on main street

and these days sell on the internet. glock had a truly unique way of combining not -- nuts and bolts gun marketing with sex. carl walters, the genius salesman would bring some procurement officers and civilian gun dealers to georgia and suburban atlanta where the company had its u.s. facility for a four day training course. by thursday evening the group of cops, salespeople and glock employees was ready to unwind. karl walter hosted lavish dinners in atlanta restaurants followed by visits to the city's best known of venue for exotic dancing and allied entertainment. thursday's became known as glock night. the delegation as many as 25 or

30 men was assigned to its own vip room on the enormous strip joint second-floor above the main polled in stage. to watch the action from wraparound balcony or recruit from the vip lounge for a lap dance. loud electronic music pounded, strobe light poles. professional athletes and shatter recorders, cocaine should be had. sex wasn't on the official menu but behind closed doors who knew what transpired? for lot of guys coming in from out of town this is the best time they were going to have all year or in their entire life said one former policeman. you get laid at the best strip club in town, drink champagne you won't forget the experience when it is time to choose between glock, and smith and wesson. in the summer of 1989 walter had another brainstorm. reconvene the meeting of 50 independent regional sales reps

and their managers. gave the group a special assignment. i thought we should pick out the best looking girl from all 300 at the gold club to promote the product at the shock show. the shooting, and it out for trade show is the u.s. gun and ammunition industry's main conference of the year often held in las vegas. in january of 1980 glock planned to unveil a new model, the glock 20, a larger puzzle that fired ten mm rounds. walter's idea was the company's export the gold club sparkle to the show. hiring a professional stripper might turn some heads. the audition that evening lasted until midnight. the glock delegation settled on a performer in her early 20ss, sharon bowlen, a tall young woman. when walter asked if she would be willing to promote the glock las vegas she readily agreed. he told dylan she would have to go through a standard glock four

day trading. she attended a program alongside personnel from the defense department and several -- several federal agencies and police department. presence on the firing range caused a significant spare. guys came in and asked who is this girl? he didn't want to tell federal agents and police swat specialists there training with an erotic dancer so he didn't. they all thought she was with the cia, he said. to heighten anticipation and draw maximum attention to the new 10 mm pistol walter created an enormous billboard on the highway from las vegas airport to the down-home should strip. attendees word greeted by her dazzling smile and head turning figure with the slogan hottest ten down. see the new glock 10 mm at the shock show. at the show retailers and wholesalers jostled together to get dylan in her tight fitting blouse. the stock posed for pictures and signed 8 x 10 glossies.

by general acclamation she helped make glock the hit of the show. a lot of guys from mom-and-pop gun stores had their ears pulled by the mob, federal license firearm dealer from long island. you are talking real excitement. sex and guns. glock reps must have taken a thousand orders the first day. people came up and said i will give you a $1 million order if i can go to bed with her. walter recounted. glock discouraged an extracurricular contract but it was las vegas and walter did not tucker in at night. at the awards ceremony marking the end of the shot showed dylan was called to the stage and given a plaque honoring her as best all-around model. shooting industry magazine reported after seeing glock sharon dylan is easy to see why dealers were anxious to get glock. that is all i am going to read from the book. i will say next week my lovely

wife julie and i are going to be shot show and only hope we have similar success marketing glock, glock 18 the book. [applause] i guess questions are in order if there are any and there's a microphone so our friends from c-span can record your thoughts. >> i assume that was your "glock" article in bloomberg magazine. >> yes. >> when this gun came out in thes i remember hearing there was a ceramic chamber that was available. a ceramic slide. it could be smuggled onto airplanes. what was the company's explanation for that? >> part of that myth i refer to had to do with this notion that

the gun was invisible to airport detection machines which turned out not to be true which didn't stop congress having hearings on it. gaston glock didn't testify -- she didn't speak english. it was an extraordinary marketing opportunity. the ceramic part of the story is a whole different mix that was derived from glock's debut in die hard 2. bruce willis who plays a detective in the movie is involved -- almost hard to describe in this period of time. the offending an airport against terrorists who are going to crash planes and terrorists in the airport and at one point bruce willis shot to another cop and says did you see that punk? he just pulled a german gun, ceramic, airport detection machines can see it. every fact in that speech was

wrong. the gun was not made in germany. was made in austria. there was no model called the glock 7. ceramic was not involved. you couldn't see it on airport detection machines. this speech like the new york post headline and so many other similar episodes was pure gold for glock. gun aficionado's had a complete field day making fun of this. t-shirts were made of and all of this free. glock benefited from all of this. that is the origin of the ceramic gun from germany. you can think bruce willis for that. anybody else? a handsome young man in the front. >> i know that people's positions get very cemented about these things on both sides

but i am wondering whether in the various contexts you had with glock's associate and salesman, did they feel the need at any time to address the moral dimension of profiting so richly off the lessons? >> i am not sure people look for glock 11 -- glock or any other moral dimension in the sense that you are suggesting. by and large people who manufacture and market guns sees them as tools and sees them as products that are intended to be deadly. and when used properly are potentially dangerous but not necessarily dangerous. certainly the people who make glock like gaston glock himself who i did not interview. refused to talk to me but i know personally because i have read

every legal definition he had ever given under oath and talked to practically everyone who worked for him over the years, saw his gun as a masterpiece. he saw it in a morally positive light. it was a tool that protected and armed police officers and soldiers. it was something that people could have in their homes to protect their families. and when asked about situations where there might have been a gun fight or even more horrendous we, a psychotic mass shooting of some sort and glock was used in a number of mass shootings the company standard response was for better or for worse, i am offering my opinion about this, would have been better if more people had glocks on the scene because then they could have shot the bad guys. this is a perspective that is elicits guffaws in some settings

but i have to tell you is taken as being completely logical and matter-of-fact by millions of your fellow countrymen. there is a tremendous divide. >> how much does the glock cost? >> if you go into a main street gun store and you are going to pay retail you will end up paying $600 and change. if you go on line or on the inter web or whatever, you can find -- many people buy used guns. there is a huge market and each secondary market and automobiles or other durable products and so if you by glock that has been

used you can get it for less. it is not an inexpensive gun. it is mid to upper range. if you need a gun in the 711, you don't go into retail gun store, you borrow someone's saturday night special and that will do the trick. >> have you shot and glock? what did it feel like? how did you do? >> several different questions there. i have fired glock on many occasions. my experience is the experience that i describe. is easy to learn how to use. it works relatively well and it is intuitive.

to compete and compared to a semiautomatic pistol like the brad lidge has external safety, you have to think much more. glock has none of those features. critics of the glock, gun control advocates who see the glock in a dark light save a lack of those features makes it too easy to fire the glock and blame those features for accidental discharge. i personally found the gun easy to learn how to use and quite straightforward. i would say i am a fairly mediocre shot. interestingly my wife julie is a crack shot. gun people will tell you that is quite common. that if you take two neophytes,

team and will have built-in ideas how to shoot a gun and will be mediocre and the woman with no preconceptions is listening to the gun instructor and do the right thing and hit a target and that was exactly our experience and i wouldn't mess with julie. >> can you talk about how the company has been managed over the years anthony unique events in its history that are interesting for your audience? >> that is what is known as a ringer. brian grow who asked that question is my former colleague and my great friend for life who worked closely with me on the first article that we did for business week about glock back in 2009. and knows full well the answer to that question.

the most fascinating thing about glock is over time as it has been phenomenally successful in commercial terms, extremely profitable because of those crazy high profit margins violated to earlier with factory designed to make justice -- a product where the profit margins even today are said to be 70% which is unheard of. the company has increasingly been subject to a kind of gothic, dark over hang in terms of its management with extraordinary rivalries, people accusing each other of terrible crimes and in 1999, gaston glock's main financial adviser who was elected a board based finance year, hired a hit man to kill gaston glock because glock

had discovered that the finance your had been stealing from him so the finance here whose name was everett hired a former french legionnaires and former professional wrestler to kill glock. strangely he didn't bring a gun. he brought a rubber mallet. the apparent plot was to make it seem glock had fallen down a flight of stairs. they were going to bop him on the head a few times and pushing down the stairs in an underground parking garage where this transpired. the problem was that gaston glock was an ornery old cuss in very good shape and when the election board police arrived shortly thereafter, the former french legionnaire and professional wrestler was

unconscious, knocked out and lying on top of gaston glock who had apparently rendered him useless with his bare hands. it sounds like something that if you put it in a movie script no one would believe it. we looked at it from every angle and it seemed impossible and yet that is what happened and a former finance year is still serving the balance of a 20 year sentence in maximum-security prison in looks and board. the hit man got out after seven years and no one knows where he is. just adding more sense of mystery but that is the way things worked. in the realm of glock. >> where does glock -- >> they want to hear you. [talking over each other] >> where does he stand in terms of forbes's rating of billionaires'? >> interesting question.

>> i have another question. >> all right. the short answer is we don't know. glock companies are privately owned in austria. there is very little public financial -- we don't know exactly how much cash gaston glock has. my guess is he would not rate very high on the fortune list, the forbes list. that is because of the phenomenal period we have just been through with our own financial world where incomes have gotten so crazily out of black. this is the man who makes tangible product as opposed to conjures things up on wall street. his fortune is fast but we don't know how fast. >> in terms of the fortune, is he known for any good

philanthropic deeds for example? >> no. the gentleman in the hat. >> my question is this. given the relative dominance of glock in the police department's, over two decades, what sort of performance record has accumulated in the realm of gunfights the police have gotten into? >> interesting question. there is no national database about -- that describes the performance of one firearm versus another. you are inevitably in the realm of anecdote talking to veteran police officers and asking them to compare and having to judge their credibility based on the way we judge anyone's credibility.

there have been police departments that have had problems adjusting to the glock in the first place. cities like washington had pronounced problems but in the end those problems turned out to be more a function of poor training than the actual tool itself. and have an episode i described about the washington metropolitan police department where they have a large number of accidental discharges but the police department itself in time admitted this was because we hired a bunch of new recruits and stuck glock in their hand and did not send them to the range but said the on the street and you don't tell someone to keep their finger off the trigger until they want to shoot they will shoot themselves in the foot. there have been those bad experiences but overall you see large sophisticated police departments like the nypd which have adopted the glock and stuck with it for 20 years.

they can choose -- they are so big they can choose any product they want and they choose the glock along with the smith and wesson comparable weapons in this city. police officers choose that list of three. i am told about two thirds of the officers in the city choose the glock. >> i can't wait to read the book. how does glock relate to the and are a? what happens after these mass shootings like gabby deferreds and virginia tech and was involved at all with fast and furious, undercover operation of guns to mexico? >> several very good questions. first of all the nra. the answer to that question forces me to slightly amend my

answer earlier about whether glock is involved in any philanthropy. the glock companies in fact are extremely philanthropic when comes to giving to nonprofits like the nra. and also to foundations that support wounded soldiers and, families of officers who lost their lives and so forth a. in all seriousness i want to amend that comment. glock gives millions of dollars to the organization's. when you give money to be an our aid is used not only to support widowed wives of cops but to support the nra's political activity directly or indirectly as well so glock is a huge player in the gun industry, part of the constituency that the n are a service even though if you ask the and are a head on what

is your business? they say to defend the rights of gun owners and played down their relation to the industry. one of the things that is distinctive about the glock is it has turned up in disproportionate number of mass shootings beginning in 1991. only a few years after it showed up in this country, with you horrendous shooting i am sure you will remember in texas in a cafeteria where more than 20 people were killed by a guy with a glock and another hand them. when that mass shooting took place it resembled in many ways the shooting at virginia tech that you mentioned and the more recent terrible tragedy in tucson involving rep giffords. you have severely demented people but not so demanded that they haven't chosen their weapon rationally and they have chosen the glock because of that large magazine capacity.

the shooter in tucson had a standard glock with an unusual magazine. of 33 round magazine. so large that it protruded out about this far below the done. no ordinary law-abiding gun would bother with an awkward accouterments like that. he would not go to the range and stick a 33 round -- you might but there would be no logical reason for it. what happens after these things? what happens is what happens in the counterintuitive world of guns in general. at bloomberg which is my sister operation or parent operation of the magazine at work for had a terrific story a day or two after the tucson shooting in which one of my colleagues tracked down a showing that

glock -- across arizona. the quick answer is people might think it was so effective they wanted it themselves. people who enjoy owning guns, reflexively fear, would become subject to restrictions. that is what happened then that happened repeatedly over time. for better or for worse, that is the story. fast and furious, involving the atf coincidentally in arizona where by undercover atf guys were allowing mexican bad guys to buy thousands of weapons. and this came to light when a

poor border patrol agents was killed on the border and a couple of these were found at the scene of the crime. that whole scandal which is a fascinating episode is mostly about military-style rifles and more potent weapons using larger magazines. that particular fiasco you are referring to. >> how glock's american competitors reacted to his great success. the main incumbent, smith and

wesson was the gm, this will never -- toyota and honda. they tried to knock off. it wasn't as good. they will settle out of court. the non experts, and comparable in quality. and and it is like the glock, and basically the rivals have

caught up, by imitating it and make a slight improvement. the corporate point of view is whether glock will figure out how to come up with something different. it meets his reward, many people by glock because it is a very valuable brand. its weakness is it hasn't innovated as much. we were hoping to buy a gun company. just this summer, he got remarried.

>> i am wondering -- excuse me. if you could talk more about the object of fantasy in particular with civilian purchase with you think they buy it for its utilitarian designs. >> it is a big part of the glock story. one element that i mentioned is that glock is the semi-official gun of all hip-hop music. there are literally scores of hip-hop songs that refer to glock by name. there are six or eight prominent rap performers who have incorporated glock into their station which doesn't seem like a good competitive ideas since i think you would get them

confused with each other but anyway, laura is very important. when comes to somebody who is going to spend 5 ended $50 or 6 under dollars on retail on a gun i think or a place a role. certainly the glock's reputation for efficiency, sort of everyman common sense, nothing fancy, just the fact, that is the aura in all honesty that appeals to the hundreds of thousands if not millions of law-abiding gun owners who purchased glocks which is not to say that they don't also become part of their brain and enjoy the bruce willis die-hard 2 business too. there is no denying that part of the appeal of guns is their power and the fact that their legal and you pick one up and fire when you know what i'm

talking about. it is a memorable experience. it is also a fun. it is fun to shoot guns which is something that gun skeptics don't absorber enough and in failing to absorb that don't understand part of the appeal of firearms. those people who own them and enjoy using them. >> i was wondering how you got interested in glock initially and in reporting the book, you change your views about guns and gun control. >> i started reporting on and writing about the gun industry in the late 1990s with my former colleague and friend vanessa connell who is standing in the back. when i worked with her at the

wall street journal. and i started in on those stories and vanessa joined me after we started because there was a lot of mass litigation against the gun industry falling on the mass litigation against the tobacco industry. many of the same lawyers who had gone to tobacco companies once those lawsuits were settled turned and quite self consciously chose the gun industry as their next target. they engaged municipalities and counties as their clients. for interesting reason those lawsuits did not work and did not get traction that the tobacco lawsuits did and we chronicled that and got interested in the industry itself. for my dollar we are on a business journalist in large