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Congress Debating National Driver's License Rules
hamelis writes "The NYT [FRR: bugmenot]reporting on Congress' attempt to set national standards for issuing driver's licenses. The Secretary of Homeland Security could require licenses to contain fingerprints or retinal scans, and while states are not required to cooperate, if your license doesn't conform to federal standards, you can be denied "access to planes, trains and other modes of transportation." Additionally, the House version would require states to keep all license data in a linked database for quick access, and calls for "an integrated network of screening points that includes the nation's border security system, transportation system and critical infrastructure facilities." How is this functionally different from a national ID card?"
When the papers are more important then the man holding them we will all cease to be human.
I've hit Karma 50 and gotten a Score:5, Troll... I win!
When I first heard of this, it was only in its premature stages and only was going to be implemented for airports and other means of traveling so that passengers could go in the "express" lane because they were cleared to go.
Some people might exclaim that it is a genuine attempt by the government to shed and protect the US public from terrorists and if everyone followed the rules, sure it would. Terrorists follow the rules? No chance in hell, documents are easy to duplicate and this will only make the terrorists spend a couple more bucks at their local document "manufacturer". Which is no problem at all for them considering they have thousands in their bank accounts.
I seriously think the government underestimates the terrorists and well maybe they dont, they just take the US public for fools and yes the majority of the public are fools.
why can't we just use passports for this? Some sort of ID/tracking is a cost of travel any more. I just don't see why the feds need to get involved with state issues, since this doesn't really have anything to do with driving.
Decades ago we Americans would decry the authoritarian governments around the world, such as the former Soviet Union for the specific practice of requiring citizens to show papers for travel internal to their country.
If fear of terrorism and a mode of law enforcement that takes the "what's easiest for us?" mentality makes America into a police state, then the terrorist win and we'll be proven to both weak and stupid.
"Provided by the management for your protection."
The way I see it, this is a clear issue of states' rights. A state gets to decide what requirements there are for licensing of any kind within itself. This is why doctors don't have national medical licenses, and why you have to get a fishing permit for two states if you fish on both sides of the state border. It seems strange to me that they think that they can get away with this, regardless of which political party they belong to (theoretically, the Republicans should be decrying this as a socialist movement, and the Democrats, well, they should just know better).
But there's no question that this falls under the jurisdiction of the individual states. Hell, theoretically states could refuse to recognize a Federal driver's license.
The way I see it, this is a clear issue of states' rights.
The thing is, Supreme Court precedent is strongly against this point of view. The problem is that the government isn't directly mandating a federal ID, but rather refusing highway funding to those states who don't participate. It's the reason we have a drinking age of 21 in the US, and South Dakota v. Dole answered the question of whether or not it's Constitutional.
Frankly, with all the caving the Supreme Court has done over the last 200 years wrt states rights, we should just get it over with and abolish states rights altogether. Let the states exist like counties or incorporated cities, they basically already do.
Is that what Bush means when he says the terrorists only have to be right once? As bad as 9/11 was, there's only been one (and I'm sure there'll eventually be another one, if the terrorists are angry enough), but since then, we've been continuously defeating ourselves without another shot being fired from the enemy.
The first time I am walking down the street minding my own busisness and some cop tells me to show some ID or go to jail is the last time I ever carry ID on my person.
All Troll + "offtopic" mods are meta moderated as "Unfair", because you abused the system.
From the story: "How is this functionally different from a national ID card?"
It isn't different. The driver's license name is the kind of lying with which many things are sold to U.S. citizens. Other examples are: 1) The "Patriot" Missile, as though you are not patriotic unless you are in favor of a particular weapon of mass destruction. 2) The "Patriot" Act, as though you are not patriotic unless you are in favor of laws that most congress people passed without reading. And, 3) The "Peacekeeper" Missile, which tries to give people the idea that a nuclear weapon keeps the peace.
This kind of lying takes advantage of the fact that most U.S. citizens have to trust their government because they simply don't have time to understand what their government is doing.
Most media exists to make money. Advertisers are understandably careful not to alienate anyone. It is not possible to develop an accurate opinion of government activities only by listening to the carefully crafted phrases from media employees who would lose their jobs if they seemed to indicate a preference for one policy over another.
Books are the major media that are not ad-supported. Have a quick look at the reviews of 3 movies and 35 books that try to tell you a little about U.S. goverment corruption: Unprecedented Corruption: A guide to conflict of interest in the U.S. government. If you don't read about the subjects mentioned, you are not informed. If you don't like the books listed, pick your own.
Even though most people simply don't have time to understand their government, it is still amazing how much distrust U.S. citizens have of their government, and yet they don't take control.
There is good reason not to trust a more efficient national driver's license, because it would be used by the government to suppress political dissent. For example, see the New York Times article, F.B.I. Scrutinizes Antiwar Rallies. Here's a quote: "Critics of the Bush administration's Iraq policy, for instance, have sued the government to learn how their names ended up on a "no fly" list used to stop suspected terrorists from boarding planes." There are many people whose jobs depend on their ability to fly. They may be forced to stop any analysis of government activity if they are harassed when they try to fly.
That article discusses a few of the other abuses. If you didn't like the Vietnam War, and demonstrated against it, the FBI would go to your neighbors and friends and "investigate" you. Merely the investigation caused enough fear to discourage most people; they could not afford to lose friends and the support of neighbors. People would think, "If someone is being investigated, that person must have done something wrong."
(Note that you can read that article at the New York Times web site, but only under extremely adversarial conditions. You can pay more than the entire cost of the newspaper in which the article was originally printed. Or, you can get a discount under plans which cause you to lose your money in a short time if you don't use the plans quickly enough. No one should underestimate the self-destructive rapacity of managers of ad-supported media.)
Driver's licenses are already a national ID card. The U.S. government is only trying to make the data gathering more efficient. The fundamental problem is not whether or not a national ID card is a good idea, the problem is that, although the U.S. government functions well in many ways, the government is corrupt in many other ways.
If you truly love your country, you will not just enjoy the advantages, you will be there for your country when there are problems.
Simple. I am not required by law to have a driver's license. In many urban areas it is perfectly fine to not have one, as public transportation is good enough for getting around. As for getting on an airplane, I've travelled internationally, so I have a passport and I've not met an airline company that would not take one of those as a valid form of identification.
Sure, our country, its associated government, and the life and people here in general are in many respects very different from the USA, but no one here ever even thinks to protest the existence of national ID's. It simply doesn't cause any problems here in anyone's daily life (and no, it's not intellectual laziness or submission to the Big Brother, either - people here like complaining about the tiniest "issues" and are very keen on bashing the government when necessary). Quite the contrary, it's considered a good thing to be able to verify who you are when you want to, as well as to be able to know with reasonable (not perfect) certainty that the person you are in contact is in fact who you think he is.
I mean, sure you have to present the ID from time to time, like when opening bank accounts, or when buying alcohol and looking like you're underage, or making purchases over 50 euros in value with a credit card or a creditless "bank card" (I don't know an equivalent English term for that one, that's a direct translation), or somesuch. There simply is no tracking or snooping into our lives through ID cards. You can walk the streets and interact with people with near-total anonymity, pay in cash, etc. The driver's licenses in our pocket don't change that.
A much worse form of espionage are the regular customer membership cards for various large retail chains - now there's efficient tracking for ya. And they're by no means alien to the USA, but I haven't seen much hubbub about those, even though they are solely a tool for consumer behavior analyzation.
The fact that everyone has a nationally standardized means of identifying themselves doesn't automatically lead to all these worst-case scenarios presented in this thread and who knows how many others in past threads on the subject.
Then again, maybe even average US citizens have some valid reasons to actually fear the emergence of national IDs, dunno. I suppose this thread will bring them out.
Not every train and airplane trip is interstate. The federal government has no jusrisdiction over intrastate transportation.
Software sucks. Open Source sucks less.
The real purpose of fingerprints on drivers licenses is simply to put them in a database. That way if we find fingerprints at the scene of a murder, we can cross check them with the DMV. Linking them to other databases is just a side benefit for the authoritarians. That the cheapass thumbprint is pretty much useless for criminology is another matter...
Everyone who works with children has had to sumbit full and complete fingerprints to the FBI for decades. But no one ever stopped to think that mandatory fingerprinting was wrong until it affected them. Sigh.
Don't blame me, I didn't vote for either of them!
The assholes at the DHLS won't even TELL you what landed you on the list. You're effectively being interfered with without being told of the charges.
If you're TRULY innocent, even a rabble-rouser in word but not in physical act, you could land on that list, never get off, and if they know you're on a flight to points outside the US, they can effectively detain you.
Worse, still, this kind of listing FORCES, COMPELS a subduing of the nations most vocal, outspoken types, for they who have money and time to travel will keep low. Some already have been, long before the DNF List, preferring to use proxies or lobbyists. But, for those like myself who "mouth from the hip" (umm, a poor play on "shoot from the hip"(sucking of any kind is NOT inferred in this context...)), we could be in deep travel-suspension.
THIS is probably what the damned corruptos in office have been plotting, twiddling their thumbs over for months.
Possible resolutions:
If you're on the DNF List, and you have a clean record,
--then an agent could fly with you and threaten to blast you with a TASER or a cyanide-needle, as case needs determine
--the government could TELL you in timely fashion (especially now that they're getting booking information, but ad-hoc/last-minute flyers will be hit hardest) that you have to clear up some things before they un-highlight your name on the list
--the list needs to be made ADAPTIVE: Just because you get ON the goddamned wretched thing doesn't mean you're SUPPOSED to be on it; once they satisfy that in the near term no real corroborative negative information is sticking to you, they can command the DNFL to silently de-highlight your name and maybe you wouldn't even KNOW you're on it; even the airport ticket or counter agents might never know
--offer the DNFL people a group class charter plane, if they're all lucky enough to fly to general points in the general area; the plane could be shadowed, or the occupants could submit to being restrained to seats but that would be harsh, unusual, and cruel if stretches or bowel or bladder relief could not be facilitated; but REINFORCED DOORS between the cockpit and the pax would solve problems (as long as the cabin pressurization is not subject to abuse); hell, if some greedy, PHB airline officials long ago decided to install reinforced doors and electrical grids when they were cheaper (vs under emergency rush orders after 9/11) then 9/11 probably would have NEVER happened with airplanes-- it would have been something else, and we'd probably NOT have the damned No Fly List.
Many of these problems are the result of bean counters not paying close attention to HISTORY. Some assholes tried to hijack El Al, and the Israelis basically said "NOT EVER AGAIN". The US has a few hijackings and some ASSHOLE insurance companies want to raise rates (as they should if screening is lousy) but the airliners negotiate in back rooms and plead (it's unforseeable; it's never happened before (despite prior incidents in other nations where they conveniently remove that incident from reporting cuz it wasnt' on US soil...))
Now, here in the US, supposedly, we don't have enough sky marshalls on the planes. Airlines want to be REactive vs PROactive. The government (the current occupants/cabal and sulliers of the oval office) sees and grabs for more power, rather than FIXING our screwed-up foreign policy, energy policy, and play-favorites treatment of foreign nationals who starve or die daily from civil unrest.
DAMN, too much of the brownies today! But, have I LIED anywhere in my writings?!
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
More detail here, under the "Constitutional Issues" section. (References are given.)