Weapons like the AR-15 are vilified throughout the nation. Gun control advocates argue that they’re preferred by evil people and they blame pro-gun states like Alabama for all sorts of ills relating to not just AR-15s but firearms in general.

It’s really rather sad when you consider the facts.

After all, let’s take a look at a recent arrest in Alabama.

A drug raid in Chilton County turned up 16 guns and several thousand rounds of ammunition, as well as illegal drugs.

The sheriff’s Special Operations Divisions on Friday carried out a search warrant in the 5000 block of County Road 754 in Clanton. The warrant followed an investigation into the distribution of methamphetamine from that location, authorities said.

In addition to the guns and ammo, investigators seized 18 grams of meth, drug paraphernalia and $400 in cash.

Four people were arrested.

Now, this wasn’t a huge drug operation by any stretch of the imagination. Yes, they were dealing, but it doesn’t look like this was exactly Breaking Bad.

Regardless, though, the weapons seized weren’t what you’d expect a drug dealer to be carrying. The Glock is about the only thing that fits the stereotype in any way, shape, or form, but since Glocks are among the most popular firearm model on the market, that’s not surprising.

The rest are long guns, and not a one of them is an AR-15 or an AK pattern rifle. Some are shotguns, including at least one single shot, but others are just your garden variety hunting rifles.

Now, Alabama isn’t known for its gun control by any stretch. To hear the anti-Second Amendment types tell it, that means criminals can get pretty much anything they want.

And it doesn’t look like any of the four were convicted felons–no charges for possession of a firearm by a felon that I could see–so they could have gotten anything they wanted without the gun stores getting into any trouble. So why didn’t they?

Honestly, all I can do is speculate.

It does seem interesting, though, that while we’ve been told that the AR-15 is the preferred firearm for every manner of criminal, it just doesn’t seem to pan out that way when the rubber meets the road. This arrest is interesting in part because it illustrates the simple fact that a lot of criminals just don’t care about long guns for their illegal business purposes.

After all, if they could get AR-15s without issue–and in Alabama, there’s a minimum of issues that could arise–then why didn’t they?

Unless, of course, they just didn’t want them.

What we’re not likely to see, though, is any discussion of this arrest in the mainstream media. They won’t look at this and think, “OK, maybe we were wrong about these ‘assault rifles’ after all.” They won’t even acknowledge it.

Why? Because it shatters the narrative that these are guns preferred by criminals and they know it. So, they’ll just pretend it never happened.

Kind of par for the course with them anyway. Anything inconvenient is ignored.