Let's look at this for what it is: legislators who all ready do not like average Americans owning firearms that they don't approve of (Sen Feinstein authored the 1994 AWB, too), taking the opportunity of a tragedy to advance a cause they have believed in for years.
Anyone who objectively looks at the root causes would not conclude that, with the AR-15 being the bestselling firearm in the United States for about the past 8 or 9 years (meaning millions of them are in common ownership -- see below), a ban on the
future purchase or manufacture of them is going to make a lick of difference in preventing events like Friday's tragedy (assuming Senator Feinstein's statement about an apparent grandfather clause is true).
This is "feel good" legislation that does not actually do anything to help fix the problem, in the same way that TSA is much like 'security theater'.
I took this picture just the other day in the Sporting Goods section of my local WalMart. Note how the sign calls the depicted AR-15 a "modern sports rifle":
According to the Heller and Miller SCOTUS decisions (and with apologies for quoting wikipedia), "With that finding as anchor, the Court ruled a total ban on operative handguns in the home is unconstitutional, as the ban runs afoul of both the self-defense purpose of the Second Amendment – a purpose not previously articulated by the Court – and the "in common use at the time" prong of the
Miller decision:
since handguns are in common use, their ownership is protected."
Although the above quote references the validity of handguns because of their common use, I don't think it gets any more common than being for sale at WalMart, or being the "best-selling firearm in the United States". Pretty strong argument that AR-15s fall under the common use clause.
I think there is a legitimate argument now that did not exist in 1994 (based on Heller and Miller) that an AWB is unconstitutional.
