[applemac_g4]

Under normal circumstances, I support the positions the NRA takes and don't care for restrictions politicians try to place on the 2nd amendment.

That having been said, I wonder if letting the assault weapons ban die is such a good idea. The difference between then and now is 9-11. If we have this type of weapon readily available for sale within the United States, it seems to me that it would make it that much easier for a terrorist group to infiltrate the country unarmed, and then acquire the necessary tools to carry out an attack.

Think of the attack at El Al counter in LA...now have a dozen guys there instead of one...and arm them with machine guns.

Preserving the assault weapons ban makes it just that much harder for terrorists to obtain tools of the trade.

[glockmeister40]

Think of the attack at El Al counter in LA...now have a dozen guys there instead of one...and arm them with machine guns.

There's nothing in this bogus gun bill about maching guns. There never was. Machine guns are highly regulated. There's nothing in this bill about guns becoming easier to get. As far as terrorists go, I want the ability to shoot back with a high-capacity magazine.

Please get your facts straight.

[Sonny M]

Keep in mind, that in Israel, they actually ask there citizens to carry guns. Anyway, if these people are going to go on a shooting rampage, they could either smuggle there guns in, or simply make explosives. This law, in all honesty, affects terrorists about as much as banning card board boxes do.

[FairOpinion]

"Preserving the assault weapons ban makes it just that much harder for terrorists to obtain tools of the trade. "

----

Sure, all terrorists get their assault weapons legally in US gun stores, sure. (/sarcasm)

Terrorists by them in the Middle East for$10, then smuggle the weapons and theselves in through Mexico. An assault rifle in the hands of terrorists is the last thing we need to worry about.

On the other hand, an assault rifle in the hands of law abiding citizens may prevent a terrorist from setting off a nuke, releasing bioterror weapons, or setting off a conventional bomb.

[section9]

Preserving the assault weapons ban makes it just that much harder for terrorists to obtain tools of the trade.

With an enormous amount of due respect to a fellow Mac user, bollocks.

The AWB would not stop dedicated, trained Al Qaeda operatives from smuggling weapons into the United States and using them. The only thing that has stopped additional Al Qaeda operations here is the strategy of forward attack, holding the enemy by the belt to kill him first.

The AWB had nothing to do with it.

Indeed, I would argue that armed citizens are a nation's best defense!

Be Seeing You,

Chris

[Tahoe3002]

"now have a dozen guys there instead of one...and arm them with machine guns."
The AW ban DOES not have any issue with machine guns. MG's were highly restricted, like in 1933, due to guys like AL Capone and Machine Gun Kelly. If you think the war on drugs is a success, then you probably also believe automatic
weapons are not smuggled across the US borders. The assault ban is based on cosmetic appearances of certain weapons. BTW, would you like it if the government told you that you could not drive anything except a four cylinder 'enviro- friendly' car, or could not own a four bedroom home?

[lawdog]

The AW ban is Unconstitutional. The AW ban is a farce as a "crime fighter". The AW ban does not stop terrorists from doing squat.The 9-11 terrorists killed more people with jets on one day than years of criminals using the poorly/improperly defined "AW's'. By the way, only machine guns are truly AW's. The Aw's "banned" are semi-auto "military appearing copy cats " rarely used in any criminal shootings ( that's before or since the ban).Klintoon, statists and other like minded indivduals support the ban.

[ez]

Wiring your children's jaws shut would make it that much harder for them to become obese.

[Dr Warmoose]

That having been said, I wonder if letting the assault weapons ban die is such a good idea

Having large safes filled with never fired green tag (pre-ban) firearms, I stand to lose a lot of investment value with the sunsetting of the "assault" weapons ban. Nevertheless, my financial loss is my brother's gain in freedom and personal safety. A small price to pay for freedom.

The rest of your post reflects the 0.2% rule. The idea that because of a negligable possibility of something bad happening, then the entire activity must be banned for everyone without distinction. That is a nanny-state mentality that for some perverse reason trusts a corrupt and inept government with benevolant morality that surpasses even your values. It seems pretty simple thinking that in a highly policed and regulated area like a maximum security prison, drugs and weapons can be found all over the place, that these terrorists can easily accumulate scarey weapons -law or no law. All the law effectively accomplishes is keeping defensive tools out of the hands of honest, law abiding citizens, and by making it even more attractive for the bad guys to accumulate these tools for themselves.

Given that, the magazine capacity laws made the wonder 9 an inefficient defense tool because the advantages of double capacity firearms outweighed the punch of the lower capacity 10mm and .45ACP pistols. With the magazine restrictions, the law of unintended consequences took effect and smart people went to the heavier calibers because they wanted their ten rounds to really count. Now we can gun down people several rooms away with a good FMJ 10mm round rather than having that 9mm projectile get stuck in the insulation.

Come to think of it, my inventory of rare non-"LEO Only" hicap magazines for the Glocks will drop in value too as manufacturers from around the globe will go on a 24/7 production cycle of hi-caps for a hungry population who now have inventories of Glock 20s,21s,and 22s.

Ahhhh, [As I broadly smile]

[Lx]

What's an assault weapon?

A Mini 14 with a flash suppressor is to feared as one of the dreaded assault rifles, while the one without the flash suppressor is Ok for children of all ages.

A ten round clip is ok, an 11 round clip will kill children, raise the deficit, increase global warming and get Scott Peterson off on a technicality.

Do you know how ridiculous it is to have to have 10-5 round clips for a Mini 14 since the knock off 10 round ones are junk? (Unless someone knows a good supplier.)

The bottom line is that only law abiding citizens such as myself are restricted by these laws. The terrorists and criminals have their own supply of weapons.

Let this bad useless law die. I don't know if it's death will do us Californians any good but it's a start.

[Total Package]

Preserving the assault weapons ban makes it just that much harder for terrorists to obtain tools of the trade.

Yes I know. Because the guns are all ready made, and a TERRORIST would never ever ever break a law.

[CurlyDave]

Preserving the assault weapons ban makes it just that much harder for terrorists to obtain tools of the trade.

It does nothing of the sort.

It does however prevent effective armed resistance against the government or against civil insurrection and riot, which historically is a lot more common than terrorist acts committed with assault weapons.

P.S. I am an Apple user and I am sane.

[Nebr FAL owner]

This countries borders are so porous that cocaine shipments weighing TONS come into this nation despite all the efforts of the various govt. agencies to stop it do you honestly think they will be able to stop illegal arms shipments when the terrorists can have access to the diplomatic pouches of sympathetic nations.

[karbine]

All of you fellow 2nd Amend people are still missing the most important point re: the ASW ban. That is that the ban doesn't even ban the so-called weapons themselves, only the dreaded bayonet lugs, flash suppressors, pistol grips (unless weapon has required # of US made parts), and mag capacity. Re: the mag capacity, for the so-called assault rifles, there is almost an unending supply of cheap full capacity mags available anyway, and for the pistols they are still available though at a greatly inflated price. Anyone who reads Shotgun News knows that the # of "assault-
style weapons" sold since klintons' attempted gun-grab in '94 is almost beyond calculation. The ban not only didn't decrease the # of military-style rifles and carbines in private hands, but probably doubled that #, though fortunatley for our security, none with bayo lugs and flash suppressors(lol). So beside the most obvious fact that real
assault weapons are select fire--full auto or burst fire--
and the weapons in the ban are NOT select fire, the ban was the biggest failure in legislative history if limiting the #of firearms in private hands was the issue. The ban really p'd me off because I'm a collector and want my firearms to be as close to the real thing as possible re: bayo lugs, etc
though not select fire($10,000 for M-16 vs $600 for AR-15 before ban)so all the ban did was mess with collectors, and limit mag capacity for pistol users. Oh, I'm 10,000% behind putting an end to the ASW ban, but just want people to realize just how ridiculous the ban was in the first place---along with unconstitutional. While they are at it, they need to get rid of the 1986 ban on manufacture of transferable Class III weapons. The cost of legal full autos has passed the stratosphere and is well out of orbit.
Again not a single crime has ever been committed with a legally owned full-auto by a private citizen (one LEO did use a "legally" owned dept gun to commit a crime). I sure hope that President Bush doesn't mistakenly cave to the yellow journalism and fascistic tactics of schummer, et al and abandon a huge but fairly quiet (we're too busy earning livings, etc to agitate) block of voters. Sorry for the absence of paragraphs and html, and God Bless America, Greg

[gdc61]

have you seen airport security lately? do you really think this ban will have ANY affect on criminals or terrorists. then try this; remove ALL restrictions on the 2nd.... how would those 12 terrorists you speak of fair in an airport where virtually every sane person who wants to, can carry? dead terrorists.

[God Bless the USA 2]

Congratulations you have exhibited your absorbtion of the liberal media's lies. No gun control in any country has ever deterred people bent on destruction from executing their desire to harm innocent civilians. Gun control laws however have always done an excellent job of taking guns out of law abiding citizens hands while leaving criminals with theirs.

Our Founding Fathers understood that a God fearing law abiding well armed population was the best homeland defense policy this country could have - both from enemies within and enemies from without. ANY infringement on the 2nd ammendment can only serve to help criminals (both in governement and the population) and hurt those that truly love this country and our way of life.

ALL gun control is unconstitutional.