3D Printers Real Concerns

[Historian]

Fox Cable a few minutes ago discussed Congress's debating new
laws banning 3D printed guns. They showed an example along
with plastic springs. ATF Representative was quite concerned.
They want to make the manufacturing of such pistols illegal unless
they have some metal in it for detection. Surely bad guys will tremble
and comply.

I was reminded of Okinawa around 500 years ago when no one
but Samurai could possess Katanas, upon penalty of death.
Common folks modified farming implements and came up with
among many the Sai.

Ex., << http://www.google.com/search?q=Okinawan ... 38&bih=991 >>

This wonderful instrument was a fantastic defense against the Katana, capturing the blade in the valley and
snapping it in half. Then one of the Sais was thrown pinning the Samurai's foot with its sharpened point and
then the other two neutralizing them. Cheap, easy for a smith to make, and no registration needed.

For home defense they are the premier 'silenced weapon', easy to start mastering, and turning your
arm into an iron limb.

The Gutenberg press also opened up books and knowledge to the masses, free of the Church's control of what
could be thought and read. Boccaccio' Decameron, the Penthouse Letters of the day.

Thus with the 3D printing technology. Is any legislation capable of preventing miscreants from
printing pistols, and even more a pistol with a suppressor in one printing?

In Palestine during the late 1940's the Jews were able to make weapons right under the noises of
the ant-Semitic British so ingeniously: under the noisy clothes washing machinery for British Army
uniforms. Seeing the old machinery for stamping out unlimited bullets, etc., is a tribute to humankind's
ingenuity.

Laws ban assaulting people, even more seriously senior citizens. But the minority thugs are given a pass
for fear that the law will be assailed for racial profiling.

The best law is the natural law of inculcating decency, honor, empathy as was done before the
progressives destroyed family values.

Anyway, what do our brethren think of the impacts that the new technology will take.

[Ethos]

if self defence comes down to those, well, were done anyway

[Tony M.]

I assume this is an argument for an extension of the undetectable firearms act of 1988, right? It's just an extension of the original law that's been on the books for 25 years.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Undetectable_Firearms_Act

[whiterussian1974]

They will probably make production, possession and distribution of the source code a Federal Felony. That way they can leverage pressure on anyone even unknowingly in possession of code they deem "threatening."

Spoiler, the following is Sarcasm...
"Thank Goddess Gaia that the Executive Branch is finally enforcing the 1.5 Ammendment. Right to have the Gov't Protect Me from myself. After all, we're all too stupid to think for ourselves. That's why we vote Democrat, right? It's much easier than thinking for ourselves or being self reliant."

[doubloon]

...
Thus with the 3D printing technology. Is any legislation capable of preventing miscreants from
printing pistols, and even more a pistol with a suppressor in one printing?
...

No.

Sites that act as hosts for 3D printable images are already filtering out things that resemble copyrighted images or weapons so the community has found a way to "corrupt" the images into abstract objects that can be "repaired" and printed in their original form.

It won't be long before someone will be able to download a drawing for a blacksmith's puzzle and repair it to print a M16 trigger group or download a drawing for a baby stroller and repair it to print a whole M16.

But that doesn't make it a practical threat to what passes for freedom or government in today's America. And it doesn't make legislation against such contrived threats any less fascist.

[Historian]

...
Thus with the 3D printing technology. Is any legislation capable of preventing miscreants from
printing pistols, and even more a pistol with a suppressor in one printing?
...

No.

Sites that act as hosts for 3D printable images are already filtering out things that resemble copyrighted images or weapons so the community has found a way to "corrupt" the images into abstract objects that can be "repaired" and printed in their original form.

It won't be long before someone will be able to download a drawing for a blacksmith's puzzle and repair it to print a M16 trigger group or download a drawing for a baby stroller and repair it to print a whole M16.

But that doesn't make it a practical threat to what passes for freedom or government in today's America. And it doesn't make legislation against such contrived threats any less fascist.

+2!!!

If the poor harried folks at ATF did not have enough problems processing all the forms for
suppressors, soon, thanks to Chucky Cheese Schumer passing a law that any 3D printed plastic guns have
5 pounds of steel in them for detection, ATF will soon have to be sending SWAT teams to arrest kids during
the summer with their plastic water pistols. Oy, as my dear departed buddy often intoned.

[Historian]

Last night, with a dearth of exciting cable viewing I replayed
my DVD of Clint Eastwood's make of David Baldacci's "Absolute Power"*. The former CIA
'wet worker' Leary, played by the Shakespearean malevolent
John Malkovich was shown hand carving a plastic .32 firearm.

The design was an ingenious two shot Derringer that hinged opened like
the old H&R revolver. When I first saw this years ago I laughed at the
idea that such a device could actually work.

There goes out the window any master gunsmithing expertise gained by early 1940's
collection and use of Tom Mix six guns.
But, I might add, the pot metal in them lasted longer than some plastic elastic modern automatics.


* In an interview Eastwood told how he chose to make the movie. On one set a Secret Service
Agent asked him why he never made a movie about them.
They deserve the respect and admiration they have garnered over the years.

An acquaintance who had served on the best modern President Reagan's detail
once told me in D.C that the Service trained to instinct shoot at targets no more than 24' away. When
queried he said that FBI studies of actual shoot outs had shown that beyond that distance and
under the violent situation induced adrenaline cocktail magazine loads of discharged shots flew everywhere with
no hits. A useful tidbit of information that I have not seen aired too often and might be incorporated
in range practicing for home defense training.

[doubloon]

...
John Malkovich was shown hand carving a plastic .32 firearm.
...

And how long before legislation aimed at preventing honest citizens from printing firearms regardless of the material is repurposed to prevent honest citizens from making firearms at all?

[Historian]

...
John Malkovich was shown hand carving a plastic .32 firearm.
...

And how long before legislation aimed at preventing honest citizens from printing firearms regardless of the material is repurposed to prevent honest citizens from making firearms at all?

As soon as the 3 Stoogies -- Obama/Reid/Pelosi -- take over the Congress in the
next election if folks do not vote to keep their freedoms.

Oh, speaking of movies, declassified information: The actual movie that really caused the 5th century
savages to kill our Ambassador and 3 former OPS guys was
Bugs Bunny << http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dZONESErkco >>
insulting sand. Not Clinton's order to not go to their rescue.

[jlwilliams]

Any attempt to stifle mankind's inherent creativity is wrong headed. 3D printing is a fantastic extension of computer aided designing. From the mind, to the computer, to the real world. That kicks ass right there. The jackoffs who want to say who can invent what are not fit to govern, much less to lead.

Gun powder has been with us for about a thousand years. Rifled barrels for about five hundred (oldest examples). The industrial revolution is less than half of that time. The idea that they can stop people from making pre-industrial tools in a post industrial world is stupid.

[whiterussian1974]

And how long before legislation aimed at preventing honest citizens from printing firearms regardless of the material is repurposed to prevent honest citizens from making firearms at all?

If we read the Anti-Federalist Papers, the Purpose of the 2nd Amendment was to limit Standing Armies, not Armed Private Citizens.
Standing Armies and Totalitarian Police State was the fear of Framers.

[doubloon]

I believe the anti-federalists were concerned about granting the fed the power to raise a standing army over the states but I'm not sure how 2A is worded to limit that ability. I am open to being enlightened.

[wacki]

If we read the Anti-Federalist Papers, the Purpose of the 2nd Amendment was to limit Standing Armies, not Armed Private Citizens.
Standing Armies and Totalitarian Police State was the fear of Framers.

Meh... not sure how I feel about that statement. Some of the founding fathers (especially big-gov Hamilton) wanted the Switzerland model. Everyone was armed and trained (regulated). He was also the reject of the group. They even poke fun of him in the John Adams series. Hamilton said a training session once a year would be the best we could hope for. We have failed miserably in that regard. Or did they reject that model supported by the reject of the times? History is not clear. That said, an armed populous was meant as a check and balance to the possibility of a standing army. They wanted it to be difficult to control by design. Times change and we don't fear standing army's nearly as much.

"I ask, sir, what is the militia? It is the whole people, except for a few public officials."

— George Mason, in Debates in Virginia Convention on
Ratification of the Constitution, Elliot, Vol. 3, June 16, 1788

[Libertarian_Geek]

If we read the Anti-Federalist Papers, the Purpose of the 2nd Amendment was to limit Standing Armies, not Armed Private Citizens.
Standing Armies and Totalitarian Police State was the fear of Framers.

Meh... not sure how I feel about that statement. Some of the founding fathers (especially big-gov Hamilton) wanted the Switzerland model. Everyone was armed and trained (regulated). He was also the reject of the group. They even poke fun of him in the John Adams series. Hamilton said a training session once a year would be the best we could hope for. We have failed miserably in that regard. Or did they reject that model supported by the reject of the times? History is not clear. That said, an armed populous was meant as a check and balance to the possibility of a standing army. They wanted it to be difficult to control by design. Times change and we don't fear standing army's nearly as much.

"I ask, sir, what is the militia? It is the whole people, except for a few public officials."

— George Mason, in Debates in Virginia Convention on
Ratification of the Constitution, Elliot, Vol. 3, June 16, 1788

Exactly.

[DarkPhoenix]

Don't 3 printed guns still shoot cartridges? What are most all bullets made out of? What are most all she'll casings made out of?

Just renew the law as is and give it a rest people. Leave me and my guns alone.

[doubloon]

I'm gonna 3D print myself a .22 cap and ball revolver that shoots ceramic balls using homemade plastic caps.

[Historian]

I'm gonna 3D print myself a .22 cap and ball revolver that shoots ceramic balls using homemade plastic caps.

You reminded me of a 1944 Nick Carter Detective radio program*, theatre of the mind
as Orson Wells, the voice of the Shadow, rumbled.

The detective was trying to find out how the victim was shot, a bullet hole, but no bullet.
Jumping ahead 3 commercials and intervening wise cracks the denouement was that Nick solved the crime
and confronted the killer: " You got frozen water in shape of a bullet, wrapped the base,
and fired it from the .38. Then in a short time the ice melted and you thought that there was
no evidence that you had anything to do with your bosses death."

So, with compressed air, ice bullets, 3D plastic pistols, you come full circle
with new technology.


* " ...Radio was TV, no color, even no picture " I explained to my son when he was five. To give him
an example I unpacked from storage and turned on my Hallicrafter SX100 radio, glowing tubes, vent holes
projecting mysterious patterns on the ceiling, scanning shortwave stations around the world with many languages.