There is a cognitive gap here:<p><i>Those of us who were in law enforcement in New York City in the late '80s and early '90s remember how drug dealers pioneered the use of 9-mm guns. We heard over and over from our friends in the police department that they were outgunned, that their service revolvers were no match for semi-automatics in a shootout. So what did the police do? The New York City Police Department finally bought 9-mms, too. It was a classic arms race, with the gun manufacturers in the economically enviable position of selling bigger and better guns to both sides.</i><p>So the proposal, then, is to restrict the government from escalating the arms race by either creating policies or internal politics in such a way that the police can't purchase the weapons that they otherwise would?<p>"Police friendly" arms manufacturers would continue to sell guns that they think the police want. They're expensive, dated, and proprietary. This is roughly analogous to the state of government tech procurement before the large push for open systems. They will always be behind the curve because they will have no market for their innovative designs since their hands will be tied compared to "police unfriendly" manufacturers.<p>The police were behind the 8-ball because they failed to innovate. If you take the divisive stigma of firearms out of the picture and look at it as a strategic game, it seems obvious to me that messing with the incremental demand of one (albeit large) customer isn't going to bend the industry to your will.<p><i>The Obama White House recently made it clear—abandoning a campaign pledge—that it won't push for a legislative ban on the sale of assault weapons. Yet a series of provocative recent events has revived the gun debate: the international tension arising from Mexican drug gangs using guns purchased at American stores, the 10th anniversary of Columbine, and a Supreme Court case invalidating a District of Columbia law prohibiting the possession of guns at home.</i><p>Let's enumerate these events:<p>1) A foreign country has problems sealing its borders at both ends. Drugs on the south and firearms, allegedly, on the north. It's interesting to point out that the automatic weapons that the Mexican gangs are using are incredibly hard to find in stores here -- they're not the guns you buy at a rural Wal-Mart. It also conveniently ignores the elephant in the room -- pervasive corruption of Mexican officials.<p>2) Tenth anniversary of a tragedy. Referring to Columbine as a "recent" event is incredibly disingenuous.<p>3) Supreme court case invalidating an unconstitutional law. The letter of the law was upheld but you'd endeavor to attack the spirit of it?<p>This is a shameful attempt to take Obama to task on, frankly, a minor component of his platform at a time when he inherited a complex and severe economic mess unheard of in generations, if ever.