Well, if crime fighters fight crime and fire fighters fight fire, what do freedom fighters fight? They never mention that part to us, do they? - George Carlin
US adopts National ID: Homeland Security Now In charge of Regulations for all US States Drivers Licenses and Birth Certificates
By: Jonathan Wheeler
In a chilling act more reminiscent of the now defunct Soviet Union or the Nazi regime of Adolph Hitler, the United States Congress passed legislation yesterday that requires the States to surrender their regulatory rights over drivers licenses and birth certificates to The Department of Homeland Security. The massive US Intelligence Reform Bill weighed in at over 3,000 pages and though unread by individual Members of either the House or Senate nevertheless passed all of the legislative hurdles needed in order to become law President Bush lobbied hard for these provisions, only objecting when Senator Sensenbrenner attempted to require these same provisions for illegal aliens but which the President opposed. This provision was dropped from the final bill.
Beginning in 2005, the Department of Homeland Security will issue new uniformity regulations to the States requiring that all Drivers Licenses and Birth Certificates meet minimal Federal Standards with regard to US citizen information, including biometric security provisions.
Added to currently existing Federal Laws and Supreme Court rulings American citizens when born will be issued a Social Security Number that will be included on their Birth Certificates, along with DNA biometric markers. All birth certificates will also be registered in a Federal Government database maintained by the Department of Homeland Security. No child will be allowed enrollment to schools or be entitled to either State of Federal Government benefits programs without first presenting a certified Homeland Security registered Birth Certificate .Drivers Licenses will also contain DNA biometric markers and include the holders Social Security Number and be required for receiving and applying for all State and Federal benefits programs.
Previous Supreme Court rulings have also upheld State and Federal Law Enforcement authorities right to request Identification from any American citizen, for any reason and at any time as not being violations of their, the citizens, constitutionally protected rights. Major Banks and credit card companies have applauded the adoption of a National ID system as being important to counter fraud and increasing instances of identity theft. National ID cards with biometric markers will eliminate them from having to issue Credit and Debit cards, which for the first time in US history have surpassed the usage of checks and cash. Utilizing The Department of Homeland Securities centralized federal database, Banks and credit card companies will only require the presentation of a citizens Driver’s License to make purchases as all of the persons financial information, including credit and cash balances, will already be known in ~real-time~. (The combining of Homeland Security and Banking databases on citizen’s balances and purchases, along with their past and present purchasing information, has been allowed under previous Federal Laws including the Patriot Act.)
Also included in this bill is a law to require The Department of Homeland Security to establish a separate ID system for citizens to use prior to boarding airplanes, and which is eerily reminiscent of the Soviet and Nazi regimes dreaded Internal Passport. Never before in our history have the words of Benjamin Franklin been so correct when he stated: "people willing to trade their freedom for temporary security deserve neither and will lose both".
Today, December 9, 2004 will be one of those moments in time that future historians will look back on and pin point as being the day that the United States of America, as it was founded by its forefathers, ceased to exist.
Today, December 9, 2004 will be one of those moments in time that future historians will look back on and pin point as being the day that the United States of America, as it was founded by its forefathers, ceased to exist.
Go go gadget hyperbole!
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The original gnomosexualizer
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This is the first step to Gatica, everyone using a id marked with your DNA code...
National ID cards with biometric markers will eliminate them from having to issue Credit and Debit cards, which for the first time in US history have surpassed the usage of checks and cash. Utilizing The Department of Homeland Securities centralized federal database, Banks and credit card companies will only require the presentation of a citizens Driver’s License to make purchases as all of the persons financial information, including credit and cash balances, will already be known in ~real-time~.
Takes me back to that song "somebodys watchin, doot do doo do do, i always feels like somebodys watchin me"
also makes me think, with a national id, based on your SSN, linked to your bank account, All they have to do is implement it as a RFID chip saying it will stop "identity theft" since its IN you...
"He also forced everyone, small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on his right hand or on his forehead so that no one could buy or sell unless he had the mark, which is the name of the beast or the number of his name"
oh and on the lighter side--
"whoever points out that Godwin's Law applies to the thread is also considered to have "lost" the battle, as it is considered poor form to invoke the law explicitly"
so can i officially refer to Meddik as looser for the rest of this thread? :P
But dude, there were some awesome deals to be had once you had taken the mark! Wallmart was selling DVD players -and- the laborers that put it together for ten bucks!
Today, December 9, 2004 will be one of those moments in time that future historians will look back on and pin point as being the day that the United States of America, as it was founded by its forefathers, ceased to exist.
i dont think its the national ID itself, but what the goverment will use it for that the people are afraid of. Things like tracking a persons spending habits, and where they go, when they go. Thats a form of invasion of privacy in most peoples eyes. And how can you be truely "free" when big brother is watching everything you do, ready to pounce anytime he thinks you might be up to something out of the normal.
they have finger prints data base connected to it , and also by civil ID they can track where you work and most merchant are connected with another data base that use civil ID as key , so for them when they enter your civil id they can get other information about you ( like chevy dealership who when i bought a car from had all the information about me , like what bank i had account in and where i work )
biometric ID is just new stuff and we don't use new stuff that fast
Credit card companies have been doing this for years. The government has always been one warrant away from accessing this data. I don't see the difference or the big whoop.
Just better hope that someone like me, who would have access to that data if you did business with my company, was sufficiently paranoid to not violate her contract by using your personal information for her own gain.
Sort of like how I have Donald J. Trump's personal info, SSN, and bank account numbers on file, but am prohibited to use that information except for legitimate business reasons, under penatlty of fine and imprisonment.
Abuses will happen regardless of the system, because there are those that think they won't get caught.
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To be honest the only thing that's making me go ouch about that is the DNA. I'd go ballistic if I were required to give any sort of DNA information to be used on a government ID card. Actually you couldn't do that in Iceland due to law, the Personal Information Protection Beaurau would throw a major fit and declare any such thing illegal and those guys do not play softball when it comes to health or biological information like DNA.
I can't find a single credible news source that mentions anything about DNA, or biometric identifiers being required by this change to the laws.
maybe I'm searching on the wrong items in Google news, but I'm not finding anything from any legitimate media outlet that claims any DNA or biometric information will be encoded on the card when searching for "national id dna" "driver license DNA" "national id biometric" "driver license biometric"
I can find lots of editorials saying that its going to happen. I can find lots of quites by ACLU representatives saying its going to happen. But I can't find a single legitimate news story saying its going to happen.
Yeah, maybe It is scary. But so is Steven King. But both are fiction!
The European Council of Ministers ruled that by the end of 2006 all new european passports must include a digitalized picture of the holder, and by the end of 2007 all new passports MUST include a digitalized set of your fingerprints.
As far as I'm concerned Shehab, the more power (information, data, etc) a governing body has over their people, the higher the chances are that they will use it against the people...human nature being what it is.
I'm not sure how I feel about all this stuff at the moment. On one hand, I don't care if the govt. knows when I take a piss, because A) I don't do anything "illegal" 99% of the time. (I guess that 1% can get ya though!)
And B) I'm not egotistical enough to believe that out of hundreds of millions of citizens, anyone is going to care enough, or be competent enough, to actually pay attention. Keep in mind, our govt. was still issuing visa's to the 9/11 hijackers after the fact...our govt. has a serious, serious deficiency in information gathering/organization/sharing/etc.
Of course, with the eventual help of serious tech advances and policy change, this could change in the future, so it can be argued that we should nip this type of Big Brother activity in the bud for our great-grandchildrens' sakes.
Anyway, it reminds me of an old coworker of mine. If I walked into her office in the lab and she had her email open or was writing something, she'd close it down and act all secretive. It always annoyed me because I thought to myself, "Do you honestly think I A) care, or B) have time to read and stick my nose into your correspondance?"
So anyway, I'm not sure that I care if the govt. knows my DNA sequence, or if I have a Natl. ID (already have a SSN, what's the difference?). On the other hand, I feel like I should care if for no other reason than the possibility that our govt. emerges from incompetence one day and truly becomes Big Brother. And then again, the whole "slippery slope" ideas annoy me too.
I look at, with equal disdain, the following ideas:
That if the govt. allows same sex marriage, it might slip further and we'll all the sudden condone polygamy or marrying a 12 year old child.
That if the govt. now assigns us Natl. IDs and keeps our DNA on record that eventually that might also slide into 24 hour surveillance and 1984.
In both cases, people (normally opposite crowds) argue that the line must be drawn "heeya!", because if we let up even a little, it could slip down the slope into our worst nightmares.
Now I don't have a LOT of faith in sense, intelligence, and human nature (esp. after this election.), but I see both extreme cases as being so remote in possibility that you have to just have faith that we aren't stupid enough to let things go that far.
But again, I'm conflicted, because I see a lot of SCARY things happening politically and religiously, so /shrug, who knows!
There are two, very key, differences between these two things:
That if the govt. allows same sex marriage, it might slip further and we'll all the sudden condone polygamy or marrying a 12 year old child.
That if the govt. now assigns us Natl. IDs and keeps our DNA on record that eventually that might also slide into 24 hour surveillance and 1984.
Ignoring the italic part, one of these infringes on rights, the other doesn't. It doesn't infringe upon your rights, nor does it affect you at all if someone else consentually marries two women. If someone marries a 12 year old, that infringes on the childs rights as they are not yet of the maturity level that our society has decided they need to be to become independant. If the government can, without warrent, spy on me and find out what I do, that infringes on my rights.
The only acceptable infringement of rights is to prevent someone else from infringing on a more basic right. I.E. it's ok to infringe on my right to beat someone over the head with a trash-can because I am infringing on their right to not have a wicked headache.
Ok, fair point. The 12 year old child was a bad example. Perhaps I should have said, "Legalize sex with animals." That's illegal isn't it? Anyway, that's sort of beside the point. I know you've heard the anti-gay marriage crowd use the slippery slope argument as much as I have.
Well, I didn't really say it was MY problem with it. I'm not terribly sure that I HAVE a problem with it in and of itself. I think what makes me nervous are the strides our grand administration is taking towards curbing privacy and freedoms in the face of "turrism".
I was just trying to explain what I've heard some other folks say about it, while at the same time, throwing my own conflicted, inane thoughts in there.
Shehab, one of the things that history proves is that if you want to prevent event 'D' try to find event 'A'.
Since we're on the topic of Nazi's, lets use that. Event 'D' would be the Nazi's getting ELECTED, and comming to power in Germany. So follow the steps back, and find out what caused that. Well, event A would probably have something to do with the state of Germany in the aftermath of WW I. You had a bunch of people who had nothing, were ignored by the world, and felt like they had nothing to lose when a charasmatic guy stepped up, told them what they wanted to hear, and started bringing order to chaos. It's really, actually, pretty easy to see how Jews started getting put in ovens if you follow each step along the way. Each step made sense at the time under the circumstances, but when you back up you realize this is almost unbelieveable and henuous.
This is why when watchdog groups see things that look like event A or B, they start making noise. The patriot act has already been used and abused and ruined the lives of some innocent American citizens. Any time you find yourself using the argument, "...I guess so, I have nothing to hide," you need to stop and take a better look at the situation.
Yeah, a centralized information source that contained all the information I needed to know, could identify me without error, could provide access to funds etc would be very useful. It would provide help to emergency services, law enforcement, every-day commerce, internet commerce, and many other things. That doesn't mean I would ever, ever want one though.
Shehab, one of the things that history proves is that if you want to prevent event 'D' try to find event 'A'.
and who say event A lead us to D ?
why not say election is the devil , hey i hear people here argue that election are bad they brought the west hitler and israel sharon and usa bush jr , so its bad .
they look and see dubai florish and its leader called the " arabian knight" in forbs and such and talk about his wisdom and how he turned sand into paradise , and all that with dictatorship , we in kuwait elect a national parliment and we are now in worst condition ( i was just reading the coureption report about kuwait , published in a newspaper here )
and have you checked what information you can get about people in the usa ? its not normal , detailed everything , IRS alone would have a nice file about most people and what they get , here in kuwait there is no way in hell to find these kind of stuff , hell we still estimate our local GDP , beacause most persons do not have to report squat to the goverment
Thought the exact same thing. Thank you for putting it into the words I could not find.
It's funny how people who are devoted to "democracy" in this "great country of ours," never fail to entirely overlook its many downfalls. One being a political system that caters entirely toward an aristocracy, and in some extreme cases, quite resembles a totalitarian regime.
Drivers Licenses will also contain DNA biometric markers and include the holders Social Security Number and be required for receiving and applying for all State and Federal benefits programs.
This is entirely displeasing. No more welfare without a driver's license. A great system!
Identity cards are in the news over here in the UK as well, i really should read up as to what is being proposed.
I really can't see a way to stop the centralisation of data due to communication & data technology advances. Either you end up with centralised data or you end up with centralised data AND lots of replicated data. It's the access, control and responisiblity of that data that is important and making 100% sure that things like the PATRIOT Act don't get into legistation (would never have made it it they hadn't found that acronym .... if it followed the trade descriptions act it would have been called the SCREWYOUYANKS Act). *shrug* The data's all there, it's just the access that's the issue.
My issue with Identity Cards is i'm not going to carry one. So whatever is on there is all well and good, but unless i have a reason to carry it (other than someone telling me to) then I won't. Yet many countries stipulate you have to have it on you at all times (including where i used to live - the police used to get annoyed with me as i never had my papers)
Concerning the A -> D with the Nazi party ..... Krimzan does have a point. One British General (can't remember name) came out of the Treaty of Versaille signing (German surrender terms at end of WWI) and said "This isn't a peacy treaty, it's a cease fire for 20 years". The only thing he was wrong on was it was 19 years not 20. He realised that the terms would put Germany in such a bad economic, security etc position that they would be forced back to war in 20 years. Just sometimes we have to see if the A -> B step is a risk or an implication of A happening.
ID cards as drivers' licenses - sure I'll agree with that. Hell, put my DNA on file. Its about the same as having my fingerprints on file - just without the classic frying-pan-identity-fix.
Here's what bothers me:
If we keep it at a driver's license, that's fine - there's a reasonf or it. But the moment it becomes one of those things that we're supposed to keep on us at all times, I start getting a few chills sent up my spine. The way the article sounds, these would be kind of IDs that INCLUDE a driver's license and a Social Security card, but aren't limited to by them. (By no means am I saying that this article sounds utterly credible... I agree with Meddik, Godwins law strikes this one hard.) If this ID card becomes ID just for the sake of identification, I can see legislation put forward to make it illegal to travel without one. The moment it becomes a crime to walk around outside with nothing but the clothes on my back, I'm moving to Australia.
I might be wrong but doesn't the US military have a DNA database of all military personel that signed up after 9/11? I remember seeing a french documentary on 9/11 and the flow of new recruits, they showed pictures of medical officers taking blood samples just after the recruits swore in. One of the officers that was interviewed said that the information would be stored in order to identify any casualties that would be unidentifiable by normal means.
We've had National ID cards in most western european countries for as long as I can remember. In Denmark we just call them medical insurrence cards and it works a bit like a credit card for standard medical care, except the government gets the bill. Our personal information isn't stored on it, and no one has access to our information without a warrant.
As a matter of fact, when I went to the US this summer I had to sign a waiver where I agreed to let the CIA keep all my personal information in a database for 7 years. I don't remember exactly what information they kept specifically but this very moment, the US government knows more about me than the Danish government does. Now that's scary.
It's a good thing that the US isn't the country that it's forefathers founded, if it was you guys would all be wearing kneepants and fending off indians. In my opinion you can't build a structure of government on ideas that were conceived in war-time over 200 years ago. That's like founding a communist state following Marx's books down to the letter in the year 2004. It doesn't work because the times have changed. I don't think Benjamin Franklin would have minded an ID card or thought of it as a limitation of his freedom.
If this ID card becomes ID just for the sake of identification, I can see legislation put forward to make it illegal to travel without one. The moment it becomes a crime to walk around outside with nothing but the clothes on my back, I'm moving to Australia.
But why need to mandate it be on a person when identification doesn't require it. You can't fake finger prints or dna. If your identification was truly in doubt or needed proving anyway having the card on you wouldn't really do anything.
I personally have just never seen any legitimate reason for needing to hide your identity when you were supposed to give it.
Granted if you want to hide, or otherwise not be able to be identified by law enforcement or other this would suck...but truly why on Earth is this a necessity.
I don't hold any illusions about being anonymous now, so I think that a standardized national ID would just make it easier to get things done.
If anyone really wanted to know what I'm doing 90% of the time they could find out with a couple of well placed warrants. My credit card company and bank can tell you where I am, what I've bought, and what kind of underware I'm wearing already. The DMV can tell you what I'm driving and give a fairly accurate description of me. The IRS can tell you what I earned, where I live, how many dependants I have, and whether or not I own my home.
Yet with all that, I still need 2 forms of ID and a thumbprint to take out a second. I'd love to have a single authenticated ID with biometrics that worked universally. Something like the current military CAC cards; with photo ID, PIN, and encoded biometric (fingerprint).
As a matter of fact, when I went to the US this summer I had to sign a waiver where I agreed to let the CIA keep all my personal information in a database for 7 years. I don't remember exactly what information they kept specifically but this very moment, the US government knows more about me than the Danish government does. Now that's scary.
hah at least they told you they are going to keep it for 7 years
Also to the poster Aura who said this "The moment it becomes a crime to walk around outside with nothing but the clothes on my back, I'm moving to Australia. "
Did the Supreme court of the United States not just rule on a case that makes it law for any peace officer to ask for your identification anywhere?. Would not having this identification on you be a crime they could arrest you for?
??? No, not really. People seem to be discussing National ID cards in general. The only posts regarding the initial article are quite dismissive of it.
