There were huge campaigns urging Americans to bring every scrap of metal they had in order to make tanks and munitions during WWII. That's what happened to all those beautiful old cast iron sinks and stoves. I don't know what bullets are made of these days. If it's plastic maybe we could recycle all the Chinese toys that were recalled to make new bullets?

Hadn't hear the name sale out Zell Miller in awhile, where the hell is he and what is he doing?

"...maybe we could recycle all the Chinese toys that were recalled to make new bullets?"

Too much lead in those toys!

One billion bullets per year is an awful lot of intent to do harm. Hard to imagine why those places aren't democratic paradises by now.

And the shortages are resulting in prices as much as double what departments were paying just a year ago.

Isn't it a special kind of bad to double the price on anything needed by both the military and the police at a time like this?

Actually, I sort of like the idea of paintball wars, as long as everybody plays by the same paintball rules.

We could have paintball bullets, paintball tanks and artillery, paintball bombs, even paintball nukes (with computer simulated blast radii and extrapolated radiation fatalities based on the paint splat center of impact/detonation.)

Instead of "The object of war is not to die for your country, it's to make the other son of a bitch die for his" (or whatever it was he said), Gen. Patton v2.0 would be "the object of war is to splatter the other son of a bitch from head to toe with non-toxic, water-soluble, washable paint!"

UN referees could monitor and judge all paintball battle outcomes and arbitrate all playground disputes ("it's a lethal hit! no it isn't! yes it is! it barely even nicked me! it killed you! did not! did too!).

http://ace.mu.nu/archives/237523.php

Unfortunately for the astute fact checkers over at the AP, the article contains within it, facts that prove that this “serious problem” is almost a complete falsehood.

The US Military does not use any .40, .45, or .38 Special caliber ammunition. The US Military uses only 9mm pistol ammunition, .233 (5.56mm), .308 (7.62mm) rifle ammunition, 12ga shotgun shells, and .50 caliber heavy machine gun rounds.

Police departments nationwide are being squeezed by the increased price of ammunition. Surging demand for ammunition by the US Military has affected the price and availability of certain types of ammunition. What the AP neglects to state is that, fueled by China’s and other developing nation’s voracious appetites for copper, brass, and lead, the price of those metals worldwide has tripled over the past few years. Such demand would have caused the price of ammunition to go up precipitously even if there were no ongoing war or increased US Military demand.