The term "assault weapons" has been thrown around a lot in the past few days and a lot in the past 20 years by Democrats. "Assault weapon" is term that was made up in the 1990s when the first Assault Weapons Ban was passed under President Clinton. There is no such thing as an assault weapon and when we ask for a definition of the term, we rarely get one.
Assault is a crime. Aggravated assault is a crime involving a weapon. Be it a bat, bottle or Bushmaster.
Yesterday on MSNBC Nancy Pelosi made up a new politically charged term: assault magazine.
“How does something like this happen? Because a person with impaired judgment had access to firepower that should be outlawed. There is no reason why these assault magazines – and that’s what they are. We’ve got to call them what they are.”
What is an "assault magazine?" It doesn't exist. Tim Carney at the Washington Examiner wrote a piece earlier this week debunking the myths surrounding assault weapons and it's well worth a full read.
First, all guns can be used to assault someone – even a muzzle-loading black-powder rifle.
Second, Congressional attempts to define this term were laughably ad hoc.
A rifle could cease being an assault weapon if you sawed off the flash suppressor. It could become an assault weapon if you added a bayonet.