From: Michael Lorrey (retroman@together.net)
Date: Fri Jun 26 1998 - 15:47:15 MDT
VirgilT7@aol.com wrote:
> In a message dated 6/26/98 8:23:18 AM Eastern Daylight Time,
> daugh@home.msen.com writes:
>
> <<
> This is NOT radical right-wing paranoia. Most of the elements of the new
> proposed national ID system are already in place NOW. The next step is for
> all information to be coordinated and completely accessible to any and all
> bureaucrats for their arbitrary and capricious abuse.
>
> The national ID card itself (which you will be required to carry) will have
> a magnetic strip (or chip) which is imbedded in it. That means YOU (when you
> have your mandated national ID card on your person) could be tracked
> wherever you go. Privacy will be an anachronism.
> >>
>
> Other cards that have magnetic strips: credit cards, ATM cards, hotel keys,
> appt keys, et al. The magnetic strips can't be used to somehow follow your
> movements.
Oh yes they can. Credit card and debit card purchases directly access nationwide
financial databases. Authorities have the ability to put 'sniffers' on these
systems to track people by their purchase locations. This applies to hotels,
restaurants, etc. In fact, my bank was able to track me down while I was on
vacation last month to notify me of an account problem. Its kind of odd to get a
phone call from your personal banker while having after dinner coffee......500
miles away from home.... I shiver at the thought that some government fascist
might track me down and drag me away merely by my participation in the economy.
> But the author of the article seems more interested in propogating
> a juvenile kind of paranoia than paying much attention to the benefits of such
> a system or to the fact that the system really doesn't add any new powers to
> the government but only makes the government more efficient.
Total BS. It makes to government more efficient at tracking people down, as well
as knowing everything about the people they are tracking down. The minute a
fascist/totalitarian party takes over, the mechanisms will be in place for them to
commit intercontinental genocide in a matter of hours.
> In any immensely
> large and complex society such as ours a standardized identification system
> makes perfect sense. And the presence of it simply has nothing to do with
> government encroachment of anyone's rights. It DOES have to do with making
> the government more efficient. The place to protect rights, however, is in
> the courts and the legislatures, and NOT upon the assumption of governmental
> inefficiency in enforcing its laws.
Again, BS. As said by many great plitical philosophers and leaders in history:
"That government governs best which governs least." Hindering the government's
ability to be tempted by such powers are necessary. Giving such absolute power
over the individual's privacy to a priviledged few in the bureaucracy is the most
corrupting potential in government. Privacy should be controlled by the
individual, not by the government. Assuming that government will 'do the right
thing' with your personal information is assuming once too much.
-- TANSTAAFL!!! Michael Lorrey ------------------------------------------------------------ mailto:retroman@together.net Inventor of the Lorrey Drive MikeySoft: Graphic Design/Animation/Publishing/Engineering ------------------------------------------------------------ How many fnords did you see before breakfast today?
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