No other purpose.

For their owners..."looking cool"

Because, as it says on the side of squad cars all over the nation :

"To make war and shoot masses".

I know the gun enthusiasts love to claim that semi-auto rifles only account for 3% of gun related homicides, but when you go to mass shootings, the number jumps seven fold.

So there is a clear argument that semi-auto rifles are an attractive option to people who carry out these types of mass shootings.

The amazing thing is that you all can't see the relative pointlessness of it.

...to be used in a mass shooting event than an "ordinary" homicide.

Again, how is that not in some way signficant? How does that not say something?

But go ahead and spin it like you want.

I'm guessing you are trying to say that both the Corolla and the SUV are capable of achieving the same deed, but that has to be the stupidest "Cars = Guns" analogy I've heard yet.

"Driving to work" = "Shooting a large amount of people"

What?

I was going to offer a better analogy, but the one you gave was so fatally flawed to begin with.

I guess my biggest problem is that guns should not be considered vanity items by their owners. It's perfectly okay with cars, which are not items who are designed with specific intent to kill, injure or simulate killing or injuring.

That's not to say that some gun owners do consider their guns as vanity items--they most definitely do--but it's more of a "shaking my head" moment at such a thought.

That is an entirely legitimate analysis.

Incidents that account for less than 1% of all firearms-related homicide are, however, statistically insignificant. It means that they aren't shown to be significant factor in the homicide rate, and thus not a primary consideration in the formulation of gun regulation policy. Not if that policy is intended to significantly reduce the rate of homicide...

But he doesn't have the audacity to stray from the script that he himself helped write.

Just like no law will prevent ALL murders or no law will prevent ALL rapes.

You're falling victim to gun industry Strawmen speak once again.

But laws can help prevent the frequency and incidence of these occurances.

I am still surprised by the number of Democrats who are looking to take the easy way out instead of sitting down and working on the root causes. Guns are inanimate objects. Hate, anger, and rage are not.

I understand the effort to ban the intimidating-looking weapons used in these incidents...but let's face it: it constitutes treating a broken finger while the patient has multiple sucking chest wounds.

If 9% of mass shootings occurred in schools, then schools are, thankfully, underrepresented in these atrocities. There are approximately 75 million students in the US (US Census Bureau) and another 10 million educators and other school staff (ibid)...or about 25% of the total population.

The cited study fails to specify just what it considers to be an "assault weapon" or a "high capacity" magazine. Not a crippling flaw, but it would be nice to know, a way to better ascertain the validity of the numbers asserted.

One important (IMO) percentage the study cites is that less than 1% of all gun-related homicides in the US occur in "mass killings.".

Easy math.

Or another way to write that headline would be;

"Assault weapons or Hi-capacity magazines used in less than a third of mass shootings since 2009".

Instead of focusing energy and political capital on promoting ineffectual legislation that focuses on weapons that are used in a relatively small percentage of homicides, why not actually start to address the real underlying issues that are the cause of much of the gun related violence in this country? Poverty, drugs, unemployment, gang culture, insufficient mental health services and the list goes on. The problem is that addressing those issues is difficult and would actually require some will and fortitude. Slapping together a cosmetic weapons ban that accomplishes essentially nothing is easy and plays well to the microphones but does nothing to solve the problem.