Bullets are flying off the shelves

By GottaLaff

Has anyone noticed President Obama taking guns away from Americans? Anyone? Hands?

There's a bull market for bullets.

Stacks of ammo, once piled high at gun shops across America, have dwindled. Prices paid by consumers for much-sought-after Winchester .380-caliber handgun bullets have doubled. At weekend gun shows, trailers loaded with boxes of ammunition are drained within hours.

Budget-pressed police departments, which can't be caught short, have increased their orders just to be safe, and the U.S. military, fighting two wars, has seen its need for bullets quadruple in recent years.

Bullets are in demand as the nation's appetite for firearms has soared. U.S. gun sales are up since the 2008 presidential election, during which the National Rifle Assn. poured millions of dollars into advertisements suggesting that Democrat Barack Obama would move to restrict gun sales if elected.

I better run right out and buy a gun so I can defend myself against the Obamalution! Anyone got a spare bullet or two for me? I'm a little short and can't seem to find any in the stores. A pox on those dreaded 1-Day Sales!

Graphic designer Tak Shimada, 37, of Torrance, has been trying to track down bullets for his 9-millimeter handgun all summer.

"Buying 9-millimeter used to be like finding Coca-Cola," he said. "It's not like that now."

Classic Coke or New Coke? Diet or regular? Come on now, let's not be evasive. Hey, is the term "pop" relevant here? Or pop top? Pop guns? Pop off? Have I popped off track again? My bad.

And now, back to our program, "Gun Owners' Sense of Urgency: The American Road to Needless Paranoia":

Both guns and ammo are in demand, but it is the bullets that are in short supply -- and bullet factories are running around the clock to meet demand.

"Nobody has ever seen this kind of demand before," said Lawrence Keane, senior vice president and general counsel of the National Shooting Sports Foundation Inc., which represents the largest ammo suppliers in the country. "Right now, the plants are operating full-bore to get the product on the shelf."

Elias Yidonoy Jr., owner of Los Angeles Gun Club downtown, a shooting range and ammo store:

"We can't stock enough bullets," he said. "As soon as we put them out, they're gone."

New gun owners tend to buy more ammo, Yidonoy said. "Most of the time they buy more than they'll ever need," he said.

Kinda like Coca Cola, huh? Nothing says refreshing like an ice-cold, frosty cup brimming with sparkling ammo a-waitin' to be unloaded on a Democrat.

Who could have put such a scare into these gullible, pistol-packin' Americans?

From January through July, gun sales increased 22% over the same period last year. The nationwide boom can be traced back to last year's political campaign, said Peter Hamm, communications director for the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence in Washington.

The NRA raised fears that Obama would "take people's guns away," he said.

Hamm points to an NRA website launched during the campaign, GunBanObama.org, as an example. Its headline says, "Obama would be the most anti-gun president in American history."

NRA spokeswoman Rachel Parsons said the organization paid several million dollars in advertising.

Gee, Big NRA is kinda like Big Pharma, Big Insurance, Big Oil, and Big Coal. Big money, big propaganda, big lies.

Big trouble.

Chief Executive of Cheaper Than Dirt (an online and catalog sporting goods dealer) Michael Tenny, whose company has done $20 million in ammunition sales alone, about 30% more than last year:

"Ammunition is like gasoline -- it's a commodity," he said. "When supply is hard to get ahold of, prices go up. That's where we are now."

Big surprise.

UPDATE-- h/t: thewvp: