I think what you propose is more or less the current law. Problem is that
M151s etc. have been declared to be a "weapon", that is to say they are
unsafe for civilians in someone's opinion. This is policy under the
current law, not the law itself.
So the influence of Congress has to be on the basis that DoD has run amok
and is destroying valuable property, harassing innocent civilians, and
doing other dumb things. That's how to get the rules changed. Problem is
always that these things have a lot of momentum and are hard to stop.
For every letter from one of us that comes in, all DoD has to do is stall,
take a few months to reply. Meanwhile, if the congressperson asks around
(that in itself is more than a letter is likely to motivate) there will be
a lot of opinions from DoD, DOT, FBI etc. which will make it all sound
complicated and dangerous. So the easy thing for our representatives to do
is nothing. Write a soothing letter about how they are going to look into
it and nothing happens.
To get anything done it either has to be a mass movement (carloads of
letters) or something very dramatic to demonstrate the idea clearly with
soundbites for the TV news. Like a fully restored M151A2 with Arnold in
the driver's seat and a crushed one side by side in front of the Pentagon
all next to a bonfire made of $100 bills showing how much taxpayer money is
being wasted for no good purpose.
But this takes a lot of work to accomplish and I don't see many volunteers.
Only a handful of people have responded to this discussion and we are among
the most motivated people in the country. Where is the mass movement?
Keep 'em rolling,
chuck