The Right To Keep and Bear Arms

Pelvic shots recommended by spec ops. Several large nerves, arteries, important bones, and joints. Plus it is your bodies stabilizer for locomotion. Not only will they go down but they won't be able to get back up and as barkey noted are likely screwed to bleed out shortly.

I like those laws for Minnesota they sound pretty sensible.

Who watches the watchmen?

I think a lot of people who don't understand firearm terminology confuse full metal jacketed rounds as armor piercing.

We rank 14/100 on the Brady Campaign website. We're nothing like Arizona's 0/100 though, lol.

edited 18th Jul '11 2:41:01 AM by Driscoll

WHAT A HORRIBLE NIGHT TO HAVE A DIALOG BOX INTERRUPT GAMEPLAY.

Well, I'm not sure how I would go about defining them on their own. We'd need something fairly in depth to do a real analysis of what counts for armor piercing for what caliber/gun type. I mean, a large hunting rifle round is going to pierce much heavier armor than a pistol round, but the rifle is much less likely to be used as such.

Most people don't know how the things are measured and are likely to define it as any round capable of penetrating any armor at any range.

Fight smart, not fair.

^

This.

Also, I can only hope to one day live someplace that scores 0/100 from the Brady Campaign.

The US Army's current body armor, the Interceptor Body Armor without protective inserts is rated for stopping a 124 grain 9x19mm Parabellum full metal jacketed bullet, which places it somewhere between the Type II and Type IIIA ratings for body armor. With protective inserts it can become Type III armor, which can stop 7.62 NATO FMJ rounds. Most body armors are rated for stopping hollow point handgun ammunition, which is easier to stop than FMJ. I remember seeing reports that surplus eastern European 7.62x25mm Tokarev rounds can usually punch through Type II armor. You have to go to Type IV armor before personal body armor has a shot at stopping an 8mm round from my Turkish Mauser or a .30-06 round from my Savage.

It makes sense for police to use vests that are rated for handgun ammunition. Handguns are the most common type of firearms used by criminals because of their concealability. Police shouldn't carry more weight than they need to. I hear the belts they carry are already heavy enough.

Regardless, when I hear armor piercing ammo, I'm thinking of the variety that's designed to defeat some kind of military grade vehicle armor, not ballistic vests.

edited 18th Jul '11 3:38:07 AM by Driscoll

WHAT A HORRIBLE NIGHT TO HAVE A DIALOG BOX INTERRUPT GAMEPLAY.

Which shows you know something about weapons. Most people, particularly the "ban everything" type, know jack all.

Fight smart, not fair.

^ Which is one of the many reasons why folks like me are adamantly against any regulation they propose. They don't know how it works or what it is therefore they do not deserve to touch it unless they educate themselves first.

Since I know those types will never do that, they should never touch the issue of guns.

edited 18th Jul '11 5:08:29 AM by MajorTom

"Allah may guide their bullets, but Jesus helps those who aim down the sights."

Knowing jack all? That problem is true regardless of the subject of legislation.

It's why they hire consultants and listen to lobbyists.

And they still make mistakes.

I agree that most politicians don't understand firearms enough to make good decisions concerning them, but I think that some amount of regulation is needed. I'm against complete bans on any class of weapon, but I think the National Firearms Act of 1934 has mostly sensible regulations. If you want to own a machine gun (the law uses the term machine gun to mean any weapon with fully-automatic capabilities), a short barreled rifle or shotgun, destructive devices (i.e. explosives), any other weapon (a catch all classification for other types of concealable weapons like cane guns, pen guns, and other disguised firearms), or a silencer, you have to contact the ATF (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives) and your Chief Law Enforcement Officer (county sheriff or chief of police), pass a background check, submit a photo of yourself and fingerprints, and pay $200 for a tax stamp. You also have to contact the ATF to notify them if you're going to transport your NFA weapon across state lines.

The law has some weird oddities in it, though. Simply attaching a vertical foregrip to a pistol automatically makes it an Any Other Weapon, in violation of the NFA if you didn't register it. Attaching a buttstock to a pistol makes it a Short Barreled Rifle, but there are exclusions for certain weapons like C96 Mauser Broomhandles and FN Browning Hi-Powers if they're old enough. Sawing off the buttstock of a rifle doesn't make it a pistol because the rifle was originally built with a buttstock. If your semi-automatic SKS accidentally slamfires, you have yourself a machine gun.

I'm of the opinion that the Short Barreled Rifle/Shotgun and Any Other Weapon classifications should just be considered pistols. It would eliminate a whole lot of headaches. I find it odd when this is classified as a pistol and this is classified as a short barreled rifle.

edited 18th Jul '11 2:19:08 PM by Driscoll

WHAT A HORRIBLE NIGHT TO HAVE A DIALOG BOX INTERRUPT GAMEPLAY.

Minnesota sounds pretty cool. I think that's how it should be done.

Would you kindly click my dragons?

@Thread in general: What I'm not too fond of is the lack of logic behind most firearms restrictions...hell, most weapons restrictions in general. A classic example is the "switchblade" ban; there's no reason to ban automatic knives other than their association with criminal types.

There are examples with firearms as well, I'll edit/post again when I find one. Anyone know what I'm getting at here (where laws are built around how "scary" something is, rather than anything logical)?

If I were to write some of the strange things that come under my eyes they would not be believed. ~Cora M. Strayer~

It's come up before in the thread.

The problem is that's applying a general concern when it's really a specific issue.

And some of it you can blame on lobbyists trying to create narrow restrictions so they can keep selling what they want to sell, as opposed to fully solving problems.

edited 18th Jul '11 5:51:10 PM by blueharp

I'll agree with the last part, Blue; lawmaking is all about compromise and people making sure whatever's getting cut is cut from someone else's slice of the pie.

However...

Not understanding you here. Care to elaborate?

If I were to write some of the strange things that come under my eyes they would not be believed. ~Cora M. Strayer~

Legislators make bad laws and regulations all the time, the solution is not to ban them from passing any laws, but to fix the problems as they are.

If we banned them from passing laws till we could be assured of perfection, then we'd never get anything done.

Okay, that makes sense. But I was more asserting that when it comes to weapons regulation, logic and reason seem to go out the window. This seems to please no one; not the extremists at either end and not the rest of us in the middle. So, why operate this way?

If I were to write some of the strange things that come under my eyes they would not be believed. ~Cora M. Strayer~

It's not just weapons legislation.

It's all over the place, all the time.

Making laws is as messy as making sausage, sometimes you get things in it you really don't want to be there.

True, but it's more prevalent when lawmakers go to regulate things that can hurt us (weapons, drugs, etc.). So it's not just the process itself that's contributing to the problem IMO.

If I were to write some of the strange things that come under my eyes they would not be believed. ~Cora M. Strayer~

My experiences tell me those are just the ones that get attention, not necessarily the most common.

But that would be getting off-topic.

I still support mandating that anyone who wants a hand in writing a law should have to prove knowledge of the subject. Or ban legislators themselves from writing the law.

Fight smart, not fair.

Most of the laws are already written by assistants and lobbyists.

Do you really want to push it further in that direction?

What ? isn't America have enough trouble with Banker self-regulating finance, and Doctors and Insurance Companies controlling Health Industries ? beside who should doing the check whether legislator understand the law ?

Run a basic test. It's not particularly hard.

Fight smart, not fair.

This is really off-topic, perhaps it would be better to start a new thread.

edited 18th Jul '11 10:24:42 PM by blueharp

Barkey

Here comes the difference between wating to shoot at the range and wanting to own a gun. If you just want to shoot and the range could lend/rent you a gun and sell ammo everyone wouldn't need a personal gun. Gets more complicated is you want to actually own your own gun.

Aprilla

No responsible gunowner should think of his/her gun as something to sell for quick cash

Tuefel Hunden IV

This should be mandatory for everyone before getting a gun.

Laws are made to be broken. You're next, thermodynamics.

Why not? As an item—i.e. when not in use—guns are merely things, like any other object in our lives. I can imagine why it would be bad if they just sold it to some random person just because, but I think that selling it to a (good, not shady) pawn shop or, hell, back to a gun shop, if they do that, would make sense.

I am now known as Flyboy.