Thursday, July 16, 2009

Being Put In Your Place


The State, that all powerful entity which once was a servant to the citizenry, has decided to put everyone in their place as a reminder that whatever the State wants, the State gets .

“Unless Congress drops a requirement by year's end for new super-secure state-issued driver's licenses to be presented at airport checkpoints, travelers will encounter massive delays and extra diligent security screenings, national security officials warned Wednesday.”

“Homeland Security chief Janet Napolitano raised the specter of unpopular checkpoint backups to bolster the Obama administration's appeal for “urgent” congressional revision of parts of the 4-year-old Real ID Act adopted during the Bush administration.”

Back in April Napolitano came out against the Real ID Act , the one enacted during the Bush administration, wanting to alter it without giving any specifics as to what would be better. Is it just me or does this sound like, “I didn’t like the wrapping paper Bush’s administration put on Real ID; but if you insist… I’ll do what I can to make everyone regret Real ID by pushing it so hard it totally pisses everyone off.”

Going through airport security was an inconvenience before; longer lines, delayed flights and random full body searches without probable cause will be used as the tool to push through Big Brother’s Updated Real ID Act. You thought this was just a bad dream; it will only get worse.

“Passengers without enhanced security driver's licenses will face “additional screening by TSA — and one can only contemplate the inconvenience in airline travel that could occur if everyone has to undergo additional screening because they don't have a Real ID-compliant drivers license,” Napolitano testified.”

Folks will be lined up like sheep, how appropriate, a punched tag through one ear just so they can get on an airplane that no longer has beverage service, arrives an hour or so late and may or may not be air worthy because of budget cuts. Maybe this is what Napolitano wants; are we having fun yet?

If you thought the 4th Amendment to the Constitution might keep TSA from conducting unreasonable searches without first obtaining a warrant based on probable cause; think again. The Interstate Commerce Act, the all encompassing fall back argument used by the federal government, has been rubber stamped by the Supreme Court as justification to get around warrantless searches involving transportation issues.

Wasn’t it Ben Franklin who said, “Those who give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety”? I’ve heard many variations on the exact wording; regardless, the issue remains the same.

If you miss an important flight, having been delayed by rubber gloved security officials going through your personal items simply because you only had a valid driver’s license instead of the more invasive national security ID module which would contain your complete medical history, political party affiliation (you think I’m joking; maybe so, maybe not), terrorist profile based on Twitter, Facebook comments or blog entries, yearly declared taxable income or anything else the digital library of congress may wish to have encoded; that my friends, is what lies ahead.

Homeland Security Secretary Napolitano, acting as a tool for the government’s endless agenda to do away with individual rights, will frustrate an already weary public through intimidation and/or inconvenience each time you go to an airport; and why not, the strategy has worked time and time again. When the lines get longer some folks will demand “change”; just what this administration wants to hear.


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