Originally Posted by shakran

Whether that argument is valid or not (and to be fair the Supreme Court seems to agree with your perspective), I view the machine gun ban as one of practicality. Having the machine guns won't help us in a fight against the government because they still have more powerful weapons. But a machine gun in the hands of a criminal /will/ hurt society.

The cost/benefit analysis of civilians having machine guns is tilted entirely toward the negative. There is absolutely nothing you can do with that machine gun that will help our country, and there is plenty that you can do with it that will hurt us.

I should make it clear that I am against banning guns, but for common sense regulation of them. I want the people that have guns to be proven to be intelligent, responsible, and sane. Even if you're not yet a convicted felon, if you're on the edge of insanity I really don't want you to have a gun.

I also want the guns to be for a non-criminal purpose. A deer rifle's purpose is clear. A pistol can be used for defense, assuming the person with the gun is well-trained (and he's probably not, realistically).

An M16 can't really be used effectively for hunting unless all you want is hamburger. As a personal protective weapon it is entirely over-the-top, especially since its rounds have a bad habit of still having energy after passing through the intended target. There is nothing the M16 is good for that regular guns are not equally good for except for killing multiple targets at once. You don't need that for hunting, unless you're hunting people. We've already established that the argument is that you guys want to kill the cops and any other agent of an oppressive government, and we've already established that if you're going to do that, you'll need a lot more than a gun, no matter what gun that is. So why should they be allowed?