When you or I have them, they’re called “assault weapons”, and they’re made for nothing but killing large numbers of people rapidly, and totally useless for self-defense besides.
When law enforcement officers have them, they’re called “patrol rifles”, and they’re the best tool for protecting innocent citizens from violent criminals.
When the government orders 7,000 of them, they’re called “personal defense weapons”, and the DHS wants them because they are “suitable for self-defense in close quarters.”
Which is it? Are they only made for killing lots of people rapidly, or “suitable for self-defense in close quarters”? If they’re only good for rapid indiscriminate killing, why would cops and DHS agents need them? And if they have a legit self-defense function, why should they be banned for civilian use? The Federal government seems to think that these kinds of rifles are ideal for personal protection, otherwise they’d be ordering something else to fit the “personal defense” role. They can, after all, order whatever they want.
(And the versions ordered by the DHS are fully automatic machine guns, unlike the semi-automatic rifles available to Joe and Jane Citizen.)
A bit of nitpicking: do you really group assault rifles (sans heavy barrels) under machine guns?
If they have a selective fire option, they are machine guns according to the NFA. Hell, the NFA classifies just a full-auto HK sear as a registered machine gun.
The original “Assault Rifle” was the German “sturmgewehr” of 1944. A full-auto machinegun that fires a carbine length round.
Josh Sugarmann of the VPC deliberately confused self loading rifles with “Assault Rifles” in order to get them banned.
So, no, James, we aren’t going to let libtard ideologs like Sugarmann redefine terms.
The Second Amendment is NOT NEGOTIABLE!!
http://tinyurl.com/NOT-NEGOTIABLE
No further infringements of the Second Amendment should be made
by those who wish to continue the pretense that the government of the USA is legitimate.
What? That can’t be right. Surely they mean double barrel shotguns like the VP recommends, right?
I’m shocked, shocked, I tell you.
😐
And if the red state governments buy thousands of M-4 lowers, and sell them at cost to all CCW holders under the militia clause of the second amendment, they become well regulated State Militia weapons.
( snerk )
I say we all go with what DHS says: A select fire AR pattern rifle is the perfect Personal Defense Weapon for self defense in close quarters. (Like your home).
Alan,
To be perfectly honest, I’m not sure the DHS has me convinced that they need the “group therapy” setting, either.