This suggests a method of allowing a secure ID for a small range of legitimate applications (e.g. showing it at the polls to verify that you’re a legal voter who hasn’t already voted) that would resist “mission creep”. Make the ID document a slab, not a card; something the size of a book (and I’m thinking more War and Peace than Jonathan Livingston Seagull) could reasonably be trotted out on special occasions but could not be reasonably extended to routine transactions.
So what’s the problem with “mission creep”?
But why? As I posted earlier, foreign nations have let me cross there borders trivially. If Canada doesn’t care if I travel in, why should my home state of Michigan worry? Mind you, I have actually worked as an election official in Michigan. Really, vote fraud just isn’t an issue here. Heck, many who can vote just don’t.
Who or what “benefits” from a national ID card?
Who or what “loses” with a national ID card?
If a national ID card is a solution, what is the problem?
What safeguards would need to be implemented to prevent abuse by government, corporations, etc?
To tell you the truth, I’m not particularly frightened about border penetration by terrorists. The DHS and FBI seem to have that pretty much under control with existing measures – at least, there have been no successful terrorist attacks on American soil since 2001.
I’m really only interested in this idea for the sake of efficiency and simplifying life. Why should I need a driver’s license, and a voting registration card, and a passport, and a Social Security card, with a different number on each one?
I also think a single ID card cross-referenced to all your public records would make identity theft more difficult, and also would make it more difficult for people to create fraudulent identities or hide from the law. Does anybody have any objections to that? (Objections to the value of the goal, I mean.)
I happen to work with a lot of foreign nationals. None have actually violated US laws that I know of. I actually spent many hours communicating with the INS to get a Nigerian an extension on his work permit here. I’m all kinds of skeptical that the subject of this thread is a material issue.
I was arguing this statement:
Well, some people (not me) do think the presence of illegal immigrants in the U.S. is a problem ipso facto regardless of whether they break any laws or not. A national ID card system would make it easier for us to round up the illegals and deport them – or to regularize their residency, whichever. Whatever we do with them, I do agree that their illegal status is a bad thing because it makes it possibly for employers to exploit them – who, after all, are they gonna complain to?
If we have a national ID card keyed to a national database, and if you have to present the card to do a wide variety of things (other than applying for a job at a farm), and if you can only get the card if you are either a citizen or a legal resident or a legal visitor, and if it easy to use a magnetic strip to check instantly whether the card is fake or not (just as we can now use a magnetic strip to check instantly whether a credit card is valid) . . . you get the picture?
Of course, for that to work, even foreign tourists would have to be issued a temporary national ID card when they enter the country – an ID specifying that the holder is here on a temporary tourist visa, with the expiration date specified.
All it takes is one instance of someone stealing your identity, and before they are caught (if they ever are caught), effectively ruining every aspect of your life. Humans being what they are do not all respond exactly the same way every time. So when you discover your identity has been compromised will there be a single place to go, get it restored, and have every instance where your identity is required be equally restored as well? I doubt it very much.
Well, a single, centralized identity database would simplify that process immensely, as well as sending up a red flag every interested party can clearly see whenever a case of identity theft is reported by anyone.
Well, lots of Canadians might tell Americans that, but if they’re Customs and Immigration (or whatever the department is called these days - I forget) folk they’ll probably phrase it more politely. 
Passports are still not required to cross the border in either direction, assuming you are a citizen of one of the two countries, but Canada is strongly encouraging its citizens to carry one when going to the US U.S.A. Bound - Consular Affairs, and your State Department says you need “proof of your U.S. citizenship such as your U.S. passport … or certified copy of your birth certificate …” Tips for travellers to Canada
Given how paranoid people have become since 9-11, I’d be rather nervous about heading south of the border without a passport, even though I realize people still do it quite regularly.
You are assuming the technical and human processes of such a system will work as expected every time. I do not hold that view. Just look the current failures of the government’s airline passenger database. Even with such well-known individuals as Senator Ted Kennedy or Cat Stevens, errors will occur and take time to repair.
Imagine losing your ID on a late Friday afternoon in the middle of summer. Do you honestly think the system will work exactly as intended with no failures, and that no one will take advantage of the weekend downtime and exploit your loss? Can you imagine the bureacracy required to maintain the system, will all individuals properly vetted for security. Can you imagine the internal security for the system to monitor itself?
For a national ID card to work, everyone from birth in this country will require one. We haven’t even approched the illegals in this country, let alone visitors. An out of the blue failure rate on any given day of just 0.01 percent means 30,000 people a day will be experiencing problems, and that’s assuming each failure lasts just one day. We haven’t even approched all those calls coming in to report lost IDs, stolen IDs, etc. How does one actually verify a loss? Must we report to the local police station? With what ID to prove who you are? Usernames and passwords? Ha! Look at all the stories of ordinary people who screw up on their Internet account usernames and passwords!
From a practical standpoint, it’s not possible. It never will be.
Nitpick: The Cat Stevens thing was an error in officials’ judgment, not a case of mistaken identity. They knew who he was, all right.
For the rest – these are good practical objections. I wonder if such problems have come up in countries that do use ID cards, such as Germany. (Of course, according to kellner, German ID cards are national but the info is kept in local registries, not a national database.)
I’m both disappointed and relieved that so far, nobody in this thread has stepped in to defend a person’s “right” to live as an unregistered, below-the-radar “stealth hermit”; or to run away from his or her past and invent a new identity for himself or herself; or to live in the U.S. as an illegal alien. We do have some sanity, even in the Doper community!
Whu don’t the federal government recommend guidlines for state ID’s?
Ok, I’ll do it.
I think an individual should have every right to do exactly that. Use cash, no bank accounts, etc. If I don’t want to be tracked on one or more databases, it’s exactly zero of anyone else’s business until I break some law.
This may cause several problems, it may force me to jump through many hoops that seem like a complete waste of time, it might require me to put up with enormous inconvenience and hardship, it might it impossible to do certain things. Big deal, it’s my life, and I shouldn’t have to justify my actions where they don’t break laws.
On the other hand, my feeling is that to pass a law, it’s the obligation of those who want the law to show that it is necessary, not just convenient. That it will stop crime, or address an inequality, not just make things simpler for law enforcement. And that it will do so without placing unnecessary burdens on the general public, even if those burdens seem light (or nonexistent) to you.
Now, I’m not one the people who choose to live this way. I’m in the computer business, I’m as plugged in as it’s possible to be. Anyone here could find my actual identity in seconds with no problem. It doesn’t bother me at all.
But it’s my choice (at least to some degree). And I’m very much against taking away what remains of that choice without some damn good reasons.
Is it your right not to pay taxes, then? Sales taxes can be paid without leaving any trail, if you pay cash – but filing federal tax returns creates a public record. So does getting a paycheck with a FICA deduction for Social Security taxes. And if you own real property you have to pay local property taxes and that also creates a paper trail.
Furthermore – I won’t defend the idea of reviving the draft, but if we do have one, and you’re not a conscientous objector, do you have the right to evade it, while others are subject to it? We can only have a draft if draft-age males are registered and can be found when needed.
We already have a " Central Control" and our SSN numbers under that control.
How do we (I) excape? :eek:
The Cat Stevens case wasn’t an error – he was on the suspicion list (for donations to charities found to have ties to Hamas, IIRC).
This brings us to one of the fundamental objections to the National ID card – the more efficiently the government can keep tabs on you, the easier it is for them to abuse the power.
From a philosophical point of view, yes, you do have to stipulate a “right” to evade unjust laws (unless you’re going to condemn people for hiding slaves in the antebellum US or hiding Jews in Nazi Germany).
From a practical point of view, a certain amount of difficulty in enforcing laws serves as a useful check on the power of government.