...and in the end, magazine capacity *does* matter. Three ten round magazines versus one thirty round magazine means lower rate of fire with pauses and opportunities to screw it up.
Is that a limitation worth imposing? Perhaps, but to dismiss it as of no effect is to blithely disregard facts on the ground. There's a whole lot of that going on in the shitstorm that passes for public debate. On both sides.
I'm not inclined to dismiss magazine size out of hand (maybe after more research and debate, maybe not then either, depending on what I learn), but there is this:
On the other hand, for the exact same reasons people say it won't help, magazine size limits seems like one of the least onerous restrictions we could apply (the biggest problem with it is setting size smaller than the standard size magazine for many guns, which means either grandfathering enough magazines to make the restriction pointless or forcing a whole lot of legal owners to get the magazines they already have modified to meet the restriction).
And I can see one possible significant benefit! In police shootings, it seems like officers tend to empty their whole magazine (and I've head that patterns of testimony and cross examination have the effect of encouraging exactly that). Thus, it seems we'd all be safer if the police had smaller magazines (and if they ever actually need more bullets than that, well, changing magazines is pretty quick, as we've determined above, right?). Note that this only works if the police are subject to the same restrictions on magazine size as everybody else, which I would support.
(no subject)
Is that a limitation worth imposing? Perhaps, but to dismiss it as of no effect is to blithely disregard facts on the ground. There's a whole lot of that going on in the shitstorm that passes for public debate. On both sides.
(no subject)
On the other hand, for the exact same reasons people say it won't help, magazine size limits seems like one of the least onerous restrictions we could apply (the biggest problem with it is setting size smaller than the standard size magazine for many guns, which means either grandfathering enough magazines to make the restriction pointless or forcing a whole lot of legal owners to get the magazines they already have modified to meet the restriction).
And I can see one possible significant benefit! In police shootings, it seems like officers tend to empty their whole magazine (and I've head that patterns of testimony and cross examination have the effect of encouraging exactly that). Thus, it seems we'd all be safer if the police had smaller magazines (and if they ever actually need more bullets than that, well, changing magazines is pretty quick, as we've determined above, right?). Note that this only works if the police are subject to the same restrictions on magazine size as everybody else, which I would support.