From the ArcaMax Publishing, Automotive Newsletter:
http://www.arcamax.com/news/automotive/s-347215-294628
People sometimes say they're not concerned about national ID cards -
and the use of "biometric" tags such as retinal scans and so on -
because, after all, we've been using fingerprints for years and
"biometrics" are just the next logical step. Except for one key point,
that's true.
The difference is that while fingerprints have, indeed, been routinely
used for decades - they've only been used as a mandatory thing to
track criminals. Or at least, people who have been formally arrested
and charged with a crime.
I've yet to be fingerprinted. Probably you've never been
fingerprinted, either. In fact, the majority of Americans (excepting
those who volunteered for the military or who applied for a concealed
carry handgun permit - both voluntary choices) have likely never been
"inked." And for good reason.
The government has (or ought to have) no business with you until
you've given reason to suspect otherwise. At least, that's the way
things used to be.
Soon, however, we may all be required to submit not merely to being
fingerprinted - but perhaps also forced to allow our retinas to be
scanned, possibly our DNA itself catalogued. If we want to renew or
get a driver's license, anyhow.
In about two years, the federal Real ID Act will begin to impose its
will on state governments - and the state governments, on us via our
driver's licenses. The new, enhanced licenses will become de facto
national ID cards - and in addition to the biometric info about
ourselves that will be sampled and collected, the IDs themselves will
be able to track our every movement via miniaturized Radio Frequency
ID (RFID) transmitters built into them. This is not science fiction -
or paranoia. The technology exists; the "biometric" tags are already
in use - and the Real ID Act is very real indeed.
Ostensibly, the Act is all about "protecting" us (isn't it always so?)
but in fact it's about allowing ourselves to be treated like common
criminals - duly registered, catalogued and easy to be kept track of.
That people don't get this - and react with outrage - is itself
anoutrage. Or ought to be.
And we'll be kept track of by more than merely the government. Private
corporations are eager to compile extensive dossiers on each and every
one of us. Where we go and when, what we buy and how - in order to
better "target" us as consumers. If that sounds innocuous, keep in
mind that unlike the government - which must still at least pretend to
abide by a few threadbare legalisms regarding what information it may
collect and how such information may be shared and used, private
corporations labor under no such restrictions.
Indeed, the government may (and has, in fact) used private
corporations to brazenly (and with impunity) skirt the law; the
private company collects the info - and turns it over to the
government. (Recent disclosures about ISPs providing details about
customers' surfing habits and e-mails being one case in point; another
being the wholesale giving over of phone records - and so on.)
A secondary effect of the Real ID Act is that once we have these IDs
forced upon us, we will be compelled to produce them in order to
transact business, open a bank account, enter public buildings, travel
on commercial carriers - ad infinitum. It will literally be a new
America - one in which, "your papers, please!" is no longer a phrase
spoken by Brownshirts of a long-gone era but a reality of everyday
life in what's left of these United States. And I think we will accept
it.
9/11 opened a window into the soul of America, all right. And it is
the soul of a cringing beaten dog with its tail tucked between its
legs - ready to submit to its master's voice. The test case was the
TSA and the oddly-named Department of Homeland Security, which sounds
like something right out of 1939 Germany, only translated into
English. Abteilung des Sicherheit des Vaterland.
We accepted - in the name of "security" and the "war on terror" -
being physically felt up by TSA goons, allowing routine rifling of our
personal possessions, at random - without any pretext or probable
cause whatever. What else will we accept? Apparently, anything. And
everything.
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www.ericpetersautos.com or EPeters952@aol.com for
comments.