The federal government needs to crack down on guns.
Its own stockpile, anyway. The Washington Examiner reports:
The federal government has spent $1.5 billion on guns and ammo since 2006, and lost nearly 1,000 weapons along the way, including Uzis, assault rifles, and grenade launchers, according to the House Oversight Committee chairman.
In a hearing to urge tightened controls of weapons, Rep. Jason Chaffetz, chair of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, said, ‘The loss of a single firearm is cause for concern – the loss of what amounts to roughly five a month is unacceptable.’
These guns were acquired by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), and the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP), for use by their agents. Inventory is managed by the General Services Administration (GSA), the agency tasked with managing the affairs of other federal agencies. It’s important for certain federal agents to be armed if their job requires it. But it’s also important for the federal government to keep track of its expensive supplies, especially when those supplies have destructive potential.
And these aren’t your run-of-the-mill weapons. Uzis, grenade launchers, the ever-nebulous assault rifles: plenty of firepower for agents who have dangerous jobs. They simply vanished, and at an alarming clip: 1,000 guns lost over the last 10 years comes out to just under two per week.
So sure, maybe it’s easier to get a Glock than a book. But only if you’re neighbors with the local branch of the DHS.