Bill sponsor Sen. Don Harmon's obfuscation of "trace" data has been truly appalling. Harmon, D-Oak Park, waited for the TV cameras to announce that 17 percent of crime guns are traced to just three gun shops in Cook County. Harmon's implication is that these shops sell guns to criminals, but that's not what a trace identifies, and he should know it. Law enforcement may trace a gun because it was lost, stolen, recovered by police in a benign setting or recovered at a crime scene. The only thing a trace tells investigators is where a gun was first legally purchased. He also doesn't explain that the average time from first sale to trace is nine years, or that the overwhelming majority of Chicago's crime guns are either stolen or bought on the black market. That's because those revelations won't support his campaign to drive Illinois gun stores out of business.