Brain Fertilizer

1) Except in a very few situations, "assault weapons" are actually less powerful and less accurate than a hunting rifle. The Washington D.C. snipers would have been far more dangerous with something like a .243 hunting rifle or a Swedish Mauser in 6.5mm than the 5.56mm Bushmaster they used. Just about the only "assault" rifles that are as accurate and powerful as a $300 hunting rifle are $1400 M-14s and AR-10s. An assault rifle just has to hit a man-sized target and take him out of the fight, whether or not it kills the individual. Whereas a hunting rifle has to hit a dinner-plate sized target and penetrate through muscle and bones thicker than a human's in order to attempt a certain kill on hard-to-kill animals like elk and moose and even bear.

2) All government programs should automatically sunset after five or ten years, just like the Assault Weapons Ban. Its proponents used scare tactics and shoddy science to get it passed in the first place, but over time it became clear that it wasn't making a difference and only impacting law-abiding citizens, not criminals and terrorists. If all government programs required an actual demonstration of effectiveness in order to maintain the political capital necessary to extend it, there's be alot of stupid programs that would have already been "sunset"-ed out of existence. We wouldn't have a deficit right now, I can tell you.