On September 11, 2004 the New York Times wrote - As regressive milestones go, few are as frightful in this new era of homeland security as the decision by Congress and the Bush administration to allow the expiration of the 10-year-old law protecting the public from assault rifles and other rapid-fire battlefield weapons.

On September 20, 2004 I posted - I think the prevailing counter argument seems to be that the ban has done absolutely nothing to change the crime rate or the ability of people to get these guns if they really wanted them. Therefore, it is a non-issue.....The Times is feeding into liberal northeasterners fear of guns (which I admit to having myself). There are no facts in their opinion piece, just the use of scary words like "Uzi", "gunslingers", "battlefield", etc.

Today, the Times looks back at the effects of the expiration of the assualt weapons ban.

Many Say End of Firearm Ban Changed Little

Despite dire predictions that the streets would be awash in military-style guns, the expiration of the decade-long assault weapons ban last September has not set off a sustained surge in the weapons' sales, gun makers and sellers say. It also has not caused any noticeable increase in gun crime in the past seven months, according to several metropolitan police departments.

The uneventful expiration of the assault weapons ban did not surprise gun owners, nor did it surprise some advocates of gun control. Rather, it underscored what many of them had said all along: that the ban was porous - so porous that assault weapons remained widely available throughout their prohibition.

I thought so.

This doesn't mean that I'm excited about people having assault weapons in the back of their pick-up trucks (and there's a lot of pick-up trucks in North Texas). The only question left is whether the liberals were wrong, or if they really thought that nothing would happen and used the issue to inflame their base of gun-hating, criminals-have-rights-too peaceniks.