Short diary; interested to see the feedback and this is meant to be another attempt at establishing an agreement between the reasonable and realistic folks here.
"Assault Weapons", "Assault Weapons Ban", etc. Source of plethora flamewars. Epic matches between people who look at definitions, obviously at times to distract the subject, and those people who aren't really concerned with definitions or how a law could be reasonably applied, as long as it says 'bad weapons are banned.'
So, instead of getting hung-up on what constitutes an assault weapon (which weapons are not for assaulting, save those specifically modified to target shoot in competitions?), why not look at fire-rate restrictions, along with clip-restrictions, instead? Wouldn't that eliminate the endless merry-go-round on what would be covered by an AWB?
I'm not going to speculate on what the fire-rate restriction should be in terms of the rate over a particular amount of time (r/t), and I'm proposing this IN ADDITION TO clip/magazine-size restrictions for weapons owned without a license, but why wouldn't this be a better, and easier, sell to get through Congress and to those who would be willing to meet you halfway on what your particular preference would be on weapons capable of a high rate of fire?
So, it would look something like this:
'No weapon may be possessed by a person within the territorial boundaries of the United States that is capable, without modification, of firing at a rate greater than (r/t) without holding sufficient federal license. In addition, it is unlawful for a citizen to posses a weapon with capable of firing at a rate greater than (r/t) outside of their private property.'
I think this essentially solves the debate over what an 'assault weapon' entails, and defeats ulterior motives and lazy thinking on both sides.
What do you think? And why?