Reply #102: An experts opinion

[russ1943]

The term assault weapon wasn’t created by those politicians or gun control organizations that wanted (and still want) to ban them.

An "expert" whose opinion actually carries some weight on this matter, certainly isn't a bunch of gun zealots posting on this or other gun boards but;

Joseph P. Tartaro

the Executive Editor of Gun Week Magazine and president of The Second Amendment Foundation, (a pioneer in defense of the right to keep and bear arms). A prominent leader of the right to bear arms movement, has acknowledged that the idea of calling semi-automatic versions of military small arms "'assault weapons" did not,

I repeat,

NOT

originate with either anti-gun activists, media or politicians. It was a marketing strategy by importers, manufacturers, wholesalers and dealers in the American firearms industry to stimulate and market sales of selected "exotica"--firearms which did not have a traditional appearance. The fact that even some of the semi-automatic versions of the military-style firearms retained their bayonet lugs, extended pistol grips, "banana-clip" magazines, folding stocks and even threading for silencers and muzzle brakes has been used to erroneously define "assault weapons." But these design features were part of the Walter Mittyesque "romance" of what some like to call "ugly guns."

http://www.saf.org/LawReviews/Tartaro1.htm

Reading posts on this board you would think the Assualt Weapons Ban meant semi auto rifles only.
Seldom if ever is the fact that most of the AWs used in crime are assault pistols rather than assault rifles.

An Updated Assessment of the Federal Assault Weapons Ban: Impacts on Gun Markets and
Gun Violence, 1994-2003
Report to the National Institute of Justice,
United States Department of Justice
(Executive Summary)
By
Christopher S. Koper
(Principal Investigator)
With
Daniel J. Woods and Jeffrey A. Roth
June 2004
Jerry Lee Center of Criminology
University of Pennsylvania
effect aw_exec2004.pdf

3814 Walnut Street
Philadelphia, PA 19104
1