‘Green’ Bullets Will Take ‘Green’ Out of Americans’ Pockets

On the heels of the Senate’s approving a budget that will fleece veterans of benefits and the announcement that 19,000 Captains’ and Majors’ careers will shortly face the chopping block of early retirement, The Lyin’ King’s war against America’s military continues to gather steam. As does his war against individual gun ownership. The lead bullet is being forced into extinction by the EPA.

FOX News reports: “The bid to ban lead bullets…started slowly more than a decade ago. But with two dozen states, including California, banning (lead) bullets…the lead bullet’s epitaph was already being written when the federal government finished it off. First, the military announced plans to phase out lead bullets by 2018. Then the federal Environmental Protection Agency, citing emissions, ordered the shutdown of the Doe Run company’s lead smelter in Herculaneum, Mo…” The Doe Run Company is the nation’s last smelter of lead bullets. Its doors close on December 31.

The EPA and several states cite “harmful emissions” as the cause for the ammunition pogrom. The EPA will replace lead bullets with copper bullets. Are copper bullets more environmentally sound? Many experts think not. But the EPA dictates that it is critical that ammunition which, by definition, is intended to cause fatalities, be “non-toxic.”

California’s on board. FOX quotes The Center for Biological Diversity, after California’s Governor Moonbeam, Jerry Brown, signed an order eliminating the use of lead bullets by 2019: “Switching to nontoxic lead ammunition will save the lives of eagles, condors and thousands of other birds every year…” Clearly The Center doesn’t care as much about saving “eagles, condors and other birds” from death by wind farm.

The military has reportedly been researching “green” ammunition since 2010. The Daily Caller quotes Lt. Col. Phil Clark, a product manager for small caliber ammunition at the Picatinny Arsenal in New Jersey: “The EPR replaces the lead slug with a copper slug… This makes the projectile environmentally friendly, while still giving soldiers the performance capabilities they need on the battlefield.”

But The American Thinker shares a less-than-environmentally-favorable fact: “Jim Yardley a retired financial controller and blogger…estimated it would cost $18,431,000 to replace the lead with copper. ‘Nearly $20 million, not to improve the effectiveness of the ammunition used by our troops, but to protect the environment,’ Yardley wrote.” In short, the cost of producing copper bullets will drive the cost of ammunition up. Way up.

The cost to the general population is even steeper. So, what is the real reason behind a ban of lead bullets? Many private gun owners have noticed a shortage of and a dramatic rise in the cost of ammunition. As anyone who has ever had to replace pipes or wiring in their home knows, copper isn’t cheap. If the government can’t force through gun control one way, it will seek to curb gun ownership by putting the cost of ammunition out of reach.

FOX cites additional warnings from Jim Yardley “… diverting copper for bullet manufacturing could have other unintended economic consequences…’This will inevitably increase the cost of electronic devices that use copper…It will add to the cost of a new home, having an adverse impact on the housing industry…”

Does anyone remember the glut of ammunition, in the millions of rounds, acquired by government agencies such as the Department of Education, the Department of Health and Human Services, the IRS and Homeland Security, as recently as this year? If martial law is declared it is doubtful that poisoning us with that lead will be of any concern to the government.

Image: Courtesy of: http://xhaxhai.wordpress.com/2011/04/11/retorika-lendon-ii/