Suicidesoldier#1
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- Posted: Sun, 10 Feb 2013 12:41:39 +0000
What an assault weapons ban would entail; yes, we've done this a lot in the ED. But since Obama is still considering and urging people to "join him", I think it's important to know what people are supporting, and since I believe most Americans support sensible gun laws, I think it's important to know what they are supporting.
So, what is an assault weapons ban? Well, the new one is different from the old one, but similiar in a lot of ways. Why is it stupid? Well, for starters, it's focusing on arbitrary or redundant things, that is, things that already exist. This includes pistol grips, adjustable stocks, and barrel shrouds, along with already banned things such as fully automatic weapons and grenade launchers. Since grenade launchers and the like are already banned, this is redundant. Since the new bill would ban specific civilian firearms and things like adjustable stocks, pistol grips, and barrel shrouds, it's overly draconic and would not focus on commonly used weapons in crime at all.
For starters, background checks are already mandatory for licensed dealers. The Brady Laws, ban guns to all convicted felons, illegal aliens, people with mental issues backgrounds, has a restraining order, any history of past domestic abuse (even if it's a misdemeanor, which is a pretty good idea imo), among other things. It also requires people to be over the age of 21 to buy a handgun, since most violent crimes are perpetrated by the youth, between 14-24 years of age. Do unlicensed dealers have to go through a licensed dealer to sell their weapon; usually, yes. There are some rare exceptions in gun shows; should we make mandatory background checks at gun shows; sure. Cracking down on it would be hard, but I'm sure it's possible. So, here, background checks for licensed dealers already make sense; since most guns are not bought from licensed dealers, you might crack down on a few crimes by making gun shows harsher, which is something I support. Even though gun shows still only contribute to a small part of the total illegal gun problem; since the Mexican drug cartels contribute to approximately 90% of the illegal contraband in the U.S., and despite the rumors that the U.S. gives the cartels 87% of their weapons, only 87% of traceable weapons were of U.S. origin; this represents 87% of roughly 4000 guns, or roughly 3480 guns, out of approximately 305,424. So 87% of 1.3% of 305,424 of guns are traceable to the U.S.; even if gotten from gun shows, these guns should be from legal U.S. manufacturer's, and if they were, they should be traceable. In a sense, only illegal, likely out of the U.S. illegal factories (such as in China or Pakistan), could be responsible for this gap. This a story to go into in and of itself; but in any case, legal guns do not contribute that much to crime.
Secondly, a lot of things that are supposed to banned in the assault weapons ban are already banned. Assault rifles, or select fire fully automatic weapons, that is a military weapon, are already banned under the amendments of the 1934 National Firearms Act in the Gun Control Act of 1968, and fully automatic weapons were even further restricted in 1986 not allowing any more to be produced or owned, by a civilian, even if they qualified for otherwise such a firearm license (in essence, if you were a creator of such arms, say a business, these weapons were not technically owned by you even before you sold them to the U.S.). Also, in his bill, "a grenade launcher or rocket launcher" is supposed to be banned, in Dianne Feinstein's new bill are already banned, as well, under the same laws, except that it qualifies as a "destructive device", that requires 200 dollar tax per item (so, 200 dollar per grenade) and that
So, that is redundant. To support this bill because you support banning those things would be like supporting a bill banning ice cream because it had "also ban grenade launchers" attached. Ironic considering we should *just* have a bill to ban grenade launchers, and that they are in effect already banned and highly regulated for civilian ownership.
So, great, most of provisions in the bill already exist and many things they are trying to ban are already banned. Machine guns, military weapons, and lots of other things are banned from civilian ownership (even a business doesn't technically own them) and there have been further restrictions down the line.
So, with that out of the way, what else is in an assault weapons ban?
The main problem with an assault weapons ban
The main problem with an assault weapons ban isn't redundancy and it's unlikely impact on crime; yes, it would be a little overboard to have multiple redundant laws around the same thing and a lot of other stuff.
But, the real reason is because it's focusing on pistol grips, adjustable stocks, and barrel shrouds. According to the new Feinstein bill, only 1 out of 3 of these features would make it classify as being an assault weapon, and or having a magazine of more than 10 rounds. "The proposed legislation defines an assault weapon as a semi-automatic firearm with a detachable magazine and one additional feature, such as a pistol grip, a folding or telescoping stock, a barrel shroud or threaded barrel, or a grenade launcher or rocket launcher."
Right off the bat, we can see the crazyness of this bill. Rocket launchers and grenade launchers are already illegal, as described above, and labeled as destructive devices. Few very people are even allowed to own these, let alone civilians, as most law enforcement have difficulty getting ahold of them. So, that's a red Herring, in a sense, and a poor reason to support the bill since it's already banned items.
So, what's something *new*, as in not banned, that will be banned?
One additional feature (instead of 2/3), such as a pistol grip, an adjustable stock, or a barrel shroud, and a magazine more than 10 rounds. He also called for the banning of reasonable substitutes, such as weapons with holes in the stock and specifically named other weapons that might not meet this criteria but that he claimed look scary. What are these things?
A pistol grip is just a grip. It is a decent way to hold on to a weapon, without accidentally dropping it or aiming it at something you don't want to aim at, or hurting your wrist. A pistol grip is simply a gripped shaped like the handle of a pistol, except that it doesn't hold any bullets. A revolver has what is technically considered a "pistol grip", that is a weapon with a grip that doesn't hold bullets. The grip of a gun is usually shaped like a pistol in some manner, or in reality, a pistol grip is shaped like a normal grip, say a hammer grip, mostly due to practicality. Holding on to a weapon without a grip like this is very difficult and presumably dangerous if the recoil is high or if a person has trouble aiming it.
There are other ways around this, being traditional grips that aren't a pistol, but generally achieve the same thing. Like this weapon and this stock. I ask you America, how do these things make a gun more dangerous? They are present on the vast majority of weapons and they make sense. For someone who wants control, but not to ban all guns, how is this in any way sensible? I simply want sensible gun laws, not gun laws that ban already banned things and then focus on features that if anything, make guns safer by not allowing accidents to occur very often. If these are the types of things people want to ban, which they seem to be by supporting an assault weapons ban, I ask why? At best, you are making people hurt their hands when they shoot guns or accidentally lose control and shoot somebody else, or injure them. Since it seeks to ban "loopholes" like thumbhole stocks, or any kind of stock, and specifically named weapons, it will virtually ban all grips or handles on guns. This is just insane to me.
The second thing it's trying to ban are adjustable stocks. What is an adjustable stock? It's a stock you can form fit to your shoulder, so as to make it fit your shoulder, or anyone's shoulder, better. Stocks like these, these, and these fit the criteria. Their only purpose is to make it so a person can fire a gun more comfortably and adapt to their shoulder without having to reconstruct the entire weapon. If anything, the lack of an adjustable stock makes a weapon more dangerous, since the weapon will be more prone to accidentally injure people. It also would not target stockless weapons, like these, a sawed off shotgun. Stockless weapons should be a larger concern, since no reasonable self defense person would want a less controllable gun, and criminals don't care if they hit innocent people and these weapons are easier to conceal, and therefore commit and get away with crimes with. By focusing on these arbitrary features, you are in effect, if anything, forcing weapons that are more desirable to criminals. Things that don't jut off the weapon make the weapon harder to hide beneath clothing; in effect, if you forced such things instead, you could theoretically make weapons harder to hide and therefore commit crimes with. It is for this reason that small guns have been banned. Weapons under 26 inches or under a 16 inch barrel have been banned. Unless a person is over 7 feet tall, hiding a weapon of this size or over is near impossible, making it difficult to get away with crime if in plain view of other people; therefore banning the use of larger weapons (and more accurate) is counter productive.
Perhaps the most draconic, is the barrel shroud. In no way could this possibly be construed as an offensive device. It was famously quoted to be "a shoulder thing that goes up". A barrel shroud is in fact a way to keep yourself from getting burned by the barrel or the working mechanism. It is hard to find a weapon that does not have a barrel shroud in some form or the other, since this would cause the user to be burned or the breach to expose the cartridge while firing, which can be dangerous. Barrel shrouds, are in fact, found on machine guns; they are found on almost all types of guns, too. Barrel shrouds, in the most basic sense, are a secondary grip; a place to put your other hand to prevent the gun from being hard to aim. Since a barrel shroud is found nearly on all weapons, what the assault weapons ban is now allowed to do is ban virtually any gun; if not all, guns. Since the assault weapon ban also specifically refers to specific weapons, it would be easy to assume it's classifications of weapons are at best, random. It is possible to have one like this (which is added after the fact), or like this. The previous lever action, shows two wooden pieces; the grip, that is not the stock (or end, or butt) of the weapon, closest to the barrel, giving the user something to hold on to, better shaped to their hand and not directly touching the barrel, would be banned. It is perhaps the most draconic of all since forcing a gun owner to burn themselves is insane, and would probably due little to deter a criminal.
Perhaps the most sensible thing
Perhaps the most sensible thing is the limitation of the magazine size. I can see how a person might believe that a larger magazine is more dangerous. More bullets could equal more danger. Despite this, larger magazines are not necessarily more dangerous. A person could simply carry multiple magazines with them in an ideal position to reload, and not have any troubles. If a person say, taped magazines to themselves, to be quickly accessible (and stick, but be relatively easy to remove), or wore specially designed clothing, they would have little trouble quickly reloading their weapon.
I on the other hand, like most sensible gun owners, am not a maniac. To expect me to carry around magazines taped all over my body or a tactical vest every where I go is crazy. Since it is usually U.S. law that all weapons carried in public must be concealed (in most states, including Texas), a gun, and the magazines, need to be concealed underneath clothing. This means that they are hard to get to. Therefore trying to reload quickly will be extremely difficult as the magazines must not be in plain sight, and therefore cannot be duct taped in convenient easily to reach locations (like you would say, in combat, or use magpul stuff etc.), legally, in most states anyways.
Does a person need large magazines in self defense. Not particularly, but since 15-30 is considered average, 10 is relatively small. Does a person need 15 rounds? Well, most police use 15-18 round magazines in glocks, some 65%, and most use 15+ round capacity magazines. The NYPD (PDF) for instance had an average of a 15% hit rate and a 10.3 rounds fired per officer involved in a gunfight. While it's arguable then that 10 round magazines would suffice, 15 is usually necessary in a case an officer misses, for multiple assailants (say two) or simply to have extra rounds in the magazine as back-up. Some officers simply fire more rounds than others (arriving earlier at the scene) which distorts this figure. It is therefore reasonable to assume that 15-30 round magazines are necessary for defense if trained officers of the law require them.
Do these make weapons any more dangerous? For the reasons described above, not really. But, a smaller magazine means that a weapon is more concealable. Since handguns are in fact responsible for 75% [1] [2] of crime, compared to rifles at 4% and shotguns at 5%, it's reasonable to assume that since rifles and shotguns are hard to hide in plain sight (despite their prevalence among civilian owners), and that pistols tend to be smaller, pocket pistol sized weapons, hence making them smaller, more concealable weapons are the weapon of choice for criminals.
Since the .38 S&W revolver (style, since most are imitation) is on the top 10 weapons used for crime, followed by various 9mm pistols, it is reasonable to assume that the smallest, weakest weapons are being used more for crime than big weapons. Small weapons possess the same capacity to kill undefended persons as larger weapons, so the smaller a weapon is, the easier it is to conceal, and therefore the easy it is to get away with, or sneak a weapon into a place, and commit a crime. Criminals usually carry guns in their pocket or their waist band, so carrying a large weapon would get them caught almost immediately. Since larger weapons stand out, criminals often times try to get as small a weapon as possible. Pocket pistols and small revolvers are generally the most used weapons by criminals, with, at best, 14-26% even using large weapons.
Any situation that warrants a firearm typically requires the perpetrator to be using one. Hence, a self defense scenario involving a firearm would require large capacity magazine, while a criminal scenario would not, largely since the victims have little way to fight back at a range. This is why a large capacity magazine would have little impact on crime, but a large impact on self defense advocates. It is the most sensible of the proposed ideas, in that some form of logic is attached, but is still not a good idea.
So...
So in conclusion, banning civilian sales of assault weapons is a bad idea. The majority of guns are not coming from licensed dealers, even according to Obama, at 88%, and the bulk of illegal weapons and contraband are smuggled into the country, and the bulk of illegal weapons from licensed dealers come from .4% of all licensed dealers (some 50%) through straw sales, it's unlikely that banning regular civilians or stores from owning these weapons will stop criminals.
Since from 1From 1994 through 2009, over 107 million Brady background checks were conducted. During this period 1.9 million attempted firearm purchases were blocked by the Brady background check system, or 1.8 percent. Since people who don't qualify for guns, in background checks, are rarely even trying to buy guns legally, it's reasonable to assume that most criminals don't plan on buying guns from licensed stores, stores that have mandatory background checks, traceable weapons (with mandated chemically retrievable serial numbers), and that sell more expensive guns that are less available on the street (most drug dealers have illegal guns for sale, as well, since it's the same group of people smuggling guns, drugs, exotic animals and people into the country), and other such features.
Since less than 1% of all crimes use a weapon that would classify as an assault weapon, even according to California law which is much stricter (as in, it bans things that wouldn't even be included in the gun bill), 5.4%, or at the highest estimates 2-8%, classify as "assault weapons", you will not be stopping much crime. Since most civilian weapons classify as assault weapons, due to reasonable features being present on guns (I.E. not weapons criminals modified by sawing off the stock to make it shorter), with around 14% of all weapons in America being AR-15's, a single type of "assault weapon", it is simply a bad idea to ban these weapons.
They are not within the criminal target group, are not being distributed by U.S. salers, and are not even more dangerous based on the ambiguous classification of an "assault weapon" (since all weapons, including knives, are presumably used for assault).
Banning pistol grips, adjustable stocks, and barrel shrouds in no way are a good idea nor would they likely reduce crime. They do not make a weapon any more dangerous or "powerful" and are present simply to make the weapon more comfortable to hold on to. At best, they make a weapon look scary or *look* "militarized", since military weapons do in fact often use these common sense features (while criminals don't care about accuracy, comfort, or other such things, often times carrying them in... less than reasonable crevices). At the very worst, since criminals are more prone to be using weapons that lack these common sense features due to the difficulty of hiding a weapon that has things that jut out at weird angles, you will force criminals to use even better weapons at crime.
So, in short, an assault weapon ban would be a bad idea.
So, what is an assault weapons ban? Well, the new one is different from the old one, but similiar in a lot of ways. Why is it stupid? Well, for starters, it's focusing on arbitrary or redundant things, that is, things that already exist. This includes pistol grips, adjustable stocks, and barrel shrouds, along with already banned things such as fully automatic weapons and grenade launchers. Since grenade launchers and the like are already banned, this is redundant. Since the new bill would ban specific civilian firearms and things like adjustable stocks, pistol grips, and barrel shrouds, it's overly draconic and would not focus on commonly used weapons in crime at all.
For starters, background checks are already mandatory for licensed dealers. The Brady Laws, ban guns to all convicted felons, illegal aliens, people with mental issues backgrounds, has a restraining order, any history of past domestic abuse (even if it's a misdemeanor, which is a pretty good idea imo), among other things. It also requires people to be over the age of 21 to buy a handgun, since most violent crimes are perpetrated by the youth, between 14-24 years of age. Do unlicensed dealers have to go through a licensed dealer to sell their weapon; usually, yes. There are some rare exceptions in gun shows; should we make mandatory background checks at gun shows; sure. Cracking down on it would be hard, but I'm sure it's possible. So, here, background checks for licensed dealers already make sense; since most guns are not bought from licensed dealers, you might crack down on a few crimes by making gun shows harsher, which is something I support. Even though gun shows still only contribute to a small part of the total illegal gun problem; since the Mexican drug cartels contribute to approximately 90% of the illegal contraband in the U.S., and despite the rumors that the U.S. gives the cartels 87% of their weapons, only 87% of traceable weapons were of U.S. origin; this represents 87% of roughly 4000 guns, or roughly 3480 guns, out of approximately 305,424. So 87% of 1.3% of 305,424 of guns are traceable to the U.S.; even if gotten from gun shows, these guns should be from legal U.S. manufacturer's, and if they were, they should be traceable. In a sense, only illegal, likely out of the U.S. illegal factories (such as in China or Pakistan), could be responsible for this gap. This a story to go into in and of itself; but in any case, legal guns do not contribute that much to crime.
Secondly, a lot of things that are supposed to banned in the assault weapons ban are already banned. Assault rifles, or select fire fully automatic weapons, that is a military weapon, are already banned under the amendments of the 1934 National Firearms Act in the Gun Control Act of 1968, and fully automatic weapons were even further restricted in 1986 not allowing any more to be produced or owned, by a civilian, even if they qualified for otherwise such a firearm license (in essence, if you were a creator of such arms, say a business, these weapons were not technically owned by you even before you sold them to the U.S.). Also, in his bill, "a grenade launcher or rocket launcher" is supposed to be banned, in Dianne Feinstein's new bill are already banned, as well, under the same laws, except that it qualifies as a "destructive device", that requires 200 dollar tax per item (so, 200 dollar per grenade) and that
So, that is redundant. To support this bill because you support banning those things would be like supporting a bill banning ice cream because it had "also ban grenade launchers" attached. Ironic considering we should *just* have a bill to ban grenade launchers, and that they are in effect already banned and highly regulated for civilian ownership.
So, great, most of provisions in the bill already exist and many things they are trying to ban are already banned. Machine guns, military weapons, and lots of other things are banned from civilian ownership (even a business doesn't technically own them) and there have been further restrictions down the line.
So, with that out of the way, what else is in an assault weapons ban?
The main problem with an assault weapons ban
The main problem with an assault weapons ban isn't redundancy and it's unlikely impact on crime; yes, it would be a little overboard to have multiple redundant laws around the same thing and a lot of other stuff.
But, the real reason is because it's focusing on pistol grips, adjustable stocks, and barrel shrouds. According to the new Feinstein bill, only 1 out of 3 of these features would make it classify as being an assault weapon, and or having a magazine of more than 10 rounds. "The proposed legislation defines an assault weapon as a semi-automatic firearm with a detachable magazine and one additional feature, such as a pistol grip, a folding or telescoping stock, a barrel shroud or threaded barrel, or a grenade launcher or rocket launcher."
Right off the bat, we can see the crazyness of this bill. Rocket launchers and grenade launchers are already illegal, as described above, and labeled as destructive devices. Few very people are even allowed to own these, let alone civilians, as most law enforcement have difficulty getting ahold of them. So, that's a red Herring, in a sense, and a poor reason to support the bill since it's already banned items.
So, what's something *new*, as in not banned, that will be banned?
One additional feature (instead of 2/3), such as a pistol grip, an adjustable stock, or a barrel shroud, and a magazine more than 10 rounds. He also called for the banning of reasonable substitutes, such as weapons with holes in the stock and specifically named other weapons that might not meet this criteria but that he claimed look scary. What are these things?
A pistol grip is just a grip. It is a decent way to hold on to a weapon, without accidentally dropping it or aiming it at something you don't want to aim at, or hurting your wrist. A pistol grip is simply a gripped shaped like the handle of a pistol, except that it doesn't hold any bullets. A revolver has what is technically considered a "pistol grip", that is a weapon with a grip that doesn't hold bullets. The grip of a gun is usually shaped like a pistol in some manner, or in reality, a pistol grip is shaped like a normal grip, say a hammer grip, mostly due to practicality. Holding on to a weapon without a grip like this is very difficult and presumably dangerous if the recoil is high or if a person has trouble aiming it.
There are other ways around this, being traditional grips that aren't a pistol, but generally achieve the same thing. Like this weapon and this stock. I ask you America, how do these things make a gun more dangerous? They are present on the vast majority of weapons and they make sense. For someone who wants control, but not to ban all guns, how is this in any way sensible? I simply want sensible gun laws, not gun laws that ban already banned things and then focus on features that if anything, make guns safer by not allowing accidents to occur very often. If these are the types of things people want to ban, which they seem to be by supporting an assault weapons ban, I ask why? At best, you are making people hurt their hands when they shoot guns or accidentally lose control and shoot somebody else, or injure them. Since it seeks to ban "loopholes" like thumbhole stocks, or any kind of stock, and specifically named weapons, it will virtually ban all grips or handles on guns. This is just insane to me.
The second thing it's trying to ban are adjustable stocks. What is an adjustable stock? It's a stock you can form fit to your shoulder, so as to make it fit your shoulder, or anyone's shoulder, better. Stocks like these, these, and these fit the criteria. Their only purpose is to make it so a person can fire a gun more comfortably and adapt to their shoulder without having to reconstruct the entire weapon. If anything, the lack of an adjustable stock makes a weapon more dangerous, since the weapon will be more prone to accidentally injure people. It also would not target stockless weapons, like these, a sawed off shotgun. Stockless weapons should be a larger concern, since no reasonable self defense person would want a less controllable gun, and criminals don't care if they hit innocent people and these weapons are easier to conceal, and therefore commit and get away with crimes with. By focusing on these arbitrary features, you are in effect, if anything, forcing weapons that are more desirable to criminals. Things that don't jut off the weapon make the weapon harder to hide beneath clothing; in effect, if you forced such things instead, you could theoretically make weapons harder to hide and therefore commit crimes with. It is for this reason that small guns have been banned. Weapons under 26 inches or under a 16 inch barrel have been banned. Unless a person is over 7 feet tall, hiding a weapon of this size or over is near impossible, making it difficult to get away with crime if in plain view of other people; therefore banning the use of larger weapons (and more accurate) is counter productive.
Perhaps the most draconic, is the barrel shroud. In no way could this possibly be construed as an offensive device. It was famously quoted to be "a shoulder thing that goes up". A barrel shroud is in fact a way to keep yourself from getting burned by the barrel or the working mechanism. It is hard to find a weapon that does not have a barrel shroud in some form or the other, since this would cause the user to be burned or the breach to expose the cartridge while firing, which can be dangerous. Barrel shrouds, are in fact, found on machine guns; they are found on almost all types of guns, too. Barrel shrouds, in the most basic sense, are a secondary grip; a place to put your other hand to prevent the gun from being hard to aim. Since a barrel shroud is found nearly on all weapons, what the assault weapons ban is now allowed to do is ban virtually any gun; if not all, guns. Since the assault weapon ban also specifically refers to specific weapons, it would be easy to assume it's classifications of weapons are at best, random. It is possible to have one like this (which is added after the fact), or like this. The previous lever action, shows two wooden pieces; the grip, that is not the stock (or end, or butt) of the weapon, closest to the barrel, giving the user something to hold on to, better shaped to their hand and not directly touching the barrel, would be banned. It is perhaps the most draconic of all since forcing a gun owner to burn themselves is insane, and would probably due little to deter a criminal.
Perhaps the most sensible thing
Perhaps the most sensible thing is the limitation of the magazine size. I can see how a person might believe that a larger magazine is more dangerous. More bullets could equal more danger. Despite this, larger magazines are not necessarily more dangerous. A person could simply carry multiple magazines with them in an ideal position to reload, and not have any troubles. If a person say, taped magazines to themselves, to be quickly accessible (and stick, but be relatively easy to remove), or wore specially designed clothing, they would have little trouble quickly reloading their weapon.
I on the other hand, like most sensible gun owners, am not a maniac. To expect me to carry around magazines taped all over my body or a tactical vest every where I go is crazy. Since it is usually U.S. law that all weapons carried in public must be concealed (in most states, including Texas), a gun, and the magazines, need to be concealed underneath clothing. This means that they are hard to get to. Therefore trying to reload quickly will be extremely difficult as the magazines must not be in plain sight, and therefore cannot be duct taped in convenient easily to reach locations (like you would say, in combat, or use magpul stuff etc.), legally, in most states anyways.
Does a person need large magazines in self defense. Not particularly, but since 15-30 is considered average, 10 is relatively small. Does a person need 15 rounds? Well, most police use 15-18 round magazines in glocks, some 65%, and most use 15+ round capacity magazines. The NYPD (PDF) for instance had an average of a 15% hit rate and a 10.3 rounds fired per officer involved in a gunfight. While it's arguable then that 10 round magazines would suffice, 15 is usually necessary in a case an officer misses, for multiple assailants (say two) or simply to have extra rounds in the magazine as back-up. Some officers simply fire more rounds than others (arriving earlier at the scene) which distorts this figure. It is therefore reasonable to assume that 15-30 round magazines are necessary for defense if trained officers of the law require them.
Do these make weapons any more dangerous? For the reasons described above, not really. But, a smaller magazine means that a weapon is more concealable. Since handguns are in fact responsible for 75% [1] [2] of crime, compared to rifles at 4% and shotguns at 5%, it's reasonable to assume that since rifles and shotguns are hard to hide in plain sight (despite their prevalence among civilian owners), and that pistols tend to be smaller, pocket pistol sized weapons, hence making them smaller, more concealable weapons are the weapon of choice for criminals.
Since the .38 S&W revolver (style, since most are imitation) is on the top 10 weapons used for crime, followed by various 9mm pistols, it is reasonable to assume that the smallest, weakest weapons are being used more for crime than big weapons. Small weapons possess the same capacity to kill undefended persons as larger weapons, so the smaller a weapon is, the easier it is to conceal, and therefore the easy it is to get away with, or sneak a weapon into a place, and commit a crime. Criminals usually carry guns in their pocket or their waist band, so carrying a large weapon would get them caught almost immediately. Since larger weapons stand out, criminals often times try to get as small a weapon as possible. Pocket pistols and small revolvers are generally the most used weapons by criminals, with, at best, 14-26% even using large weapons.
Any situation that warrants a firearm typically requires the perpetrator to be using one. Hence, a self defense scenario involving a firearm would require large capacity magazine, while a criminal scenario would not, largely since the victims have little way to fight back at a range. This is why a large capacity magazine would have little impact on crime, but a large impact on self defense advocates. It is the most sensible of the proposed ideas, in that some form of logic is attached, but is still not a good idea.
So...
So in conclusion, banning civilian sales of assault weapons is a bad idea. The majority of guns are not coming from licensed dealers, even according to Obama, at 88%, and the bulk of illegal weapons and contraband are smuggled into the country, and the bulk of illegal weapons from licensed dealers come from .4% of all licensed dealers (some 50%) through straw sales, it's unlikely that banning regular civilians or stores from owning these weapons will stop criminals.
Since from 1From 1994 through 2009, over 107 million Brady background checks were conducted. During this period 1.9 million attempted firearm purchases were blocked by the Brady background check system, or 1.8 percent. Since people who don't qualify for guns, in background checks, are rarely even trying to buy guns legally, it's reasonable to assume that most criminals don't plan on buying guns from licensed stores, stores that have mandatory background checks, traceable weapons (with mandated chemically retrievable serial numbers), and that sell more expensive guns that are less available on the street (most drug dealers have illegal guns for sale, as well, since it's the same group of people smuggling guns, drugs, exotic animals and people into the country), and other such features.
Since less than 1% of all crimes use a weapon that would classify as an assault weapon, even according to California law which is much stricter (as in, it bans things that wouldn't even be included in the gun bill), 5.4%, or at the highest estimates 2-8%, classify as "assault weapons", you will not be stopping much crime. Since most civilian weapons classify as assault weapons, due to reasonable features being present on guns (I.E. not weapons criminals modified by sawing off the stock to make it shorter), with around 14% of all weapons in America being AR-15's, a single type of "assault weapon", it is simply a bad idea to ban these weapons.
They are not within the criminal target group, are not being distributed by U.S. salers, and are not even more dangerous based on the ambiguous classification of an "assault weapon" (since all weapons, including knives, are presumably used for assault).
Banning pistol grips, adjustable stocks, and barrel shrouds in no way are a good idea nor would they likely reduce crime. They do not make a weapon any more dangerous or "powerful" and are present simply to make the weapon more comfortable to hold on to. At best, they make a weapon look scary or *look* "militarized", since military weapons do in fact often use these common sense features (while criminals don't care about accuracy, comfort, or other such things, often times carrying them in... less than reasonable crevices). At the very worst, since criminals are more prone to be using weapons that lack these common sense features due to the difficulty of hiding a weapon that has things that jut out at weird angles, you will force criminals to use even better weapons at crime.
So, in short, an assault weapon ban would be a bad idea.
