WMD are a line in and of themselves. They are characterized and addressed differently than conventional weapons even among modern nation-states. I don’t even know why that line was drawn (perhaps the indiscriminate nature of their effects), but drawing the line there — right there and no lower — might at least present some degree of consistency in how different weapons are treated.

If you, or anyone else, want a line drawn somewhere well below the destructive power of WMD, then some logical premise for drawing that line in a particular place MUST be provided; or it’s just an arbitrary distinction founded upon nothing more than an emotion-based opinion.

Personally, I suspect that maybe there is a line somewhere along the continuum between one’s fists and a nuclear warhead. However, I have no idea where that line would be, or how to justify one line over another.

There may well be a logical argument for a particular bright line to be drawn; but I’ve never heard one presented …. only PRESUMED.

I did a quick google search and found this:

http://www.autoweapons.com/pagelinks/buyandsell.html

It has some relevant facts; but the one that caught my eye was the last one:

“No new machine guns can be made, as per the 1986 ban. We have to keep trading the ones already out there.”

That’s hardly the type of freedom to purchase and own something that Bob is talking about. You can hardly have the right to own a thing when the right to manufacture it has been taken away. The 1986 ban is as unconstitutional as a ban on semi-auto would be. As unconstitutional as confiscation.