From downstairs:

re: #277 Rightwingconspirator

Just to relate a conversation about gun control and SCOTUS I had today. Back in the days of Bonnie and Clyde the Feds regulated full auto guns. As we know. Yet I see a lot of parallels in the problem from then until now.

The essential thing is those guns were too much in the hands of criminals for police to deal with. The AR and other semi-auto models today, it’s just too much killing horsepower to let run around.

This ain’t gonna happen but if they regulated certain assault rifle models like they do full auto, we satisfy certain legal angles and get a very specific handle on who has those guns.

It’s my feeling that we would have to make all semi-automatic firearms with detachable magazines class III weapons for that to work. I’d also say get rid of the Hughes Amendment and reopen the full auto registry as a carrot at the same time.

It would work, just as it did then, but even if it did get passed, how do we handle the gazillion rifles already out there? I’d certainly be fine with registering my AK and getting a tax stamp for it but you know the nutjobs would go nuts about it. Perhaps a freebe for the current owner - register and get your stamp and then if you sell it, the transfer tax would be applied? And it would have to be possible to do it much faster than it takes to currently register a short barrel rifle or transfer a MG. Sigh…