You Can't Stop The Signal

I was researching a different topic and happened across this March 20, 1992, New York Times article by Barnaby J. Feder, "As Gun Debate Rages, Ammunition Makers Are Quietly, and Busily, at Work." The article basically explores the idea of whether limiting ammunition sales would be effective at reducing crime. From the article:

      The inattention to the ammunition market frustrates Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan, the New York Democrat, who has waged a lonely drive to ban the manufacture and sale of ammunition used in many handguns.

      But most law-enforcement officials and policy makers believe that the easy availability of ammunition has little to do with the nation's gun problems. They say that criminals tend to use ammunition sporadically and in such small quantities that a minute fraction of the available supply is all they need. In addition, the officials say, any effort to choke off the commercial production of ammunition would almost certainly be undercut by a homemade supply.

      "You could work for years and never learn to machine a gun," said John C. Killorin, head of public affairs for the Federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms. "You could take a 20-minute course and learn how to make ammunition."

And now, 27 years later, it is increasingly becoming easy to build the necessary parts of a firearm, what with 80% lowers and automated CNC machines such as the Ghost Gunner, and even 3-D printing.