kip,

actually, the country with that makes it mandatory for all adult aged males to own a gun has the lowest crime rate of any european country. look up interpol + crime rates + US vs europe and i think you may find that your guesses are not correct

that said, there is more than just more than 1 factor than just gun ownership and its correlation to crime rate. id rather not go into one of my long posts as this is a topic ive studied quite a bit over the years.

about assault rifles and law enforcement, i can only speak from experience as to the need for one: the LA Riots. my father started the largest korean american grocer store owner's association in america. after the LA riots, he got first hand information about how the police *did not respond* and allowed rioting and looting to continue. their mission (when they stood around) was to not piss the looters off. yeah, only later were people arrested, but for the most part, the cops came and left. most regrettably, they pulled korean store owners off their store roofs, esp if thy carried one of those evil assault rifles. we know the vast majority of those burned down thought the police were going to handle things. as we all know, they were wrong and quite frankly, the police and the city politicians did not give 2 s##ts.