In the present debate, one of the main, if not the main, points of contention is whether high-capacity assault rifles are necessary for self-defense. To someone not understanding a real-world, home invasion gun-fight, 10 rounds might sound like enough bullets.

In the US there are on the order of 40,000 to 50,000 home invasions a year, classified as "residence robberies" by the FBI. Robbery is defined by the FBI as:

"the taking or attempting to take anything of value from the care, custody, or control of a person or persons by force or threat of force or violence and/or by putting the victim in fear."

Almost half, 40-plus percent, involve a gun wielded by the assailant or assailants. That is about 20,000 or so armed home invasions a year, or conservatively, one every half hour somewhere in America, involving robbery. No statistics are published by the FBI on how many of these turn violent, although unsubstantiated sources indicate on the order of 10%.

These are conservative estimates. Although the data is spotty, other government sources such as the Bureau of Justice Statistics indicate higher numbers which take into account "intent" in burglaries gone bad when a home was unexpectedly occupied, and number of break-ins which turned into assault, rape, or murder. Between 2003 and 2007, 430 burglary-related homicides occurred on average annually.

The Second Amendment is about rural people. One of the biggest disconnects between city and rural folk over gun control is the understanding that, in huge swaths of America, many people live in areas where one county sheriff or one state trooper has 500 square miles to cover.

A police officer is not around the corner like in most large municipalities, at least the ones which are still financially solvent. In many places, help is a half-hour, 45 minutes away, depending on what's going on in the rest of the sparsely populated county at the moment.

In other words, until help arrives, you are the police. People have guns even if they don't like hunting, especially women living alone. What are reasonable gun laws in one part of the country may not be reasonable in another. Gun laws are not a one-size-fits-all proposition.

Multi-assailant home invasions have been on the increase in America, judging by news reports, since hard statistics from the FBI website do not seem to exist. Amoral thugs have figured out that they have a better chance of overpowering a family if they attack in a group, typically three.

If you have ten rounds, do you just pick them off as they come at you as in a video game, a shot apiece? That is not combat, which is surreal and topsy-turvy and your arms are shaking from adrenaline.

Take the best trained, most experienced civilian gun-fighters in the country: police officers. In 2018 the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported, again, what law enforcement knows, that in a life or death gun-fight it's really hard to hit something.

When SHTF, our finest hit what they are aiming at only 20% of the time. These are often competition shooters in their off time, men and women who do this for a living.

In the landmark lawsuit District of Columbia v. Heller, in which a federal judge struck down a California ban on "large capacity magazines," after an exhaustive study of home attacks the judge cited three in his decision. Two in which women defending their families against aggressive intruders emptied their guns and ran out of bullets, and one who did not run out of bullets.

In real life, it is dark and you are shooting at shadows, and you are not as good as a policeman who hits his target 20% of the time. The attackers are not standing still like targets at the range, waiting for you to shoot them. They are usually young and agile - crime is a young man's game - and they are practiced at jumping, dodging, and running like antelope.

Once you are out of bullets, even if you had the presence of mind to grab another magazine, it is hard to reload in the dark. You might drop it, then good luck fumbling for it on the floor. In the dark. Your hands are shaking. It is different if you are a fabulously trained Special Forces soldier. But most of us are not.

An AR-15 with a 30-round mag in the hands of a single woman living alone in the sticks is an extremely liberating, feminist concept.

The remarkable video below is the case which the judge cited as one of the cases where the would-be victim did not run out of bullets. The woman fended off three invaders who had stormed into her door, all of them armed, killing one of them.