Quote:
Originally Posted by Derwood
you make many great points, but I have to ask: what are the positives of you or any non-military citizen owning an assault weapon? Just because they aren't used in crimes doesn't make them a positive thing, does it? Can you outline for me the positives to Joe Blow owning such weapons?
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Cop Killer bullets? These things are real? and legal?
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Ok, I have been very busy, but here is my attempt to answer your questions.
I was not trying to build a case for assault weapons, but rather questioning why they get so much attention when they are involved in so few crimes. It's like raising millions of dollars to combat a disease nobody actually gets.
I cannot quote you statistics, so you are only going to get my opinion in response to your first question. I believe the positives of law abiding civilians owning semi automatic rifles are thus: They allow the homeowner to out-gun most burglers armed with knives/pistols (I think if you have to use lethal force, you should be in it to win), and they may potentially allow people to defend their houses/neighborhoods during periods of civil unrest...this has happenned in the past, and the neighborhoods who posted armed sentries did not get looted. If I find myself in either situation and I have time, I am going to reach for a long gun because it will allow me to dominate the situation.
Also, as far as 'preventing' deaths consider this: How many burglers are going to continue to advance on a guy wielding a rifle? I think intimidation is a key factor in self defense...if you hold the upper hand the bad guy is less likely to call your bluff.
For your second question, yes 'copkiller bullets' are real.
But (and it is a big but) they are not at all what the public thinks of. I don't mean to lecture, but it is important to know how armor, and armor piercing rounds work.
Soft armor as worn by most police officers depends on the materials ability to spread the energy of an impacting bullet out over a large-enough area that it is not able to penetrate the vest/body of the officer. Conversely, armor piercing ammunition attempts to place as much energy as possible on a pinpoint area to 'stab' through the armor. As a result, true armor piercing performs very poorly against the average unarmored assailant as it will poke as small a hole as possible. Rifle rounds, by nature, are very fast, narrow rounds which will punch through most soft armor. There have been several attempts over the years to ban all rifle ammunition on the grounds that it is 'armor piercing' and it is for that reason this debate is so touchy amongst the gun crowd. I don't know anybody who even wants armor piercing pistol ammunition...it performs poorly against unarmored assailants, and against the odd armored one it is simple enough to shatter their pelvis or perform a failure drill. The attempts to ban other ammunition under the umbrella of 'armor piercing' or 'cop killer' are misleading, but commonplace.
As of a couple years ago (and I believe it is still true) there were no recorded cases of a police officer being shot through his armor with armor-piercing ammunition. Cops who die of gunshot wounds are by definition killed by cop-killer bullets, but they are not armor-piercing and never have been.