Heavily armed Floridiots

Ahhh, Florida. The State Where Everyone Gets a Second Chance.

Well, not any more. There will be no second chances if you find yourselves lined up in the laser sight of a .499 caliber Alexander Arms Beowulf Elephant Gun. Apparently a sheriff department in the Orlando area is stocking up.

Some choice excerpts from this Only in Florida story:

Essentially an assault rifle on steroids, the $800 weapon has "the power to kill anything that walks, swims or crawls!" according to a 2003 product review by gunblast.com. "Everyone who shot the gun was grinning like an idiot, and muttering phrases like, 'I gotta get me one of these.'"

and

In the 1960s, an elephant escaped from a circus in Winter Park. It rampaged along Cady Way into Winter Park Pines, leaving large mementos of its presence along the street, until it was subdued and recaptured.

and last but not least

Orange County's toughest neighborhoods may not have elephants, but the deputies who work there are getting a shipment of 25-shot machine pistols.

"Matching firepower," said sheriff's spokesman Capt. Mark Strobridge, when asked why.

"Our tactical squads that are getting the weapons are dealing with the worst of the worst and those types of neighborhoods," Strobridge said of the new semiautomatic, .45-caliber Heckler & Koch machine pistols. "They're more accurate than their [regular] pistols, and they can stand back further from the bad guys."