Frontiers of free enterprise

Despite wide public support and the last-ditch attempts by gun control activists, health care advocates, and law enforcement groups, the 10-year old federal ban on assault weapons is likely to expire this coming Monday.

In anticipation of that,

gun manufacturers are marketing military-style firearms and are ready to sell them as soon as Sept. 14, a consumer group said Tuesday.

"The gun industry is champing at the bit for the ban to expire," said Susan Peschin, firearms project director at the Consumer Federation of America, a nonprofit association of 300 consumer groups that released the study. ...

For example, ArmaLite Inc., a gun manufacturer in Geneseo, Ill., is advertising a "Post-PostBan Rifle Program," offering consumers attachments to convert their firearms to their pre-ban configuration, with shipping available Sept. 14. The company is offering a nonrefundable prepayment option to those who wish to get a jump-start. ...

The Consumer Federation of America predicted that manufacturers will introduce new models of popular weapons banned under the 1994 law, such as such as AK-47s, TEC-9s, and Uzis.

The NRA, naturally, is goggle-eyed and drooling at the prospect of the end of "this sad chapter."

"What we ought to be concerned about is firearms in the hands of criminals, not in the hands of law-abiding citizens," said Andrew Arulanandam, director of public affairs for the National Rifle Association.

Somehow, an NRA-type toting an Uzi is not exactly the image I get when I think of "law-abiding citizen."