CBS News today covers the situation between legislators in Virginia beholden to the gun lobby, and New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg who, fed up with gun violence in his city and others, is fighting illegal gun dealers in the southern state. Bloomberg's campaign has been extremely successful-- already a dozen gun dealers have agreed to tighter restrictions on gun sales and keeping records. But not all of the gun dealers have agreed to rein themselves in yet, and Bloomberg is facing opponents in the strangest of places: our own government.

Are the lawsuits hurting their bottom line? It's hard to say in Virginia.

Two of the five Virginia dealers still fighting New York City — Old Dominion Guns & Tackle, in Danville, and Webb's Sporting Goods, in Madison Heights – are having their defense bills paid by their insurance companies.

"I'll expect this thing will go on a couple years before it's over," owner Harold "Webb" Babcock tells CBS News. "We're going to be there until the end."

One sued vendor, Patriot Services Inc., simply surrendered its federal firearms license and re-launched with a new license as Virginia Firearms & Transfers, Inc. at the same Richmond address. Owner Jim Jarrett tells CBS News he runs the business out of his garage. "I wouldn't want to operate a company under a lawsuit," he says.

Bob Moates, owner of a Midlothian, VA gun shop fighting the New York suit, says his legal bills so for amount to only $11,000. "I'm concerned. This could go on for years," said Moates. "It's money that could be spent for a better purpose."

What, like selling more guns? And it is unbelievable that one of these dealers could avoid a lawsuit just by re-launching with a new license at the exact same address. Just how many loopholes has the NRA built into these gun laws?

But what's most shocking here is that Bloomberg's worst antagonists aren't necessarily the gun stores-- it's the government.

The city then dispatched local investigators with hidden cameras to see if the stores were engaged in any illegal sales. The sued stores, according to the city, all permitted a "straw purchase," when one person who might not pass an instant criminal background check does all the shopping but turns to a companion to make the buy.

Virginia wants to stop what its attorney general, Bob McDonnell, calls "unauthorized, undercover, vigilante private investigators." McDonnell persuaded the state legislature to pass a law barring outside investigators from conducting simulated straw purchases without contacting and working with Virginia State Police. The law going into effect in July 1 would make violating this protocol a felony.

The federal government is siding with Virginia. In a recent letter sent to John Feinblatt, the New York City criminal justice coordinator who ran the gun store stings, Michael Battle, the Justice Department’s outgoing overseer of all 93 U.S. attorneys, has asked the city to cease and desist. "The circumstances surrounding the purchases do not rise to the level that would support a criminal prosecution," Battle wrote. "Civilian efforts can unintentionally interrupt or jeopardize ongoing investigations."

That's unbelievable. Bloomberg had to go down there because Congress and the state government did nothing about these illegal gun dealers. And now that he's making progress and getting these gun dealers shut down (as best he can), they're the ones standing in his way? Just whose side are they on? Why are they protecting illegal gun dealers while letting those same dealers sell guns that kill our citizens?

Through a spokesman, Bloomberg has said that McDonnell’s efforts to stop New York from sending undercover agents into Virginia to search for illegal gun sales was a “bizarre position for the commonwealth’s top law enforcement official to hold.”

“Mayor Bloomberg wants the same things that every elected official should want - to protect the rights of law-abiding gun owners but also keep guns out of the hands of criminals,” said the mayor’s spokesman, Jason Post. “Attorney General McDonnell feels otherwise.”

It’s a mystery why McDonnell is on the wrong side of trying to prohibit illegal gun sales in Virginia.

And it's not the first time our federal government has been on the wrong side of the gun issue while Mayor Bloomberg has been on the right one. The Tiahrt Amendment, pushed forth by a Representative from Kansas named Todd Tiahrt, would actually keep police officers from obtaining information about crime guns bought and sold in their districts. It would put a hamper on their own efforts to figure out where crime guns were coming from, all because the gun lobby wants to keep that information secret. Bloomberg has also been campaigning against that law, and when Tiahrt made a statement against Bloomberg this week, he said pretty much the most ironic thing we've ever heard.

In a 30-minute interview in his office last week, Mr. Tiahrt accused Mr. Bloomberg and his aides of negotiating in bad faith, and he says the famously nonpartisan mayor is putting politics over police safety.

"I think it's a self-serving effort to put a political agenda above the safety of our law enforcement officers," Mr. Tiahrt said.

You've got to be kidding us. There is nothing more political and self-serving then hamstringing the efforts of law enforcement and Bloomberg to stop illegal gun dealers. And if Tiahrt wants to talk about safety, it means getting the weapons out of criminal hands and off of the streets. If Tiahrt wants to find "a self-serving effort to put a political agenda above the safety" of our citizens and law enforcement, he needs to simply look in the mirror.