Torian
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The teflon-coated bullet quote I have bolded in the paragraph tells you everything you need to know and worry about in this worthless AND dangerous piece of legislation.
http://www.examiner.com/article/new-armor-piercing-ammo-legislation-might-outlaw-nearly-all-rifle-ammunition
Tucson Gun Rights Examiner Chris Woodard alerted readers Friday to some of the most recently introduced federal gun bills (both anti-rights and pro-rights). In fact, his Constitution Watch blog is a great resource for keeping current on pending federal gun legislation. Today, we will focus on Representative Jackie Speier's (D-CA) H.R. 2566, the "Modernized Law Enforcement Officers Protection Act of 2013."
Related topics
gun rights
'Cop Killer' bullets
50 caliber
body armor
The text is not yet available, so the look will necessarily be somewhat cursory, but there are some assumptions that are probably safe to make.
For one thing, we can almost certainly assume that by "armor piercing," Rep. Speier means that the ammunition is capable of defeating soft body armor, like that worn by cops on the beat, rather than the much heavier and bulkier rigid body armor worn by combat troops and S.W.A.T. team personnel. To be considered "armor piercing," in other words, the ammunition would need only, at most, to defeat Level IIIa armor (if Speier lowers the standard below that, even more ammunition would be banned). In fact, Speier makes that pretty clear in her press release, which talks about "first responders," rather than soldiers:
“It’s been 27 years since Congress acted to protect law enforcement personnel from so-called “cop-killer” bullets. Our first responders are at a greater disadvantage today than they were decades ago. If they are going to put themselves in the line of fire in our communities and neighborhoods, we owe it to them to update existing laws and get with the times.”
This is significant because soft body armor is not intended to be capable of stopping most centerfire rifle fire. In other words, if all ammunition with the ability to defeat typical police body armor is to be considered "armor piercing," and thus illegal, nearly all centerfire rifle ammunition would be banned.
But it's worse than that, because for nearly every rifle cartridge, someone has built a handgun to fire it, such as the handgun pictured above, chambered for the .50 BMG, already demonized for its power and armor-defeating prowess (New York's new "SAFE Act" bans the .50 BMG, and New Jersey Governor Chris Christie is expected to sign into law a bill banning the .50 BMG any day now).
This is how legislation proposed by the late Senator Ted Kennedy (D-MA) would have threatened the legality of all centerfire rifle ammunition--legislation supported by then-Senator Barack Obama, whose Attorney General Eric Holder has openly advocated "armor piercing" ammo bans (under the Kennedy legislation, incidentally, it is the Attorney General who would determine whether or not handgun ammunition is "armor piercing," and even which rifle ammunition had a more than "standard" ability to defeat armor, and would thus be subject to banning, even if no handgun were chambered for it).
Speier's press release also resurrected the tired old myth of the supposed armor-piercing qualities of Teflon-coated bullets:
Because of significant developments in bullet propellants, coatings and materials, such as Teflon, the original Law Enforcement Officers Protection Act of 1986 is outdated.
Respected attorney and Second Amendment scholar Dave Kopel soundly debunked this notion nearly a decade ago, explaining that the Teflon coating did nothing to enhance a bullet's ability to defeat armor, but only served to protect the rifling in the barrel from damage caused by extremely hard and dense tungsten bullets. It is the tungsten that provides the bullet with the ability to penetrate armor, and federal law bans tungsten handgun bullets (the "mere metallurgical content" standard that Speier says is inadequate).
More fundamentally, of course, why shouldn't private citizens be permitted the ability to defend themselves from armored assailants? A growing number of killers wear body armor, thus extending the amount of time available to kill--and no--the solution is not to impose "body armor control."
More fundamentally even than that, though, is that even if it were true that only the government's hired guns had access to armor, the entire purpose of the Second Amendment would be defeated by laws that made effective resistance against them impossible.
If oath-breaking cops choose to enforce tyrannical evil, "cop killer" bullets are just what we the people will need.
http://www.examiner.com/article/new-armor-piercing-ammo-legislation-might-outlaw-nearly-all-rifle-ammunition