UPDATE 08-02-2018: Amazon Web Services was the host for codeisfreespeech.com and Bezos’s minions are responsible for shutting it down. Jeff Bezos apparently isn’t a defender of FREE SPEECH. The wealthiest man in the world doesn’t give a crap about your rights.
UPDATE: It appears the link to codeisfreespeech.com that was hosting the scary files has disappeared. I will update again if the site reappears.
“We have met the enemy and he is us” – Pogo
Two days ago I wrote about the loony left’s desire to trample the Constitution over there fear of plastic firearms. I had linked to a “file” of a parametric model of Defense Distributed’s “Liberator” single shot zip gun. Last night I removed the link.
The following is my layman’s description of a bunch of legal mumbo jumbo as to what’s going on and why I removed the link in my previous post.
Publication of this file as I pointed out was prohibited because it was deemed as violating International Trade in Arms Restrictions (ITAR). For the United States within ITAR is a list of restricted items pertaining to defense and space technology defined by the United States Munitions List (USML). The Obama administration had started revising the USML in 2013 because it has grown out of control and has always been considered overly broad and not very well defined. In my previous job I wasted many many hours and many many dollars maintaining ITAR compliance because of this poorly defined list. Communications (conversations and emails) with a foreign national can fall under ITAR restrictions. I had to be cognizant of ITAR restrictions even if I was just spit-balling ideas with a non-US citizen. The Trump administration finished in May 2018 this revision and clarification of the USML, that the Obama Administration started.
The revised USML removed the restrictions on items such as the “files” that Defense Distributed published. Hence the settlement to the lawsuit brought on by Defense Distributed against prohibition to publish by the United States Department of State.
Last night, US District Judge Robert Lasnik of Seattle WA issued a TEMPORARY RESTRAINING ORDER (TRO) against the removal of 3D printed firearms “files” from the USML. You can read the TRO HERE. If you read the restraining order it’s filed AGAINST the UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF STATE. It is not against Defense Distributed. This means that the prohibition to publish is a nationwide restraining order and not specific to Defense Distributed. Within this TRO the 8 states suing the Trump Administration are arguing that the country will suffer “irreparable harm” to WORLD AND NATIONAL SECURITY if the restrictions on publishing the “files” are removed from the USML.
It’s interesting that the argument to obtain the TRO is that these “files” for a plastic zip gun will cause worldwide calamity and that the noble 8 states are protecting the safety of the world. There is ONE “oh by the way” SENTENCE that removing the restriction from the USML might have “negative impacts on a state level“. Thus far, the 8 states who self proclaim as holders of morality for we lowly citizens and the rest of the world, have danced at the edge of dismantling the First Amendment using the USML to do their dirty work.
Here’s another little bit of legal mumbo jumbo. The TRO states that prohibiting the removal of the restrictions on the “files”, “… shall preserve the status quo ex ante...”. What “status quo ex ante” implies is that nothing changes but this evaluation of “no change” is a prediction base on, wait for it, NO evidence.
Okay so what does all this mean? The transfer of the “technical data” contained in the “files” temporarily remains part of the USML. A hearing on the TRO is scheduled for Aug. 10, 2018. Right now it is illegal to allow the export of these “files” to foreign countries. That is why I removed the link. I cannot guarantee ITAR compliance. I don’t have the resources to fight the government if they decided to prosecute me for an ITAR violation.
Now for some predictions. Defense Distributed has stated that they intend to continue the fight for the right to distribute “ideas” all the way to the Supreme Court of The United States, if necessary. I believe they will prevail. The next step, which right now is only a small step, is for the loony left to argue that ideas that they don’t like should be prevented by the force of law. This is when you can kiss the FIRST AMENDMENT goodbye.
The loons are using the USML to skirt around directly saying, “Lowly US Citizens have no right to exchange any thoughts or ideas we disagree with“. The left keeps saying that conservatives are FASCISTS, but what they are hoping for is a FASCIST STATE that they control. “Wrong thinkers, to the GULAG!”
We are at a tipping point in our country. The left wants to destroy the Constitution and remake the United States into their idea of a communist utopia. I have never seen anything even close to this in my lifetime. With the rise of socialism (as witnessed by the rise of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez) in the youth of America and the mainstream media (as witnessed by Joy Behar defending socialism on national television), and the trampling of the Constitution by the elder elites (as witnessed by the political leaders of the 8 states attempting to stifle the free exchange of ideas), it’s starting to look like a real possibility that the United States will morph into yet another failed communist state.
Welcome to the new world order comrade.
I need to leave anyone who reads this with a little present. You can go HERE and still find all the scary files. F’ you leftists!