-------- Original Message -------- Subject: RE: [Politech] Update on new House driver's license bill: Votescheduled today [priv] Date: Wed, 9 Feb 2005 09:41:10 -0500 From: Nojeim, Greg <GNOJEIM@private> To: Declan McCullagh <declan@private> The REAL ID Act is not coming up under a suspension of the rules. Instead, a rule will be adopted that governs length of debate and amendments permitted, among other things. The Whip's notice indicates that the 1st 4 bills that come up today will come up under suspension; REAL ID is not among those 4. -- Greg [Greg is correct. I misread the Whip's notice. --Declan] -------- Original Message -------- Subject: Re: [Politech] Update on new House driver's license bill: Vote scheduled today [priv] Date: Wed, 09 Feb 2005 04:47:33 -0500 From: Robert L. Ellis <mccullagh@e-a.com> To: Declan McCullagh <declan@private> Declan, Not only are the feds creating a national ID card; in Section 202(b)(6) they are introducing nationwide mandatory residential address registration. These developments do not bode will for our country. Residential address registries are used by many governments to restrict and control where people can live and travel. In many countries, the police can stop anyone without cause and demand their papers. (Mandatory residential registration, combined with the requirement to carry one's ID -- "papers" back then -- is what enabled the Nazis to round up Jews and others so efficiently.) Such practices as residential registrations and "papers", so I thought, are totally at odds with everything America stands for. That appears to be changing now. The Supreme Court has recently ruled (in the Hiibel case) that the police can demand ID for no reason. And now this. Mandatory verification of residential addresses will do absolutely nothing to increase security: The law will be evaded by those who desire to do so, and in any event there is nothing (as yet) to stop a person from moving to a different address the day after the license is issued. The requirement is just more mindless collection of data, one more mindless invasion of privacy, and one more way that this administration is reducing "freedom" to an Orwellian slogan. - Bob Ellis ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Ellis & Venable LLP, Attorneys & Counselors at Law NOTE OUR NEW ADDRESS! We're at Polaris now. 8824 Commerce Loop Drive, Columbus, OH 43240 +1 614 505-0808 /phone/ 614-985-6898 /fax www.internet-attorneys.com <http://www.internet-attorneys.com/>/ -------- Original Message -------- Subject: FW: Oppose HR 418 (national ID) Date: Wed, 9 Feb 2005 08:24:06 -0500 From: Singleton, Norman <Norman.Singleton@private> To: 'declan@private' <declan@private> please forward to the politech list: -----Original Message----- From: The Liberty Committee [mailto:thelibertycommittee@private-publisher.com] Sent: Tuesday, February 08, 2005 9:57 PM To: Singleton, Norman Subject: Oppose HR 418 (national ID) ACTION ALERT February 8, 2005 Are the terrorists winning? When al-Qaeda attacked the United States on September 11, 2001, they made it clear they hate America and want to terrorize us into changing America. If they could, the terrorists would destroy the unique American way of life. But they can't. Only we can do that. Tragically, too much of the legislation enacted by Congress in a knee-jerk reaction to 9/11 does al-Qaeda's job for them. The Patriot Act took the first, disastrous step toward fundamentally changing our way of life. Then came the homeland security bill, followed by the 9/11 intelligence reorganization bill. And now the Real ID Act of 2005 (H.R. 418) will be voted on Thursday, February 10th. What's wrong with H.R. 418 -- a bill we are told will stem the flow of illegal aliens through our porous borders? For starters, it does NOTHING to stem the flow of illegal aliens. Instead, H.R. 418 will: 1. Establish a national ID card. 2. Establish a federally-coordinated database of personal information on American citizens with Canada and Mexico. 3. Use the new national ID to track American citizens when traveling outside the U.S. -- and within the U.S. 4. Re-define "terrorism" in broad new terms that could include members of firearms rights and anti-abortion groups or other such groups as determined by whoever is in power at the time. 5. Authorize the secretary of the Department of Homeland Security to unilaterally expand the information included in driver's licenses, including such biometric information as retina scans and DNA information -- and even radio frequency identification (RFID) tracking technology. Carry a driver's license with RFID and governmental officials will know your whereabouts 24/7. Incredibly, H.R. 418 does nothing to solve the growing threat to national security posed by people who are already in the U.S. illegally. Instead, H.R. 418 states what we already know: that certain people here illegally are "deportable." But it does nothing to mandate deportation. H.R. 418 fails miserably on this most critical issue. The Real ID Act or Real National ID Act will impose a Soviet-style internal passport on law-abiding American citizens. Proponents of H.R. 418 say we must "make sacrifices" like this to control our borders and fight illegal immigration. But H.R. 418 is a Trojan horse -- it pretends to offer desperately needed border control in order to stampede Americans into sacrificing what is uniquely American: more of our constitutionally protected liberty. H.R. 418 does what al-Qaeda could never do without our help. H.R. 418 does what legislation restricting firearm ownership does. It punishes law-abiding citizens. Criminals will ignore it. H.R. 418 offers us a false sense of greater security at the cost of taking a gigantic step toward making America a police state. The terrorists will have won. Urge your U.S. representative to vote "no" on H.R. 418. Go to http://capwiz.com/liberty/issues/alert/?alertid=6938731&type=CO Kent Snyder The Liberty Committee http://www.thelibertycommittee.org _______________________________________________ Politech mailing list Archived at http://www.politechbot.com/ Moderated by Declan McCullagh (http://www.mccullagh.org/)
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