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Serious question: Even if a government makes encryption illegal, if I have the source code to gpg then I can still encrypt anything I want right? In other words, even if we lose secure access via SSL because of a master cipher, nobody can make the gpg source code, for example, disappear entirely.

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Sure, but that same government can jail you for using it, or jail you for refusing to turn over the passphrase to your encryption key.

The government also can't stop you from robbing your neighbor, but that's not how laws work. Laws are about punishing you after the fact. If they catch you, of course.

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