The entire 3D printed guns kerfuffle that was set off when Cody Wilson’s Defense Distributed settled a longstanding lawsuit with the US Department of Justice has resulted in a nearly endless procession of news reports and commentary featuring jaw-dropping ignorance and misinformation about the nation’s gun laws.
Or it would be jaw-dropping, if it weren’t already so typical of the quality of both politicians and reporting by the mainstream media wherever firearms are concerned.
First, it should be reiterated that it is and always has been legal for Americans to make their own firearms for personal use. Similarly, it’s perfectly legal for anyone in the United States to possess files for 3D-printed firearms and to use them to create guns if they so choose.
And despite the attempts to keep Defense Distributed from making those files freely available via the Internet, those very files have been widely available for year. And still are. You can download them yourself right here.
Still, here are just a few examples of the blatantly inaccurate, pig-ignorant reporting that’s been the norm lately.
If you live in Pennsylvania, you can’t legally download a 3D blueprint for a gun.
After an emergency hearing in a Pennsylvania federal courtroom, Texas-based Defense Distributed agreed to block users in Pennsylvania from accessing and downloading 3D gun plans.
It also said it would not upload new files – for now. This temporary agreement comes after the U.S. State Department settled a lawsuit against the company to allow those gun plans to be put online.
Not only did they falsely report that it’s illegal to download the 3D files, they falsely reported that the State Department settled a lawsuit against the company. The lawsuit was filed by Defense Distributed against the State Department.
Then there’s this from wired.com:
Wilson said that while the preliminary injunction forbade him to share the files online for free, it expressly allowed him to sell them. At a news conference Tuesday, Wilson periodically stopped talking to check his phone when a new sale came through.
This technicality, legal experts say, really does allow Wilson to sell his blueprints. The legally tricky part is verifying that his customers are all US citizens; if not, he’ll be in violation of US export law.
The “technicality” that Wired.com refers to is otherwise known as the First Amendment of the Bill of Rights. However, the statement from Josh Shapiro, the Attorney General of Pennsylvania, puts Wired.com’s fake news to shame.
“Selling these files into Pennsylvania violates both our state law and the agreement Defense Distributed reached with the Commonwealth before Judge Diamond on July 29. Putting untraceable weapons in the hands of criminals presents a clear public safety threat to Pennsylvanians, which is why I am exploring all of my legal options to stop these sales,” said Pennsylvania attorney general Josh Shapiro in a statement to WIRED.
Shapiro claims he’s looking at options to stop the sales. Sorry, Josh, but you don’t have the authority or the power to do so. Those files have been available on the Internet for five years. And the First Amendment prohibits you from censoring speech, as you so desperately seem to wish to do.
Get ready for a lawsuit for violating civil rights under color of law, because that is exactly what you are doing.
Long story short, it’s perfectly legal in Pennsylvania for people to possess 3D gun files and to print their own guns, as long as the guns themselves are compliant with the state and federal laws. But let’s not let inconveniences like facts get in the way.
©2018 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice and link are included.
Never under estimate the stupidity or deliberate ignorance of gun banners and the media.
Local media in Australia started trying to get gel ball guns banned on Thursday as “too real looking”. No one has used one in a crime to date but “guns” is all they need.
https://www.google.com.au/amp/www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6114803/amp/Toy-gel-blaster-guns-banned-Australia.html
It’s all smoke-and-mirrors to distract the sheeple.
If the libtards didn’t lie, they would have nothing to say.
They do nothing but lie, fear monger, threaten and violence. Oh, I forgot, whining and crying too.
More people died this week from preventable medical errors than will ever by killed by Cody Wilson’s Liberator.
1,200 PER DAY according to stats provided by Consumer’s Reports magazine that are documentable. True number is nearly TWICE that. http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/magazine/2014/05/survive-your-hospital-stay/index.htm
I don’t get why anyone still trusts the mainstream media. If you’ve ever seen them report on a subject that you know well, you’ve seen how consistently they get even simple things wrong. And yet everyone seems to assume the news gets it right on everything else.
Ignorance, mistakes, and ideological bias are not outliers, they’re the rule.
My department is more concerned with accuracy and truth than the average news outlet — and I’m in marketing communications, for God’s sake.
Don’t worry, they don’t trust them any more. That’s the good news… 😉
My favorite line in The LEGO Movie is
“You don’t know me, but I’m on tv, so you can trust me.”
That movie is full of good lines like that….
When I worked retail I would tell people flat out if a product was bad. One night two women saw an absolutely trash product (it was later recalled) and the one said to the other “I saw that on TV, it HAS to be good”. Did not say a word; if you are that stupid/gullible you get what you get.
Even marketing is more honest than the news? I believe it. They don’t call it infotainment for nothing.
Back many, many years ago I had the opportunity to speak to a very respected European journalist. Among other things he told me was that European journalists laugh behind the backs at American so called “journalists” who according to him don’t get their facts straight, are lazy and extremely biased. As soon as an American journalist applies to work in a news room over there, they politely take his application and then once he or she has left the building toss it into the trash along with the other garbage.
Why is there so much fuss with 3D plans? The anarchist cookbook has been available for decades, but no one complains about it. Fed laws already outlaw “undetectable” firearms, just as they also outlaw many of the items found in the cookbook. Information does not a crime make. Only if you apply that information to construct an illegal item would a crime be committed.
Same can be said abou NFA controlled items. There is readily available Information to construct a suppressor, SBR, SBS, etc. Only if you apply that knowledge without following proper process do you break the law.
This is mass hysteria, to quote Micheal Savage.
Savage wants a national “assault weapon” ban and “high capacity magazine” ban. He thinks they are machineguns and is against national reciprocity and suppressor de-regulation. He is not our friend. I stopped listening after one rather ignorant show:
https://youtu.be/qEl34pBJLEk
This needs to immediately go to the U.S. Supreme Court where the majority of judges there will tell the Attorney Generals about what the first and second Amendments to the U.S. Constitution REALLY MEANS. They don’t have the option of outlawing something constitutionally protected just because they personally don’t like it.
While I agree with the general sentiment, it might be wise to hold off until Kavanaugh is confirmed.
It’s not ignorance. It’s all for a deliberate political purpose: To drum up support for a legislative ban on home manufacture and a background check requirement for ALL firearm components down to the springs and detents and firing pins.
The “technicality” that Wired.com refers to is otherwise known as the First Amendment of the Bill of Rights.
Considering almost everyone calls dismissed charges due to illegal search and seizure (i.e., Fourth Amendment violations) “getting off on a technicality,” why are we surprised?
A bit different, in those cases the idea is that someone actually committed a crime but was technically found ‘not guilty’ despite their actual guilt due to what sounds like procedural errors.
In this case… there is no crime of which to be guilty. Kinda a whole new step of ‘technicality.’
I heard that you can now print a gun off a 3D printer, but I am not impressed.
I’ve had a Canon printer for years.
See, you’re basically okay using your Canon printer for whatever, unless it has a shoulder thingy that goes up.
If it does… you BASTARD!
ROTFLMFAO!!!!!!!
What I find funny is no one has thought about there is no way to make a 3d gun undetectable..the ammo can’t be made of plastic duh…whats even more funny is who wants to trust a plastic printed gun even once
..
Washington’s communist AG continues to mislead the public to drum up support against “undetectable” 3D guns as he fights against freedom. One would hope that lying by a public official, in the face of facts, would be grounds for impeachment. Sadly, apparently ideaology is greater than the Constitution, at least in WA.
When the facts don’t coincide what you wish them to be, lie.
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