How many American senators actually know their way around guns?

[Mazryonh]

Okay, after a bit of research, it seems that since 2013 the percentage of congress members with direct military experience has been dropping steadily ever since the end of the Vietnam War. Guess no one ever thought that this demographic change would lead to an increasing ignorance about guns at large in the US. Perhaps some of the remaining veteran congressmen privately think to themselves: "I've fired helicopter miniguns in combat and you don't know what a barrel shroud does?"

Originally Posted by Evil Tim

Come on Mazryonh, don't you remember how the Scary Gun Bill ended the menace of drive-by rifle grenadings and gangland bayonet charges?

Rifle-grenadings? You mean carbombings, right? And gangland bayonet charges still exist, they're called stabbing sprees, since bayonets that aren't WWI-vintage are just knife-length blades. What you're talking about might be par for the course in the worst part of cartel violence in Brazil or Mexico, or maybe 1930s Chicago.

Originally Posted by Evil Tim

More seriously, the feature test of the Clinton AWB and others was based on a precedent from the "sporting purpose" test of the Gun Control Act (ie the ATF Form 4950, which was a transparent attempt by US gun companies to screw over their European and Combloc competitors by either banning their weapons entirely or requiring the addition of features nobody wanted). The idea is that the features are not sporting features, therefore banning guns with those features will ban scary military rifles and leave only grandpa's lever action or something.

Obama banned importation of quite a few former Soviet firearm manufacturers without mentioning features, so the anticompetition bit wasn't necessary in the end. But the purpose behind "sporting features" bit escapes me. Even a single-shot .22 LR hunting rifle can be perfectly serviceable as a killing tool in the right hands.

[Evil Tim]

Originally Posted by Mazryonh

Rifle-grenadings? You mean carbombings, right? And gangland bayonet charges still exist, they're called stabbing sprees, since bayonets that aren't WWI-vintage are just knife-length blades. What you're talking about might be par for the course in the worst part of cartel violence in Brazil or Mexico, or maybe 1930s Chicago.

Was joking, but the Clinton AWB included "a grenade launcher" as a banned feature. Nobody could ever work out what the hell it was talking about and it's generally assumed it was trying to bag Yugo SKS rifles with grenade launcher sights under the mistaken impression they had detachable magazines.

Originally Posted by Mazryonh

Obama banned importation of quite a few former Soviet firearm manufacturers without mentioning features, so the anticompetition bit wasn't necessary in the end. But the purpose behind "sporting features" bit escapes me. Even a single-shot .22 LR hunting rifle can be perfectly serviceable as a killing tool in the right hands.

Gun Control Act of 1968. There's two lines of reasoning for the import restrictions, one's a smokescreen for the other.

The fake reason was related to what the Soviets were busy doing in Africa: anyone who looked like a Marxist was getting free crates of factory AKs signed by Santa Lenin, and this was played up with the claim that the Soviets would try to legally import AKs to civil rights groups in the US in the attempt to trigger a civil war or something.

The truth was that it was a protectionist ban imposed at the not-so-subtle behest of the American gun industry. Imports of extremely desirable weapons from the Communist bloc and Europe (particularly AKs and compact pistols in metric chamberings) were really starting to put the hurt on the big US companies, so they were all for a law that either banned these weapons entirely, forced them to be nobbled with features that made them less desirable than domestically produced weapons, or forced their manufacturers to open up American subsidiaries and lose their dirt-cheap labour costs. Since they couldn't just come out and say it was protectionism, they came up with a line about these being weapons that don't have a "sporting purpose."

What the gun-grabbers did was come along and say "hey, if these weapons are too dangerous to import, why can people buy them here?" The sporting feature thing wasn't even their idea.

[commando552]

Originally Posted by Evil Tim

Was joking, but the Clinton AWB included "a grenade launcher" as a banned feature. Nobody could ever work out what the hell it was talking about and it's generally assumed it was trying to bag Yugo SKS rifles with grenade launcher sights under the mistaken impression they had detachable magazines.

Not sure it is that complicated, I always assumed it was just the idea that muzzle devices for rifle grenades were a feature of "military" rifles so were banned along with other "military" features like bayonet lugs, flash suppressors and folding stocks. In a lot of cases it is redundant though as the grenade launcher and flash hider are the same thing.

Where it gets really weird is the fact than in California the M59/66 is classified as a destructive device. I think the only reason for this is that somebody didn't read the brochure properly and though that the muzzle device had an internal diameter of 22mm and launched 22mm grenades out of it.

[S&Wshooter]

Originally Posted by Evil Tim

The fake reason was related to what the Soviets were busy doing in Africa: anyone who looked like a Marxist was getting free crates of factory AKs signed by Santa Lenin

Well, mostly SKS'; the Chinese liked to give out both Type 56 rifles and carbines, though

[Excalibur]

Remember that one time when Norinco tried to sell AKs and RPGs to LA gang bangers?

[S&Wshooter]

Just a continuation of their arms program to the ANC