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THE DAILY ASTORIAN • FRIDAY, JULY 27, 2018
Abraham honored for his
volunteer work at Lions Club
The Daily Astorian
Longtime Astoria Lions
member Carl Abraham has
been nominated to the Ore-
gon Lions Sight and Hearing
Foundation Hall of Fame.
He is being honored at a cel-
ebration and presentation
at 1:30 p.m. Saturday in the
second floor Community
Room at Clatsop Retirement
Village, 947 Olney Ave.,
with refreshments to follow.
Community members, pres-
ent and former Astoria Lions
members and Oregon Lions
are welcome to attend.
Some of his many accom-
plishments include receiv-
ing the Melvin Jones, Helen
Keller and Norman Ross
awards; sponsoring over 25
members to join the Asto-
ria Lions Club; going on 15
Lions sight missions to for-
eign countries at his own
expense; and securing a used
ambulance and coordinat-
ing efforts to get it in ser-
vice for emergency medical
transportation in a Mexican
community.
He has also made many
trips to Vision Quest car-
rying donated eye tissue,
used his skills as an optician
with the Oregon Lions Club
sight programs, served in all
offices of his local club mul-
tiple times, and given count-
less hours raising funds for
Lions’ programs by recy-
cling newspapers, barbecu-
ing at events and other club
activities.
Caregivers can learn techniques
for elder care at free class
The Daily Astorian
Oregon Care Partners is
hosting a free, instructor-led
class, “How Communica-
tion Influences Care in the
Non-dementia Adult Pop-
ulation,” from 8:30 a.m. to
1 p.m. Aug. 6 at Comfort
Suites Columbia River, 3420
Lief Erikson Drive. There is
no cost, thanks to funding by
the state of Oregon.
The class is designed to
help anyone who cares for an
aging person develop com-
munication strategies and
techniques to support a pos-
itive approach to behavioral
challenges common in older
adults, such as anger and
withdrawing.
Individuals
who provide care for an aging
family member or loved one,
as well as those who work in
professional caregiver set-
tings, public safety or social
work, are invited to attend.
To register,go to Oregon-
CarePartners.com
SELF-HELP GROUPS
Al-Anon (Astoria) — 7
p.m. Tuesday, Peace Luther-
an Church, 565 12th St.; 12
p.m. Wednesday, First United
Methodist Church, 1076 Frank-
lin Ave. For information, call
503-325-1087; 7 p.m. Thurs-
day, Crossroads Community
Church, 40618 Old Highway 30,
Svensen. For information, call
503-458-6467.
Al-Anon (Clatskanie) — 7
p.m. Monday, Faith Lutheran
Church, 1010 N.E. Fifth St.,
Clatskanie. For information, call
503-728-3351.
Al-Anon (Nehalem) — 7
p.m. Monday, Riverbend Room,
North County Recreation Dis-
trict, 36155 Ninth St. For infor-
mation, call 503-368-8255.
Al-Anon (Seaside) — 6:30
p.m. Tuesday, Seaside Public Li-
brary, 1131 Broadway, call 503-
810-5196 for information.
Al-Anon (Tillamook) — 7:30
p.m. Wednesday, St. Albans
Episcopal Church, 2102 Sixth
St., call 503-842-5094 for infor-
mation; 9 a.m. Thursday, 6505
Headquarter St., Tillamook;
noon Friday, 5012 Third St., call
503-730-5863 for information.
Al-Anon Family Groups in-
formation, Oregon Area Al-Anon
website. oregonal-anon.org
Alateen (Tillamook) — 4
p.m. Monday, 5012 Third St. For
information, call 503-730-5863.
Alcoholics
Anonymous
— To find a meeting in Clatsop
County, call 971-601-9220, in
Tillamook County, call 503-739-
4856, or go to aa-oregon.org
Celebrate Recovery —
6 p.m. Thursday, The Table
Church, 852 Broadway, Sea-
side. Faith-based 12-step pro-
gram designed to help anyone
struggling with hurts, habits and
hangups, including drugs and
alcohol, anger, co-dependence,
domestic abuse or sex, food or
pornography addictions. Being
religious not required. Free din-
ner and child care provided. For
information, call D.B. Lewis at
503-741-5977.
Eating Disorders Anon-
ymous — 1:10 to 2:10 p.m.
Wednesdays, River Zen Yoga,
399 31st St. A 12-Step program.
For information, call Susan Wil-
liams at 510-417-5553.
Men’s Sexual Purity Recov-
ery Group — Tuesday nights.
Part of the Pure Life Alliance
(purelifealliance.org) in Portland.
For information, call the confi-
dential voice mail at 503-750-
0817 and leave a message.
Texas company cleared to put
3D-printed gun designs online
Weapons made
of hard plastic
By LISA MARIE PANE
Associated Press
They look futuristic, the type
of firearms that would-be assas-
sins use in movies: 3D-printed
guns made of a hard plastic that
are simple to assemble, easy to
conceal and tough to trace.
The future is here.
After spending years fight-
ing the federal government
for the right to do so, a Texas
company was given the green
light to post blueprints online
showing people how to make
3D-printed guns from the
comfort of their home.
Gun safety advocates and
some law enforcement officials
are appalled, worried that this
is exactly what criminals and
terrorists want: guns that can’t
be flagged by metal detectors,
don’t have serial numbers to
trace, and don’t require the usual
background checks. A coalition
of gun-control groups filed an
appeal Thursday in federal court
seeking to block a recent Trump
administration ruling allow-
ing Cody Wilson and his com-
pany, Defense Distributed, to
post blueprints online to create a
3D-printed firearm.
“There is a market for these
guns and it’s not just among
enthusiasts and hobbyists,” said
Nick Suplina, managing direc-
tor for law and policy at Every-
town for Gun Safety, one of
the three groups that have gone
to court. “There’s a real desire
and profit mode in the criminal
underworld as well.”
Wilson, the founder of
Defense Distributed, first pub-
lished downloadable designs
for a 3D-printed firearm in
2013. It was downloaded about
100,000 times until the State
Department ordered him to
cease, contending it violated
federal export laws since some
of the blueprints were down-
loaded by people outside the
United States.
But in a reversal that
stunned gun-control advo-
Narcotics Anonymous —
The Northwest Oregon Area of
Narcotics Anonymous (NWO-
NA) holds meetings in Clatsop
County. For full schedule details,
as well as upcoming special
events, call the Helpline at 503-
717-3702, or go to nworegonna.
org
TOPS (Take Off Pounds
Sensibly) (Astoria) — 5 p.m.
weigh-in, 5:30 p.m. meeting
Tuesday, First Lutheran Church,
725 33rd St. For information, call
Trisha Hayrynen at 503-298-
9058.
TOPS (Seaside) — 9:15 to
10:15 a.m. meeting Tuesday,
North Coast Family Fellowship
Church, 2245 N. Wahanna
Road. All are welcome. For in-
formation, call 509-910-0354.
TOPS (Warrenton) — 9
to 9:45 a.m. weigh-in, 10 a.m.
meeting Wednesday, First Bap-
tist Church, 30 N.E. First St. For
information, call Marilyn Barnard
503-861-2918 or Glennys Sher-
man at 503-338-8214.
+
Jay Janner/Austin American-Statesman
A plastic pistol was completely made on a 3D-printer at a
home in Austin, Texas.
cates, the State Department in
late June settled its case against
Wilson and agreed to allow
him to resume posting the blue-
prints at the end of July. Wilson
took to Twitter, declaring vic-
tory and proclaiming he would
start back up on Wednesday.
Wilson did not return an
email seeking comment. His
attorney, Josh Blackman, a
professor at the South Texas
College of Law Houston,
declined to comment.
Gun industry experts say
the guns are simply a mod-
ern-day equivalent of what
already is legal and read-
ily available: the ability to
assemble your own firearm
using traditional materials
and methods at home without
serial numbers. They argue
that 3D-printed firearms won’t
be a draw for criminals since
the printers needed to make
one are wildly expensive and
the firearms themselves aren’t
very durable.
“It costs thousands and
thousands and thousands of
dollars to acquire a printer
and the files and the know-
how to do this. They don’t
work worth a damn. Crimi-
nals can obviously go out and
steal guns or even manufac-
ture quote-unquote real guns,
not 3D printed,” said Larry
Keane, executive director of
the National Shooting Sports
Foundation, which represents
gun manufacturers. “If you’re
a gang banger in L.A., are you
going to go out and spend tens
of thousands of dollars to buy
a printer to print a gun that
doesn’t work very well or are
you just going to steal one?”
Unlike traditional firearms
that can fire thousands of rounds
in their lifetime, experts say
the 3D-printed guns normally
only last a few rounds before
they fall apart. They don’t have
magazines that allow the usual
nine or 15 rounds to be car-
ried; instead, they usually hold
a bullet or two and then must
be manually loaded afterward.
And they’re not usually very
accurate either.
A video posted of a test by
the federal Bureau of Alcohol,
Tobacco, Firearms and Explo-
sives in 2013 showed one of
the guns produced from Wil-
son’s design disintegrating
into pieces after a single round
was fired. Wilson’s website
will also offer blueprints for
AR-style long guns besides
its first product: a pistol called
the Liberator.
A similar style of firearm
was famously used by John
Malkovich’s character in the
1993 movie “In the Line of Fire”
in which he portrays a would-be
assassin who surreptitiously
brings the firearm into a hotel
ballroom, assembles it under-
neath his dinner table and then
tries to use it to kill the president.
Law enforcement officials
express concern about allowing
the designs for such firearms to
be publicly available expressly
because they’re easy to conceal
and untraceable since there’s no
requirement for the firearms to
have serial numbers.
“When you think about
all the rhetoric we here in our
nation about tightening our
borders and homeland security,
and now we’re going to put out
there for anyone who wants a
recipe for how to overcome …
TSA airport screenings or any
other metal detector,” said Rick
Myers, executive director of
the Major Cities Chiefs Asso-
ciation. “It’s absolutely insane.”
The State Department deci-
sion came amid an obscure
administrative change — begun
under the Obama administra-
tion — in how the weapons
are regulated and administered.
Military grade weapons remain
under the purview of the State
Department, while commer-
cially available firearms fall
under the Commerce Depart-
ment. The settlement with Wil-
son determined that 3D-printed
firearms are akin to more tradi-
tional firearms that aren’t sub-
ject to ITAR, or International
Traffic in Arms Regulations,
overseen by State.
U.S. Sen. Bob Menendez, a
New Jersey Democrat, called
on Secretary of State Mike
Pompeo to review the decision.
Robert Spitzer, chairman
of political science at the State
University of New York at Cor-
tland and an expert on the Sec-
ond Amendment, warned that
while 3D-printed firearms are a
novelty now — too expensive to
make and too fragile to be used
for more than a few shots —
technology will soon catch up.
“Their popularity right
now is limited,” Spitzer said.
“There was interest in the
blueprints because they’re sort
of exotic and because sort of a
taboo thing.”
Erich Pratt, executive direc-
tor of Gun Owners of America,
echoed that sentiment.
“It’s not very practical,”
Pratt said. “Let’s be serious.
First of all, you’re going to
plunk out thousands of dol-
lars just for the printers. This
is a very expensive route to go
just to get a piece of plastic that
will only last a round.”