The REAL ID Act of 2005, which mandates that states conform their driver’s licenses and identification cards to a common standard defined by the Department of Homeland Security and that states put personal information into a central database, is being sold as a secure document which will protect us all from terrorism, illegal immigration and identity theft.
But it will do no such thing.
Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff defended Real ID on Thursday, saying that the initiative would help prevent identity theft and illegal immigration and promote privacy.
“I think this is an example where security and privacy go hand-in-hand,” he said Thursday. “It is a win-win for both if we are disciplined and intelligent about the way we analyze the risks.”
First, there’s illegal immigration and identity theft. Someone gets hold of your personal information and gets a job, or a bank account, or a credit card, with your name and Social Security number.
“For every single person whose identity was stolen by someone who forged their name and their Social Security number on a driver’s license, or on an identification document, ask that person, do you feel your privacy is better protected if someone can walk around with phony documents, with your name and your number?” he said. “Or is your privacy better protected if you have the confidence that the identification relied upon is, in fact, secure and reliable, and uniquely tied to a single individual?”
But REAL ID won’t stop phony documents. It may make them harder to get, but there are plenty of corrupt DMV employees ready and willing to provide real identification to anyone who pays a hefty enough bribe. Indeed, it won’t stop most types of identity theft at all, since the ID itself isn’t required, only the information.
And it won’t stop illegal immigration. I suspect Chertoff knows this. He’s previously admitted that he knows why people come here. “We all know that the primary economic engine that draws in illegal migration is work,” he said. But one can make up a phony name and number on the spot and work. Or a person can work under the table. The REAL ID won’t stop any of this.
Finally, there’s terrorism. The 9/11 Commission recommended that “Secure identification should begin in the United States. The federal government should set standards for the issuance of birth certificates and sources of identification, such as drivers licenses.”
The justification for this? “At many entry points to vulnerable facilities, including gates for boarding aircraft, sources of identification are the last opportunity to ensure that people are who they say they are and to check whether they are terrorists.”
REAL ID does precious little to help authorities determine who might or might not be a threat. The 9/11 hijackers, the 9/11 Commission was forced to admit, just walked right into local DMV offices and got driver’s licenses in their own names! There’s no reason to think future terrorists could not also do this under REAL ID.
So what exactly is the point to REAL ID? Who is being made secure, and why does Chertoff think it’s a “win-win” for privacy?
As we now know, the central databases required by REAL ID won’t be maintained by the federal government, but by a private company. This lets the federal government bypass Privacy Act protections when it wants access to that data. It also reduces the protection you have against bad information getting into the database.
It would have been easy enough for the government to track you with the data in a government database, but with it in a commercial database, it’s even easier. “Is this somehow an invasion of privacy?” Chertoff asks. No reasonable person could possibly answer “no.”
Then there’s the money. REAL ID is an $11 billion unfunded mandate that states must comply with or risk losing federal highway funding. States can’t absorb all the costs associated with compliance, so REAL ID compliant driver’s license costs could exceed $100 each.
It’s also worth mentioning that many people consider REAL ID to be the “Mark of the Beast,” without which people won’t be able to participate in ordinary commerce, and with which people won’t be allowed to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. Without a REAL ID compliant identification card, people won’t be allowed to enter airports or federal buildings, receive government services, and quite possibly be barred from doing business with banks and other financial institutions.
The only purpose behind an identification card is to allow the government to require you to show it to them. Is that the sort of country we want to be? Didn’t we do battle with a country just like that 60 years ago? How far America has fallen.
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Karl Marx would love the popular moves among politicians in various state governments and the federal government to ban so-called "junk" food in schools, and to "put healthy food in" convenience stores and on the tables of those they define as poor. It's a very elitist and arrogant mindset that promotes this ideology, and it needs to be addressed.
Ultimately, the war supporters in Congress prevailed in the vote on the resolution. Still, the vote was significant because it places every member of Congress on the record as supporting or not supporting the unconstitutional, costly, violent occupation of a country that never attacked us. This vote should serve as an important reminder to the American people of where their representatives really stand when it comes to policing the world, empire building, and war.
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Potential Threat
Dec 17, 2006
Fortunately, the Democrats might tweak or repeal it.
Driver’s licenses should serve one purpose: to prove that someone is qualified to operate a motor vehicle, regardless of whether that person is in the country legally or not. It’s INS’s (or ICE, or whatever they are this week) job to keep good track of visitors.
If the government wants to tie it to legal residence, all of this RealID crap isn’t necessary. I spend a lot of time overseas and in many places have to keep my passport (with visas inside) handy, because my U.S. driver’s license doesn’t cut it. All the states need to do is set Joe Elbonian’s license to expire when his visa does and add a restriction that invalidates the license is valid only when presented with Elbonian passport number 12345 and U.S. visa number 54321. Problem solved without inconveniencing the other 280,000,000 of us who drive.
–Po
Michael
Dec 19, 2006
Yes we did go to war over that Hitler called it the Motherland which is why my grandfathers turn over in their graves hearing about Homeland.
Wide Eyes
Dec 20, 2006
Michael,
Thank you for the informative article. I strongly agree with your brief analysis. I worked for over twenty years with government agencies that handle “confidential information about US citizens”.
These agencies and their private contractors leak worse than the Titanic. The VA Hospital, DOD, FEMA,et.al., debacles are just a few of the recent publicly disclosed cases of how well confidential data on citizens is secured, much less misapplied, altered and abused.
What really occurs behind closed doors by the “Brokers of Power” and their planners, if fully disclosed, would cause a mass exodus from this country. Sadly, most citizens of our “Late, Great Nation” are fast asleep. Like the Greeks, Persians, and Romans before us, we very likely will still be asleep (or watching Cable) as the very walls are burning down all around us. Such, it seems, is the repetitive march of “Empires” and the perpetual blundering of Homo SAP-ians.
BTW, you’re definitely on the right track; however, the “Mark” is being designed for application to the hand and/or head.
Ponder the 20-21 century explosion of these:
The Credit Card; The Debit Card; The Mini Microchip; Hand Stamping; Mass Tattooing; Body Piecing; Mini Micro RFD transmitters; Rampant Identity Theft; Internet and Wire Fraud/Theft; Skin Implanted Personal Data Systems.
It doesn’t take a genius to fit in the next piece of the puzzle. Like it, or not, the picture is nearly complete.
Respectfully,
Wide Eyes
Michael Hampton
Dec 20, 2006
RFID chips are now available which can be implanted in the back of the hand, the forearm, the shoulder, or possibly even the forehead, though the current line of chips would leave an unsightly lump.
This line of chips has an effective range of about six to 12 inches.
We aren’t too far away from skipping the card altogether, and just having a chip under your skin, which can be read by anything in the immediate vicinity.
But while people might opt-in to this sort of thing if their bank offered it, it would take a federal law to mandate this sort of thing for identification or commerce.
Keep your guns clean and well oiled…
Ted
Feb 06, 2007
Maine and Montana have already rejected REAL ID. Who’s next?
Mar 26, 2007
Washington state accepts REAL ID, gets bonus - Homeland Stupidity
Apr 12, 2007
Washington state pretends to reject REAL ID - Homeland Stupidity
JUST ME
Apr 12, 2007
The Real-ID nightmare needs to be stopped; and nightmares are stopped by WAKING PEOPLE UP.
I like the idea of an ALL-STAR NO REAL-ID TELETHON!
Let’s get Willie Nelson, for starters, up there on stage, with his hole-y geetar!, belting out some tunes AGAINST THE FEDS NOSING IN EVERY POCKET OF OUR LIVES!
Let’s contact every known Celebrity Maverick and then some…
Here’s a few possibilities:
Oprah Winfrey, Robert Redford, Al Pacino, Barbra Steisand, David Letterman,
you know– the RICH AND POWERFUL who are NOT cowed down by the Powers That Be in Wash.!!!!
Let’s get Obama up there too, and Al Gore, and any other politician who APPEARS to have half a brain and can recognize the DANGERS in this damnedable Real-ID scheme.
We need CLOUT (Powerful People with Big Names & Big Bucks) to put a stop to this thing.
Where we gonna get it????
Any Ideas???
tphill37
Apr 30, 2007
Will REAL ID prevent terrorism, illegal immigration, or crime? By itself of course not. No one single measure or act will stop any of these illegal activities. So by your rational, these steps shouldn’t be taken at all. I disagree. Most security professionals would tell you that security must be done in layers. This is one layer of many that may be taken to make document forgery more difficult. You say that this will just be circumvented and it won’t help. Do you think there is a problem at all? If you do what steps should be taken to correct them? One thing the gov. needs to do is to be open with the public and have some foresight to address people’s concerns. Show us how you can safegaurd and balance these issues that must be addressed. By passing this as rider legislation without any debate makes you look shady. This in turn makes everyone start to play politics instead of trying to solve problems. Typical government dopes.
May 02, 2007
Who wants a national ID? - Homeland Stupidity
May 09, 2007
DHS: You’ll take a national ID and you’ll like it - Homeland Stupidity
Mike
Jun 29, 2007
It’s just another step that the New World Order is pushing. The US is not the country it used to be. Personal freedoms are being discarded every day by the federal government. Just take the time to actually read through the Patriot Act!
Washington State opting out is great, although the reasoning behind the opt out is a financial and not moral issue with the state. Our state government seems to not have any concerns with morality at all, over almost any issue you can name.
Another Balker
Aug 15, 2007
WHY hasn’t this damned Real ID nonsense been quashed and put to rest PERMANENTLY?
WHAT is it going to take to wake up enough Americans to make enough NOISE and STINK about this Real ID crap, to KILL it forever??
And while you’re on the topic of Real ID, what about all the new FUSION CENTERS proliferating across America, in the name of so-called security?? Americans have the RIGHT to privacy! But to enforce that right, we need to speak out loudly against all these invasive schemes.
Starting NOW!–before it’s too late!
Servant
Oct 18, 2007
Let it happen soilders…
Those who will not get off their couch will see Real ID for what it is (as it applies to them) only when it becomes reality. Only then will you hear the uproar. Some laws can be made to be repealed by the way of protest, however, this one will not. I assure you. The reason? The federal government does not care what we say about this or about us anymore, they are pushing ahead with this despite hearing and the voice of resistance. Just like the states, the majority of the people will resist on the grounds of the cost in dollars rather than the cost to their freedoms and more importantly the cost to their salvation.
In the words of Christ … “… all these things must come to pass in order that prophesy might be fulfilled…”. (These words apply here too.)
I have come to learn these things by firsthand experience. Having told people about Real ID and it’s implications, including Christians,(Five pastors were among those people), they did not care, instead they paid me lip service – gasping at the thought that this might be a prelude to the prophesy spoken of in the bible, telling me they thought so as well, then never mentioned it again, inquired further about it, looked into it, or debated what a Christian, or non-Christian, should do about it.
Having mailed people articles on the subject, they responded in like manner.
(Recall Matthew 13: 14 – 17. (Fellow Christians, please don’t get me wrong, now… I am only saying it is similar.))
I am sure you have all heard people say “If you didn’t do anything wrong you have nothing to worry about.” If those people have had the unfortunate experience of being audited, by the I.R.S, then, from what I have heard, they would not say that about the government, or any arm of it. Real ID comes from the same government that does the audits.
Reiterating my opening sentence, let it happen, because only then will the cry be loud enough to be heard. Wether it is of any consequence it would have, if only, effectively been a much needed warning of who, in reality, is in control.
(Young Christian, read Revelation 12:13 through 17 and compare it to Matthew 1:21 through 2:17. You will learn that the “serpent” resides in the “dragon”.)
Thanks for considering my somewhat long winded post.