A comprehensive expose of the gun industry's efforts to increase profits by aggressively manufacturing and marketing more lethal and concealable guns. The gun industry is the last unregulated manufacturer of a consumer product in America, with a level of secrecy that makes the tobacco industry look like a model of transparency. Making a Killing blows away the smoke and offers a provocative new analysis of gun violence in our society. Tom Diaz argues that despite endless rhetoric about the right to bear arms, the real story behind the epidemic gun violence in America is the systematic increase in lethality by manufacturers. Diaz shows how over the last two decades the gun industry has sought to reverse declining profits by dramatically increasing the killing power of its products; designed and distributed guns with more ammunition and greater concealability; and aggressively sought to build a wider market by collaborating with the "gun press" and by targeting women and minorities as vital new consumers. Making a Killing goes in depth to explore the fascinating but little known business side of this $1.4-billion-a-year industry, revealing the inner workings of what one executive described as "a little money-making machine." Finally, it outlines a series of practical regulations that would help clean up the mess. Facts about the gun industry from "Making a Killing": guns are less regulated than toasters or teddy bears; most gun deaths in America are not crime related; by 2003, firearms are expected to supplant motor vehicles as the leading cause of product-related death in America.
I was born into a military family and raised largely in the American South, where I learned to shoot in the Boy Scouts and was on a rifle team in high school. I served in the Air National Guard as a small arms specialist and in the Army National Guard as an anti-tank platoon leader. Worked for the Department of Defense (Advanced Research Projects Agency) in Thailand for a while during the Vietnam War. I also served three years as a District of Columbia Police Department reserve officer.
I graduated from the University of Florida (BA Pol. Sci. 1962)(Go Gators!) and Georgetown University Law Center (1972, editor, Law Journal). I've followed a wandering career course, practiced law in and out of government, became a journalist and ended up serving six years as assistant managing editor at the very conservative The Washington Times newspaper in Washington. My guru was the former editor-in-chief Arnaud de Borchgrave, a true professional whose passion was and is journalism and truth, not ideology. I also reported from Central America, Russia, India, Pakistan and the first Gulf War before leaving The Times. I then spent two years at a small think tank in Washington studying terrorism and international organized crime, and from there went to work in 1993 (following the first WTC bombing attack) as a Democratic counsel to the U.S. House of Representatives Crime Subcommittee, where I worked on legislation and hearings involving terrorism and firearms.
I currently work part-time at the nonprofit Violence Policy Center in Washington. I sought out this work and center after I was converted from an NRA partisan to a gun control advocate based on what I learned about the predatory American gun industry while serving on "the Hill." The rest of my time I devote to projects involving the study of crime, terrorism, and history.
I used to be a "Scoop Jackson Democrat" politically, but today I am decidely non-partisan---I find little competence, honesty, or source of inspiration in either "organized party."
