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**44 AMP** · March 27, 2012, 10:48 PM

I don't recall the exact quote, and am too lazy to look it up, but one of our Founding Fathers wrote something like "all the terrible implements of the soldier" were to be available to the citizens, and the other Founders did not seriously disagree.

In those days, that included cannon and warships. It also meant the standard issue military arms. Today those arms would be M16s, which under federal law are machine guns.

It is tragic that some of us have seen the horror and the destruction these "dangerous" machineguns can wreak. However NONE of them has ever done so without a human being aiming and pulling the trigger.

Personally, I find someone claiming to support gun rights, but only supporting some guns for some people to be disingenous at best, and hypocrytical, at worst. You may feel machineguns are "not for the public", but the history of legal private machinegun owners in the nearly 80 years since the passage of the NFA 34 is the most law abiding group of people on the planet.

There have been, I believe, two (at most) crimes commited with legal machinguns in all that time, and one of those was done by a police officer! That is a record better than any other group I know of.

Personally, I don't believe this is a good time to push for repeal of the Hughes amendment. Not yet. IF the administration changes enough in the next election, THEN we might be able to argue for a "return" to the pre 86 policy. But we won't have a good strong case, even then. The fact is that while we know that we have a legal right to machineguns, just the same as our legal right to all other firearms, the rest of the country has had multiple generations of brainwashing thanks to the entertainment media, that only govt agents, soldiers and CRIMINALS & TERRORISTS want or use machineguns.

That much should be obvious to anyone who hasn't been living under a rock for the last 30 years. The whole "assault weapon" hysteria got traction because the semi autos they targeted look like machineguns, even though they aren't.

The Hughes amendment is a sleeping dog that is best let lie. Its day will come, but it is not this day. Sadly, it is a fact that bringing this issue to the public eye at this time, or in the near future, offers a much higher risk to our rights than potential rewards.

March 27, 2012, 10:48 PM	#48
44 AMP Staff Join Date: March 11, 2006 Location: Upper US Posts: 28,846	I don't recall the exact quote, and am too lazy to look it up, but one of our Founding Fathers wrote something like "all the terrible implements of the soldier" were to be available to the citizens, and the other Founders did not seriously disagree. In those days, that included cannon and warships. It also meant the standard issue military arms. Today those arms would be M16s, which under federal law are machine guns. It is tragic that some of us have seen the horror and the destruction these "dangerous" machineguns can wreak. However NONE of them has ever done so without a human being aiming and pulling the trigger. Personally, I find someone claiming to support gun rights, but only supporting some guns for some people to be disingenous at best, and hypocrytical, at worst. You may feel machineguns are "not for the public", but the history of legal private machinegun owners in the nearly 80 years since the passage of the NFA 34 is the most law abiding group of people on the planet. There have been, I believe, two (at most) crimes commited with legal machinguns in all that time, and one of those was done by a police officer! That is a record better than any other group I know of. Personally, I don't believe this is a good time to push for repeal of the Hughes amendment. Not yet. IF the administration changes enough in the next election, THEN we might be able to argue for a "return" to the pre 86 policy. But we won't have a good strong case, even then. The fact is that while we know that we have a legal right to machineguns, just the same as our legal right to all other firearms, the rest of the country has had multiple generations of brainwashing thanks to the entertainment media, that only govt agents, soldiers and CRIMINALS & TERRORISTS want or use machineguns. That much should be obvious to anyone who hasn't been living under a rock for the last 30 years. The whole "assault weapon" hysteria got traction because the semi autos they targeted look like machineguns, even though they aren't. The Hughes amendment is a sleeping dog that is best let lie. Its day will come, but it is not this day. Sadly, it is a fact that bringing this issue to the public eye at this time, or in the near future, offers a much higher risk to our rights than potential rewards. __________________ All else being equal (and it almost never is) bigger bullets tend to work better.