From: tcmay@netcom.com (Timothy C. May)
Date: Thu, 14 Jul 94 19:17:18 PDT
To: perry@imsi.com
Subject: Re: National ID cards are just the driver's licenses...
In-Reply-To: <9407142100.AA20683@snark.imsi.com>
Message-ID: <199407150217.TAA06839@netcom5.netcom.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain



> The following is worth mentioning: market forces will eventually
> destroy virtually all controls. However, as the Soviet Union showed,
> millions of people can be made miserable or killed in the meanwhile.
> The mere fact that internal passports (what the ID cards are, really
> -- another friend of mine called them that the minute he heard of
> them) would not stop everyone doesn't mean that they couldn't make
> almost everyone's life miserable.
> 
> Perry

Perry makes my point well. That some people will be able to skirt the
system, or that the system will ultimately be unenforceable, does not
lessen my concerns.

My assets are not well hidden--which makes it very tough for me to
adopt a low-profile, tax-avoiding, ID card-skirting lifestyle. (As to
why my assets are not well hidden, hiding assets is harder than you
think, despite what some here on this list may claim.)

To tie this in with the title I picked for this thread, about national
ID cards being the driver's licenses for the Infobahn, let's consider
that for a moment.

- Imagine that vehicle registrations require presentation of this card
(gotta get those illegals out of their cars, or, more benignly, the
bureaucracy simply makes the ID cars part of their process).

- Instantly this makes those who refuse to get an ID card unable to
get valid license tags. (Enforcement is already pretty good....I was
pulled over a couple of times for either forgetting to put my new
stickers on, or for driving with Oregon expired tags.)

- Now I suspect my friend Duncan will mention that one can--and
should--lease one's car from one's Nevada-based tax shelter company.
Perhaps. But I again claim that this is much easier said than actually
done.

(I hear these proposals and think of all the detailed arguments about
how income taxes are invalid becuase Ohio incorrectly ratified the
XXth Amendment, or somesuch. All very logical, but it doesn't work.)

Anyway, I see the imposition of internal passports--with a name chosen
for easiest acceptance, probably something like "Social Benefits
Card"--as very likely and not easily avoided. Just the tying of such
cards to driving would be devastatingly effective.

Ditto for travel. And commerce.

Let's not forget that Nickie Halflinger was able to bypass the
Surveillance State because he was one of the guys who wrote the
system! The rest of us will be mostly unable to skirt the system.

--Tim May



-- 
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