Real ID: You Can Still Fight It

toupsz writes "Bill Scannell has created a website where anyone and everyone can fax their senators regarding the Real ID Act. Note that the act is up for vote on Tuesday, May 10th! All those against the Act might want to go to Bill's site: UnrealID.com. Thanks, Cory from BoingBoing!"

Comments

What's so bad?

[TheKidWho]

I mean seriously, what is so bad? Is everyone really buying into that Big Brother Crap where the government is going to know everywhere we go and shiat?

Most European Countries use ID's like this already.

Re:What's so bad?

[uqbar]

Bruce Schneier (as usual) has good insights on this.

Re:What's so bad?

[stlhawkeye]

I mean seriously, what is so bad? Is everyone really buying into that Big Brother Crap where the government is going to know everywhere we go and shiat?

I don't care about the Big Brother side, I care about the part where our officials are enacting pointless legislation that won't solve anything but will create a whole new department of bureaucracy that you and I get to pay for. Hell no.

Re:What's so bad?

[null etc.]

REAL ID also prohibits states from issuing driver's licenses to illegal aliens. This makes no sense, and will only result in these illegal aliens driving without licenses -- which isn't going to help anyone's security.

Yeah, that's some REAL good insight.

Re:What's so bad?

[DrStrange66]

Sounds to me that paranoia is what drives this "REAL" guy. One of the points he makes is about the magnetic strip on the id making it easy to sell info to companies without authorization. I'm not a lawyer but that sounds illegal. That's beside the point. My driver's license already has a magnetic strip and I have had it scanned on a few occasions without consequence. This card makes it more difficult for illegal aliens and terrorists. Seems like a good idea to me.

Re:What's so bad?

[intnsred]

I'll ignore the fact that this law blatantly violates the 10th Amendment, and will instead cite this CNet article by someone who knows far more about the law than I do:

How Real ID will affect you
By Declan McCullagh

What's all the fuss with the Real ID Act about?

President Bush is expected to sign an $82 billion military spending bill soon that will, in part, create electronically readable, federally approved ID cards for Americans. The House of Representatives overwhelmingly approved the package--which includes the Real ID Act--on Thursday.

What does that mean for me?

Starting three years from now, if you live or work in the United States, you'll need a federally approved ID card to travel on an airplane, open a bank account, collect Social Security payments, or take advantage of nearly any government service. Practically speaking, your driver's license likely will have to be reissued to meet federal standards. News.context

What's new:

The House of Representatives has approved an $82 billion military spending bill with an attachment that would mandate electronically readable ID cards for Americans. President Bush is expected to sign the bill.

Bottom line:

The Real ID Act would establish what amounts to a national identity card. State drivers' licenses and other such documents would have to meet federal ID standards established by the Department of Homeland Security.

More stories on this topic

The Real ID Act hands the Department of Homeland Security the power to set these standards and determine whether state drivers' licenses and other ID cards pass muster. Only ID cards approved by Homeland Security can be accepted "for any official purpose" by the feds.

How will I get one of these new ID cards?

You'll still get one through your state motor vehicle agency, and it will likely take the place of your drivers' license. But the identification process will be more rigorous.

For instance, you'll need to bring a "photo identity document," document your birth date and address, and show that your Social Security number is what you had claimed it to be. U.S. citizens will have to prove that status, and foreigners will have to show a valid visa.

State DMVs will have to verify that these identity documents are legitimate, digitize them and store them permanently. In addition, Social Security numbers must be verified with the Social Security Administration.

What's going to be stored on this ID card?

At a minimum: name, birth date, sex, ID number, a digital photograph, address, and a "common machine-readable technology" that Homeland Security will decide on. The card must also sport "physical security features designed to prevent tampering, counterfeiting, or duplication of the document for fraudulent purposes."

Homeland Security is permitted to add additional requirements--such as a fingerprint or retinal scan--on top of those. We won't know for a while what these additional requirements will be.

Why did these ID requirements get attached to an "emergency" military spending bill? Because it's difficult for politicians to vote against money that will go to the troops in Iraq and tsunami relief. The funds cover ammunition, weapons, tracked combat vehicles, aircraft, troop housing, death benefits, and so on.

The House already approved a standalone version of the Real ID Act in February, but by a relatively close margin of 261-161. It was expected to run into some trouble in the Senate. Now that it's part of an Iraq spending bill, senators won't want to vote against it.

What's the justification for this legislation anyway?

Its supporters say that the Real ID Act is necessary to hinder terrorists, and to follow the ID card recommendations that the 9/11 Commission made last year.

It will "hamper the ability of terrorist and criminal aliens to move freely throughout our socie

Re:What's so bad?

[waynelorentz]

EAL ID also prohibits states from issuing driver's licenses to illegal aliens. This makes no sense, and will only result in these illegal aliens driving without licenses -- which isn't going to help anyone's security.

It happens already. I got hit head-on on a one-way street by an illegal alien driving a stolen van with no license and no insurance in Houston, Texas. Fortunately, a cop was driving right behind me. Unfortunately, the cop let her go because she is illegal. At the time (March 2003, I don't know if it's still true), the police were under orders from city council not to arrest illegal aliens unless they do something like murder, rob, or rape. It was part of then-mayor Lee Brown's plan to make Houston a safe haven for illegals so he could boost census numbers and bring in more money from the federal government. Since the city signs the cops paychecks, not the federal government, they do what council wants, not what the law is -- and that means letting people who have broken the law go free. I'm so glad I moved to the north.

Re:What's so bad?

[discordja]

REAL ID also prohibits states from issuing driver's licenses to illegal aliens. This makes no sense, and will only result in these illegal aliens driving without licenses -- which isn't going to help anyone's security.

Wrong, it means they can't issue a drivers licence that has any value as an ID card. For example, in TN, there are two forms of licenses available. One that can be issued to undocs that states clearly 'For Driving Only' and is not a valid ID for airports etc. This does not limit whom the states may give a drivers license to but it does limit the value of that license if it does not meet certain minimum standards.

Re:What's so bad?

[Holi]

Well for one, I am not required to have a passport.

Re:What's so bad?

[AviLazar]

CC is commonly used form of ID. You can check into a flight with a CC, a bar, ect. Social security card is considered a form of ID. There was a checklist of what is considered forms of ID, driver's license and SS card together is the same as a passport (according to the list).

Really? Where? I worked at three different banks and each of those had CC as a secondary form of ID (you had to have a primary with you). I worked as a bouncer at a bar and we didn't accept CC's as 1) it didnt state your age 2) didn't have your picture.

Now at banks what we did accept was: DL, state ID (official), passport, military ID, green card. At a bar we accepted all of those ID's. There may be one or two I am missing but all of the official ID's have this in common: Picture, Age, and were issued by the fed/state/local gov't.

RFID I agree should not be included. If someone wants to see my ID information they need to ask me for it (or grab it from my body), not just get near me with a scanner. As for paying for it - we currently pay for ID's, and if handled properly (by merging all id's to one form) it might get cheaper (though the way our gov't is run, i doubt it).

Everyone COULD demand to see ID, but not everyone will get it. Then again, they can just as well demand it now. Do you think if the GAP store didn't demand your DL before they will do so now? The bank has and will continue to do so, bars will (those that do in the first place), police will, and so forth.

Re:What's so bad?

[camliner]

Look at the no child left behind act. Oh yes, that do SOOOO well didn't it?

Evidently not...

Re:What's so bad?

[pilgrim23]

Another REAL product? Will this ID included embeded Spyware an Adware like all their other products?

Re:What's so bad?

[dadeSF]

There are some good initiatives in this bill. One of them is eliminating the 10,000 adjustments limit for asylees.

there are currenly 180,000 asylees waiting to get their green cards, and with this cap in place it'll take more then 18 years to get it (and then another 5 to get citizenship).

Re:What's so bad?

[As Seen On TV]

A passport is required to re-enter the United States, even if the place to which you're going doesn't require you to show one.

Last May, I went to a family friend's house on a small private island off the Florida Keys for Memorial Day. (The owner went to boarding school with my Dad, became a banker, grew to be super-rich, all years before I was born.) Because the island was outside US territorial waters, I had to show my passport at airport customs to get back in, even though the entire island where we went was privately owned.

Passports are required by the United States when a US citizen crosses the border inbound, no matter where you're coming from.

Re:What's so bad?

[david duncan scott]

You're not required to have a driver's license, either.

However, if you wish to, for instance, cash a check, you may be asked for ID. Your local store might choose to accept your word for your identity, or you may choose to avail yourself of the identification provided by your state, which is generally more widely accepted. Still, you aren't being required to have anything, if you're willing to operate on a cash basis or only with people who know and trust you.

Re:What's so bad?

[CodeBuster]

Populist policies, which are exploited by politicians such as the aforementioned mayor, are common in South America and Mexico and it doesn't take a rocket scientist to see the end result of those policies. The problem is that selective enforcement of laws for political purposes breeds contempt for all laws which leads to rampant government corruption, citizen vigilantism, and, in the most extreme cases, armed rebellions. If the states are not enforcing federal laws then the federal government needs to step in and do it for them before the problems escalate out of control.

Re:What's so bad?

[As Seen On TV]

Well, really it doesn't. The act only seeks to establish federal guidelines for what kinds of ID the states can issue. The act won't establish a bureau of federal licenses or anything like that. It just sets the standards and mandates that the states follow.

It's called an "unfunded mandate," and to respond to that other poster out there someplace, no, it's no more a violation of the 10th Amendment than federal highway safety laws are.

Re:What's so bad?

[milimetric]

what is so bad?

1.) See Roman empire for downfall.
2.) Hackers are going to know everything about you by walking past you. They can even cut your finger off and use your precious Biometric security enabled device because they'll know your 16-digit password is your social security number plus your last name and birthday, Mr. Smith.
3.) You don't need an ID to take off with a plane from Canada and smash it into whatever the expletive you want.

Re:What's so bad?

[DavidTC]

You do not need a passport to get back into this country if you are a citizen. A passport is just a way to demonstrate that you are one, because only US citizens can have US passports.

Legally, they cannot keep US citizens out of the US. Now, airlines can stop them from flying in, or Canada may not let them walk to the border, but the US government cannot keep Americans out of the country. (Barring some sort of due process of law that results in exile, but exile is not currently a punishment for any crimes.)

Do people honestly not know this? You really think the government can say 'No, you stepped out of the country, we do not have to let you back in?'. That's been like the definition of 'citizen of a country' for millennia...they have to take you back.

Re:What's so bad?

[poot_rootbeer]

"Starting three years from now, if you live or work in the United States, you'll need a federally approved ID card to travel on an airplane, open a bank account, collect Social Security payments, or take advantage of nearly any government service."

How is this substantially different from the situation today, where I need to present a state-issued driver's license and/or a federally-issued Social Security number in order to do any of those things?

I'm sure there are some pretty nefarious riders attached to this bill, since that's the case with almost all legislation. But the basic concept of a national ID card is not anything that I have any objection to.

Re:What's so bad?

[Skye16]

Err... republicans have been in pretty much complete control for almost 4 and a half years now. The government has gotten a LOT bigger than it was under the Democrats.

I think in the old days you were right. But now it's more like this:

• Democrats: For any problem the poor and middle class have, the solution is bigger government.
• Republicans: For any problem the ultra rich have, the solution is bigger government.
• Libertarians: For any problem, the solution is smaller government.

That looks about right for the year 2005.

Re:What's so bad?

[CohibaVancouver]

Passports are required by OTHER COUNTIRES, not your own

Don't American citizens require passports to enter their own country?

Re:What's so bad?

[bombadier_beetle]

That doesn't make any sense - police are charged with enforcing the law, not just the laws that have been enacted by the government that signs their paychecks. That may be a political or economic reality, but not a legal one.

Of course, if I'm wrong, please post some definitive sources to the contrary.

Re:What's so bad?

[JohnnyCannuk]

When I was a teenager, some Republican American President and former actor said that countries that did these kinds of things to its own people were "the focus of evil in the modern world" and "the evil empire".

25 years later, another Republican President says they are absolutely nescesary for "security" and to "support the troops". So how come if I say that the US is now the focus of evil in the modern world or an evil empire, I get modded as "Flamebait" or "Troll"?

In a nation ruled by the politics of fear, this is not surprising. Look at who stands to benefit from this:

Will you be safer from an "terrorist" attack? Nope, this may even make it easier by creating a false sense of security.

Will it make it easier to catch terrorists? The CIA and the FBI seemed to have all sorts of information on 19 folks travelling on their own identities 4 years ago but couldn't figure it out. This won't change because of a shiny new card.

Will it be easier for large corporations to use information to better target their goods, prevent labour from effectively organizing and get into the "new" business of selling personal data? Yep.

You guys once had a great country. It is very sad to see it sliding into corporatism and facism.

Frankly, the billions spent on the card would be better spent on intelligence gathering and disemination. Now THAT would provide protection to the US. Unfortunately, it wouldn't provide a central information database for corporate America.

Now which way do you think the vote will go?

Stll

[adamjaskie]

Typos in the headlines. What are editors for, again?

Re:Stll

[tehshen]

What are editors for, again?

Complaining about

Re:Stll

[PaxTech]

Vwls wst bndwdth.

Hurrah! Real ID is bound to fail

[gowen]

This will swing the deal, because nothing -- and I mean nothing -- persuades Senators faster than a room full of bulk faxes, all sent from the same website and all basically the same!

Sheesshh.

How can so mainly nominally smart people be so dumb about how best to influence the democratic process.

Re:Hurrah! Real ID is bound to fail

[The Angry Mick]

nothing...persuades Senators faster than a room full of bulk faxes

Everybody knows its rooms full of cash that count.

Re:Hurrah! Real ID is bound to fail

[LaughingLinuxMan]

Please try the website (now /.'d :-/) before commenting. The site does not provide a form fax where you fill in only your name and address. You must write your own text. Now they do provide a few bullet points to talk about, but the fax will be in your own words. I don't think they will all be "basically the same". I, myself, commented on an issue not mentioned in the bullet points.

LLM

Re:Hurrah! Real ID is bound to fail

[MasterOfUniverse]

ok, so why don't you tell us the better way? It seems like this is the only way left (even though I know it does not really work). atleast they know that people are watching them.

Re:Hurrah! Real ID is bound to fail

[uprock_x]

There is some truth in that. But people have to try. Because if you don't try nothing happens and stupid, ridiculous and often socially divisive laws are forced onto people.

Some people have mentioned the UK under your post, when the then UK Home secretary (Blunkett) went mad one day and started cooking up crazy ideas about giving the postman, the milkman and the food standards agency the right to read your email and inspect your internet and mobile phone communicatons there was an uproar and many including myself did write to several MPs at the time. I am glad I did.

Blunkett backtracked later on and acknowledged the stupid bungle he had made. Ok maybe that wasn't down to people faxing and emailing and more the media scorn poured on his idea but it is still good to be part of something like that, and these things are always worth fighting for.

Re:Hurrah! Real ID is bound to fail

[amliebsch]

Having worked in an actual legislator's office, the answer is to do one of the two following:

1. Hand-write a letter (that means in handwriting - I know, low-tech, but it works) stating your opposition and the reasons.

2. A polite phone call stating the same.

In both cases, be sure to mention that this an issue you care about strongly and will remember it during the next election.

Re:Hurrah! Real ID is bound to fail

[kpwoodr]

Well, it works for the FCC. They get a few hundred emails/faxes from the same family group, and suddenly I can't listen to Howard make dick and fart jokes, all radio shows are on a delay, and live TV only comes through with a censor on the hot button.

Moral of the story:

The vocal minority often rule. The silent majority are the ones who take it in the kiester. Sites like this are often seen in the wrong light. It serves as an easy way to get people to take an active part in government, and to have a say (even if it is miniscule) in largers issues that may end up affecting the way they live.

I sent a fax, did you?

Re:Hurrah! Real ID is bound to fail

[Dun Malg]

OK, so bulk faxes aren't a good idea; would you care to enlighten us further? Unless you have loads of money, how do you influence the democratic process in a 'smart' way?

Hand written letters, sent by US Mail, postmarked from the house member's district or senator's state, individually written and uniquely phrased, from a whole lot of different people, expressing their disapproval. Emails and faxes are generally given little or no weight because they require almost no time investment to send. Phone calls are only slightly better than emails or faxes. Old-fashioned letters in large enough quantities do make a difference.

Re:Hurrah! Real ID is bound to fail

[endus]

RIGHT! Doing nothing is MUCH MORE EFFECTIVE! Everyone, the government is trying to pass legislation to put tracking devices in everyone's ass! Quick, let's all sit around and read about the new XBOX...that'll stop em!!!

Unable to connect to SQL

[affinity]

now it's to late for everyone as it's has been /.

Bruce Schneier on RealID

[PaxTech]

Bruce Schneier's weblog has some thoughts on RealID and why it's a terrible idea and won't increase security. Highly recommended.

Re:Bruce Schneier on RealID

[jacoby]

60 million Elvis fans can be wrong, and so can 600 organizations. Try using arguments instead of peer pressure, OK?

Re:Bruce Schneier on RealID

[The Angry Mick]

Try using arguments instead of peer pressure, OK?

???

Peer pressure is exactly the mechanism being used to get this act passed. Seriously you don't expect us to believe that its inclusion into a "support our troops" bill is an unintentional side-effect of an absent minded congressman? No sane congressperson would dare to vote against the troop funding omnibus because all of his peers would immediately label him an enemy of the troops. If that's not peer pressure, I don't know what is.

Re:Bruce Schneier on RealID

[kfg]

Try using arguments instead of peer pressure, OK?

You do understand that this current government is "faith based" and rather sneeringly refers to people who use argument as "reality based," then goes out and wins with peer pressure, don't you?

Nor is soliciting your elected representative in government a form of "peer pressure." It is electorate pressure, i.e. pressure from a superior. That's what they're frickin' there for! Not to rule, to represent.

KFG

Re:Bruce Schneier on RealID

[Kainaw]

No sane congressperson would dare to vote against the troop funding omnibus because all of his peers would immediately label him an enemy of the troops.

Sane congresspeople vote against military and defense spending all the time. They vote to close military bases all the time - putting hundreds of people out of work. There is nothing at all magical about 'troops' or 'military'. It is simply an issue where people focus heavily on the times when military spending is accepted and ignore the times when it is denied.

This is a reply to a topic of peer pressure. Peer pressure is used to invoke inflamtory concepts, such as the Reds are invading Hollywood and we must blacklist all the dang Communists! Peer pressure tells you that you must believe the inflamatory concept at face value. Do not do research. Do not go to the US Congress' website. Do not look up military bills that have been voted on. Do not look at the voting history on those bills. Do not get the facts. Just believe what you are told - oh, and tell it to everyone else. If enough people say it, it must be true.

Re:Bruce Schneier on RealID

[jacoby]

You want to convince me that this is bad legislation? You want me to do more, to call my congresscritter and say "don't vote for this"? Saying "over 600 organizations are against it" doesn't say much. Saying "This is what Bruce Schneier thinks" says a lot, because I accept Bruce as an authority on security matters, and because Bruce writes "this is a bad idea because...", and you can accept, reject or counter the arguments he gives. Saying "Over 600 organizations are against it" isn't debate, it's social pressure. That is what I'm talking about, and all I'm talking about here.

slashdotted

[samgaudet]

when this site gets slashdotted, how are we supposed to fight it?!

The article assumes a lot

[HighOrbit]

Of course this is slashdot and we are supposed to think alike and reflexively be against anything the government does in the security arena. But I *really do* want to know that the person boarding the airplane with me is who they say they are and not on an expired visa with a fraudulantly obtained ID (like the 9-11 hijackers on expired visas with fraudulantly obtained Virginia driver licences). I *really do* want the government (all of it including state and local subdivisions) to enforce immigration laws and to know if somebody's visa is expired.
So thank you for the information, I will call/fax my senator to let him know that I want him to vote in favor of Real ID.

Re:The article assumes a lot

[Y2]

But I *really do* want to know that the person boarding the airplane with me is who they say they are and not on an expired visa with a fraudulantly obtained ID

I, on the other hand, don't give a flying expletive who they are or what their visa status is, as long as they don't have a weapon.

(It would be a distinct bonus to know that they also don't have a communicable disease!)

So thank you for the information, I will call/fax my senator to let him know that I want him to vote in favor of Real ID.

You've satisfied yourself that Yet Another ID card won't be issued and obtained fraudulently? To paraphrase the patron saint of the current administration, "I find your excess of faith disturbing."

Re:The article assumes a lot

[MasterOfUniverse]

Yea I agree! only if the native americans had some strict immigration laws, we would never be in this mess!

Re:The article assumes a lot

[Ironsides]

I know who I'd bet on. But when the odds are 0% vs .1%, I can tell you who'd win that, too - and this answer isn't as nice.

I've given this quite a bit of thought. When you are in a pinch, a lot of stuff becomes a weapon. Especially when you don't value your own life very highly. Lets say that some guy had a box cutters (which is apparently what the 9/11 hijackers had). Take jacket, wrap around arm (use as protection against blade). Hold Laptop in both hands and use as shield/club. Bull charge the guy and don't stop hitting him until one of you stops moving.

Most people might not want to "get hurt" but some of us are borderline suicidal as is and don't give a flying f*ck about what physical condition we are in afterwards. As long as the guy doesn't have anything serious, the passengers can overwelm him.

Re:The article assumes a lot

[Y2]

'm not in favor of the act, but there does need to exist some way to ensure that dangerous items don't go on a plane. Attempting to keep dangerous people off is one way. Better security of everything physically going on the plane may be preferable, but just how much can you screen before it becomes an invasion of privacy? Some say what's currently in place already does that.

You can try to discriminate based on something they have or something they intend, or both. Every major criminal once had a clean record. I believe there is a vast number of potential malefactors that still have clean records. So how do you want to keep them out? Reject every person who has ever met with a person who has associated with a suspected evildoer? There's your invasion of privacy, and worse - it's punishment without accusation or trial.

My money - and life - is on physical inspection rather than mental.

Wow...

[0x461FAB0BD7D2]

The arguments in the "What is RealID" section are ludicrous.

Linking together databases is not spying. Just because China and Vietnam have national IDs doesn't make it a bad idea. A lot of people, after passing the driver license test, still can't drive properly. What's that got to do with illegal immigrants and national IDs?

To me, it sounded like it was written by the guys that wrote about peak oil and the 911 conspiracies.

Re:Wow...

[Anonymous Coward]

Peak oil is not a conspiracy. Peak Oil

Re:Wow...

[Valar]

How about this? It will cost money and will not make anyone safer.

It will, however, provide a false sense of security which is dangerous.

Worldwide

[Exitar]

You can find a lot of nations that have unique ID but not capital punishment, weapons in every house and don't make war every 10 years. Uh, and they have a working social security too!

Re:Worldwide

[cduffy]

What's wrong with capital punishment and ownership of weapons by the law-abiding public? ("Weapons in every house" is a pretty serious overstatement, unless you count kitchen knives). The latter is pretty damned near necessary in the rural regions, anyhow; I have friends (in rural Texas) who literally have alligators and water snakes in their back yards.

Getting back to topic, a National ID is just one more step away from a group of independent states who are members of a federation with strictly limited powers, and one more step towards a strong central government which flaunts the document supposedly limiting its extent. Look: You out in the rest of the world don't like the US federal government getting too much power, especially when it's mismanaged as badly as it is. Us here in the US don't like our Federal government taking too much power, either, when that power would better be left closer to home where we have more influence -- in our state governments.

Re:Worldwide

[ArghBlarg]

Chile, Vietnam, CIA-funded terrorism training in Afghanistan, among others; all these predate your dad getting blown up. That doesn't make it any better, and it doesn't exuse it in any way, I know, but don't try to pretend that the US hasn't conducted multiple illegal wars prior to "9-11".

There are definite reasons why the US is so hated by some peoples around the world. Some of those people are extremists, unfortunately, and will do crazy things as a result.

Perhaps if the US would stop f*cking around in other sovereign nations' affairs, extremists would have less ideological ammunition (and thus less real ammunition, eventually).

Re:Worldwide

[CrystalFalcon]

Off the top of my head:

Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Switzerland. The latter is particularly interesting as their militia system makes the "weapons" part equivalent to "assault rifles in every house".

You could probably use most of the West European countries as answers to this quiz...

Re:Worldwide

[Kombat]

Public bathrooms. Public swimming pools. Public schools.

Think about the above three things, and then tell me you want public healthcare.

This is one of the perplexing paradoxes of a pro-capital-punishment society. You people think the government lacks the competence to run schools or hospitals, yet you put your faith in its ability to conclusively determine a person's guilt with enough certainty that you're willing to execute someone when that same government has concluded is "guilty." Mind-boggling.

Re:Worldwide

[CAIMLAS]

Lots of nations? Reallly.

Name one nation that meets your "requirements" other than Sweden. Can you? I'd like to see you try.

Even if you could, that's not the norm by far. With the trend our government is taking (including all the civl rights violations we've seen from the DMCA to the Patriot Act in the last 5 years - to say nothing of how some of our gun laws are more strict than even Britian's), can you honestly say that you don't think this will be abused?

Re:Worldwide

[jc42]

It's not really all that mind-boggling if you've read much of the press coverage of the issue in the US. (Not that many Americans have read it, but still ...)

There have been any number of "investigative reports" in recent years on the issue. Almost all the reporters express dismay and shock at the shoddiness they find when they look into capital-crime cases. They report that the cases they examined were absolute horrors of blatant injustice, with incompetent lawyers (usually publicly funded because the defendants are almost always very poor), arrogant and dishonest police and prosecutors, and juries that systematically exclude anyone with the slightest doubts about the rightness of capital punishment. They get across the idea pretty clearly that, no matter what their prior beliefs, they now believe that death sentences are essentially random, and reforming the system is hopeless.

The public reaction to this? A big yawn. Well, yes; there's the half of the population that pays attention, and doesn't want the death penalty. The other half of the population doesn't care, and doesn't read such activist, liberal reports. Why not? Their attitude is simple: A crime was committed. They want someone punished. If the defendant is guilty, so much the better. But all that really matters is that someone dies for the crime.

This becomes especially clear when you look at the reactions to the recent exoneration via DNA analysis. Overwhelmingly, people react by being very upset that the criminal was set free. There is political pressure to block such DNA analysis after the case is "settled".

A couple of years back, there was an interesting situation in Texas. After several such DNA exonerations, the state went through their frozen evidence from previous convictions, and destroyed them. This got the point across about as clearly as possible: They didn't care whether those prisoners had been wrongly convicted, and they weren't about to allow any re-examination of the evidence using new forensic technology.

So it's not that this half of the population believes that the government can determine guilt accurately. The real truth is that they don't care about justice. They just want vengeance and it doesn't matter if they get the right guy. It's the Hollywood approach to justice.

We should note the surveys that show this to be only around half of the American population. The other half shouldn't be blamed for their attitude. And there is a political fight (which the media calls a "culture war" ;-) raging right now over this and a lot of related issues. Stay tuned to see how it turns out ...

[Just doing my bit to explain the complexities of American culture to the rest of the mind-boggled world. ;-]

Re:Worldwide

[jc42]

A couple of years ago, I was in Finland with a group of people (performing at a folk festival ;-). One of the group's members got a toothache, and went to a clinic. They advised a root canal, which she agreed to. Afterwards, the people at the clinic were apologetic that they had to charge her the equivalent of about US$15 because she wasn't a citizen.

Now, we are all aware that this was paid for out of the taxes of Finnish workers. But when you compare, they don't pay much more in taxes than we do here in America. They sure do get a lot more for it.

OTOH, they don't get the fun of watching their nation's troops expending large quantities of munitions in another country. But if they're into that, they can follow the news of American troops, and cheer them on. I did meet a number of Finns who rooted for the French or English or Italian soccer teams; I suppose this wouldn't be much different.

Line Item Veto?

[Oculus Habent]

Wouldn't it be more productive to attempt to persuade the President to use his much-neglected Line-Item Veto than to attempt to stop a military spending bill for one of its riders?

Re:Line Item Veto?

[jumbledInTheHead]

The line item veto was ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court, so I don't see how this would be any good to Bush, who by the way supports the bill.

Re:Why Bother.

[stlhawkeye]

My Senator is a democrat. Her vote doesn't count.

The minority party in the Senate isn't nearly so toothless as you make it sound. Every vote counts, and with the filibuster rules, the minority party wields a significant amount of influence.

And before you fax your Senator...

[Jurph]

and cuss him out for not reading it, you might want to read the text of it yourself. You know, just maybe. Democracy requires an informed populace to work, and if you believe the partisan propaganda in the headline of a Slashdot story, how are you any better than a Republican senator who buys the partisan propaganda of the bill's author?

Re:And before you fax your Senator...

[stlhawkeye]

No no no no no! Shut up! Shut up! Republican bad! Conservative bad! Bush bad! Thok not like it! Thok think Bush bad! Thok hate read id card! Thok know it wrong! All idea from Republican bad and not work! Me know! It what other people say who Thok think smart!

I actually don't oppose the Read ID on the grounds that it's invading my privacy or anything, but that I don't think it'll help much and it's going to cost a lot.

Re:And before you fax your Senator...

[Oculus Habent]

Check out Section 102, which allows the Secretary of Homeland Security "the authority to waive, and shall waive, all laws such Secretary, in such Secretary's sole discretion, determines necessary to ensure expeditious construction of the barriers and roads under this section." It also prevents any oversight or judicial review of those actions.

I always wanted to be above the law. Now, to become Secretary of Homeland Security...

Re:And before you fax your Senator...

[jsebrech]

I thought you were kidding, then I actually read the thing. It's true. If this passes, the secretary will get to waive any and all laws as long as it is in the service of keeping illegal entrants outside of the US borders, and is excused from judicial review in any such decision he or she makes.

That is scary stuff. If not for the actual consequences, then for the precedent of waiving the entire body of law, and judicial review, at the sole discretion of a single person in government.

What are the real objections?

[John Jorsett]

1. It encodes the data digitally? My current driver's license has a mag stripe on the back that does that.

2. The data is readable at a distance? If you're really concerned about that possibility, wrap your license in foil.

3. There's a master database being built? I've got news: private companies have already done that. They've purchased the state databases, digitized them (including biometric data from your picture), and make them available for a fee. Las Vegas casinos love it for determining the identities of who's gambling in their places. Big Brother government, when it wants to know all about you, can, and does, buy that same info.

Real ID doesn't worry me. I'd be more concerned with the US becoming like the UK, a country burying itself in surveillance cameras (and soon, audio devices). That's the real Big Brother scenario to me, when it becomes possible to track and records one's every movement and every public utterance.

Re:Why Bother.

[jellomizer]

That is not a vote. And if the democrats phillabuster every thing on the table when they gain power again the republcans will do it right back at them.

I'm waiting for

[ICECommander]

UnrealID: Tournament Edition

Is this really so bad?

[$FFh]

A driver's license is just that, a license to drive a car. Same with a Social Security card/number, to identify you to the IRS and Social Security. Yet both of these are used as general identification. I think it's about time we had a standardized identification card. How many bars have gotten in trouble with the excise police because the accepted a fake out-of-state drivers license? It may have been the first time the bouncer saw a license from that state, and thus, has no reference in his mind. If this passes we might have something to replace Social Security numbers as the primary key for credit agencies that won't be treated as both identification and a password.

What's the Big Deal?

[ultimabaka]

Sure, I'm probably going to be flamed a whole bunch for this, but ever since the national ID card issue developed in the U.S., I've been left wondering what the big deal about this is. States can pretty much get the same info off of you from a basic driver's license, the project is under development in the UK (apparently the project will create lots of IT jobs over there - I know jobs vs. limited freedom isn't much of an argument, but it's not a bad thing is it?), and until I see some solid evidence to the contrary, I see no reason not to believe it will help reduce, at the very least, illegal immigration. I can see a cop walking down the street asking people for their national ID card (which, on an aside, I prey will at least be difficult to counterfeit), and at least I wouldn't complain too much. The ACLU provides five reasons why the system would be a bad idea here, of which only reason #1 seems to make sense. I would love to hear opposing views on this, since, even though the idea doesn't seem too bad to me, I'm still on the fence. Flame away.

what we really need...

[Legato895]

what we really need is to have a world wide identification system, that is also tied to a universal screenname/email etc. also, this should be the sole form of credit currency. this chip should be placed in the skin, preferably on the forhead or hand.

we shall call it... the mark of the best!!!

(note, while im kinda making this a light hearted jab, i realized in all honesty that its not a happy matter for the people that will still be on the earth when this is inacted)

Groucho said it best..

[j0e_average]

Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly, and applying the wrong remedies. -- Groucho Marx

Isn't this what our Passport is for?

[RancidMilk]

I guess I don't understand the difference between real ID and the passport. The only thing is that its a passport/drivers licence hybrid. Is this a replacement for the passport, the driver's license, or the plain identification card. Because if you are over 18 and you don't have a driver's license, you may have the plain ol' identification card. Seems kinda weird that it should be different from the standard driver's license. Or maybe they will change the background color (like that worked in the past). I must say that the site was pretty one-sided and didn't argue both sides. I don't think that it is the best idea with putting all your information on the same card that you have with you at all times. Might as well just burn a barcode in the back of our necks at birth. That way they can only look up the information, they can't specifically read it off of you.

Re:But... but...

[cyber0ne]

I dont even have a senator, you American-centric clods!

That's ok, I have two. You want one of them?

Nothing he can do

[discordja]

At this point there is nothing that can stop the passage of REAL ID short of a line item veto when it reaches the presidents desk .. and that's simply not going to happen.

It's part of the spending bill, which just so happens to be a war bill, and was passed by some 350-50 margin in the house. If you think the Senate is gonna vote an 80 billion spending bill down you need your head examined.

Bush will sign this into law even tho he doesn't want to, because if he doesn't, he'll never get anything through the Judicial committee. Sensenbrenner pretty much drew a line in the sand after the Pres promished him last November that he would get the opportunity to bring it to the floor after effectively demanding it be removed from the 9/11 bill. In some ways, the white house hopes to use this to leverage the immigration reform Bush has talked about twice.

Re:Nothing he can do

[discordja]

As much as I'd like to have one, I can't give you one. I don't really like saying 'trust me on this' but you'll just have to take my word on it. I work for an office that deals with immigration related legistlation in DC and most of this was coming out of the congressional office staffers, etc.

The way it boils down was this. Back in November, when they were trying to cram the 9/11 bill through conference before elections, Bush demanded Sensenbrenner had to give up the REAL ID provisions of that reform bill. Sensenbrenner nearly called the Presidents bluff which would have killed the 9/11 bill cold out of conference and waste months of debating and crafting. Instead, House leaders promised to let him move to attach it to the spending bill (i.e. this current war bill).

Sensenbrenner all but threatened the President he'd never get anything through the Judicial committee if he fought him on REAL ID. It's not that the Pres does not like all of REAL ID, but the pro business Bush doesn't like the implications and impacts on the cheap/illegal labor market. Furthermore, seeing as his previous stance was for an amnesty for current illegals (the debate on whether his work for citizenship plan really is or is not an amnesty is yours to take), it's not hard to see his dislike.

Hope that makes some sense.

We need to go to the source

[cyberlotnet]

What we need to do is change the reason this is happening.

This bill got slammed before, The ONLY reason it is going to make it into law ( and it will make it ) is because its attached to a huge military spending bill.

Neither side at this point wants to hamper our military by killing this bill so this law will pass no matter what you do ( ok maybe thats being over dramatic but its pretty close to true )

What can we do that would prevent this and half the other useless laws that get passed each year?

We need to voice our opinion against unrelated laws being piggy-backed together to get things past the general public and congress.

It should not be possible to have 2 laws totally unrelated in the same action!!! Congress should not be able to attach a law banning you from eating hotdogs to a law funding the federal goverment.

Its biases, deceptive but in todays congress a very common practice..

"Hey you, yea you republican, Yea if you get your people to vote for this democratic bill giving us all raises, we will let you piggy-back that important bill we vetoed last year to ban those evil hotdogs you hate so much, You know I rub your back you rub mine?"

Reasoning

[Perl-Pusher]

This law is an attempt to stop the flow of illegal aliens. To stop organizations such as MS-13 and of course these guys

I would like to see more enforcement along the borders. Both of them. But one positive benefit will be that illegal immigrants won't be taken advantage of by heartless money grubbers who could afford to pay a decent wage if they wanted too.

Most of those crossing the border are just looking to better themselves and their families. We need a legal way to help those who want "the American Dream" and kick those listed above out.

Re:Reasoning

[bluprint]

heartless money grubbers who could afford to pay a decent wage if they wanted too.

As an aside, I find this logic amusing. Because wal-mart could "afford" to pay more, they are heartless bastards if they don't. On the other hand, assuming you "could afford" to pay a little extra for a gallon of milk, and yet still refuse to do so, I'd bet my last dollar you don't apply the same standard to yourself and consider yourself a hearless bastard. Maybe instead of paying $2 a gallon, you should just go ahead and start pitching in an extra buck, eh? Or maybe it's just easy to have "high standards" when it's someone else's money. heh.

Re:Reasoning

[Jelanen]

Who determines need? Maybe we should create a Politburo to determine how much someone "needs"...oh wait...that was tried already...hrmm..

Re:Reasoning

[philipgar]

Soviet Russia taught people how to share too. . . The concept is called communism, and it only works on a large scale when someone points a gun at your head.

Sure the big corporations may have more than moeny than they need in your eyes, but I'm sure in someone elses eyes you have more money than you need. This trickles down all the way to the bottom. If we all gave what we didn't need, everyone would be living at the poorest level. We wouldn't bring the poor up to the level of the middle class. Its just the way humanity works.

Phil

Re:Reasoning

[bluprint]

I think *you* should learn about sharing. I do share. What I don't do is get mad at someone else who I don't think shares "enough" (whatever that means this week). Sharing is voluntary and people who think otherwise are usually only interested in sharing when they are on the receiving end of the share.

Re:Reasoning

[bluprint]

My position is to respect the degree to which an individual (or company) does give. It's hard to judge someone elses need and further, how much is "too much" to have. Giving is good. But to what degree should one go to give? Is it ok, for example, if I were making good money and trying to retire (through savings/investments) when I'm 30? That money I could give away, and presumably be ok in the short term. (I don't really have that kind of money, I'm just speculating) How much money is it ok for a company to have in reserve to provide security for the insecure future?

I think those are all personal questions, which only you can answer. And it's no more ok for me to say "you give to much" than to say "you don't give enough".

Certianly, legal obligation to "share" according to someone else's standard begins to smack of communism and many people see your type of position as one who would like to legally force everyone to share according to your standard. So those type of "communism" responses seem somewhat valid as well.

Re:Reasoning

[DavidTC]

You dumbass.

If they're working for Walmart, they're already paying taxes. It's called 'withholding'. And they're paying it under a purchased SS number.

Which means they not only pay as much taxes as you, they can't get a refund and they can never withdraw that money from social security. Yeah, man, they've got a great scam! Pay too much taxes and get no credit for them. How clever of them.

The people who don't pay taxes are the ones getting paid in cash on the side of the road.

And legality wouldn't alter that. Plenty of those people are here legally. The only way to do anything about that is to demand accurate record keeping and withholding by the people who hire them. At which point the illegals will use made up SS numbers and start paying taxes they can't benefit from.

Wait, no they wouldn't. You don't have to pay taxes if you make that little money.

It astonishes me that people think all these people make less than minimum wage are causing some huge tax shortfall. Most of them wouldn't have to legally file a return because they didn't make enough!

Re:Reasoning

[Obfuscant]

Sharing is not voluntary,

Of course sharing is voluntary. When sharing is not voluntary, it is called something else. If you try to share something of mine when I don't want you to, it's called "theft". When the government tries to share my stuff, it's called "eminent domain" or some other high-sounding euphemism for "theft".

...it's a moral obligation. ... What's the point in my keeping more of a resource than I need?

Here is where your argument fails. You can talk about sharing your toys because you have more than you need, but once you start talking about sharing someone else's toys because you decide for them that they have more than they need, it is no longer "voluntary" and thus no longer "sharing", no matter what high sounding moral terms you put it in. Your 'moral obligations' are not binding on anyone else. They're yours to deal with, not mine.

If some people can't be bothered to help others who are less fotunate out, then they are typically the root cause of the problem.

This illustrates the second fallacy of your argument. Reworded slightly, you are saying: "the rich are filthy bastards because they have money they won't give to other people. They have 'more than they need'. ". Well, yes, they have money, but they've also done something to earn that money that includes making things better for others. (Let's ignore Carly and her platinum parachute for now, since there are always outliers in the data. Most "rich" aren't like her.)

Even Sam Walton has done some good for a lot of people -- they have jobs selling cheap stuff to the rest of us, or driving trucks delivering cheap stuff to the stores where we can buy it. Even the Chinese, who get paid a pittance (in US dollars) are probably better off than they would be otherwise, since they have jobs, too. (And yes, they could be paid more.) So, there are a lot of people that Sam "helps out", just like every other entrepreneur who hires folks to help him make money. Yes, he keeps what you think is "more than he needs", but if you take it away from him to meet YOUR definition of need, why should he bother working to make anything more than what you'll so graciously let him keep?

Why would anyone want to work any harder than the minimum necessary, if all they get to keep is what you decide they need? And then, when they figure out that they could just as easily be one of the folks on the receiving end of things instead of the producing end, there goes the incentive to even get up in the morning. And that's the point behind the failure of communism and every other welfare system.

Re:Reasoning

[DarKnyht]

Most of those crossing the border are just looking to better themselves and their families. We need a legal way to help those who want "the American Dream" and kick those listed above out.

The legal way to keep those seeking the "American Dream" is called immigration, perhaps we should start enforcing it.

Re:Reasoning

[Sumocide]

"When the government tries to share my stuff, it's called "eminent domain" or some other high-sounding euphemism for "theft"."

You get nothing in return for theft.

In return for taxes you get to vote for representation, you get a system of laws and courts, an army deterring aggressors etc etc

Re:Reasoning

[ccalvert]

For your argument to make sense, you would have to prove that being rich is a positive attribute. But that is not the case. Some people get rich off prostitution, pornography, selling drugs, selling cigarettes, selling weapons to third world despots, exploiting the elderly, exploiting children, winning the lottery, investing in a stock, destroying the environment, etc. These are all ways of getting rich that don't reflect positively on the person who acquired the money.

What you are arguing for is a plotocracy: a society in which power and virtue should be given and attributed to the rich simply because they are rich. Personally, I'm strongly against that idea, and so are most people -- when they stop to think about it.

I'm not in favor of communism, but your statement about the "failure" of communism is patently false. The fastest growing economy in the world today is run by the Chinese communist government. It has been growing at some 8 to 10 percent per year for nearly ten years now, and no one is expecting it to slow down.

Right facts ... wrong conclusion

[HighOrbit]

Most of those pesky 9/11 people had valid IDs.

Yes, that is the problem. The current system does not have enough safegards. AFIK, all the IDs used by the 9-11 hijackers were valid and officially issued. But some were fraudently obtained and some should have never been issued at all (as in the case of expired visas). RealID is specifically crafted to address those specific issues.

Re:Right facts ... wrong conclusion

[geekoid]

ITs specifically a power grab by the Secretary of Homeland Security. He is once again being given the same authority as the Attorney General without the checks and balances.

It give the Secretary of Homeland Security the authority to do whatever they decide regarding immigration, with no recourse for us.

This doesn't just mean borders, this mean anything he determince citizens need to do.

in the words of Robert Anson Heinlien

[gonar]

When a place gets crowded enough to require ID's, social collapse is not far away. It is time to go elsewhere.

-From the Notebook of Lazarus Long

Re:Why Bother.

[Concerned Onlooker]

What a load of Republican crap that is. The Republicans stopped more Clinton appointments than the Democrats ever will for Bush.

In reality, Bush has had more judicial nominees approved than in the first terms of Presidents Clinton and Reagan, and the administration of his father. Of the 214 nominees sent to the Senate for a vote during his first term, Democrats blocked only ten, using the filibuster. As such, 95 percent of Bush's nominees have been approved. By contrast, from 1995 to 2000, while Republican Senator Orrin Hatch was chairman of the Judiciary Committee, the Senate blocked 35% of Clinton's circuit court nominees.

From http://www.counterbias.com/236.html">this article.

I think this is a moot point -- it's been removed

[14erCleaner]

If I'm looking a the right Senate bill, the Emergency Supplemental Appropriations Act for Defense, the Global War on Terror, and Tsunami Relief, 2005, it appears that the offending Real ID Act portion has been removed.

Peeing in the wind

[Ars-Fartsica]

No Senator/Congressperson is oging to vote against an implied national security bill. No Senator/Congressperson is going to hold up a military spending bill that seeks to get body armor to soldiers in Iraq.

Sorry, but thats as simple as it can be put.

In 21stC USA, they don't need to see your papers!

[antispam_ben]

This is the Information Age more than ever before, and any good (in the sense of being competent) entity (commercial, Government, or private investigator) can find out everything pertinent about you with any ONE identifying piece of info: name, phone number, address, where you work, SSN, car tag, etc. In some cases it may be illegal for a Government entity to do this, but I'm sure we can trust all Government entities to follow the law, can't we? [insert appropriate emoticon here]

A national ID card won't violate anything that's not already being violated, it will just be a public admission of what's already being done. Perhaps it would be a Good Thing to have it, that way everyone would have a clue as to what has happened to their financial and legal identity - that it's owned by themselves, but by the owners of commercial and government databases.

"Papers? We don't need no stinking papers!" "We have The Technology."

I'd post as Anonymous Coward but I'm sure /. saves the IP address of each post anyway.

First,

[isotope23]

I don't give a shit if the guy in the seat next to me claims to be bobo the dog-faced boy. What I do care about is that he does not have a weapon, and cannot get into the fricking cockpit. A National ID does not stop that from happening.

It will also not stop another Timothy McVeigh, who as far as I understand was never busted for anything prior.

What it will do is create more red tape, and the perception that government is doing SOMETHING so it must be making us safer. It will probably INCREASE terrorism as well. Why?

Because as the government continues to push more draconian laws, they will begin to piss "patriots" here in this country off. It may very well create a positive feedback loop.

I value what little privacy I have remaining, and I should not have to carry a piece of plastic just to fricking travel.....

If we were serious about stopping terrorism, we would stop playing world policeman. The arrogance of my fellow countrymen just amazes me sometimes. It's as though americans believe we have a god given right to intervene around the world if we don't like a certain government, etc.

The Republic is Dead. Long Live the Empire...

Re:First,

[Jorrit]

We have national ID cards in Belgium and I never ever felt they were a threat to my freedom at all. I'm 35 and so far I think I needed that card about 5 times. Other then those 5 times it is just a card that sits in your wallet and doesn't bother me in the slightest bit. I really don't see what freedom has to do with that.

Greetings,

Re:First,

[wcdw]

I value what little privacy I have remaining, and I should not have to carry a piece of plastic just to fricking travel.....

Personally, I carry a big piece of plastic wherever I travel, because I value my freedom.

Of course, in this case, my plastic was manufactured by the likes of Mr. Glock.

Re:First,

[RedBear]

We have national ID cards in Belgium and I never ever felt they were a threat to my freedom at all. I'm 35 and so far I think I needed that card about 5 times. Other then those 5 times it is just a card that sits in your wallet and doesn't bother me in the slightest bit. I really don't see what freedom has to do with that.

Congratulations on adding absolutely nothing to the conversation. You see, Belgium is not the United States of America. This card, if it is created, will be in use constantly in this country. It will be used to keep you from getting on an airplane, or crossing borders inside or outside the US, or maybe getting a bank account, or a loan, or ordering something online, or any number of other things. When it gets stolen it will give a wealth of identifying information about you to whoever stole it. You see, it will be in use because it's being promoted as something that will protect us from terrorists, even though it will do no such thing. If you travel a lot you will be showing this card quite often, even just to travel without your own state. (That's kind of like traveling from one city in Belgium to another. Are you able to fly inside Belgium without your national ID card? We won't be able to.)

It has to do with freedom because it's exactly the sort of thing we have berated other countries for requiring from their citizens, particularly the old U.S.S.R. It is a precursor to a police state, and many of us would rather not see what is supposedly the free-est nation on Earth degenerate into a police state (as if we don't already, but I digress).

Someone who hasn't lived in the US for a long time really can't comprehend the value we place on protecting our freedoms. We like the fact that we can travel from state to state without a passport, and we dread the day when we hear "papers, please" at any state border or "checkpoint". Checkpoints, the very things we reviled in communist or fascist countries because they restricted freedom.

If you only had to show your card 5 times in your whole life it bears no resemblance to the national ID card we would have. We are seriously on the wrong track in this country, and we have to fight tooth and nail to keep it from getting worse. It's nice to hear that you don't mind having a national ID card, but this is a whole different country with a different government and population with different attitudes toward freedom. Your opinion is irrelevant to our situation.

Uh oh...speeding in other states is coming to end.

[Jakewk]

Section 203 of the bill requires the linking of motor vehicle databases including all moving violations.
Remember the days of speeding through Wyoming or Texas, paying the fine right there when you got caught and not having to report it back on your home state insurance?
Well, those days are over.

Re:Why Bother.

[Winkhorst]

Ah, we seem to have forgotten already about all the judges Bill Clinton couldn't even get voted on. Did you know that most federal judges now sitting are Bush and Reagan appointees? Doesn't it bother you that these "conservative" judges now are even too liberal for the current crop of neo-fascists who control the Republican Party? No, I didn't think so...

What's so good?

[mobby_6kl]

Do we now judge the government and its actions by how bad they are?

RealID isn't so bad...

[Jakewk]

Personally, I want our government to confirm the identity of anyone receiving official identification docutments. The text of the bill just says that state governments will have to start doing things that I assumed they did already. Corporations have much more information on us than this puny bill requires the government to collect. Why do you think the Dept. of Homeland Security is now one of the biggest customers of many large commercial consumer databases?

Don't bother with unrealid.com

[hikerhat]

That UnRealID site is the worst I've seen in a long time.

• First, any site with a Matrix fetish loses all credibility.
• Second, clearly the site is designed to spread FUD. The fake image of the "Real ID" card indicates that the card will contain information such as Religion and Occupation. It will not. Read the bill. FUD.
• The site says cops will die. Right. Because when cops are working under-cover they will be carrying their real ID cards. Just like today, when under-cover cops are required to carry their badge and drivers license. Oh, wait, no they aren't. FUD.
• "every convenience store learns to grab that data and sell it to Big Data for a nickel" Right. Because every time I got to the convenience store I have to present my license. Oh, wait, no I don't. FUD.

Anyway, the site goes on with a bunch of rambling, random conspiracy nonsense (We'll turn into a communist state! Oh no! The highways will run red with blood!). There may be good reasons not to support this bill, but this web site doesn't give you any.

Read the bill yourself. Don't trust this unreal.com guy.

After you decide if you want to support the bill or not, contact your senator through www.senate.gov.

Re:Don't bother with unrealid.com

[Jtheletter]

I agree with you the site is rather uninformative and alarmist, and it also comes across as slightly suspicious since it doesn't even link to the full text of the bill as far as I could tell - but it was already at least partially slashdotted when I visited. However I have read the text of the bill and I must refute the following point you made.

Second, clearly the site is designed to spread FUD. The fake image of the "Real ID" card indicates that the card will contain information such as Religion and Occupation. It will not. Read the bill. FUD.

Granted, their 'mock ID' is designed to spread fear with lines such as religion and occupation, however the text of the bill itself grants the power for other information to be added to the ID as the government sees fit. Most people assume this will be retina or fingerprint, but it could include anything, including religion! FUD is FUD, but their example is illustrating one of the key points why myself, and many others, are opposed to the bill - the fact that it hands the government arbitrary and vastly expandable powers of information collection and tracking. If Big Brother says your new ID must carry and display your political party affiliation, your stance on abortion, and if you've bought a 'support the troops ribbon magnet' then that info will be collected and added for anyone reading it to see. They could add your 'terrorist score' to the card, they can add your campaign contributions info to the card, anything!

Also in regard to your comment about your data being scanned and sold by convenience stores being FUD, I think that's very likely to happen. Right now, at least in MA, if you look under the age of 27 - which is a totally objective evaluation by the store clerk - you must present ID to purchase tobacco or alcohol. In most of the stores around here they not only check your birthdate listed but they scan the drivers license to make sure it's real and not forged. Guess what? You want to make that transaction, you have to let them scan it or they won't accept it as a valid ID, and once they scan it they have your ID and all your data and it can be sold. It's bad enough you have to scrutinize privacy policies for every webstore you buy from, but now I need to find and read the privacy policy of every 7-11 or liquor store I want to make purchases from? Yes, consumers can vote with their wallet for those establishments but a majority of the populace either is unaware, or doesn't even care most of the time. Do you really think you and a handful of morally conscientious (sp?) geeks boycotting the 7-11 will affect their bottom line when 2000 other Joe Publics will buy smokes from them regardless?

This is not a personal attack, and I am against FUD. But I think people need to be shown examples of what this ID allows and - lets face it - things this government will probably get around to trying to track with these cards. They want a nationally standardized ID? Fine, but it should outline all the info and a new bill should have to be passed (to allow for public input to their reps) to change what that card tracks. Simply giving the government un-checked, unmonitored ability to add info as they see fit is dangerous to freedom!

I recommend everyone follow the parent poster's lead and read the text of this bill in full, think about it, read some arguments for and against, then send your opinion to your senator. Informed decisions people! Basing your choice on kneejerk reactions from any source (esp /.) would be just as bad as the people trying to fly this under the radar by attaching it to must-pass legislation!

Re:Don't bother with unrealid.com

[hotspotbloc]

"every convenience store learns to grab that data and sell it to Big Data for a nickel" Right. Because every time I got to the convenience store I have to present my license. Oh, wait, no I don't. FUD.

Here in MA everyone gets carded (normally with one's driver's license) to buy a pack a smokes. A friend of my has had many stores scan in the PDF417 bar code on the back of his license. When he questioned why some said it was the law, others said it was to guard against fake IDs. The fact is decoding this bar code is a trivial matter and it contains your name, address, date of birth, license number and license type/restrictions. All this information is now property of the store. BTW, he ended up duct taping the bar code and no one has refused to sell him anything.

So, for example, do you thing insurance companies would pay for a list of smokers?

A few years ago there was a guy who slipped and injuried himself at a Ralph's market. When he sued they used the data from his shopping card (as in the beer and wine he bought) against him.

To go from carding for smokes and beer to everything is a very small technological step. All the tools are in place. Thing about stores like Home Depot that sell some dangerous stuff when used incorrectly. I could see RealID being slowly extended over time, item by item, to cover any and all purchases all in the name of protection from "terrorists".

The fake image of the "Real ID" card indicates that the card will contain information such as Religion and Occupation. It will not. Read the bill. FUD.

I could see religion being added in the future. The "Radical Right" aka "Christian Right" would say it's a good thing so, in case of an accident, the proper religious person could be summoned. Of course the inverse would be it ending up like a system in Nazi Germany with Star of David or upside-down pink triangle. Maybe add a crescent for current times. Before anyone says this could never happen, that's what most people thought of the Holocaust.

Oppression does not happen in one big swoop, but in very small steps. IMO RealID is one of those steps.

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[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

THE HORROR!

[Jim_Callahan]

Yeah, better protest... reading the act, the card will require awful, intrusive things like

An adress of current residence
A signature (oh, no!)
A photograph (the horror!)
and... wait for it... a DRIVERS LICENSE NUMBER.

Those bastards! How dare they force my driver's license to reveal confidential information like my driver's license number! It's a crime against humanity, I tell you?

Seriously, though. I have applied for drivers license in two states and neither of them will have to change a thing under this law, except being overseen by a federal organization. Maybe this means I'll finally stop getting jury summons for a state I haven't lived in in three years.

Re:THE HORROR!

[danila]

"An adress of current residence" is very bad. Do you realise that eventually (even if not in the beginning) it may require you to report to the authorities every time you move. Initially it may not be required for short trips, but it's only a technical change to replace "more than 60 days" with "more than 6 days". That would basically mean an obligatory trip to a police station when you travel to any place for more than a few days. Trust me, it sucks and it does strongly infringe on human rights of people - in practice, in those places that have such requirements.

I don't know much more about the law than is written in your post and don't particularly care, not being an American and having decided already that I don't want to visit your nice police state any time soon. But I can tell you that requiring a "propiska" is indeed undemocratic, restrictive and limits your freedom of travel. Sucks to be an American.

Re:THE HORROR!

[JimBobJoe]

the card will require awful, intrusive things like
An adress of current residence


Here in Ohio I worked my ass off and got a legislator last year to introduce a bill that would allow any Ohio license to be issued without an individual's address.

The address is an awful anachronism, and unnecessary today. If you're an attractive 22 year old, would you want to show ever bouncer in town your home address simply to get into a club? For people who use their ID's a lot, it doesn't make so much sense to show everyone and their grandmother where they live. (Keep in mind, this doesn't remove the address record from DMV files, and if the DMV wants proof of address before issuing the license, that doesn't change anything either.)

North Carolina currently issues address-less licenses to individuals who are domestic violence or stalking victims.

I've also pointed out that the address is a huge key toward identity theft, should your license fall into the wrong hands.

(You'll note that the legislation also allowed you to have a license issued without date of birth, also on privacy grounds, for individuals who do not use their license for age verification activities.)

A signature (oh, no!)
There is something to be said about your license not having the signature of the bearer, in case the license finds itself in the wrong hands, and then someone can use that signature for nefarious purposes.

A photograph (the horror!)

Approximately 16 states have codified relgious objector's non-photo driver's licenses. All states are technically supposed to issue them under federal case law.

Keep in mind however, you've left out the bigger requirement regarding the photo. It must be a *digital* photo. I guess that's not necessarily a huge thing because all states now are on the digital license kick.

However, this legislation technically requires that every single american over the age of 16 be photographed and that photograph be put into a national photograph database (since the state databases must be combined.) While that's basically in place, it wasn't being done with federal requirement.

Think about it this way, essentially, every American is being required to show up at their local police station and be photographed. Since it's part of the natural licensing process that's been created no one noticed. (My Ohio BMV, when they brought out the photo license in 1974, promised that there would be no central photo archive...which they introduced in 1995 and hoped no one was paying attention.)

and... wait for it... a DRIVERS LICENSE NUMBER.

Did this legislation require a permanent driver's license number? If so...that's basically another SSN, with all its disadvantages and baggage.

What I really want to know is . . .

[harley_frog]

How is this bill going to prevent the documents that are required to get a RealID from being forged in the first place? Granted, this is outside the realm of most illegals, but if the intention is to stop terrorists from coming into the country under guise, than they are more than likely well-funded enough to get forged documentation to get a real Real ID. This is, at best, a short term solution that will, more than likely, become a long-term problem.

Re:Am I the only one who remembers this?

[amliebsch]

Just a guess but I suspect the reason is that previous legislation directly mandated the states to participate in the identity legislation scheme, whereas this one just withholds federal funding for states that refuse to comply.

It's the same reason why directly requiring states to raise their drinking ages to 21 is unconstitutional, but withholding highway funds for states that decline to do so is not.

Libertarian Fantasies

[Doc Ruby]

I'm glad the Republican control of Washington means a smaller, less intrusive government, protecting state's rights to self-government. And real tough security measures, to protect us from terrorists.

Wait - Republicans have controlled the White House, Senate and House of Representatives for years? The WTC planebombers and OK City bombers all had legitimate ID? I'll have to wait for the next Fox News cycle to get ny updated talking points.

My Letter to Illinois senators Obama and Durbin

[justanyone]

I wrote:

The implications of having a card like this are HUGE.

We must address a variety of privacy concerns, including if the card will have its own ID number, how long that number is, whether it has 'check digits' in it to verify that is is valid (a checksum or 'hash' in computer lingo), whether anyone can request or retain the information in it, whether it has the person's address, if the address's city is the Post Office's or not (various villages are not recognized by the USPS), If there will be an RFID embedded in it, and if so, what information will be accessible via that RFID, and many other questions.

Please address these issues in committee or in the Senate before voting quickly on something with so many privacy concerns attached. Various people in and out of the US Senate have said it is a very deliberative body. This bill cries out for committee hearings to determine what the advantages and disadvantages are for various items of information being put on the card as well as the open questions above.

Thanks for your time,
Cordially yours,
-- Kevin (etc).

Lazarus Long said it best:

[ThosLives]

"When a society starts requiring ID cards, it's time to move to another planet." (probably paraphrased, credits to Heinlein)

Seriously though, I have still not been able to figure out the whole "privacy" debate. All the information that is on these cards, as far as I can tell, including address, is information that can be publicly observed. Of course, this raises the question "should it be legal for someone to follow someone around to determine where they live?"

Where you live isn't necessarily a private piece of information, but I can understand the desire people have to not make that information easily available to anyone who might want it. The plain fact of the matter is, there isn't really any such thing as privacy except where there is no possibility of observation.

The dilemma faced by legislators - and the average citizen - is how do you know if people are telling the truth? How do you ensure "trust"? It's a pain in the rear in modern society - it used to be that you lived your life in a small town where you knew the entire town, and when outsiders came in they were treated with suspicion until they were around for long enough with demonstrated character to be trusted.

That is, in fact, the only way to build trust: continued demonstration of certain behavior. This isn't even a guarantee of future behavior, which is the nasty caveat. So, as far as I see it, at best any new type of ID will be a neutral thing. In reality, it will probably carry some nominal fee and so not be good, and it will also probably be abused by certain people or organizations.

The thing is, society is based on trust, and all this type of thing demonstrates is that people are less likely to trust than in the past. The other interesting thing is that you really cannot legislate trust, or behavior for that matter. You can only build trust, and you can only punish or reward behavior. Those are the only controls in society: reward and punishment. It's the unfortunate reality of the world in which we live.

Re:Lazarus Long said it best:

[0xABADC0DA]

The privacy argument is really pretty simple:

If somebody were to follow you around all day, everyday... from your house to your work to the convienience store, and anywhere else, would you get creeped out? Or more accurately, if you knew somebody was doing this but couldn't see them (they sent you summaries of what you did that day or something) would you like that? Would you want to stop them from doing this by invoking some anti-stalking law?

If you would not like somebody following you everywhere in this way then you are either against the Real ID or feigning ignorance.

But fundamentally the issue is whether you think obeying laws should be a person's responsibility or something enforced mechanically, because ultimately Real ID is about the latter. Seriously, how many war funding bills do you think it will take before your car will refuse to start without reading your id card first and checking wirelessly against a national "ok-to-drive" list? Or for that matter before the voting booth will require a machine-readable ID before allowing you to place your 'anonymous' vote? Do you want to be mechanically excluded from virtually everything with flip of a bit because some CITI thinks your daily patterns changed too much and requires an explation first, or do you want humans to always be in the loop?

The more you actually think about the ramifications the more you should be against this id.

Re:THE FACTS:

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

Currently most states do not even require proof of U.S. citizenship to obtain a Driver's License. You don't even need a SSN.

Sigh. SSNs are for getting social security benefits, they do not uniquely identify you. And why should someone need to tell you where they live to get a driver's license? Does it somehow effect their ability to drive?

We don't have ID cards because we're supposed to be a free people that don't have to register with the government just to live. I guess such outdated ideals were thrown away because the TV scared all the little cowards into being afraid of the big, bad terrorists. You're a a stinking coward if you're willing to give up your freedom to let the government try to protect you and an idiot if you think they can or will. How about trying out a little personal responsibility? If a terrorist tries to blow you up, shoot them. This is America, right?

Re:What's the Big Deal?

[ultimabaka]

I don't believe a policeman asking to see my ID card qualifies as harrassment. And as someone who has been on the receiving end of police harrassment, lemme tell ya that getting my ID checked out is paltry compared to what they CAN do to you.

It's funny...other democratic nations have laws in place where cops can ask anyone for their ID whenever they like, and no one even so much as sez anything. Take, for example, Japan; granted, Japan has all kinds of problems, but I personally don't believe this to be one of them.

And, as debatable as it might be (read: flame away ), suspicion of being a terrorist could one day become just cause. It pretty much already is here in New York.

Big Brother is BAD

[Doc Ruby]

Most European countries are analogous to US states, not to the entire US. And most European countries learned from their 20th Century fascist disasters just how dangerous is the centralized control of identity. So European privacy laws, and government operations, aren't a tinderbox of identity theft and covert surveillance risks. The US, on the other hand, is swarming with powermad bureaucrats, and their corporate backers, doing whatever they can to turn the $2.5T Federal government's eyes on our citizens, on the hollow pretext of "protecting us" from terrorists.

For more information, look into the MATRIX and TIA programs, their connections to identity leakers like ChoicePoint, and the seriously real threat all this Big Brother "crap" poses to Americans.

Re:What's the Big Deal?

[Mr. Slippery]

I can see a cop walking down the street asking people for their national ID card (which, on an aside, I prey will at least be difficult to counterfeit), and at least I wouldn't complain too much.

I'm sorry that you love liberty that little.

My identity, much less the information on my personal papers, is simply not a beat cop's business.

Unless he's looking for a specific person fitting my description ("I have an arrest warrant for a Richard Roe, fitting your description, please show me some ID to prove you're not him or I'll have to arrest you"), my name and information have nothing to do with whether he has a reasonable suspicion that a crime has been committed.

I see no reason not to believe it will help reduce, at the very least, illegal immigration.

I see no reason to beleive that it would help reduce illegal immigration. I certainly see no reason to curtail the liberties of American citizens in a half-assed attempt to pretend to reduce illegal immigration.

Same thing

[ebvwfbw]

The Clinton administration DID try to do this. There was an outrage. At the same time he was also pushing through his "know your customer" rules where banks would be required to know you and how you get your money. That was shut down but it took a LOT of effort. Same with what he proposed for a real national ID, not the requirements for a uniform drivers license and procedures for obtaining that license that they are proposing right now.

I have a feeling that a national ID is one of those things they will continue to push until they finally get it. President, Congress, none of that matters, they will do it regardless. They, Them - The Men In Black.

about national id under clinton
Know your customer
Lots of other articles on this, check with google. Type in "clinton national id" and "clinton know your customer".

MESSAGE TEMPLATE

[LanMan04]

Here is the message template that eff.org (Electronic Freedom Foundation) provides to write your representatives to speak out against the REAL ID Act. Use this if you're having trouble thinking of what to say. I know I'm encouraging thoughtless messages to congress, but hey, too bad for the idiots that support this bill:
------------------
I am a constituent who cares about privacy and national security, and I urge you to oppose the REAL ID Act provisions of the House emergency supplemental spending bill. The REAL ID Act creates a de facto "national ID," threatening our privacy, security, and the principles of federalism that safeguard both.

National identification systems are prone to abuse at every step of their creation and use. The REAL ID Act would establish an enormous national database of ID holders, where even a small percentage of errors would cause major social disruption. Also, the ID would function as an internal passport that would be shown before accessing planes, trains, national parks, and court houses - an irresistible target for forgers and identity thieves. The Act also requires IDs to include "common machine-readable technology," which would likely include controversial radio-frequency identification (RFID) technologies that can broadcast personal data to passersby. Worst of all, the REAL ID Act would divert resources from security measures that could actually work.

Moreover, states do not want this kind of system. A similar program called "MATRIX" recently failed because states abandoned it due to privacy concerns. This is an example of federalism at work. We should respect a state's decision to protect its citizens' privacy, not conscript it into an ill-conceived national system.

I hope that you will work to strip the REAL ID Act provisions from the emergency supplemental spending bill. Thank you for your time.
-------------

here is why this is bad with Excerpts:

[geekoid]

I noticed several people not understanding why this is bad. Here are some excerpts from the bill:

`(1) IN GENERAL- Notwithstanding any other provision of law, the Secretary of Homeland Security shall have the authority to waive, and shall waive, all laws such Secretary, in such Secretary's sole discretion, determines necessary to ensure expeditious construction of the barriers and roads under this section.

`(2) NO JUDICIAL REVIEW- Notwithstanding any other provision of law (statutory or nonstatutory), no court, administrative agency, or other entity shall have jurisdiction--

`(A) to hear any cause or claim arising from any action undertaken, or any decision made, by the Secretary of Homeland Security pursuant to paragraph (1); or

`(B) to order compensatory, declaratory, injunctive, equitable, or any other relief for damage alleged to arise from any such action or decision.'.

Secretary of Homeland Security can do what he wants, and nobody has any recourse at ALL. He wanst to put in land mines, nothing we can do about it. Wants to spend 80 Billion dollars a year patrolling our borders, nothing he can do about it.

It errods Attorney General position by giving the Secertary of Homeland security the same power. Bear in mind the attorny general has checks and balances that the Secretary of Homeland Security does not.

NO judicial review???

[KlomDark]

What in the mother fucking hell is wrong with these people? No judicial review? Since when do we remove a major check and balance from the American system? Just let this Homeland security guy play cowboy with no oversite from other factions of government?

How completely, absolutely UNAMERICAN this Sensenbrenner person is. Has no grasp of the long term impact things like this will be to the US. Has no place in our government.

Yah buddy, I said it, get out of our country since you obviously don't respect what made our country great.

------------------

SEC. 102. WAIVER OF LAWS NECESSARY FOR IMPROVEMENT OF BARRIERS AT BORDERS.

Section 102(c) of the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996 (8 U.S.C. 1103 note) is amended to read as follows:

`(c) Waiver-

`(1) IN GENERAL- Notwithstanding any other provision of law, the Secretary of Homeland Security shall have the authority to waive, and shall waive, all laws such Secretary, in such Secretary's sole discretion, determines necessary to ensure expeditious construction of the barriers and roads under this section.

`(2) NO JUDICIAL REVIEW- Notwithstanding any other provision of law (statutory or nonstatutory), no court, administrative agency, or other entity shall have jurisdiction--

`(A) to hear any cause or claim arising from any action undertaken, or any decision made, by the Secretary of Homeland Security pursuant to paragraph (1); or

`(B) to order compensatory, declaratory, injunctive, equitable, or any other relief for damage alleged to arise from any such action or decision.'.

Re:THE FACTS:

[aiken_d]

How are we going to secure our borders without a national ID system? A nation without the power to control its own borders isn't really nation. It's just a hunk of land.

Damn, so for the past 229 years, the United States hasn't really been a nation? Just a hunk of land? And this ID card will fix that?

And remind me exactly how a national ID card will "secure our borders"? Last time I checked, most illegal immigration happened away from our border checkpoints. How exactly will that change with a national ID card?

Sheesh
-b

Re:ALL of this begs the question...

[symbolic]

What if these so-called illegals aren't stupid enough to apply for a state ID or driver's license? What then? [That sensation that your soul is being pierced is from the blank stare you'll get when you ask any politician for an honest answer to this question.]

Obviously, the guy wants to cut down on the potential terrorist threat. But who in HELL says that a terrorist needs a driver's license? Or a state ID?

So who suffers? The criminals and terrorsts? Hell no- they'll just route around it. That leaves only one other class...the vast, vast majority of people who are neither terrorists nor criminals.

House Voting Record

[wcdw]

For those outraged enough to complain to their House representatives for passing this crap to the senate in the first place, here's a link to the vote:

http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2005/roll031.xml

HR 418

[tocs]

Here is a link to a statement by Representative Ron Paul (Republican of Texas). I think he has good things to say about the Real ID Act I think some of the other parts of the Bill (HR 418 ) are just as troubling. I am not a lawyer but some of the things sound a little spooky. Dosent the part below mean the Secretary of Homeland Security has (http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/D?c109:3:./te mp/~c109hAhhtl::

SEC. 102. WAIVER OF LAWS NECESSARY FOR IMPROVEMENT OF BARRIERS AT BORDERS.
Section 102(c) of the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996 (8 U.S.C. 1103 note) is amended to read as follows:
`(c) Waiver-
`(1) IN GENERAL- Notwithstanding any other provision of law, the Secretary of Homeland Security shall have the authority to waive, and shall waive, all laws such Secretary, in such Secretary's sole discretion, determines necessary to ensure expeditious construction of the barriers and roads under this section.
`(2) NO JUDICIAL REVIEW- Notwithstanding any other provision of law (statutory or nonstatutory), no court, administrative agency, or other entity shall have jurisdiction--
`(A) to hear any cause or claim arising from any action undertaken, or any decision made, by the Secretary of Homeland Security pursuant to paragraph (1); or
`(B) to order compensatory, declaratory, injunctive, equitable, or any other relief for damage alleged to arise from any such action or decision.'.

Simple amendment to kill this provision

[nokiator]

It would be easy to fight this provision in the senate: Just attach a simple amendment that requires gun dealers to scan a customer's Real ID before making a sale!

Re:THE FACTS:

[lanfor]

My wife is in the US on an H4 visa. She cannot apply for SSN. You are trying to prevent her from getting a driving license and driving a car. I am in the US on an H1-b visa. I don't have a US citizenship. You are trying to get my WA driving license away (you want me to walk to work or what?). Lukasz

Re:ALL of this begs the question...

[rootbeertapper]

They are criminals by definition. They broke immigration laws and entered the country illegally. Calling them undocumented workers or another PC term is intellectually dishonest.

Enter The Panopticon

[fupeg]

Stuff like this seems harmless to the "average" citizen, and it seems like it could somehow "stop" illegal immigrants and potential terrorists. This is exactly how freedom is lost. Seemingly well meaning bills passed during times of "crisis." Oh I'm sure some will say that I'm being paranoid and shouldn't by all this "big brother crap." But if you give the state the ability to monitor all of its citizens, then you have essentially put yourself into a prison and given away your rights. It's called a panopticon. If the state can observe you at any times, then you lose all freedom. Not because they punish you for things, but just because of the fear it creates. It's the perfect prison.

Now the Real ID does not create a panopticon necessarily. However, it does create the means. If everyone has to have this card with them at all times and it can be "read" electronically, then it doesn't take a genius to connect the dots, through in some GPS (or even just triangulation) and suddenly the state can track the location of all of its citizens at all times. Now imagine if all businesses start requiring Real ID if you're going to use a credit card. That's not really that far-fetched, now is it? So now suddenly much of your economic activity can also be identified and tracked without your knowledge. You can easily get even more wild with the "uses" of such technology, but these two things are both pretty simple and far-reaching.

Re:Better than what we have!

[bani]

So do tell me how a national ID will prevent another 9/11. Considering all the hijackers had valid ID, and none of them were on any watch list.

What's going to stop the next batch of terrorists from having perfectly valid ID? Nothing.

What will this prevent? Nothing.

Remind me again what the point of this bill is then?

Bullshit.

[isotope23]

"If you don't like that idea, I'm sure you could move to Rwanda and be perfectly happy without all the responsibilities of being a US Citizen."

I not only have a right, but an OBLIGATION as an American Citizen to question the actions of my government.

"I'm not saying that we do it perfectly... there's plenty of intervention that i think we could stay out of and not be the worse for it, and at the same time I know there are plenty of circumstances that the US could intervene that it doesn't"

That is just it, the USA intervenes ONLY when it is in its interests, i.e. OIL, or geopolitical games.

"If you can live with the ridicule and guilt of your nation NOT doing something that was considered so "wrong" to the rest of the world when you COULD HAVE... fine, I can't"

Hmmmm.... Why haven't you volunteered to go fight for "freedom" in Rawanda, or Darfur yet? Oh that's right you are perfectly happy to say "we" have a duty to fix the world, as long as YOU don't have to risk your life for it. I just love people who talk about how we need to fix the world, as long as the potential cost is someone else.

Frankly we do not have a responsibility to any other nation or people. We have no obligation to send our soldiers to die for someone else, nor do we have an obligation to spend our taxes upon them.

That said I have no problem if you or any other private citizen voluntarily donantes your money, or volunteers to fight for the cause of freedom in another country.

As for Patriotism I offer this quote :

Theodore Roosevelt:
To announce that there must be no criticism of the president, or that we are to stand by the president, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public. (1918)

It's not about driving. It's about election fraud

[Ungrounded Lightning]

REAL ID also prohibits states from issuing driver's licenses to illegal aliens. This makes no sense, and will only result in these illegal aliens driving without licenses -- which isn't going to help anyone's security.

Yeah, that's some REAL good insight.

The prohibition on issuing drivers licenses isn't about driving. It's about identity fraud - including election fraud.

In some states (when you can challenge a voter's identity at all) a driver's license is adequate proof of identity to respond to the challenge.

California (for instance), where a LOT of illegals vote (often multiply), recently almost passed a law explicitly granting illegals the right to be issued a driver's license with no special markings to indicate that they were anything other than a full citizen and resident at the indicated address.

There are a lot of security implications to issuing official identity cards to illegals and deliberately looking the other way about their status.

IMHO the way to spike this bill is to add a rider that:
- requires voters in federal elections to show the card as ID at the polls and give the number when registering to vote and when asking for an absentee ballot, and
- tie the state registration databases into a national system to insure that no vote is cast without a valid ID number and each ID number only votes once in a given election, and that each ID represents a real person who is still alive and has no other ID nuber.

That (combined with the security-related federal checks on the database) would effectively spike a number of forms of voting fraud. Current legislators were elected under a system WITH the fraud. So even the honest ones will worry about how much fraud their party machines might have used to get them their seats, and whether they'd be voting themselves out. B-)

What I'd expect of such a rider:

- The Rs would be for it. (They believe the Ds are the major beneficiaries of such fraud and thus the Rs would benefit from the cleanout of the voter rolls.) But many of them are against other personal-info probing aspects of a National ID system. So they'd push for including the rider (and given their majority in congress might succeed). But many would vote against the bill even with the rider.

- Successfully adding the rider would convince a lot of Ds to vote against the bill containing it, because they too believe they are the beneficiaries of machine politics.

Together these two effects might raise enough nays to kill the bill.

Sounds like it's too late for this go-around. But if the ID bill does pass, and the system is deployed, it will be hard for a congresscritter to justify voting against a new every-voter-counts-ONCE act to use it to reduce election fraud. So the spectre of such use can be brought up when calling your congresscritter (if you think he's corrupt) and it might work as well as if the rider WERE present.

Of course you'll have to couch such arguments as using the card to harass minorities and such at the voting booth. B-)

It isn't the information it holds now that matters

[Colin Smith]

It's the information it might hold in the future that matters and that's basically anything that the government want it to be. Today they want your name and address, tomorrow they could add ethnicity, religion, sexuality, salary or political preferences.

Hell, they can put anything they want on the database, you're giving them that power, and guess what, you're also giving them your identity. Once an ID system is in place it is the state, the card and the number which define *your* identity, not the other way round. The real Colin Smith becomes the person with the Colin Smith card and the Colin Smith ID number.

You may well think this is paranoid. Well I would have thought so as well but history says that it isn't, look up Tutsi and the J stamp on Google in the context of ID cards.

The thing is that an ID card is an enabler for discrimination, it is *specifically* designed to allow the government to discriminate against non citizens, but why stop there? Adding another field to a database is a seconds work.

Sensitive information

[bluGill]

The government calls this sensitive information. Things are are public, but when combined can result in conclusions that are secret.

My mom's maiden name is public information. My address and phone number is public. My social security number is easily available, though in theory non-public. (Nearly everyone uses it as ID) Knowing any one of the above is pretty harmless to me. Knowing all of them is enough to withdraw all my saved money, and get some loans in my name.

This card puts too much sensitive information in one place.

Not anymore

[bluGill]

Until a few years ago you were correct, hand written letters go the most weight. However this is no longer the case.

Now any letter is unopened for several weeks, while they carefully check it for various poisons. (well anthrax and the like which are not exactly poison, but are deadly)

Email is now preferred, everyone has email. Most people do not own a fax machine, though they are also liked. Phone calls work too, but they take more time.

Make sure that you give your home address. Not a P.O. box, but a real address where you get mail. They will respond with a letter to that address for everything you send if you are in their area. If you not in their area they will forward your letter to your representative from that area who will respond.

Try asking a hard question...

[raehl]

But who in HELL says that a terrorist needs a driver's license? Or a state ID?

You're kidding, right? Let's think of things that it is harder for a terrorist to do with a national standard for issuing driver's licenses and state IDs:

- Obtain a driver's license or state ID with a fake name
- Get on an airplane
- Rent a Ryder truck
- Buy Firearms
- Withdraw money from a bank
- Go Clubbing

It blows my mind that the general reasdership of Slashdot, who would assail the concept of security through obscurity were it applied anywhere else, think their personal privacy depends on states being able to issue IDs without actually being very sure if the IDs they are issuing are for the people they are issuing them for. "As long as the government has to keep track of 50 different IDs, my privacy is secure!" Right.

That's all the federal government is saying: If you want YOUR state's ID to be accepted as REAL identification, your state needs to excecise due diligence in making sure the IDs issued by your state are accurate.

If we're going to let states issue IDs that are not worth the plastic they are printed on, what's the point? Why make everyone go through the trouble of getting an ID if the criminals are just going to walk into the DMV and get fake ones anyway?

So if we don't force states to take issuing IDs seriously, who suffers? The criminals and terrorsts? Hell no- they'll just get bad IDs. That leaves only one other class...the vast, vast majority of people who are neither terrorists nor criminals.

Re:Try asking a hard question...

[symbolic]

If we're going to let states issue IDs that are not worth the plastic they are printed on, what's the point? Why make everyone go through the trouble of getting an ID if the criminals are just going to walk into the DMV and get fake ones anyway?

You say this as though it's going to make any difference- or did I misunderstand your intent?

Instead, they'll just issue a "motor-vehicle operator's-license-turned-universal-id" so that everyone and their grandmother can have access to pretty much everything about you. That makes a MUCH more sense.

In other words, it won't solve the problem, and it will likely create a few that we have yet to see.

Re:Try asking a hard question...

[raehl]

In other words, it won't solve the problem, and it will likely create a few that we have yet to see.

My point is that's a specuous argument. You can make that argument about *ANY* change - virtually no change compleely solves the problem, and virtually every change will create a few that we have yet to see.

Take the CURRENT system of drivers licenses for example. Does that "solve the problem" of preventing people who are not qualified from driving? Nope. People who are not qualified still get licenses, and people who have revoked licenses still drive. I guess since it didn't "solve the problem", we shouldn't bother licensing drivers at all, right?

The correct question is "Will the benefits of this change outweigh the other consequences?" And the answer to that is yes. It won't be perfect, but it will be closer to perfect than the current hodge-podge of 50 different identification systems.

Any argument against a national ID card system boils down to "My (whatever) relies on having several incompatible, and sometimes ineffective, ID systems in this country." Regardless of (whatever) is, it's a stupid argument. If you do think having ineffective ID systems is a good thing, then having no ID system would be better, right?

Re:Try asking a hard question...

[lav-chan]

Someone can correct me if i'm wrong, but, if i'm not mistaken, most of the terrorists who highjacked the planes on 9/11 were let on because they had foreign passports. They did not need a driver's licence or a state ID, and the REAL ID Act does not change this fact. You can still board a plane with a foreign passport.

In other words, if REAL ID was in effect in 2001, 9/11 probably still would have happened.

Re:ALL of this begs the question...

[RM6f9]

"Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door."

That is inscribed on what may be the most famous symbol of the USA. The statue of liberty. She stands in NY harbor, welcoming the immigrants since being given to the USA by France, in 1886.

Should we just take the old girl down, then?

Re:ALL of this begs the question...

[aldousd666]

nope, just when your poor and tired huddled masses come in, make sure they sign up to pay taxes and follow the law like the rest of us.

Re:ALL of this begs the question...

[Jherek Carnelian]

They are criminals by definition. They broke immigration laws and entered the country illegally. Calling them undocumented workers or another PC term is intellectually dishonest.

Ever exceed the speed limit? Congratulations you, and just about every other citizen, are a criminal by definition.

It is not politically correct to use a term that reflects your feelings about the severity of the "crime." If anything, that is the exact opposite of political correctness. People who have a bug up their ass about the issue can call them wanton dangerous criminals while people who think immigration policy is no big deal can call them undocumented workers and then we can all better know each other's position than if we had simply used a rather non-descriptive catch-all term.

Be scared of this as well...

[TofuTerror]

http://zabasearch.com/ this pulled up everyone i knows info, this sucks.

Re:ALL of this begs the question...

[OxygenPenguin]

You have got to be joking me. This statue is indeed there to welcome the "huddled masses yearning to be free" but it is not there to welcome the 25 million illegal aliens that enter this country every year. Immigrants fleeing to this land of liberty is one thing, and everyone has an opportunity here. But you cannot claim that our attempts to keep those who refuse to register, refuse to become citizens, to learn our language, to become part of our culture, out of this country, is defying the fundamental liberties of this country.

Reread your history books

[isotope23]

"Just like we had no obligation to the rest of the world in both world wars. we went in not because we were obligated, but because it was the right thing to do."

We entered WW I because the Germans sank the Lusitania. Even though they published a full page ad in American Newspapers warning people sailing to Britain that any ship carrying war goods was subject to sinking, (which the Lusitania was), when it was sunk with americans onboard we got sucked into the war.

We entered WW II because of Pearl Harbor.

Before BOTH incidents the majority of people here in the US were Isolationalist. Doing the "right" thing, had nothing to do with our entrance into either war.

"and if we were in iraq for the oil, we sure as hell wouldn't be paying opec's prices for it."

I'd suggest you read Wolfowitz's papers for the Project for a New American Century to understand why we invaded Iraq. Iraq not only has the 2nd largest oil reserves, but being centrally located in the middle east it is the perfect place to have permanent military bases.

Keep in mind this was written in the 1990's long before 9/11 and the whole preemptive strike/WMD
tale.

FYI

[paranode]

Sweden and Switzerland are not the same country.

Re:ALL of this begs the question...

[danielsfca2]

Gee, let's examine your brilliant comment here:

If you're an "illegal alien," you are probably working in this country. That's what most of the fuss is around them. They're "Not Authorized To Work In The United States," the little checkbox on any job application. So right off, they're paying payroll taxes, including federal income tax, and social security and medicare tax--which they'll never be able to collect on with their fake SSN's, and they won't be able to file a tax return to get part of that money back. Then they go out and buy things (like $800 apiece rims) and pay 7-10% sales tax on them. Ditto for all the tons of taxes on cars, on gas, on cigarettes, on phone service...

So who are you trying to kid that these people aren't contributing their fair share?? Yeah, their kids are going to school. So are every trailerpark welfare mother's kids in Podunk, Oklahoma. I don't see anyone trying to deport them. Everyone's paying taxes. You can be sure of that. (Oh, except the rich...They always manage to avoid paying their fair share by keeping a team of lawyers researching loopholes, and offshore accounts in the Caymans.)

And if you want to draw a correlation between illegal immigrants and increased lawbreaking, I dare you to show a statistic that shows that they are any more likely to commit crimes than US-born citizens with white skin, of equal economic status.

Re:Better than what we have!

[bani]

the administration is pushing it as a magic bullet for terrorism though.

no, the only reason for this bill to exist is to make tracking and surveillance of citizens easier.

i guarantee the next wave of terrorists will have perfectly valid national id.

and the government will have blown $120 million on a placebo anti-terrorism measure, instead of $120 million that could have been used on actually effective security measures.