I had a pretty surprising phone call this evening. Ray Schoenke, the president of the AHSA called me. In an an earlier thread a couple of days ago, someone suggested that I must work for the AHSA (given my support), but I am in fact a software developer in RTP (NC), and I don't have much contact with political sorts.
Mr. Schoenke wanted to talk to me about my suggestion that we give a Shiloh Sharps rifle to President Obama - my suggestion to him by email had been that we present an all American rifle like Shiloh Sharps in an all American caliber like 45-70 to President Obama.
In the course of the conversation, we talked a little bit about AHSA policy. That part of the phone call focused on two issues: assault weapons bans, and the AHSA support for making 50 BMG weapons regulated like NFA weapons.
I am happy to report that he expressed strong opposition to an assault weapons ban. He did argue that when used for hunting, AR-15s would have the same magazine limitations as other hunting weapons. I actually don't know how that works for hunting rifles - I am not a hunter. I assume that you must be able to buy "hunting capacity" magazines for Mini-14s, but I don't know how the Fish and Game people make sure you only hunt with the "hunting capacity" magazines. Maybe some of you hunters know how all of that works.
At any rate, Mr. Schoenke is very clear on the fact that the AWB is a silly law the regulates the looks of some kinds of semi-automatic weapons. I don't want to put words in his mouth, but if I understood home correctly, he did not want AR-15s regulated any differently than any other of what he would call "semi-automatic hunting rifles".
On the second issue, I did express my objections to the AHSA suggestion that 50 BMG weapons as NFA weapons. His argument was that there wasn't a legitimate hunting use for a 50 BMG weapon, unless you are hunting elephants. I argued that there are legitimate non-hunting uses for 50 BMG weapons - the example I used was long range target shooting - and that I hadn't seen any stats indicating any criminal use of 50 BMG weapons. I think that criminal use of full auto weapons was the basis of the 1934 NFA. Mr. Schoenke agreed that the evidence for criminal use of the 50 BMG was "minuscule".
Unfortunately, the cell phone connection was very bad at that point and I couldn't really understand his response. I think it was pretty clear that he understood my point. I wish that I had followed up a little more strenuously on that point, but the connection was bad, and I was a little flabbergasted to be speaking to him.
I will follow up that point in subsequent e-mail. That is my only objection to AHSA pubic policy, so I would be very happy to see that change of policy. I will work to change that policy, and if the policy is changed, then I will appraise THR members of that change.
I do not want to repeat the debate we had two days ago about the AHSA - if you have any overall objections to the AHSA, please see the following two threads:
http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=419569
http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=405427
I will not repeat any arguments in either of those threads. If you want to raise some new objection to the AHSA, please PM me. If it's truly new, we may have a private discussion. If it's a re-hash of anything in those threads, I will probably ignore it.
Mike
Mr. Schoenke wanted to talk to me about my suggestion that we give a Shiloh Sharps rifle to President Obama - my suggestion to him by email had been that we present an all American rifle like Shiloh Sharps in an all American caliber like 45-70 to President Obama.
In the course of the conversation, we talked a little bit about AHSA policy. That part of the phone call focused on two issues: assault weapons bans, and the AHSA support for making 50 BMG weapons regulated like NFA weapons.
I am happy to report that he expressed strong opposition to an assault weapons ban. He did argue that when used for hunting, AR-15s would have the same magazine limitations as other hunting weapons. I actually don't know how that works for hunting rifles - I am not a hunter. I assume that you must be able to buy "hunting capacity" magazines for Mini-14s, but I don't know how the Fish and Game people make sure you only hunt with the "hunting capacity" magazines. Maybe some of you hunters know how all of that works.
At any rate, Mr. Schoenke is very clear on the fact that the AWB is a silly law the regulates the looks of some kinds of semi-automatic weapons. I don't want to put words in his mouth, but if I understood home correctly, he did not want AR-15s regulated any differently than any other of what he would call "semi-automatic hunting rifles".
On the second issue, I did express my objections to the AHSA suggestion that 50 BMG weapons as NFA weapons. His argument was that there wasn't a legitimate hunting use for a 50 BMG weapon, unless you are hunting elephants. I argued that there are legitimate non-hunting uses for 50 BMG weapons - the example I used was long range target shooting - and that I hadn't seen any stats indicating any criminal use of 50 BMG weapons. I think that criminal use of full auto weapons was the basis of the 1934 NFA. Mr. Schoenke agreed that the evidence for criminal use of the 50 BMG was "minuscule".
Unfortunately, the cell phone connection was very bad at that point and I couldn't really understand his response. I think it was pretty clear that he understood my point. I wish that I had followed up a little more strenuously on that point, but the connection was bad, and I was a little flabbergasted to be speaking to him.
I will follow up that point in subsequent e-mail. That is my only objection to AHSA pubic policy, so I would be very happy to see that change of policy. I will work to change that policy, and if the policy is changed, then I will appraise THR members of that change.
I do not want to repeat the debate we had two days ago about the AHSA - if you have any overall objections to the AHSA, please see the following two threads:
http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=419569
http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=405427
I will not repeat any arguments in either of those threads. If you want to raise some new objection to the AHSA, please PM me. If it's truly new, we may have a private discussion. If it's a re-hash of anything in those threads, I will probably ignore it.
Mike