Do you think as Attorney General, Senator Chuck Poochigian would enforce California's gun laws?

Their is an inconsistancy in this larger argument. If guns are bad, and they are in the wrong hands (who will get them anyway), then why can't a jury of their peers decide, if appropriate, to use the death penatly to punish gun using criminals who use guns in crimes?

I am a gun owner. People breaking the law should be punished. I must obey all laws strictly, or lose my ability to own guns. I feel strongly that there should be a law that everyone should own a gun. I feel that would greatly reduce the crime rate. Before owning a gun everyone should be taught gun safety. I think crime would be almost eliminated and would create a more patriotic citizenry.

If Poochigian were to become California Attorney General, we would be much better off than having Jerry Brown as Attorney General. And I don't think I've ever seen Senator Poochigian actually "scoff" at anything. He will do his job whether he agrees with the laws in question or not.

It's rather laughable the Demos are touting their supposed antigun credentials.

Lockyer's DOJ Firearms Divison is often so incompetent they don't even know what some of the laws are. You can ask them one question 5 times and get three answers.

In fact, AG Bill Lockyer helped 50,000 people get assault weapons since Dec. 2005. See, he forgot to update the list of banned guns (make/model) and folks got their new AK47 and AR15 guns without a 99-cent pistol grip, making them legal and compliant because they are not described by the generic description nor are they listed. He (and the Deputy AG) didn't really realize the two sets of laws had to be work with each other for full effect due to the effect of a 2001 court decision. The law had intended an active DOJ/AG role in the field which didn't happen for 5 years. This led to tens of thousands of gunnies building legal "off-list" rifles minus a cheap pistol grip. Many of these 50,000 people appear to have bought multiple such firearms so the likely number likely is in the 100K+ area now.

When line DOJ staff tried to 'fix' the situation before it blew out of control at end of December, they were overridden by his Deputy AG Alison Merrilees (known for her arrogance). As things blew further outta hand he disowned his own Deputy AG, Alison Merrilees, referring to her in conversation with the redoubtable Irwin Nowick as "a low-level employee" and wishing this whole mess would just go away. He was further irritated at Merrilees because she generated a huge paper trail to hundreds of folks that, for a variety of reasons, will be eminently useful in a variety of future court challenges to CA gun laws.

It got so bad the AG/DOJ had to give up its authority to name ("list") new assault weapons to avoid further embarassment - they got Johan Klehs to gut & amend AB2728, and were indeed so desparate for its passage that, rumor has it, they let NRA interests tear it apart and radically amend it.

Whoever gets into AG office is gonna have a mess to clean up in the gun field regardless of political slant due to a bunch of confusing regulations with major gaps in them, and a Firearms Division staff that's often not technically, nor regulatorily/ legally, competent. Stuff like this causes courts to be flooded for no good reason.

Bill Wiese
San Jose, CA

I can't find anyone that advertises ".50 cal sniper rifles" for sale. The accuracy of the .50 cal cartridge is much better than most people can actually shoot. Theoreticaally, yes, they can take down a plane or helicopter, but so can a bird. Please provide a link to the stats that say .50 cal rifles have been used in crimes in this country.

I'm a student and a poorly skilled researcher. To me, as a U.S. citizen, a citizen of this federal government we are protected by the 2nd ammendment of the constitution of america, to "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."

#1 These "assault weapons" are nothing more than semi-auto knock off's. Thier not the real deal, machien gun regulation went into place in the early 1900's. However the press liked to skew this issue to make it sound like these guys with AK-47's and AR-15's are walking around with machien guns. That's not the case at all. In fact many (most) "assault weapon" rounds are less powerfull than your grandpa's old hunting rifle. In the hunting world they are considered in-humane to use on anything larger than a cayote, meaning that a larger animal will likley suffer because of the weak round. Since full auto counterparts are well.. full auto, it's more practicle to use small low power ammo. The learning curve is lessened with small ammo and since it's full auto it dosen't matter if they don't kill um on the first shot. In fact the chances are pretty slim that one of these guns would kill you on the first shot, thier not designed to. So what's wrong with removing the pistol grip on an AR-15 (M16 knockoff)? It effectivley becomes nothing more than a weak plastic carbine. I don't see anything wrong with owning guns like that.
If you're wondering why people "need" an "assault weapon" (I use quotes because they aren't assault weapons, they are knock-offs) it's for the same reason someone "needs" a Corvette. Because it's fun, flashy, and "cool" in popular culture. As with most Corvette owners, most shooters guy thier guns with no intention of harming any human being.

As far as .50 BMG rifles are concerned: I don't think the opposition realized how expensive these guns are to operate. The gun alone costs more than most people's cars and the ammo is $4-6 a round. They also weight upwards of 30 lbs. Yes they were designed for millitary to take out vehicles and disarm exploisves, but in civilian hands they are almost exclusivley used as long range target rifles. The long range of these guns makes for some very technical and skilled competitions.

The argument that these guns have "no legitimate sporting use" is rediclous. Who is to judge why "legitimate sporting". Is target practice no longer a legitimate use of my time?

And as many people have said over the years: if you outlaw guns, only outlaws will have guns.
Under the counter type gun sales are not hard to come by, especialy in large citys. Gang's and criminals will still have guns, while the rest of us are trying to knock bullets out of the air with baseball bats.

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