Its not the ID itself that is most troubling, but its the incremental chipping away of our liberty. Every law the government passes makes us less and less free. We have to lick the boots of high school dropout TSA employees to get on a flight. We work for half of the year to pay the IRS. Our internet use is monitored. Our liberty is eroded in hundreds of small ways every day that adds up to us being slaves of our Government.
More and more, I think you are right. Such measures in the hands of Bush are one thing, but in the hands of a Hillary Clinton, something quite different. Maybe our government would do well to abandon such intrusions on law abiding people and spend some time and effort rounding up and deporting those non citizens who are likely to pose a threat to our security.
Homeland Security is basically a subsidy to airports & airlines that want to shift risk and don’t want to cover the costs of their own security.
Thanks to lazy interest groups such as this, we get heavy-handed government (and loss of privacy rights).
If these companies (e.g. airlines) want to ask people to VOLUNTARILY give up their privacy with a retina scan for the convenience of getting through bag check more quickly, that’s fine. People should be able to sell their privacy for convenience, but — it’s THEIR CHOICE. The govt should not force them to give up privacy in travel, business trips, etc.
A private businessman may not want his competitors (who gave campaign contributions to a politician in exchange to access to this large database) to KNOW exactly where he is traveling and what he is doing. He needs alternative arrangements, screening methods that may be a bit more time consuming — but preserve his privacy, and protects him from corporate “espionage”.
The airlines will have to provide safe — & anonymous — ways to process such business people on to planes, if they want to keep the business of small firms, start up companies and inventors/entrepreneurs, such as these folks.
....Businesses “will find a way” — if it is profitable.
“Homeland security” is just corporate welfare to travel industries too lazy to take on the commercial liability (economic responsibility), and “do it right” - read: offer choices & different services, depending on the passenger & his preferences.
“TSA” is corporate welfare — and it violates essential privacy rights to boot.