If we're talking about essentially military weapons, what is the point of owning them? You don't go deer hunting with an M-16. There is no legitimate purpose for consumers owning these guns.
First off, this rifle is akin to an M21 not a M16. As dead0man already pointed out, sniper rifles are a completely different beast than automatic rifles. And you know what, while I don't see the appeal personally, especially at the price, I can easily see some hunting enthusiast wanting one so as to be able to brag about bringing down a trophy deer with a single shot at 1000 yards. So the no legitimate purpose argument can be quickly be discarded. So can the anti-terrorist argument since actual terrorist groups such as ISIL and DPM already have access to military sniper rifles that serve the same purpose and are cheaper.
You can play that game with any particular gun. Sure, one boutique model of gun is probably not significant. It's an issue of where you draw the line between legal and illegal.
True, but there is no bright line separating this gun from a "legitimate" hunting rifle, so trying to ban it will arouse a whole lot of heat from the pro-gun nuts, and even if the anti-gun nuts were to win such a battle, it's doubtful the win would end up having saved any lives as even if a genuine nut were to make use of it, that nut would likely have killed and wounded more people with a different gun.
Technically a hunter targeting a deer is a sniper except that the object of his attack is not human. A sniper is a specially-trained soldier who typically has a high likelihood of killing people but little of surviving once detected.
Accuracy of a shot and the potential for killing several persons at once is the difference between a hunting rifle and a machine gun. Getting extreme precision in a shot is inconsistent with rapid fire.
One typically has only one shot at a deer... or a high-value military target (let us say a senior officer or a high-level political figure).
