Before we even knew the magnitude of what transpired in Las Vegas, some leftist anti-gun activists were beating the “universal background” check drum. They maintain over and over again that bad people are getting guns and we need more background checks to stop it. They completely ignore evidence to the contrary, mind you, but continue their push.

The problem is, even trying to obtain a firearm is illegal if you’re a convicted felon. This is just a simple fact. However, if you didn’t know that, you can be forgiven. After all, judging by the number of people who are actually arrested for this crime, it seems the government has forgotten it’s illegal as well.

The problem is that background checks are a lie. The crusaders’ big claim, now repeated on all the old-news channels, is that the existing check has stopped about three million gun sales. What a glorious achievement. We need more of this, they say.

Not a single reporter in the entire profession has the brains, training or ethics to ask even the most obvious questions. This perpetuates the lie. Whether that’s deliberate, ignorance, stupidity, a plot, it doesn’t matter. What matters is it’s harmful. I’ll ask.

Where are the three million arrests?

It’s a serious crime to try to get guns if you legally can’t, you know that. The check is designed to find criminals trying to buy guns at retail. The criminals banned are really bad dudes—bank robbers, rapists, murderers, fugitives, addicts, the mentally unstable, spousal abusers, jihadis, illegal aliens, there’s a federal list. It’s a long-term felony for these people to try.

What good is the background check if it finds these villains, has them right there in the store with the FBI on the phone for Pete’s sake, and we just turn them away? Do you know how much money we’re spending on this? Do we want to catch and lock up “the element” or not? We have their signatures on a form for proof. The background check is a lie.

Harsh words, but hardly unfair ones. Alan Korwin makes a valid point. If crusaders were really interested in making our streets safer, enforcement of this law above all others would be far, far more useful than trying to create new ones for the same folks to break. These are people who have broken the law, know they can’t own a firearm, yet are seeking out guns anyway.

Yet hardly any of them ever do any time for their new crime.

If anti-gun zealots were serious about wanting to combat gun crime, why not actually push for action to be taken on these felons who violate the law by trying to obtain guns? There would be little to no push from the pro-gun side. After all, we want these guys prosecuted too. So why the silence?

Maybe it’s because, despite their sorrowful rhetoric, they don’t actually care about the poor, downtrodden communities that are plagued with gun violence. It’s not their mothers and daughters, fathers and sons being gunned down for whatever reason. No, it’s poor minorities who are great for a vote but otherwise hold no importance in these crusaders’ lives.

Drop the universal background check rhetoric, gun grabbers. It’s a bad look on you.