Real Bad ID

Wall Street Journal ^ | October 10, 2006 | Wall Street Journal

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

It's unfair to say that the Republican Congress has done nothing on immigration. In one respect, according to a new report from state officials, Congress made matters worse.

In May of last year Congress passed the Real ID Act at the urging of House Judiciary Chairman James Sensenbrenner (R., Wis.). It was yet another border-security measure, intended to thwart illegal immigration by denying drivers' licenses to undocumented aliens. President Bush signed the legislation in hopes that Republicans then would meet him halfway on comprehensive immigration reform. Didn't happen. We now know that the Tom Tancredo "enforcement first" crowd has no intention of ever compromising with Mr. Bush.

We doubt Mexicans willing to risk their lives crossing hundreds of miles of desert on foot care much about not being able to obtain a drivers' license once here. Nor is deputizing Department of Motor Vehicle officials going to force many illegal aliens already in the country to return home. The most likely result is more unlicensed and uninsured motorists, which means more dangerous U.S. roads.

Real ID gets worse. According to a new analysis from the National Governors Association, the National Conference of State Legislatures and the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators, the law is also going to be costly and burdensome.

Under Real ID, all 245 million existing holders of drivers' licenses must apply -- in person -- for new, standardized identification cards. The report says that state motor vehicle department staffs will need to be more than doubled, and workers will have to be trained to verify copies of original birth certificates, Social Security cards and the like. Misplaced your Social Security card? Have fun getting a new one. We're pretty sure that voters don't elect Republicans to increase the size of their already bloated state bureaucracies.

[Carry_Okie]

You won't get any argument out of me that NAIS is an abomination designed to put small domestic producers out of business while building the infrastructure of tyranny.

I assume yours was a rhetorical question?

[supercat]

I assume yours was a rhetorical question?

Well, I assume your answer as to which makes more sense would probably match mine. I do think it's a fair argument to bring up, though, and I didn't see things put in those terms elsewhere.

I would expect that owners of large herds of cattle would probably want to chip their animals to aid in tracking changes in weight, food consumption, etc. Someone with three cows, however, may prefer other means of identifying them (e.g. this one's Bessie, this one's Danielle, and this one's Phyllis). Such a person would have little use for an implanted microchip (except, perhaps, as a slight anti-theft measure).

I can think of plenty of bad uses for the NAIS database; it's hard to think of good uses that couldn't be accomplished just as well by letting people keep track of their own livestock.

[Ben Ficklin]

I am acquainted, to some degree, with NAIS, I just didn't recognize the acronym.

[OldPossum]

I now filter out any WSJ commentary on the ILLEGAL ALIEN situation

I do too. It's gotten to the point where I can read the lead-off paragraph and I can write the rest of the story/editorial.

For purposes of your blood pressure, it's best to ignore the WSJ's "news" pages and go right to the editorial pages and the features sections. Your time is wasted on their left-leaning "news" stories.

The amazing thing is that those liberals who edit the news stories don't see how they are damaging the paper long-term with their crap.

[OldPossum]

I should add that you should also ignore anything on the editorial page that mentions Mexican labor, undocumented workers, the like. Again, think about your blood pressure.