Article by MARKVOL in RedState
All those firearms sales. Is this normal? Nope
Since about the eighties, I have been collecting firearms. I have amassed quite a collection, from old Smith Model 29s, lever action Marlins and Winchesters, and built several AR 15s, mostly as a hobby, but one that has been fulfilling. I like mechanical stuff, and one can’t argue that a firearm isn’t mechanical. I have bought and sold hundreds of guns. It’s always been a popular thing for many people. I remember when a neighbor and I snuck off with his dad’s war trophy Luger and shot it, for the first time. I got hooked. Those were the good ole days.
I’m not sure if you would call me a part of the gun culture, but it would be a compliment to hear someone say I was, because I have met so many friends through horse trading guns, and at the range, and just learning from everyone I was around. Most folks who enjoy hobbies can relate. It’s a hobby, to me, but one that has taken an added dimension. I worked for an old friend who had a gunshop, until his health, and his wife made him retire and close his shop. I got to do a lot of neat stuff to customer’s guns, repair a sight, float a barrel, clean up a trigger, finish stocks, all kinds of neat stuff. I was a worker bee, because of my love of tinkering.
Lately, but it isn’t like it hasn’t happened before, weapons, ammunition and reloading supplies have been flying off the shelves. Go try to buy a box of ammo. Go try to buy a box of primers. That stuff has disappeared from everyone’s shelves. A few years ago, it was .22 rimfire ammo that went short because of an ammunition plant explosion. That stuff went through the roof. I remember seeing CCI Stingers and Mini-mags hitting a hundred bucks a box. The latest shortage is primers. It was caused by all the folks wanting ammunition for their newly purchased firearm. The ammunition industry is trying to keep up with demand, so the primers are going to them, first, and the reloader is out of luck. That is, unless he planned ahead and bought stuff for that rainy day. I did. I figured getting that stuff was cheap, so I bought tens of thousands of primers, and everything else that goes with it. No way am I going to be caught out of ammo.
This time the shortage was created by fear and uncertainty in the rise of political radicalization, from you know who. I thought the last great NRA Salesman of the Year, Barack Hussein Obama, would never be topped, but the entire Democrat Party has replaced him. All those NICs checks prove that, don’t they? No need to name the sites, but go and try to find a typical Glock 17, or your favorite brand. I guess Diane Feinstein never figured her message about assault rifles, all those years ago, would trigger the opposite effect it had. Thank you, Diane! You just made every bit of my collection double in value, and that pile of reloading stuff go up in value five or more times what it cost me. Maybe I should sell some of it.
I really wish things would get back to normal, because there are a lot of folks left out in the cold, and now realize the value of the 2nd Amendment, when it is kinda late to be fretting over how you are going to protect yourself and your family. But you have to do what you have to do.
We’re going to see Trump win his re-election, and we’re going to see the Supreme Court get a little more constructionist, but things will be rough for a while longer. The trend for uncertainty seems to get more pronounced each day, and that’s just life. These ANTIFA/BLM types won’t just go away, overnight, but they will go away, eventually, one way or another, and I’m preparing for the worst, hoping it never happens. I hope you are, as well.
One of the best things people can be doing is to get together in their ideas, get behind Trump without placing all the haughty demands on him, and grab your neighbor and vote for Trump. Unless, that is, you think Chance, the Gardner is a viable alternative. He isn’t, and his running mate is even more of a buffoon. Just the gall of the Democrats putting those two buffoons on their ticket should solve any problems one might have about the stuff around the edges of a Trump presidency. It’s like night and day, this time, again. Vote! It keeps guns in holsters, and away from trouble.
Meanwhile, if I can figure out this hazmat shipping stuff, I might just try and sell a few of those primers.
https://www.redstate.com/diary/markvol/2020/09/20/all-those-firearms-sales/
