Did you know that the problems the state of New Jersey is having with gun-related crime are none of New Jersey’s fault? Not a one.

No, it seems that New Jersey’s tough anti-gun laws that take away rights from law-abiding people while doing nothing to stop actual criminals are just fine. It’s all the states that don’t buy into that line of bovine excrement that are to blame.

At least, that’s what some in New Jersey seem to think.

Three of every four traceable guns recovered by authorities in New Jersey are purchased in states with weaker gun laws.

That’s according to an analysis by The Record and NorthJersey.com of federal firearms trace data and a gun-law score card published by the Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence.

The firearms trace data were compiled by the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, or ATF, between 2012 and 2016. The figures include guns used in crimes or found by authorities but not tied to specific crimes.

Some 40 percent of the firearms successfully traced during that period came to New Jersey via the so-called Iron Pipeline, made up of Southern states along the I-95 corridor with comparatively lax gun regulations.

An additional 16 percent were traced to Pennsylvania, which requires background checks for private sales of handguns but not rifles and other long guns.

For the record, it’s illegal to purchase firearms from one state with the intent of transporting them to another. In fact, none of this is legal.

It looks like criminals are just breaking laws and stuff. Shocking, I know, because criminals are typically known to be such upstanding citizens. The idea of them breaking laws and stuff…well, it’s unfathomable. What is wrong with a world where criminals would break the law?

Of course, that’s just what criminals do, but those who think New Jersey would be a peaceful, non-violent Utopia if they could just stop the tide of guns flowing into the state are deluding themselves.

Anti-gun states always blame pro-gun states for their problems, yet look at what happened in England. London has more murders than New York City. Its gun crime rate is skyrocketing, as well, yet it doesn’t have pro-gun states sending firearms across borders. The U.K. is an island, as isolated geographically as it can get. The only direct way to transport anything into England that doesn’t require a security check somewhere along the way is through the Chunnel, and that connects with equally anti-gun France.

In other words, England suffers from none of these supposed disadvantages, yet its gun crime rate is climbing faster than a Saturn V rocket on steroids. Why is that?

It’s because when you stem the flow of legal firearms that the law-abiding can purchase, the criminals aren’t hurt. They go with other methods of securing firearms. They steal them from the law-abiding if possible, but if not then they get them the same way they get cocaine or heroin. Those products are also illegal, and yet somehow people still get their hands on those. Why would guns be any different?

The problem isn’t other states. The problem is that New Jersey residents are only marginally able to defend themselves, which emboldens criminals who get their hands on guns and use them regardless of any laws. They use them because they know there’s virtually no risk.

New Jersey needs to stop blaming everyone else for their gun problems.