The government is about to destroy hundreds of thousands of M14's. Sign the petition to force Congress to "civilianize" the rifles and sell them to civilians.

[ul]http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=33080[/ul]

Its [URL} not [ul]

[url]www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=33080[/url]

Don't forget to sign the petition.

[url]http://www.petitiononline.com/M14CMP03/[/url]

While your at it, this one too.

[url]http://www.petitiononline.com/AWB/[/url]

Bilster

DO NOT SIGN THIS PETITION!

This is UTTER BULLSHIT!!!  This petition is a revamp of a petition created in the middle 1990's when the Clinton Administration was Captain Crunching M14's and shipping the rest overseas to allies emerging from the iron curtain. But even THEN some of the info was woefully out of date.

The cruncher hasn't eaten an M14 in a long while and isn't going to be anytime soon.  Why?  Because the military is scrounging up every M14 they can find for Designated Marksman's Rifles.  Any M14 that is unserviceable is being scrounged for parts to be used in serviceable rifles.  

Where did I get this info?  From Walt Kuleck who knows the guy in charge of Anniston Army Depot (former home of the CMP rifle sales program and current home of the infamous Captain Crunch. Walt is also personally acquainted with the Special Ops armorers who are scrounging up the m14's for DMR employment.  The M14 is a HIGH priority item these days thanks to the needs of desert and open terrain combat.

All that aside, the very premise of such a program returning money to the Federal Government is ludicrous.  Why?  Let me explain.

1. The DCM rifle sales program was killed by the Clinton Administration and replaced with the Civilian Marksmanship Program, a civilian corporation owned by the federal government, but with a limited brief to support marksmanship training.  All profits generated by CMP go directly into CMP operational costs and program development.  

2. The CMP does not purchase its M1 and other rifles from the government, they are allocated the rifles when they are declared surplus to the Army's needs. CMP does not have access to Air Force or Navy rifles, though Marine Corps rifles are surplussed out through CMP since their small arms procurement is run through the Army.   So at what point does the revenue stream touch the military?   It doesn't and can't without changing the CMP's charter, and frankly, we don't want to give Congress another chance to fuck with CMP.

What if the government set up a program to directly collect the proceeds of such a rifle sale?  Then no revenues would be collected. Why?

Because the amount of legislation and litigation involved would wipe out any potential profits before a single rifle changed hands.  You could COUNT in court cases and appeals all the way up to SCOTUS with costs running up into the millions.  Then there are the costs of the government actually setting up the program.  Before the government would release the rifles a foolproof process would need to be engineered to permanently modify the rifles to prevent restoration to full auto, and that process would have to survive BATFE tech branch's assessment.  Many more thousands of dollars.  Then the government would need to actually PERFORM the modifications on the rifles either directly or through a licensed contractor.  Then the rifles would need to be inspected for safety, etc. before the paperwork could proceed and they could be released to civilian buyers.  Now add in the government program 200% cost multiplier.  300 million goes away real fast under all that.  The result would be (assuming the rifles were surplus to the Army's needs in the first place (which they aren't)) a program that is a pain in the ass to institute, a pain in the ass to implement and which costs more than it takes in in revenues.  

Up the cost of the rifles?  How many civilian shooters are going to spend 2 grand to buy a heavily used M14 rifle with the Go-Fast parts permanently removed and or mangled when they can get a SA Inc. M1A built up to match specs with new or as new parts for a similar amount of money?  Most shooters don't see the advantages of the forged receiver. They can get an M1A standard with similar specs for half that money.

Bottom line:  When gun owners petition the government we cannot afford the slip-shod, emotional "thinking" that environmentalists and anti-gunners can get away with.  Our issues are not soccer mom friendly and politically correct.  We need to back up our arguments with exhaustively thought out, responsible, intelligent and honest information.  This petition is not well thought out, it is irresponsibly researched and presented, it is not intelligently crafted, and is not intellectually honest.  It would actually HURT our position if presented to a body of lawmakers because it is so poorly done.  It comes off as the rantings of a bunch of gun-nuts rather than a responsible petition.

This thing is so bad I suspect it might be an anti-gun plant.  We've got a big enough task on our plate with trying to get Congress to allow the AWB to sunset and now we have people trying to gin up support for some crack-pot petition that is sure to undermine us with the general public and moderates in Congress.

This stuff is exactly the kind of crap that gets pro-gun people painted up as half-wit red-necks with an axe to grind.

As evidenced by the posts made by the reactionaries in the thread about Larry Craig, that would be an accurate description of the average gun owner.