That has such people in’t:
(via)
A 3D printable plastic handgun is now (more or less) available.
As the linked article suggests, there is a nasty possibility of having the thing blow up in your hand if you use too-powerful ammunition…but still.
Talking Points Memo is also on the story, with a gussied up video that adds swelling music and shots of WW II bombers to the mix. They grabbed this quote (warning – do not read while eating lunch):
“I recognize that this tool might be used to harm people,” Wilson said, according to Fox News. “That’s what it is — it’s a gun. But I don’t think that’s a reason to not put it out there. I think that liberty in the end is a better interest.”
Presented without further comment, this story, also now up on TPM.
And this one.
And this one (per commenter StringOnAStick @ 15).
And…hell, wait half an hour and there will be another tragedy to report. (At somewhere north of 50 gun suicides per day, that’s a reasonably non-hyperbolic time period — to say nothing of gun violence imposed on others.)
The nuts, Civil War revanchists, and simple thugs who drive gun policy in this country are a danger to themselves and everyone else. Demographics are not their friend ...but real political change ain’t arriving nearly fast enough.
Zifnab
Finally, a home made pipe-bomb that fits snuggly within your hand. Truly, there is no end to the wisdom of our Libertarian brethren.
Chris
Arms dealers own America as thoroughly as drug dealers own Mexico. And actually, that comparison is probably unfair to the Mexican government.
Yutsano
I cannot wait until one misfires and blows up and takes off a hand. But hey, FREEDUMB!!
GregB
Remember when homemade guns were called zip guns and they were used by bike gangs, gun thugs and garden variety criminals?
The cult of death worship is quickening in this nation at a meteoric pace.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
They have internalized the very Randian view of liberty: It’s all about me (sorry to involve you, Phineas and Ferb). If others get killed so that I can have my freedom, that’s just the price we all pay.
I can’t wait for the first lawsuit against the person who came up with the design, and the 3D printer, when someone loses a hand.
Omnes Omnibus
I can’t imagine that gun manufacturers will see this as a good thing.
dollared
Hmmmmm…..wouldn’t be too hard to publish one with inadequate firing chamber reinforcement, or improper ammunition guidance…….
And don’t think of that as evil. Think of it as “Assisted Darwinism.” Intelligent Design!
Yutsano
@Omnes Omnibus: This does put the NRA in a wee bit of a pickle doesn’t it?
Fair Economist
This could have complicated effects. The drive behind gun nuttery is the gun manufacturers who have figured out how to manipulate a vulnerable section of the populace into wasting vast amounts of their money on guns and ammo. The Founding Fathers and Americans in general prior to the 70’s were perfectly fine with gun regulations.
While wide availability of 3D printing makes it virtually impossible to limit guns (although not ammo) it also could easily take most of the profits out of gun manufacturing. If manufacturers can’t make enough to pay for manipulating the rubes, they will have to stop and the populace may become much saner about gun regulation.
Zifnab
@Omnes Omnibus: Nonsense. It just gets gun manufacturers into the same game as the RIAA and MPAA. Copy write licensing and enforcement is the real economy of tomorrow.
Forum Transmitted Disease
An interesting experiment; pulling firearms beyond the reach of politics. Not an ethical experiment but an experiment nonetheless.
In an intelligent world, such a development would force us to face and address the human issues behind violence.
I suspect that debate is simply too tough to have, so we’ll keep speaking of gun violence in political/tribal terms rather than face the human issues behind gun violence.
Omnes Omnibus
@Zifnab: In other words, they are screwed.
Amir Khalid
So what niche in the gun market is this product supposed to fill? The high-tech Saturday night special?
Ryan C
Honestly, more destructive instructions are easily available on the Internet now. The bombs used at the Boston marathon were almost identical to things I read about making as a teenager.
The problem isn’t so much the information. It’s that we fetishize these things. We’ve got to separate “manly” from “violent.”
StringOnAStick
You should have added the TPM link to the guy who was pulled over for running a stop sign, and came out of his car with his AR-15 blazing at the cops. It is certainly worth reading the whole story, especially when you scroll down and see where he apparently obtained some of his rifle fighting techniques. The bit of dashboard cam from the police officers POV is shocking, and makes it clear why cops are so damned paranoid anymore.
http://editors.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/2013/05/when_stories_collide_1.php
SatanicPanic
If this happens at least we won’t need to pry it from cold, dead hands.
? Martin
This is a tactical mistake by the gun folks. Congress is going to regulate firearms. We might be in an insane window now, but the moment a Republican wins the White House, the GOP will support all of this regulation. If we’re in an era of untraceable guns, they’re going to accede to a registry or to traceable ammunition instead.
This is going to cost the gun community quite a lot in the long run.
Patricia Kayden
Very disappointing that gun nuts run Congress. Amazing that something as benign as background checks has no chance of passing. I hope things change by the time 2016 rolls around, i.e., more Dems in Congress.
Yutsano
@StringOnAStick: Jeebus. I wish they’d just come out an fucking revolt already. Then we could solve the Civil War issue once and for all and maybe just break this damned wingnut crazy.
SatanicPanic
@StringOnAStick: At least the story had a happy ending.
deep tin
Just imagine how easy it would be to smuggle a gun into a secure area. Granted the 3-d printers are pretty bulky now, but they may get smaller and cheaper in the future.
Amir Khalid
This is not much, but at least it’s a start.
? Martin
True for now. We’ve got Selective Laser Melting (SLM) machines that will make that same gun out of metal. Expensive, but that will change. The marginal cost of the parts is getting competitive with traditional manufacturing of guns – it’s the up-front cost of the machine which is what’s stopping it from happening. Pretty high fixed cost to make up. That’s what will drop the fastest.
roc
@? Martin:
Not unless they want to get primaried. What reasonable center is going to stand up to the billionaire-backed fringe? Guns are a dead issue until demographics deliver 60 (actual) Democratic Party votes in the Senate or until the GOP itself collapses and US party lines shift.
Tonal Crow
And in related news, if we ban guns, murderers’ll just use hubcaps:
http://news.yahoo.com/ak-47-wielding-gunman-fires-37-times-shocked-225626374.html
Terrifying dash-cam footage captures the moment a crazed motorist opened fire with a 1966 Dodge Dart hubcap at police officers who had just pulled him over for a minor traffic violation in Middlefield, Ohio.
James Gilkerson, 42, exited his parked car and then threw his deadly hubcap 37 times at the officers and their patrol car, the Cleveland Plain Dealer reported. Officers Erin Thomas and Brandon Savage returned fire with their service revolvers, killing Gilkerson.
…
Police have no idea why Gilkerson opened fire.
…
“He got of the vehicle, intending to kill my officers. We don’t know why he did it,” said Middlefield Police Chief Arnold Stanko. “He was a scumbag, and a terrorist, and he’s dead.”
In the March 10 video, Gilkerson exits his car–which the officers pulled over for running a stop sign–and sprays the patrol car with rounds of hubcapfire, cracking the windshield.
Thomas, reportedly outside the patrol car on the driver’s side, is heard shouting as the hubcap flew at them again and again and again. Stanko said Gilkerson was shot several times, but kept throwing his hubcap; he even shouted, “Kill me.” Savage returns fire through the windshield, after which the officers kill Gilkerson.
Thomas lost a finger in the shootout; Savage sustained minor injuries to his left thigh….
Raven Onthehill
“…there is a nasty possibility of having the thing blow up in your hand if you use too-powerful ammunition…”
Or just blow up in your hand, period. Every object made by additive fabrication is a one-off.
Circle, circle, circle…
catclub
FYWP ate my comment.
Firearm manufacturers ( the NRA) will want to use the power of the government and their federal licensing to limit the rights of individuals to make guns with these methods.
Ironic.
? Martin
@roc:
Won’t be an issue. Rules change when it’s a Republican in the WH. See Bush, deficits, Medicare D, nation building, and so on. So long as a GOP President supports the legislation, it’ll be okay with the base. And the President won’t get primaried.
Chris
@roc:
This.
catclub
@deep tin: I already watched the Clint Eastwood. John Malkovich assassination movie.
Amir Khalid
@Tonal Crow:
There is clearly a gap in my knowledge of firearms. How does a hubcap work as a gun?
scav
@Amir Khalid: Test. You may have have joined the prestigeous Yatsuno-triangle of comments club.
ETA. not this time. Anyway, I think you may have underestimated the ability of nuts to be buying more kids guns from that firm on the Chik Fil A Piss-off Lie-brals principle. Who needs advertising when that self-organizes?
Tonal Crow
@Amir Khalid: Take yer snark pills. This post takes to its logical conclusion the Republican bromide that banning guns won’t affect violent crime rates. It’s suppose to read absurdly, because the argument it’s satirizing is absurd.
Cris (without an H)
If they outlaw 3D-printed guns, next thing you know they’ll outlaw 3D-printed bongs
Tonal Crow
@Cris (without an H):
You’ve got that backward and inside out. It should read: they won’t outlaw 3D-printed guns, but will trip over their microscopic dongs in their haste to outlaw 3D-printed bongs. (Not to mention the next menace: 3D-printed porno objects and sex toys).
Roy G.
Yes, this is a bad idea, however, it may not make things worse with the NRA nutters – for the same reason that the Prius isn’t challenging the RAM 4×4 with this demographic.
ie. it’s not ‘badass’ looking enough to suit their macho egos.
Trollhattan
Totally the wrong use of this technology. Folks should be 3D-printing their targets, not their shooty things. For example.
http://wonkette.com/515265/why-is-the-nra-censoring-this-innocent-dead-obama-mannequin-that-bleeds-when-you-shoot-him
See, Freedom needs to remain free.
dollared
@Roy G.: Easily solved. Make it look like an Imperial Storm Trooper Assault Energy Weapon. Plastic is cheap….
catclub
@scav: Is that triangle the reason FYWP eats posts. I responded to one of Yutsano’s.
BTW, Yutsano, not Yatsuno. Maybe that was also ironic.
Amir Khalid
@dollared:
And make it go “pew pew pew” when you fire it …
jl
Been out of the loop most of the weekend. But I did hear a news report that the NRA decided to unleash a ‘culture war’ (which, IIRC, was the news report quoting the NRA).
The NRA has gone nuts, or maybe has polling that indicates the public (and maybe even its own membership) is so solidly behind better gun and ammo regulation that they are desperate.
I guess the NRA figured they could unleash a can of righteous culture war wedge issue whoop ass that would solidify the GOP base and scare their political tools into keeping sane regulation at bay.
But, looks like they did not understand what kind of crazy base-head whoop ass their announced culture war would stir up. And if this racist and violent right wing anarchist (for that is what it is) garbage keeps up, the backlash will be very damaging to the NRA and their buddies.
joes527
@Omnes Omnibus: Meh.
This is and will remain exactly no one’s only gun.
It is a fetish item that will be owned by folks who own lots of real guns. It will divert exactly $0 from gun sales, while at the same time supporting the “guns are fun” mentality that makes people want to buy more real guns.
The gun manufacturers see this as a huge win.
scav
@catclub: I’m wondering. Do we need a user named Bermuda to properly test? But any triangle so-discovered should be named after Yutsy, clearly. Stick a flag in it, call the cartographers and update googlemaps.
danimal
@catclub: Time for the Obamas to come out strong against 3D printing of guns. The NRA will spin itself into an even more incoherent sputtering rage as the GOP-operative NRA reflexively opposes Obama while the gun-manufactuing interest group NRA finds itself supporting Obama.
And both NRAs will be packing.
jl
And I been saying that one of the powerful ideas behind US style gun nuttery is that the second amendment contains some kind of Constitutional right to shoot up the place as a form of redress of grievances. Exactly how that is supposed to work without violent anarchy breaking out is hard to figure, but these people don’t figure too well.
And that is there the out-of-context Jefferson quote about watering the tree of liberty with blood comes in. As I posted last week, if you read it in context, Jefferson is saying the opposite of what these nut cases think he was saying. But, shows you now much they really know (squat) about how our government is supposed to work.
But, what it leads to, as the TPM clip about the shoot-out indicates, is right wing deranged loons with poor impulse control going off because of a traffic stop and similar forms of tyranny. Maybe the guy figured he would go down fighting rather than jail time (though I don’t remember reading that he had violated any gun laws in the article). But more likely, he just went nuts, and was fighting the tyranny of a effing traffic stop. Though, If anyone has a link with more info, I would be interested in reading it.
Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism
@GregB:
Came here for this.
Leaving happy.
TriassicSands
Given who the people are who are likely to use this, I’d say that is a feature, not a bug.
joes527
@StringOnAStick: The most amazing thing about that incident was the number of misses by both the good and bad guys.
Thank god no one down the street or in one of the houses was killed.
And yeah, if the dude actually got firearm training, his estate should be looking to get his money back.
Amir Khalid
@scav:
Gasp!
Avery Greynold
@Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism: Wow, sure beats a shotgun shell in some common plumbing parts. Not.
Yatsuno
@Amir Khalid: Maybe I need to do a nym change. Plus Yatsuno is prolly a Japanese name and I kinda like it. Moderation here I come!
Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism
@StringOnAStick: Gah.
Once for the article’s subject.
Once for the lack of proofreading on the article. What, spell check is too hard for TPM now?
catclub
@joes527: The first crude example may not be what ends up taking business away from the gun manufacturers. Since making your own gun is already possible with a home machine shop, the manufacture itself is not new, but it might still change the manufacturing dynamics.
Kiril
It’s already legal to make your own gun. You can google “homemade gun plans” and find plenty of free plans that use very cheap materials. The only thing stopping people now is the lack of desire to do it. Nothing has changed except that this guy is getting a lot of publicity and people are getting upset on the internet.
catclub
@dollared: I don’t think I am going to subscribe to your newsletter, even though I am intrigued by your ideas.
daverave
The guy in that video immediately struck me as a total a-hole… so proud of his manhood for being the first. FLICK him.
chopper
@? Martin:
i’m trying to figure out exactly when congress would get around to regulating this particular type of gun (dunno how they’d do it anyways), and all i can come up with is ’10 minutes after a high-ranking republican lawmaker is shot with one’.
Snark Based Reality
I’m going to split from my liberal brethren and point out many of your reactions in these comments are a combination of future shock and denial.
The cost of 3D printing is dropping and is becoming more and more viable as technology improves. A low-end 3D printer is $2,000 and the plastic material is cheap.
What this guy did was inevitable. Anyone exposed to 3D printing figured it was only a matter of a couple years before anything that could be 3D printed will be. Him doing it first was more of a “first!” thing.
Sorry but it isn’t viable to ban possession of something that can be made at home using materials and tools that have very legitimate legal uses without major invasion of privacy and destruction of civil liberties.
Gun control in the form of outright bans of physical items is not long term viable as technology progresses. Viable long term strategies involving mental health will be far more effective than who owns what physical object.
Also, too: You will pry millimeter scanners and such from the cold dead fingers of the TSA as metal scanners will increasingly become a joke.
Higgs Boson's Mate
Black powder pistols and rifles are not considered firearms and can be ordered online. They are not subject to registration. A decent, ready to fire .44 caliber black powder revolver costs less than three hundred bucks. These are the same weapons used to kill or wound thousands in the venerated Wild West.
Modern black powder substitute propellants are subject to the same shipping and storage regulations as smokeless powder. These regulations are less stringent than those which apply to black powder. The propellant, slugs, and percussion caps needed to fire black powder weapons are all available online.
Mike G
Plastic guns have obvious durability issues. If you want to fire off a few shots before discarding the gun it will probably perform OK. But with the media attention and ease of ‘manufacturing’ one of these, I’m counting the days until some idiot blows his hand off by using this like a normal steel pistol, over and over again for weeks or months.
SatanicPanic
@Snark Based Reality:
We ban counterfeiting money, what’s the difference?
Ted & Hellen
testing
Snark Based Reality
@SatanicPanic:
We have a dedicated federal agency for that named of all things the “Secret Service”. Many stores in my area won’t accept anything higher than a $20 bill. And it’s becoming increasingly legally dubious to carry large amounts of cash.
So how well do you think we are doing on that front? ;-)
Edit: Also keep in mind only around 3 to 8% of world currency is in a physical form, conversion from digital to physical currency is logged, there is almost always a camera on you in stores at cash registers, etc. How far down the rabbit hole do we want to go at linking everything up by currency serial number?
SatanicPanic
@Snark Based Reality: I don’t get, it you didn’t really answer my question, you just said it would be hard.
Higgs Boson's Mate
@SatanicPanic:
We also ban counterfeiting Gucci handbags. There’s no ban against making a perfect copy of a Gucci handbag at home as long as you don’t try to sell it.
Calouste
@joes527: The guy used a semi-auto, not a sniper rifle. The whole idea behind auto and semi-auto firearms is that you spray bullets in the general direction of the target and the law of large numbers dictates that a few of them hit.
SatanicPanic
@Higgs Boson’s Mate: I wouldn’t object to 3-D printing guns if I thought no one would ever shoot anyone with them.
Snark Based Reality
@SatanicPanic:
I said it wouldn’t be viable. As in you will not prevent people from owning a gun if they want one. Controlling manufacturing and distribution in the retail channels wouldn’t fix anything. It doesn’t prevent the negatives and introduces more. All that happens is you add more laws for police and prosecutors to throw on people not involved in a violent crime.
Also: Laws that add on additional penalties for possession of an item (guns, computers, etal) while committing a crime are also bullshit. You committed murder, the fact you did it with a gun shouldn’t flipping matter sentencing wise. Hell… I’d be more afraid of the guy who did it with his bare hands.
SatanicPanic
@Snark Based Reality: What do you define as “viable”? Sure, there’s nothing that will prevent a determined computer whiz from somehow getting around some safeguards. But preventing a group of 14 year old dummies from printing out a gun and blowing their hands off? Probably not that hard.
Snark Based Reality
@SatanicPanic:
Viable as in:
– Not preventing school shootings and other mass violence events
– Not preventing usage of guns in drug related crimes
– Not preventing crazy militia groups being armed
– Any benefit from murder rates involving guns will only be because we’ve further elevated the massive prison population in this country and we’re getting better at finding stupid official reasons to lock up potentially mentally unstable people
US citizens have a massive inventory of guns, it’s ingrained into our culture (families passing down guns, etc), and with technology advancing any means of controlling gun distribution by controlling manufacturing will be laughable.
Our problem with guns will have to be addressed as a public health problem if we’re going to have any success in reducing gun violence.
If a 14 year old wants to blow themselves up there is always bomb making. Good luck getting that information purged from the Internet even with raping and pillaging the first amendment.
SatanicPanic
@Snark Based Reality: I don’t think it could prevent all, I am sure the number is greater than 0% but less than 100%.
Kids know the difference between what a bomb does and what a gun does. Apples to oranges.
What’re the odds of gettin some sort of federal mental health bill passed?
Snark Based Reality
@SatanicPanic:
We’ll have to disagree on predicted effectiveness. :-)
As for passing mental health care reform that is more complex than doing nothing so the odds of it happening anytime soon have a remarkably zero-like probability.
After all… An athiest would argue that fundamentalist christianity is not distinguishable from mental illness and what would repubs do without their base?
SatanicPanic
@Snark Based Reality: Them and the sociopaths, also not considered insane. What is the definition of insane worth anyway?
kerFuFFler
@daverave:
Couldn’t agree more. The glare that he maintains after shooting the gun was such a pathetic way of trying to appear manly. It just made him look spiteful.
joes527
@Calouste:
Yeah, well, so much for that thought. He shot a metric fuckton of bullets in the direction of the cops, not hitting them once. (He did seem to hit their windshield at least once, so evidently he _could_ hit the broad side of a barn)
The cops returned as good as they got. And yeah, their hit/miss ratio sucked. But then again they could only kill him once, so made no difference. The law of large numbers did its job for the cops.
Something tells me that even with a pew-pew-pew gun, you need to do better than spray in a general direction.
joes527
It is interesting that they didn’t show the target. I wouldn’t be surprised if the safest place to be standing when someone shoots a plastic gun is directly in the cross-hairs. No telling where the bullet is going to go, but most likely not where it is aimed.
The Other Bob
Just watch the NRA come out in favor of a ban. If they don’t it might put the gun-makers/NRA funders out of buisness.
dance around in your bones
@Yatsuno: Just checking the new nym, as I am one of those affected by the Y Triangle :(
ETA: Worked!
Sad_Dem
@dollared: Agreed. If it doesn’t have a steel chamber and a rifled steel barrel, it ain’t much of a firearm. Rifling machines are rare, expensive, and difficult to operate. This latest news story is, so to speak, a flash in the pan.
Incitatus for Senate
Wake me up when they can 3D print hardened steel. Until then who cares.
Lee Rudolph
Just sighted on the Boston Globe’s website:
I think it’s already been found, guys.
pseudonymous in nc
@Snark Based Reality:
Let’s wait until we see the first person to shoot his nuts off from using one of this tech troll’s designs. 3D printing is still really fucking crude, and it’s really something to see all the people who think that plastic is plastic is plastic.
Uh, no. The Venn Diagram for “potential gun mass murderers” and “mentally ill” has a relatively small intersection. How about treating that one special group of physical objects designed to kill as if they’re not fucking sacred?
Lurking Canadian
@Sad_Dem: An FDM machine ought to be able to make you a rifled barrel in one piece, no need for rifling after the fact. It’d be tricky to get the sacrificial
material out of the grooves, but tricky isn’t impossible.
Now, whether the resulting rifled tube could withstand an enclosed detonation of cordite without splitting, sagging or melting, I have absolutely no idea