Slashdot Mirror
More States Challenging National Driver's Licenses
berberine writes "A revolt against a national driver's license, begun in Maine last month, is quickly spreading to other states.
The Maine Legislature on Jan. 26 overwhelmingly passed a resolution objecting to the Real ID Act of 2005. The federal law sets a national standard for driver's licenses and requires states to link their record-keeping systems to national databases.
Within a week of Maine's action, lawmakers in Georgia, Wyoming, Montana, New Mexico, Vermont and Washington state also balked at Real ID. They are expected soon to pass laws or adopt resolutions declining to participate in the federal identification network.
Maine's rejection was recently discussed on slashdot."
Those of us who work everyday with databases should know the futility of opposing any linkages of all DBs in the world. It is only through government stupidity and lethargy that this hasn't happened already. Anybody who has a DB is going to link them up if at all possible. The only thing we have on our side is the delay caused by government sloth.
Your best bet if you don't like this is to go off the grid. But we know what an exercise in futility that is unless you're willing to live in Montana ala Ted Kazinsky.
I wish they could take advantage of the timing and challenge other measures like national speed limit and national drinking age too, putting an end on this bastardized federalism that is not only against the intention of the Founding Fathers but very damaging to the very concept of the whole thing.
Slashdot Burying Stories About Slashdot Media Owned
sorry, couldnt resist.
watch out for revenous mooninites while you are at it.
comment directly in my journal
We fought against the drinking age issue, but congress had tied it to the funding of the roads. IIRC, In the end after 2 years of losing ALL road funding, the state gave in.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
I sure hope more states revolt against this. We are surrendering our privacy for 'security'. Of course one must realize how few terrorist attacks the USSR and Nazi Germany had that weren't staged. I find it very interesting how the government convinced millions of very independent Americans to be tracked in the first place. Social Security, aka 'free' money.
Most people don't think much about the north eastern and north western states. But it's these states that have truly helped retain the last remnants of the freedom the Founding Fathers fought so valiantly for.
So while the people in a state like Kansas focus all their attention on debating whether or not evolution should be taught in science classes, the people in states like Maine, Vermont, and Washington are defending their freedoms.
Maybe it's a matter of the level of education of the general populace in those states. No offense to anyone from Kansas, but it has traditionally ranked quite low, often at the very bottom, when it comes to a variety of measures. As a whole, the people of Kansas typically have a lower IQ than those from other states. Fewer people there have undergraduate or graduate degrees from universities (sorry, Oral Roberts University doesn't count) as compared to the people from other states. On the other hand, university degrees are extremely common in the north western and north eastern states, with virtually everybody having at least attended university for some period of time.
So while I no longer live in America, I do want to thank those in the north west and north east who are defending the rights of our nation's people.
FWIW, the government sloth and lethargy is part of the American ideology of limiting government so it can do the least harm to the people, while doing the most work for us. I'd rather have an inefficient government topheavy with accountability than an efficient totalitarianism.
Those of us who work with the government (I advise the NYC City Council's Technology committee) know that governments, born to bureaucracy, have the most chance of actually adhering to policies that prohibit invasive DB linking, when the people get involved to stop aggressive officials with Big Brother dreams. They live by those rules and the audits. If they are designed by both policy and info architects, to actually work with the "machinery" of people who run them.
If you are that fatalistic, and just give up, of course exploiters in government, and the "subcontractors" who love them (and pillaging their data) will track your every move. Only if you do something to engage your democracy will you make it work for you. You are the "dem" in democracy.
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make install -not war
My understanding is that it makes applicants prove either their citizenship or legal presence in the country (i.e valid permanent resident visa) to get a license. The 9-11 hijackers had real valid Virginia issued drivers licenses, but they were obtained fraudulently. This makes it harder for them to get one. Once they are denied a driver license, a whole host of otherwise trivial transactions (banking, travel, renting an apartment, etc) become much harder from them to accomplish without attracting attention.
national id, or state id: from a privacy point of view, what's the difference?
but, from a law enforcement id, it provides a comprehensive framework:
1. rather than have to prove/ disprove the veracity of 50 different ids, you only need to figure out the authenticity of one
2. it brings to bear national resources when weeding out the fakes/ questionable ids/ other types of enforcement and vetting
i understand privacy concerns and what they mean. but what i don't understand is if someone with privacy concerns were to grant that a state id is acceptable, why a national id is somehow any different or more onerus to privacy concerns. a national id, from a privacy point of view, grants no more exposure than that which is lost with a state id
however, from a security point of view, one national id obviously superior than all the different state models. so what's the problem? it makes law enforcement's job easier. what, you think there will be more nefarious government activity with one big model? one big model that every privacy group will monitor with a white hot spotlight? you think somehow 50 different little models is going to have less shady activity, more monitoring? oh i get it: crooked law enforcement only goes on in washington dc, it doesn't go on in montpelier or bismarck or sacramento. pfft... get real
of course maine is fighting the model: it undermines their entrenched authority. furthermore, fighting the national id from maine's point of view then has nothing to do with championing privacy rights for individuals, its all about championing the state of maine and its concerns. why does anyone think that what maine is fighting for has anything to do with the fight for privacy? its all about states versus nation, not individuals versus government
don't drink the koolaid: a national model is superior from a security AND privacy stand point
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
You should have placed tolls (collected simply by cops in cruisers) at all road entrances to your state and had them collect a (large -- think 5-figure or more per-vehicle) toll only from federal (military, etc.) vehicles.
Ensure that if the feds want to use your roads then they *will* fund them whether its indirectly (as per usual) or directly.
If you live in the US, you can voice your opposition to the REAL ID Act by sending your senators and representative a message using the handy form at http://action.downsizedc.org/wyc.php?cid=30
The states don't care about you.
They have eleventy-billion lines of COBOL to care about.
it is easy for an illegal to get a fake state dmv license
that's the point
50 different state models, with only a state's resources behind them, is easier to crack than one big national model
i would go so far as to say that it might still not be so hard to get a national id
however, it will be HARDER, without a doubt. no huge bureaucratic system is airtight. but national resources, and one national id card, brings to bear resources on the problem that individual states are ill-equipped to handle. plus. for law enforcement, its easier to vet one card and one database than 50 fractious, differently standardized state models
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
I think that this has less to do with "protecting your rights" than it does with states keeping their archaic way getting you licenced. If you have ever moved from one state to another, you know the total nightmare process it is to move your licence and register your car. Every state has some crazy multi level state process for doing this. Oh no, it would be too obvious to get ALL that stuff done at the DMV, no its to the tax office, then to the department of transportation (not the dmv), then to the court house, then if you are unlucky enough to go to a state that will reject your previous state's driver's licence, you need to take their set of tests etc etc. The processes is so old and confusing, and these people have had these jobs position for years, the above government standardization will make these people jobless and ruin their money shuffling games. The last state I came from still was using PAPER for these registration processes, and it was MY responsibilty to check after a few months that my previous state had actually processed my move. I have had friends who made a similar move where the state they came from STILL had them registered in the previous state, their licence expired in that state and it was a big pain to get it all straightened out.
This is based on a problem that some states started fighting at least 10 years ago. I has nothing to do with protecting your privacy, it's about money. This is just another "unfunded mandate" from Washington. Congresscritters pass a law requireing the states to do something but don't supply the funds to cover it. The states are supposed to come up with the money out of already tight budgets, sometimes when the legislature is not in session so there is no way to alter the budget until the next session. During the Clinton era many states passed their own bills stating that any law like this would be enforced only when Washington paid for it. In other words: Don't tell us how to waste our money, we are already very good at that and don't need your help!
If half the money taken in taxes was actually spent wisely, most people would quit complaining.
Professional Politicians are not the solution, they ARE the problem.
Well, look on the bright side. Neither the states nor the Feds are enforcing capital letters, and you for one must be very glad of that.
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You are why this country is failing apart. In the 1940's and earlier it wasn't The United States of America. It was These United States of America. The loss of two little letters changed us from 50 states of different people united, to one Nation State who must follow the will of the Party in Control.
The Constitution clearly states that all rights not assigned to the federal government are rights of the States.
It is too bad you have never read and understood such an important document.
i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
According to a report from the National Conference of State Legislatures, it'll cost states 11 billion dollars to comply with the Real ID act. There was no money put aside in the bill for states to comply, just a mandate to do so. California is looking to spend between 500 and 700 million dollars alone.
I'm not saying that the fine people from the states that are holding back are less than honest - some of them probably feel that privacy is important. But when your state's already facing a budget deficit - as most are - yet another unfunded Federal mandate is going to get a less than warm reception.
For what it's worth, the original slashdot discussion had a lot of people incorrectly assuming that Maine was giving up highway funding in order to reject the REAL ID Act.
The REAL ID Act doesn't affect funding at all, and promises no money to states in order to meet REAL ID Act requirements.
Maine's decision only means that Maine licenses after the deadline will not be REAL ID Act compliant and will not be accepted for identification by the Department of Homeland Security (which, for all practical purposes, means a slight change on how one travels by air.)
Having said that, the REAL ID Act also allows for mixed issuance systems--where a state would issue both Real ID Act compliant license documents, and non-compliant documents, with the requirement that the non-compliant documents indicate their non-compliance.
I lived in SF, where government access was just as open (in the early 1990s). I lived in Albany, NY, in the 1980s, and there was absolutely no access to the government by mere citizens, even under Cuomo "the Great". I lived in New Orleans the first part of this decade, and mere citizen access to N'O/LA government (without a fistful of cash or a cemetery of old boy relatives) was a dream, a joke, a thorough hoax. We'll see whether near extinction has any constructive effect, especially depending on which outsiders (if any) move in, bringing expectations of government with them.
Interactive government is a culture that varies by region. But the underlying rituals, however vestigal, leave all Americans somewhere to start reactivating citizen access, even if it's a long road to a real republican democracy. It's worth doing. And the only one who can do it is "you", whoever "you" are.
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make install -not war
There are two reasons I support state's rights:
... and approximately 1 million other people. My state congressman represents a few orders less. Having laws passed by a group whose majority doesn't come from within 1000 miles of my home does not give me a warm fuzzy. What does the Congresswoman from California know of the needs of Connecticuters?
- The likelihood of a public policy being agreeable to 300 million people is much less than it being agreeable to 3-30 million people. Additionally, there is a tendancy for the 'rich' states to be forced to subsidize the 'poor' states. Before you say it's the poor states' right to be subsidized, is it the right of say Kosovo to be subsidized by Lichtenstein? Coming together for a common defense and free trade doesn't mean coming together for the giving of ones resources to the other.
- Representative governments lose touch with their constituents as the number of constituents rises. My US congressman represents me
"Because Science" is one step from "Because old book". Try "Because of my experiment testing my falsifiable assertion".
Then we track all purchases via national ID numbers (we just got an alert that a licensed driver purchased 4 drinks in an hour, and the master control programs reports his GPS phone is moving outside the public transportation grid, better dispatch a pursuit car)...
Then we socialize medicine...
Then we use the info from the purchases to determine if you get healthcare (cigarettes and fast food, no doctor for you my friend)...
Then we see who are buying fast expensive new cars...
Then we investigate them cause they're obviously not paying enough in taxes or insurance...
Then we start tracking all gun and ammo purchases, cause anyone with a gun is obviously a terrorist...
The modern push for federal control in what is and should be states rights started in the modern day with the speed limit...at the time it seemed sensible, there was an energy crisis. Then helment laws, it only affected a small part of the population so what's the difference, next drinking age, it makes sense after all to protect the children. But the real starting point was in the mid-1800's and tarrifs on cash crops from the south...the northeastern states wanted the products but the overseas market was paying more. How to solve the dilemma? Get the House (populated by the densely concentrated north) to pass a tarrif that canceled out any profit.
Next we'll hear how cool it is to have an RFID implant that makes accessing your now national information so fast and easy...Not hard to do if you think about it...we require newborns basically to have a social security number now when they are YEARS from being on the tax roles...
If a national ID card could be created that was truly impossible to counterfeit, that couldn't be used for identity theft, and that you could use for your driver's license, banking, passport, employment identification, and various other situations that require some other form of legal documentation (such as birth certificate, etc), I'd rather just have that than have to carry a dozen other things.
In a perfect world, yes. However in this world what will happen is that it will be counterfeitable (I think I made that word up), but everyone will believe it is not. So rather than do anything productive about identity theft, it will simply place the burden of proof on the victim.
"You have a government certified ID card which we are assured cannot be counterfeited, so your little claim about identity theft must be false, all those charges must have been by you, so pay up or go to jail."
That is the best case, the worst case is that something illegal is done in your name and you have no way of defending yourself, because a foolproof ID card was used. Believe me, the financial institutions would LOVE to be able to blame everyone else for identity theft and not have to eat the costs of it on their own. The government just wants people to think they are doing something productive about both identity theft and terrorism, but as usual this does absolutely nothing for either.
Finkployd
I recently moved from Florida to Pennsylvania and DL databases are already linked, having national database and national drivers license would actually be a really nice thing.
To get my car registered in PA I needed to get PA insurance. Figuring I'd do it all in one trip I got PA insurance, canceled my FL insurance and headed down to the DMV. Because my FL insurance was canceled, FL suspended my DL. Because FL suspended my license and PA checks that with their already connected DBs, they won't issue me a license.
FL won't reinstate my license without insurance or returning the plates and waiting a few weeks. I can't get PA to register the car and get plates from them without a PA license. My insurance company won't issue me FL insurance without a Florida address (i.e. I could do it, but it would be fraud).
Finally an email to the guy in charge of DMV Florida (who reports to Jeb Bush) got a response and someone who would work with us. Funny enough the exact same thing happened to the daughter of the woman who called us back.
This is the problem with having 50 distinct (but already connected) databases. It shouldn't be such a pain to move.
when you hear a social conservative whine about state's rightsd and the fight for your freedoms, don't drink the koolaid. your state capitol will strip you of your personal privacy and freedoms far faster and easier than washington dc ever could I have no choice but to disagree. The issue of "states rights" is, of course, not necessarily in line with the notion of individual rights. But while a state can erode individual liberties, it can only do so within a limited region. In contrast, when the federal government does the same, the entire nation is affected.
I'm not sure who originated the term "laboratory of the states" (Sandra Day O'Conner?), but it summarizes the reason that states rights are important. Instead of having federal bureaucritters and congresscritters arrogantly deciding what's best for everyone, we should be having different states try differing methods to solve problems. When one state hits upon an effective solution, then the other states can adopt it.
Those with agendas spend little time in state capitals. Why should they, when influencing a few hundred individuals in DC can accomplish what they want, rather than influencing the many thousands it would take to accomplish the same at a state level. but i do know this: there is a bright hot spotlight pointed at washington dc. i think the bulb pointed at augusta is a lot dimmer. people studying washington dc for erosions in personal rights probably outnumber those doing the same in augusta by orders of magnitude, don't you think? Because there is little or no effort being made by those with agendas in Augusta. The watchdog groups spend their effort where the agenda advocates are working. Move the power away from DC and back to the state capitols, and you'll find that the spotlight changes focus to follow.
Don't tell me to get a life. I had one once. It sucked.
state versus nation != individual versus government
True.
anyone reading your post above would get the distinct impression that when the state of maine fights washington dc, they are fighting for your individual rights
In a way that is true. Laws like one restricting 18 year old people from drinking are anti-freedom. They remove the rights of an individual to choose for themselves. When the federal government imposes such a restriction, it restricts at least as many and perhaps more people than a federal restriction. As such, making this an issue of states rights, instead of a federal mandate results in no more, and quite likely less restriction of freedom.
seems to me that the state of maine is fighting for the rights of the state of maine
I take it you don't see the benefit of moving more power to the states.
why in a million years should i trust that the government in augusta to be a better guarantor of my rights than washington dc?
You shouldn't trust them and that isn't the reason to support state rights. Why do extremely socialist countries turn into authoritarian regimes? Many of them have a democratic process that is completely subverted, but started off very similar to our own. So why is it that those countries so commonly fail in that way? The answer is quite simply, consolidation of power. The more power you put in fewer hands the more motivation and risk of that power being seized by an individual or group. The more centralized your decision making and the more people you have answering to a single authority, the greater the risk.
The founders of our country understood this risk. They broke up the federal government into competing branches and spent a lot of time specifically writing own all the powers the feds should never have and trying to bolster state rights as much as possible. They knew the less power was concentrated in one place, the harder it would be for a single group to control that power for personal gain and to the detriment of the people. Also they understood an important facet of human nature. Power tends to consolidate. People who seek positions of power are the same sort who tend to want accumulate more power. Unchecked, they would take more and more power until they were an authoritarian system. That is why it is important to decentralize power and have multiple factions competing.
i am firmly of the opinion that my individual liberties are better preserved by undermining state's rights
On a case by case basis, this can be true, but in the grand scheme of things, every power the feds get increases the risk that the US will be completely taken over by a small group.
state capitols, it seems to be, always seem to be rotten with more corruption and social conservative agendas (agendas always at odds with personal liberties and freedoms) than what goes on washington dc
Sometimes, but the damage they can do is limited because it only applies to one state. As such, there will always be reform movements and people can always vote by walking to a new state. When it gets too bad, there are the feds to step in and clean house. If we instead centralize all power with the feds, who steps in and cleans house?
what goes on in montpelier or sacramento or bismarck is no better, and often a lot worse, and often a lot less scrutinzed
Actually the more localized an issue, the more likely people are to both get involved and feel that they can make a difference. Ask the average person if they think their vote in the general election matters. Now ask them if they think their vote on state constitution amendments matters. Now ask about the local school millage. Notice a trend? The individual would be right to. It is possible to become active and get a Green party or Libertarian party candidate elected mayor. It has even happened that they have been elected to control a state. The same sort of reform on the federal level is unlikely to ever happen beca
so ebay, amazon.com, google, etc.: they should all subdivide into separate companies for the sake of database integrity? what a red herring. there is no single point of failure. look into some rudimentary concepts if basic IT work
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Constitutionally, your state can pretty much trample all over you and you have little recourse. At least with the federal government, as in this case, the states, on your behalf, can blow raspberries. The federal government really can't do much to you without the active participation of your state. So, people freak out whenever the feds do something they don't like, but they haven't the slightest clue what anyone in their state government is up to, which rather makes the states the more dangerous beasts, since your state is not just your protection from the federal government--it is also the colluding executor of its will.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/
That's the "nice" case. The "not so nice" case is that you continue to complain until the bank finally gets fed up and reports you to the police for fraud. I've read a report of this happening at least once, but I can't find any evidence as search results get buried in instances of people being arrested for big organised crime card fraud.
About living in Russia, you are correct, or at least you were correct. I lived there in 1997 [See Russian Plumbers. For a time, I lived in the apartment of friends while I rented out my own St. Petersburg apartment. The electric bill arrived and so--not wanting to mess up my Russian friends--I set out to pay it. That was not easy. When I finally found the place to pay it, the woman behind the counter was really surprised that I did. She dutifully took my money and I paid the bill.
When my Russian friends returned from the dacha, they were amused that I had bothered to pay the bill.
"Nobody pays the electric bill in Russia," they said.
Because there were no separate electric meters in the apartment building, there was no way for the government in Russia to know their individual electricity usage, let alone shut it off for anybody.Likewise, when I got paid from the Russian newspaper where I worked, I was told I would be making 146,000 rubles (about $42.00). When payday arrived, I was paid in cash exactly the amount I had been promised. No taxes whatsoever.
I don't know if it is still that way but in 1997 Russia was the wild west. So if you're looking to avoid government, Russia used to be the place to be. Just the mafia to worry about.
The EU would nearly be a perfect parallel, only the EU at a much later time (Their previous history of nationhood is significantly more rooted than the "sovereignty" of the individual United States). States, especially in the south, have fought tooth and nail against the decay of their "once-sovereign" rights. Of course it has been most visible in the case of the "peculiar institution" of slavery and later Jim Crow laws in the South. However, the issue proliferates the US as a reflection of a very fundamental liberty-centric debate (ie power further from the individual allows fewer individual liberties). This libertarian streak (I understand) is characteristic to American Democracy more so than European Democracy. States (and by extension their citizens), until the civil war, had been significantly more autonomous, though without quite the degree of national identity of the European states. Still, until the middle of the 20th century most folks in the South would claim their state-citizenship ahead of their national citizenship. I think you would find this trend persists, particularly in powerful states (California, and most notably Texas). It is really an interesting phenomena when one's geographic identity and national identity are at odds. I am Texan, if I was abroad I would say "I am Texan" rather than "...American". I think a fair portion of Texans would do likewise. Still my national identity remains decidedly American. I too am curious about how folks from other federal systems see this working out.
I would say that we shouldn't restrict 16-18 year old drivers to one per car. Going out with your friends is a right of passage in our county. People consistently say that we don't have any 'culture', and we don't have the quaint 'rights of passage' that many other cultures have. I say that most of us just don't recognize our culture and rights of passage. If you want to reduce the damage that teen drivers do, don't stop them from driving, or dating (that's what a one teen per car does). How about licensing them sooner. Let them get a license at 14, but only for one of those Gem type cars. You know the road legal golf carts. They max out at ~35 mph, and are not allowed on the freeway. Not only will it get a majority of new drivers to spend 2 years driving slow instead of getting a muscle car for their first vehicle, but you can bet that a large percentage of them will not be trading in their slow small vehicle for a fast one on their 16th birthday. It would help in getting people to transition to more rational car choices.
As for drinking, don't reduce it to 14. Get rid of the drinking age all together. Remove the mystique of drinking all together. Don't tell your 13 year old that on their next birthday, they will be grown up enough to drink. Make it something that is not a prize at all. Of course getting rid of the drinking age would remove that right of passage. Maybe I could be convinced that there should be a drinking age. It would take some doing, but maybe.
Well, for one, my state's legislature better represents me and my neighbours than the assholes in DC. I can hold my local legislature far more accountable as I can actually get enough people to care enough to vote out the assholes since the only people who really vote in local elections are those who give a damn about politics anyhow. Hell, it's far more possible for someone like me (without shitloads of money for campaign ads) to be elected into the legislature, so there's far less bribery that goes on. Also, our [Illinois] constitution clears up a lot of shit the US constitution still hasn't touched (like rider bills for instance).
'Yes, firefox is indeed greater than women. Can women block pops up for you? No. Can Firefox show you naked women? Yes.'