Assault weapons—just like armor-piercing bullets, machine guns, and plastic firearms—are a new topic. The weapons' menacing looks, coupled with the public's confusion over fully automatic machine guns versus semi-automatic assault weapons—anything that looks like a machine gun is assumed to be a machine gun—can only increase the chance of public support for restrictions on these weapons. In addition, few people can envision a practical use for these weapons.
Where of course self-defense is not "a practical use", e.g for bog standard "plastic gun" "assault weapons" such as the Glock.
Correct. I've gotten used to dumbing it down to Brady (because very few people have heard of VPC) that I forgot that it was unnecessary for this audience.
And, yeah, well, I suppose we might be the two most "expert" on this subject, with my having joined the gun politics battle in the early 1970s (sic), and you having worked at the ATF (!!!, I hope that was a youthful indiscretion! :-). I'm just particularly ... sensitive? in that the Brady groups are now really fading (see especially their $$$ lawsuit loss WRT to the Colorado movie theater shooting), and Bloomberg replacing them as the big threat. Hmmm, haven't heard much about the VPC since I and many other research minions helped Clayton Cramer destroy their "Concealed Carry Killers" paper.
As for my dalliance at the ATF, it was, frankly, about three years worth of time in which I had not yet developed much of a political conscience.
Actually working for the government has helped shape much of my opinions of the government, and in most ways, for the poorer.
Politics aside, I would have a very hard time convincing myself to work for any of the agencies again, if only because I can't bear to watch tens of millions of dollars evaporate when someone's opinion changes, or an election year happens, or the government decides that, despite having gotten to year 4 of the project with all milestones succeeding, they've neglected to budget for years 5+.
Assault weapons—just like armor-piercing bullets, machine guns, and plastic firearms—are a new topic. The weapons' menacing looks, coupled with the public's confusion over fully automatic machine guns versus semi-automatic assault weapons—anything that looks like a machine gun is assumed to be a machine gun—can only increase the chance of public support for restrictions on these weapons. In addition, few people can envision a practical use for these weapons.
Where of course self-defense is not "a practical use", e.g for bog standard "plastic gun" "assault weapons" such as the Glock.
That's from an "assault weapons" political campaign he had ready for the first screaming headline abuse of one, conveniently in the following year: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stockton_schoolyard_shooting