Baltimore: I hope you'll save yourself the embarrassment

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The Executive Director of the Ancient Coin Collectors' Guild last week made a comment on the content of this blog over on Looting matters. He admonished David Gill:

I hope you'll save yourself the embarrassment of ressurecting that ludicrous claim that ACCG itself violated some law by launching a test case in U.S. Federal Court. That charge by one of your colleagues has already spun itself into oblivion along with whatever shred might have been left of the author's credibility.

"Spun into oblivion" eh? Should I be embarrassed that an organization like the ACCG questions the credibility of my arguments?

If US law says that to export certain types of objects from a certain place and after a certain date, they have to be accompanied by certain documents (there is choice of two types laid down by the CCPIA) anyone who imports objects of those types from those places after a certain date without them is illegally importing them. Likewise if they take their car on the road without the documents US law requires the driver to be able to produce, they are driving their car illegally. Or have a gun without having applied for the requisite permits and undergoing the attendant screening. I do not see anything embarrassing about pointing that out.

The ACCG imported a few dozen ancient coins into the US in defiance of the existing legislation in order to precipitate a court case. They could see no way to provoke the desired effect by legally importing the coins. It seems to me that it is the coineys who are getting embarrassed by it being pointing out.