Gun Policy Debate

[turbo]

The M-15 and its fully-automatic M-16 counterpart left our troops badly outgunned in many conflicts. Nobody around here hunts deer with a .223 - the round is ineffective, and wounds more than it kills. My prime hunting rifle is a single-shot Ruger Model One chambered for .45-70. No deer has ever needed a follow-up shot.

To get back on the policy track, confiscation is not the way to go. Within a mile of here, every single household (to my knowledge) with the exception of a widow who moved here about a year ago has at least one shotgun, one deer-rifle, and one pistol. Most of us have multiples of at least some of these. Maine is in the midst of an epidemic of poverty, meth use, and oxycodone (and related) addiction. As a result, home invasions and burglaries are quite common. This section of town is not a soft target, even though we are ~20 minutes at best from a police response from a 911 call.

Edited to add: I do not support disarming citizens selectively. Take away all assault rifles (however tenuously defined), take away semi-automatic hunting rifles, take away semiautomatic pistols, etc. Those "solutions" are fake, and do not address why people in rural areas (who hunt anyway) might want not to have all their guns confiscated bit-by-bit. It is nice to know that if some addict tries breaking into your house for valuables that you can turn the tables and not end up as the victim.

 

[turbo]

I should mention that many of us have reverted to more primitive rifles at times, since Maine offers an extended deer-hunting season for hunters using muzzle-loading black-powder rifles.

My particular BP rifle looks fairly modern, but it's essentially a cap-and-ball rifle that seemed to die out over 100 years ago. Most of these modern clones are quite accurate, so lots of folks are learning to hunt properly and get that one good shot. These rifles load mighty slow, so home-defense is not a good purpose for them.

 

[D H]

Sorry, but you can't have it both ways. Either an assault weapon IS effective at killing or it isn't. Why would it work on the populace and not a deer?

You don't want a deer full of lead. Ideally, one shot = one kill. That's the problem a sniper rifle is designed to solve. Assault weapons are designed to solve to a different problem.

The reason there are so many different kinds of guns (shotguns, sniper rifles, assault weapons, hand guns) is because each kind of gun addresses a different problem. The problem that assault weapons are designed to solve is "how best to kill a whole bunch of people with a gun at mid-range". And that in a nutshell is the problem with making assault weapons available for public consumption.

 

[Oltz]

You don't want a deer full of lead. Ideally, one shot = one kill. That's the problem a sniper rifle is designed to solve. Assault weapons are designed to solve to a different problem.

The reason there are so many different kinds of guns (shotguns, sniper rifles, assault weapons, hand guns) is because each kind of gun addresses a different problem. The problem that assault weapons are designed to solve is "how best to kill a whole bunch of people with a gun at mid-range". And that in a nutshell is the problem with making assault weapons available for public consumption.

D H that is not accurate it is designed to accurately fire aimed shots with limited down time between firing for the purpose of sustained suppressive fire or elimination of single targets. In fact the US military uses the 5.56 mm round because it is lighter and a soldier carrying the same weight of 7.62 mm rounds would have ~40 less rounds and reloads more often. It was designed and chosen so that our military could out last opposing forces using AK series weapons thus winning the engagement or lasting until superior force can be brought on target. The trade off in stopping and killing power is for extending the fight it is actually not really designed to kill multiple targets efficiently at all.

The 7.62 rounds are designed for greater penetration and being able to hopefully hit targets behind cover still not a weapon made for "how best to kill a whole bunch of people" at any range.

 

[Evo]

By popular demand, thread closed.

 

[IMP]

Evo, it appears you didn't actually close the thread...

 

[Evo]

Evo, it appears you didn't actually close the thread...

Ooops, see this is what happens when I attempt to mentorate before I've had my coffee.

Thank you!!