EDITORIAL FIRING BLANKS BANNING AMMUNITION SALES MIGHT BE GOOD PR FOR THE CITY COUNCIL, BUT IT'S BAD LAW.

FOR the Los Angeles City Council, politics isn't about results, but attitude. What matters is not that it does good, but that it looks like it's doing good.

Take its proposed citywide ban on ammunition sales, which has cleared committee and awaits consideration by the full council.

For a body that regularly pillories law enforcement and winked at the Lakers riots, the proposed plan is a convenient way to look tough on crime without actually doing anything about it.

Hardened criminals aren't the type to take a ban on ammo sales very seriously. Breaking the law comes easily to them. So, for that matter, does driving to another city to buy bullets, or ordering them through the mail.

Law-abiding citizens, on the other hand, will feel the force of the law - whether it's honest people who keep a weapon in their home for self- defense, or local businesses that will lose customers to cities with less selmportant governments.

The proposed ban isn't even an original piece of political posturing - it piggybacks on the County Board of Supervisors' vote last year to prohibit ammunition sales on county property. (Not that that ban has made L.A. County any safer - crime actually increased in the last year.)

Gun-control opponents have challenged the county's ban in court, and they vow to do the same if the city goes ahead with its own.

Publicity-starved council members can't wait. ``It'll give us a reason to engage in the current debate,'' Councilman Nick Pacheco gushes.

That means more legal bills for Los Angeles taxpayers - money wasted on lawyers and court fees to defend a useless piece of feel-good legislation.

All so that City Council members can act like the care, while proving that they don't.