Gun smuggling on Bloomberg’s watch - but he wasn’t watching

by "Buckeye" Dan Allen

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg is arguably one of the most vocal and visible public figures in the anti-gun community. Billionaire Bloomberg and his organization of city mayors are known for promoting tougher federal, state, and local gun regulation. Bloomberg and the group MAIG (Mayors Against Illegal Guns) can regularly be found in the media spotlight criticizing and sometimes publicly attacking states with more relaxed gun laws.

In the alternate reality that is Bloomberg's world, the average citizen should not have access to firearms; Firearms should be limited to trained professionals such as the police or military. In fact, law-abiding citizens from other states who are licensed to carry back home and who visit New York City are regularly arrested and punished under the local draconian gun laws. It is a crime for all but an elite minority to carry a firearm where Bloomberg reigns supreme.

Bloomberg is known for having his cronies infiltrate gun shows in Ohio, West Virginia and Virginia, among other states. I'll refer to these cronies as "agents." These agents lurk around gun shows in hopes of finding some unsuspecting gun seller that they can entrap in questionable transactions. The agents record these transactions and publicly display them as being a result of the dreaded "Gun Show Loophole." If this were a screenplay I would insert *ominous echo sound effect* here.

This so-called gun show loophole is what Bloomberg perceives to be a threat to the safety and security of NYC residents. In Bloomberg's reality this is where criminals obtain the firepower that endangers his streets. Every study on the subject contradicts that, however. Studies show only 1 percent of guns used in crimes are traced back to sales at gun shows.

For as long as I can remember, firearm owners have been using the phrase: "When guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns." Well, Bloomberg has helped that come to fruition. His obsessive attacks on the Second Amendment and his city's own draconian gun laws have come back to bite him. He's made firearms such a hot commodity in his bailiwick that even his own policemen were tempted by this new lucrative black market taboo.

Recently, Brooklyn NYPD officer William Masso pleaded guilty to smuggling firearms, among other charges. Masso was among five NYPD officers charged in October. The 12-person smuggling ring also included three retired NYPD officers and a New Jersey correction officer.

This should be a warning to the rest of us. This is what Bloomberg's future of gun control looks like: Law-abiding gun owners criminalized for crossing a border; Second Amendment rights reduced to a privilege that only the elite need apply for; Firearms so difficult and expensive to obtain that only the criminal willing to risk jail time will obtain them. All while the rest of us are disarmed and at the mercy of whomever can tap into whatever black market arises.

Had Mayor Bloomberg spent more time attending to the business of NYC instead of harassing firearm owners in neighboring states, he may have prevented a real crime from happening in his own backyard. Bloomberg's delusion of gun control is so grand that he probably doesn't realize that he may have helped create the conditions that turned his officers to the dark side in the first place.

Dan Allen is a Buckeye Firearms Association Minute Man.