National I.D. Card

Subject: RE: National I.D. Card
From: DougR
Date: 03 Oct 01 - 11:54 PM

Okay then, I won't require them!

DougR

Subject: RE: National I.D. Card
From: GUEST,Genie
Date: 04 Oct 01 - 01:34 AM

I still fear a too-powerful, oppressive government as much as, or more than, I do criminals and terrorists.
Genie

Subject: RE: National I.D. Card
From: DougR
Date: 04 Oct 01 - 07:03 PM

Okay, Genie, you're excused from carrying one too!

DougR

Subject: RE: National I.D. Card
From: Celtic Soul
Date: 04 Oct 01 - 10:26 PM

As with gun control laws, all it means is that law abiding citizens will have another law to remember to obey while the criminals all do as they please. And no, I am not an NRA member. Frankly, I'd rather we go the way Sweden did. Naked is OK, guns and killing aren't.

Every form of ID can be faked, if you have the right $$$. Holograms on Visa cards and drivers licenses made a difference for what? A month? And now, the fake ones are everywhere.

The thing that needs to be done is for us all to start actively participating in our own safety. This means law officials, government, the intelligence field, and you and me, Joe and Jane Citizen.

National ID cards will do nothing more than make your wallet fatter, but open, alert eyes may avert another disaster.

Subject: RE: National I.D. Card
From: GUEST,Genie
Date: 06 Oct 01 - 03:32 AM

Doug,
I'll tell that to the cops when they cite me at the beach for not having my ID card with me!

Genie (temporarily surfing without her cookie)

Subject: RE: National I.D. Card
From: GUEST,Genie
Date: 06 Oct 01 - 03:32 AM

Doug,
I'll tell that to the cops when they cite me at the beach for not having my ID card with me!

Genie (temporarily surfing without her cookie)

Subject: RE: National I.D. Card
From: DougR
Date: 06 Oct 01 - 04:35 PM

Hmmm. Are our surfing without your swimsuit too, Genie? :>) If so, direct us to the beach!

DougR

Subject: RE: National I.D. Card
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 06 Oct 01 - 06:39 PM


A fairly widespread and well publicized attempt at a National Drivers' License, as I recall late in the forties or early fifties, died a long and withering death. The purpose was, supposedly, so that people could travel freely from one state to another without confusing the highway patrol.

Visualize the headline "ILLEGAL TEXANS DRIVING IN KANSAS!" and you get an idea of the "pro" side of the argument.

The movement failed primarily over the issue of STATE SOVEREIGNTY.

It may be difficult for our "foreign" friends to understand, but the issue of what things the Federal government can, and cannot, do is fundamental to our Constitution. The determination of who is qualified to operate a motor vehicle is simply not one of the things the Feds are (or at least were) permitted to do.

One might expect the same objections to any form of National Identification Card.

I note that no one in our conversation - or any of those who propose such a card - has been very specific about who would be identified:
Citizens?
Voters?
People-who-have-lived-in-the-same-place-for-more-than-3-days?
"Good People?"
"My Friends?"
"Your Friends if I Like You (and they don't look funny)?"

It would seem that we would need a very complicated system of cards to be useful.

Note, as an example only, that there are Federal standards for who is eligible to vote on national issues; but there are still battles going on here over the right of individual states and individual communities to set different standards for voting in local elections and on local issues.

This issue has received virtually ZERO press here in radical Kansas. Apparently our citizens, and even our liberalpinkoradicalbleedingheartpress (a word I heard somewhere else) snorted a healthy "BULLSHIT!" and went on about their business.

There has been some coverage of other nations who seem more enamored with the notion, but I personally don't find it something to worry much about here - at least for now. Others may have more immediate reason for concern.

John

Subject: RE: National I.D. Card
From: GUEST,Genie
Date: 06 Oct 01 - 11:05 PM

Doug,
Here in the Portland, OR, area we have (or at least used to have) two nude beaches--one at Rooster Rock park (the rock was so named by Lewis and Clark because of its appearance, except they used another word for "rooster") and one on Sauvie Island.
Back in my younger (read "stupider") years (before the melanoma), I used to hang out a lot at both. It would have been a perfect example of a place it would have been a blasted nuisance to have to carry ID! (If we carpooled, only the driver needed tho carry a driver license.)

I understand that recently the residents of Sauvie Island succeeded in limiting the nude beach area to about an eighth of a mile strip (no pun intended). As for Rooster Rock, I no longer need an all over tan since I no longer want a tan at all, so I'm afraid I have lost track of happenings at "the Rock." But if you want to see a lot of ordinary folks in the buff (like the Mudcat calendar?), that's where to go in PDX.


John in Kansas, and the rest of y'all,
I can see good arguments for extending the powers of surveillance to the agencies of our government that are entrusted with our protection. Wiretapping, photo radar and other public cameras, and ways of identifying people quickly can, indeed, help catch terrorists, spies, criminals!
But I have yet to see a type of police power that has not been widely abused by the rogue elements in our law enforcement/government -- to harrrass political opponents, line the pockets of the corrupt, etc. I don't expect the new anti-terrorism laws to be any less subject to abuse than have the extended powers associated with the "war on drugs."

Genie