Oh he "is", "is" he?
Then why did we go from 284,000 down to 54,000? What happened to those 230,000 "dealers"?
I mean, according to you they were all legitimate dealers, just small. Right? Honest and legit, right?
Yeah. Right. Sell that to your friends -- I ain't buyin'.
They didn't have formal storefronts, that's all. BATFE, with no change in law, decided that you had to have a storefront and posted hours to be considered a "dealer". I've been to some of those "kitchen table dealers", and they did indeed buy & sell as a business - they just didn't need or want a storefront ... but the BATFE crushed them anyway.
I would actually like to get my Type 01 FFL, and indeed would engage in legitimate business of volume buying and selling therewith. The only catch is that for the [perfectly legitimate] service I have in mind, I have no need for a storefront with posted hours (just frequent trips to FedEx). Since would not need, have no desire for, and currently no money for, a storefront I am denied the 2nd Amendment rights pertaining to what is a perfectly legitimate use of an FFL certification.
You "did" read the part about the new BATF**K regulations requiring a physical storefront, didn't you?? THAT is where they went--driven out of business by over-regulation--just like a lot of other legitimate businesses.
Only in this case the legal requirement was one made of NO OTHER TYPE OF BUSINESS. "Physical storefronts" are useful if you are a certain type of business, or your volume is large, but as I said, there are literally tens of thousands of legitimate business that do NOT require "physical storefronts".
So yes, they were legitimate dealers.
As to whether or not you "buy it", I could give a flying ****.