Firearms Owners Against Crime
Institute for Legal, Legislative and Educational Action
Institute for Legal, Legislative and Educational Action
Surprisingly, many anti-gunners will note that gun control laws really do only impact the law-abiding. However, they argue that if law-abiding citizens can’t get guns, then how will criminals get them? In other words, if we’re choked off from our supply of legal weapons, then the criminals will eventually run out of their supply of stolen guns as there aren’t any more left to steal.
This is an argument I’ve seen start to work on some folks. After all, there’s a certain degree of sense to it. Not much, but enough that if you don’t understand the issue, it might be enough to sway you.
In response to that, however, I’d like to point out that guns can come through the exact same pipeline as drugs. In fact, they already do.
Alexis Sanchez, 20, was part of a conspiracy to smuggle firearms from Tennessee, where there are no background check for private firearms purchases, to California, according to U.S. Attorney McGregor Scott. The weapons included AR-15 rifles. In a plea agreement, Sanchez acknowledged neither she nor other conspirators possessed federal firearms licenses.
According to the Tennessee website Knox News, Rafael “Ralphie” Sanchez, another conspirator, the group shipped edible marijuana, cash, and cocaine to Tennessee in exchange for a shopping list of firearms. The purchases took place between April 2016 to March 2018.
In this case, it’s just across state lines where drugs legal in one state are transported one direction and guns are transported back. It’s not exactly rocket science here.
I’ll also note that no one is pitching a fit because California has legal marijuana that’s being transported out of state.
Anyway, most drug smuggling isn’t across state lines but across national boundaries. Right now, guns don’t come in that way because there’s no reason to. There’s ample supply on the black market here. Yet even if you somehow choked off that supply, they’ll come through on the exact same pipeline, much like what happened here. The only difference is that guns and drugs would suddenly start flowing the same direction.
If you don’t think that would happen, you’re an idiot. The Mexican cartels sell drugs because they can make a profit off of it. They’ll sell anything else they think they can make a profit on as well. If that includes guns, they’ll start selling that as well. Especially to those in their own pipeline who will need to protect their product.
We’re not talking about rocket science here. We’re talking about the absolute futility of gun control in stemming the flow of guns to criminals. There will always be criminals who will make their living selling guns to bad people. They simply don’t care about the body counts or laws or anything except for how much money they can get.
Meanwhile, anti-gunners would disarm law-abiding citizens and eliminate their means to defend themselves from these predators who don’t care about these laws.
Gun control won’t stop bad people from doing bad things. It’ll just stop good people from doing anything about it.
Tom Knighton is a Navy veteran, a former newspaperman, a novelist, and a blogger and lifetime shooter. He lives with his family in Southwest Georgia. https://bearingarms.com/author/tomknighton/
https://bearingarms.com/tom-k/2019/10/01/california-womans-arrest-illustrates-stupidity-gun-control/