Larry Correia:
We should ban Assault Rifles!
Define “assault rifle”…
Uh…
Yeah. That’s the problem. The term assault rifle gets bandied around a lot. Politically, the term is a loaded nonsense one that was created back during the Clinton years. It was one of those tricks where you name legislation something catchy, like PATRIOT Act. (another law rammed through while emotions were high and nobody was thinking, go figure).
To gun experts, an assault rifle is a very specific type of weapon which originated (for the most part) in the 1940s. It is a magazine fed, select fire (meaning capable of full auto), intermediate cartridge (as in, actually not that powerful, but I’ll come back to that later) infantry weapon.
The thing is, real assault rifles in the US have been heavily regulated since before they were invented. The thing that the media and politicians like to refer to as assault rifles is basically a catch all term for any gun which looks scary.
I had somebody get all mad at me for pointing this out, because they said that the term had entered common usage. Okay… If you’re going to legislate it, DEFINE IT.
And then comes up that pesky problem. The US banned assault rifles once before for a decade and the law did absolutely nothing. I mean, it was totally, literally pointless. The special commission to study it said that it accomplished absolutely nothing. (except tick a bunch of Americans off, and as a result we bought a TON more guns) And the reason was that since assault weapon is a nonsense term, they just came up with a list of arbitrary features which made a gun into an assault weapon.
Problem was, none of these features actually made the gun functionally any different or somehow more lethal or better from any other run of the mill firearm. Most of the criteria were so silly that they became a huge joke to gun owners, except of course, for that part where many law abiding citizens accidentally became instant felons because one of their guns had some cosmetic feature which was now illegal.
One of the criteria was that it was semi-automatic. See above. Hard to ban the single most common and readily available type of gun in the world. (unless you believe in confiscation, but I’ll get to that). Then what if it takes a detachable magazine! That’s got to be an Evil Feature. And yes, we really did call the Evil Features. I’ll talk about magazines below, but once again, it is pretty hard to ban something that common unless you want to go on a confiscatory national suicide mission.
For example, flash hiders sound dangerous. Let’s say having a flash hider makes a gun an assault weapon. So flash hiders became an evil feature. Problem is flash hiders don’t do much. They screw onto the end of your muzzle and divert the flash off to the side instead of straight up so it isn’t as annoying when you shoot. It doesn’t actually hide the flash from anybody else. EVIL.
Barrel shrouds were listed. Barrel shrouds are basically useless, cosmetic pieces of metal that go over the barrel so you don’t accidentally touch it and burn your hand. But they became an instantaneous felony too. Collapsible stocks make it so you can adjust your rifle to different size shooters, that way a tall guy and his short wife can shoot the same gun. Nope. EVIL FEATURE!
It has been a running joke in the gun community ever since the ban passed. When Carolyn McCarthy was asked by a reporter what a barrel shroud was, she replied “I think it is the shoulder thing which goes up.” Oh good. I’m glad that thousands of law abiding Americans unwittingly committed felonies because they had a cosmetic piece of sheet metal on their barrel, which has no bearing whatsoever on crime, but could possibly be a shoulder thing which goes up.
Now are you starting to see why “assault weapons” is a pointless term? They aren’t functionally any more powerful or deadly than any normal gun. In fact the cartridges they normally fire are far less powerful than your average deer hunting rifle. Don’t worry though, because the same people who fling around the term assault weapons also think of scoped deer rifles as “high powered sniper guns”.
Basically, what you are thinking of as assault weapons aren’t special.
Now, the reason that semi-automatic, magazine fed, intermediate caliber rifles are the single most popular type of gun in America is because they are excellent for many uses, but I’m not talking about fun, or hunting, or sports, today I’m talking business. And in this case they are excellent for shooting bad people who are trying to hurt you, in order to make them stop trying to hurt you. These types of guns are superb for defending your home. Now some of you may think that’s extreme. That’s because everything you’ve learned about gun fights comes from TV. Just read the link where I expound on why.
http://larrycorreia.wordpress.com/2007/09/20/carbine-vs-shotgun-vs-pistol-for-home-defense/
I had one individual tell me that these types of guns are designed to slaughter the maximum number of people possible as quickly as possible… Uh huh… Which is why every single police department in America uses them, because of all that slaughtering cops do daily. Cops use them for the same reason we do, they are handy, versatile, and can stop an attacker quickly in a variety of circumstances.
When I said “stop an attacker quickly” somebody on Twitter thought that he’d gotten me and said “Stop. That’s just a euphemism for kill!” Nope. I am perfectly happy if the attacker surrenders or passes out from blood loss too. Tactically and legally, all I care about is making them stop doing whatever it is that they are doing which caused me to shoot them to begin with.
The guns that many of you think of as assault rifle are common and popular because they are excellent for fighting
7.5-9 million semi-auto “assault” rifles in the US in private hands.
In 2011, the total number of murders committed with an “assault” rifle was 323. With handguns? 6,220. With any type of firearm? 8,583. “Assault” rifles contributed to 3.7% of all murders committed with a firearm.
That 3.7% figure is roughly the number of firearms, under the 1994 Assault Weapons Ban, that make up the “assault” rifle category. Feinstein’s most recent “ban” wish is to include more weapons within that category.
Why all of the above data? Because it shows that the gun-control crowd doesn’t have anything to support the idea that these types of weapons are more of a danger to the general public than any other type of firearm, let alone any other type of weapon, including knives, hammers, bats, etc.
Is the capability there for them to be more dangerous? Sure. But the capability for shotguns, for example, to be more dangerous to the public at large is equally present. As is handguns. As is knives. Etc., etc., etc. A shotgun, for example, shot into a crowd of people, especially with a shell loaded with larger shot pellets, is inherently more dangerous than a handgun shot into that same crowd. A handgun, for example, is much easier to conceal and take into a crowded area, such as a diner, than a rifle or shotgun is, making it inherently more dangerous, in that situation, to the public in general. And we could go on, and on, and on, with all of the possibilities exampling where certain types of firearms, over other types, are inherently more dangerous to the public at large. And that means diddly squat in the real world.
Why? Because numbers do not lie, and the 2011 figures used above show exactly that. That an “assault” rifle is no more dangerous to the public at large than any other type of firearm is. And when suggesting limitations upon them, it matters not that the possibility is present, it matters what the numbers say. Simple as that.
via:
http://info.publicintelligence.net/NJROIC-MassShootings.pdf
Commonalities of mass shooters. A few key ones:
Male between the ages of 17 and 48.
Usually no prior military service. (Goes against a stereotype favored by some on the Left, of the rampaging psycho ex-soldier.)
Usually acts alone. (Columbine was an exception.)
Usually uses a semi-automatic handgun. (So, the banning of so-called “assault rifles” would accomplish… ?)
Usually “no pattern or method to the selection of victims.”
But, nearly half of the shootings (13 of 29) were at a workplace and done by an employee or ex-employee. Warning signs would be a sudden increase in the employee’s: absenteeism, drug/alcohol use, poor hygiene, depression, withdrawal, resistance to change, mood swings, angry outbursts, suicidal comments, comments about “putting things in order”, comments about problems at home, comments empathizing with previous mass shooters and other criminals
Shooters include whites and non-whites .
Most of the active shooters took their own lives or were shot by responding police officers.
It takes 10-15 minutes, typically, for police to get there; during which time people are sitting ducks.
The report looks at only “the 29 deadliest” of mass shootings in recent years.
Almost by definition, those would be the ones where an armed civilian did not quickly stop the shooter.
In at least a few shootings, armed civilians are known to have slowed the shooter, or prompted him to think “game over” and take his life.
Diane F’s ban on assault rifles has been rejected by the Senate Judiciary Committee chairperson.
Republicans all oppose it.
and…..
Democrat Senators oppose it.
Sen. Mark Pryor of Arizona, Joe Manchin of West Virginia, Mark Begich of Alaska, and Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota, are all Democrats who oppose it in writing.
Will Sen. Reid bring it up for a vote it will lose?
He’s pretty tone deaf, so maybe.
Why do we ever use the term “assault weapon” when the term “defense rifle” is perfectly descriptive and would be understood by everyone. It makes the actual purpose for the rifle immediately obvious and defines the misuse of the weapon in crimes intuitively. Why surrender the language to the silly socialists?
Language is the weapon in the battlefield of ideas. The silly socialists have always understood this fact. It is the reason they resurrected the name “progressive” from history to obscure their collectivist ideas rather than the discredited “socialist” descriptor. Who, after all, is against progress? They often choose virtuous names, laden with admirable values for their most subversive or venal organizations. Think “Planned Parenthood” for the abortion factory or “Center for American Progress”.
Can you imagine how the debate would sound if even just one side refused to use their words and instead substituted the more correct ones? Republicans should submit a bill in congress called the “Public Defense Rifle Ban” so it could be discussed that way in the media and then take credit for voting it down. Then again…
@DaNang67:
Thought you’d find it interesting where the term “assault weapons” was born:
It’s a self-admitted propaganda campaign and it’s working just as Sugarmann predicted.
How long do you reckon all this took?
In Los Angeles County the Sheriffs admit it takes them 4.8 MINUTES to respond to a frantic 911 call.
That’s in cities.
In the REST of LA County, the unincorporated area, it takes them 5.8 MINUTES to respond!
This lady would have been dead or raped.
Her child dead, too.
When seconds count, the police will be there in minutes.
*Look at the photo.
Is that a gun on a ban list?