The Associated Press is reporting this morning that Louisiana has become the latest state to formally reject the REAL ID concept through legislation. Maligned by social conservatives and the ACLU alike, REAL ID was conceived by Bush and buddies as a way to track terrorists and illegal aliens by requiring a national identity card that verifies social security & birth information. In other words, fascism.
Besides the huge cost of completely overhauling each state's id issuing bureaus and increasing the chance for id theft, REAL ID, like so many of the Bush Administration's anti-terrorism plans, has no real hope of actually catching real terrorists. The only effects will be to place ordinary, law-abiding Americans under more surveillance while simultaneously forcing us to wade through ever-higher bundles of bureaucratic red tape.
Of course, since state compliance isn't mandated until 2009, this legislation is largely symbolic at this point. We'll see on down the line if this was simply a political tool to wave around when we cave later. But still.
Labels: fascism, REAL ID, surveillance
