Lies, lies, and more lies!

Tick, tick, tick. Time is running out on the current session of Congress. Lawmakers leaving on their mid-summer break are not expected back until well after Sept. 13, when the 10-year-old ban on assault weapons is due to expire.

This is true, but there's not much else in the article that is.

If that happens, in many states customers as young as 18 (some say 13) could buy brand-new semi-automatic weapons like TEC-9 assault pistols, AK-47s, Uzis and Kalashnikovs - and carry them concealed into taverns and stadiums, colleges, even public schools.

The first half of this is true; adults would be permitted to buy legal semi-automatic firearms, and younger children could receive them as gifts from their family. But then, that was the law before the "ban" expired. The only thing the ban accomplished was to change the names of 19 firearms, require minor cosmetic changes to others, and force people to reload more often; even those items supposedly banned could still be owned and sold, simply not manufactured. for civilian use. (Apparantly, the anti-gun crowd is under the impression that guns wear out rapidly; not so).

It's the second half that is a blatant lie. Start with the practical: how can you conceal an AK-47? (For those wishing to nitpick, an "AK-47" is a "Kalashnikov"; this alone goes a long ways towards demonstrating the ignorance of this editorialist).

On the legal front, I'm not sure what the current legal status on the infamous "no guns within 1000 feet of a school" is at the moment. But leaving that aside, it's generally illegal to carry a concealed weapon without a permit (the exceptions are Vermont and Alaska, where it doesn't seem to be causing a problem). Even if you have a permit, most states say you can't enter a bar or tavern while carrying, and most laws allow for places like stadiums to post "no fireams" signs if they really wanted to do so. Schools, as I noted earlier, have their own special law to protect them.

So, sure, you could do those things with your shiny new "assault weapon", if you're willing to break the law. But then, you could do the same things with your older, pre-ban "assault weapon" if you are willing to break the law. Or a shiny new "cosmetic features removed and name changed" assault weapon, for that matter. Of course, I'm not sure why any of this would be a problem unless you are doing it with intent to shoot someone -- and if that's the case, I rather doubt the additional laws would stop you. Paper doesn't stop criminals; that's why they are criminals.

That's because combined with the so-called "gun-show loophole" and other shortcomings in the nation's gun laws, purchases of this lethal weaponry require no background checks or questions asked.

The "gun show loophole" isn't a loophole; it's the difference between private sellers and people who are in the business of selling firearms. If you go to a gun show and try to buy a gun from a gun dealer, you will have to pass a background check and fill out a yellow form with several questions on it. The answers are required and lying is a felony. That's certainly not "no questions asked".

On the other hand, if you buy from a private individual who happens to be selling a few firearms from his collection, you will not need to pass the background check. That's the same law that covers buying a gun from your friend Mike at his home, since he doesn't need to run a background check either. In fact, he can't; he's not permitted by law to access the database. Of course, if the "private seller" does a lot of selling at gun shows, the BATFE will probably declare charge him with being an unlicensed dealer, so the whole idea is not entirely risk-free.

Now, I'm sure people like Diane Feinstein would love to make all private sales illegal, but so far the people aren't interested in that idea.

Why ban assault weapons? The better question is: Why allow them to begin with? Semiautomatic weapons can fire up to 100 rounds from unregulated magazines; police in San Jose, Calif., test-firing a semiautomatic Uzi were able to empty a 30-round magazine in five seconds. As the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms explains, such weapons are means for close-quarter shooting at human beings. The expiring ban specifically exempts 661 sporting rifles and shotguns from its limit, banning just 19 of the most lethal firearms.

Ahem. Actually, it bans 19 firearms and a whole bunch of others that happened to have a specific combination of cosmetic features. Of course, the industry just removed those features and continued to sell the slightly-modified designs, since the features didn't really alter the functioning of the gun much at all. In practical terms, of course, a pre-ban Uzi with a couple pre-ban 30-round magazines could do exactly the same thing; if a criminal wants an assault weapon he's not going to let a law stop him.

But there's a better question to ask here. Why does this police department have a banned firearm? You might be thinking it was confiscated from a criminal, and you might be right, but if so they likely wouldn't be using it on the firing range to give demonstrations to ignorant reporters. Since they are, it's more likely that the weapon falls under the law enforcement exception.

Wait a minute, you ask. Why is there a law enforcement exception for weapons that are "means for close-quarter shooting at human beings"? Lots of that in police work, is there? Killing lots of people at once in a confined space? Spray fire from the hip? Bloody massacres brought to you by the LAPD? I thought that sort of thing was confined to drug dealers, but then, maybe there's not much difference.

Public and political opinion are squarely behind the assault weapons ban. Polling reliably produces majorities up to 80 percent for renewal. Eleven national police organizations back it, as do the U.S. Conference of Mayors, the National Association of Counties, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, the Episcopal Church and the NAACP, among many other groups. Former presidents Ford, Carter and Clinton and the late Ronald Reagan were all outspoken backers.

Well, sure, unreliable polling produces reliable opinions. Never mind actually holding an honest poll, you might get a surprise.

And no wonder: The use of assault weapons in crimes has fallen 66 percent since the ban took effect in 1994. Moreover, in this jittery, post-9/11 world, the very real prospect of would-be terrorists or their agents buying assault weapons at gun shows, through mail order or the Internet, only adds to the urgency of keeping the ban in place.

Yep, the number of crimes committed with assault weapons fell from just under 3% to not quite 2% over the course of its 10-year effect. That's some real positive impact of the law, at least, until you read the fine print and learn that the change was well within the margin of error. In other words, statistically the ban had absolutely no effect; the small drop was coincidence.

So how could the assault weapons ban expire? The National Rifle Association aims to kill it. House Majority Leader Tom Delay, R-Texas, vows to block a vote. While the Senate approved renewal in March by a bipartisan margin, and while there is wide support in the House, a strange inertia has set in. President Bush has pledged to renew the ban - but the White House says it is waiting for Congress to act. And GOP leaders in Congress say - you guessed it - they're waiting for a signal from the White House.

The National Rifle Association itself is conflicted on the issue. The NRA's 4 million members want to kill it. So do the hundreds of thousands of people who belong to pro-gun political organizations that refer to the NRA as a bunch of sissies. And we all vote. Remember that.

And as for that "bipartisan margin", it was 52 for, 47 against. That's bipartisan only in the sense that a few Republicans voted for it and a very few Democrats voted against. That vote took place under ideal political conditions: the Republicans were not using parliamentary mechanisms to block amendments to the gun industry liability bill: a bill that Republicans and the NRA wanted very badly. It would have made wonderful political cover for a ban renewal. But the combined bill failed with nearly 90 votes against -- THAT was a bipartisan vote, folks. Nobody wanted that bill, once it was amended. Nobody.

But that's all pointless speculation. Very pointless, in fact. I'll close with a question that settles the entire issue in my mind. What part of "shall not be infringed" don't you understand... punk?