What happened to those that owned machine guns pre-34? Did they all get "taxed"?
The tax is a transfer tax, which requires someone to pay a tax when transferring the firearm, and to get permission (registration) before doing so. I believe this would exempt pre-1934 owners from any action (but not subsequent owners of the pre-1934 weapons). There was one 30 day NFA amnesty in 1968.
Given the way they paint them as bad and the fact the your average voter thinks banning bad guns is a good thing, I think it's very likely.
Say 80% of people favor an AWB (unlikely). Of those 80%, likely no more than 5% are really worked up about it. The rest favor it in a very tepid way -- they'll likely have forgotten about it when they next vote for their representatives. The 20% who oppose the AWB are more active, and more likely to hold their representatives accountable. Basically, even if 80% of the populace favors an AWB, by and large they're not willing to get up of their asses to do anything about it. This is why a Republic is a good thing.
I doubt they'll try and go after those who already own the guns though.
The political will for any kind of confiscation just isn't there. Almost none of the anti-gun groups even claim to support confiscation because its such an unpopular notion. If it makes you feel any better, they'd be more likely to confiscate NFA weapons first, right? So that'd give you some warning.
Then again, there was no armed resistance or huge uproar when California confiscated evil rifles...
There was no armed resistance because non-compliance is so much easier.
so maybe it's not so unlikely.
Not impossible, but far from likely. My advice: stay aware, but find something else to worry about.
The California confiscation (I assume you're talking about "detatchable" mag SKSs with grenade launchers) speaks more to an
ex post facto judicial and executive malfeasance issue than a strictly gun control issue. It was not the intent of the California law to enact a confiscation.