Real ID? ...Get Real!

Oppose Real ID! This a bureaucratic nightmare in the making, it will curtail our constitutional right to privacy, and will expose everyone who participates to an increased threat of identity theft. The proclaimed benefits are illusory and based on the ill-advised notion that a greater concentration of information in the hands of a monolithic law enforcement agency will provide the means to prevent terrorism -- terrorists will exploit this conceit and find ways around it. What it will do, through inevitable mistakes and internal fraud, is expose innocent citizens to unlawful detention and prosecution due to mistaken identity. And, it will cost taxpayers billions of dollars that could be better spent on education, health care, and infrastructure -- not to mention effective measures to insure domestic security like cargo container screening, first-responder training, and protection of our food and water supplies.

So, visit the ACLU site, and follow the instructions to post a comment in opposition to this act on the Department of Homeland Security’s web site.

ACLU site: http://action.aclu.org/site/PageServer?pagename=REALID_comments&JServSessionIdr007=daguxv1fma.app26a

Follow the ACLU instructions for submitting a comment. (It's a hassle, but as Kurt Vonnegut would say, "so it goes.")

See also: http://www.realnightmare.org/

Here’s the comment that I posted:

For the following reasons, I strongly object to enacting: "Minimum Standards for Driver's Licenses and Identification Cards Acceptable to Federal Agencies for Official Purposes", DHS-2006-0030.

** It will have little effect on security. Determined terrorists will find ways to skirt and exploit this system.

** It will place paralyzing financial and administrative burdens on state governments.

** It will disenfranchise the poor who can not afford, or choose to not to pay for this ID, when they travel, apply for jobs, vote, or seek federal assistance. (While the act as written only applies to air travel and access to government facilities, if enacted, it is a certainty that use of this ID will become more widespread, if for no other reason than to amortize it’s monumental cost.)

** The database used to administer this act will become a target for identity theft and internal fraud. With the concentration of data in the required database, the implications of this are devastating.

** It will interfere with existing Driver’s License procedures, creating delays and administrative hardships for drivers and state governments. Senior citizens will be especially burdened by the added complexity of obtaining a simple driver’s license.

** Most important, it infringes on the right to privacy that the U.S. Constitution guarantees; it places the burden of domestic security on innocent citizens, with scant guarantee of tangible results; it exerts excessive government control over the lives of citizens.