Life in Utah with Real ID

BTC - Thank your lucky stars this isn't your life. They could call a halt to it all if they'd simply call a special session and invoke their 10th Amendment. I'm pretty sure DHS would understand.

c/o AP>> Austin Statesman

SALT LAKE CITY - So packed is the parking lot at Utah's busiest driver's license office that on certain days people circle it endlessly in their cars, waiting to pounce on an elusive open spot. Some give up, and park illegally.

Lines of frustrated customers often stretch outside the busy office into the bitter cold. Others stream out, frequently muttering obscenities after waiting for hours — sometimes only to be told to come back another day.

A year ago, the average wait at this office was 19 minutes — lately, it's been three or four hours at times.

"I think if we get through today it'll be ... God's will," said Jennifer Selvidge, who was trying to get her son's learner's permit on a recent afternoon. "It's like being on a bad flight across country with three layovers and a bad movie."

The wait-times have ballooned in part because of efforts by Utah to comply as of Jan. 1 with the federal Real ID Act by issuing driver's licenses designed to prevent forgery — requiring verification of birth certificates, Social Security numbers and immigration status.

That new paperwork has forced many to come into the office rather than renew online or through the mail, as they once did. On top of that, Utah's driver's license offices have been closed on Fridays for the past year to save money and the state shuttered six traveling offices in rural areas because they didn't comply with security requirements under the new law.

The long lines have left Republican Gov. Gary Herbert scrambling for ways to reduce waits, while one state lawmaker is pushing for the state to stop adhering to the Real ID Act, potentially joining about a dozen others who have refused to comply since the act was passed in 2005.

"People are saying 'Why are we having to do this?' They're upset at the state, they're upset at the governor. But really this is something that truly has been dictated upon us by the federal government," said Rep. Stephen Sandstrom, R-Orem. "To have this is really quite onerous."

Utah is one of nine states where driver's licenses can't be renewed online or through the mail, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. It isn't clear how many of those states require in-person renewals in an effort to comply with Real ID.

Lawmakers in other states have noted that fully complying with the act likely would require more workers or longer wait times. In Nevada, there were warnings in 2007 that 196 additional DMV employees would be needed and that some offices would have to remain open longer to meet the new requirments. Lawmakers opted out of the plan, in hopes Congress might repeal the act. :::MORE HERE:::

FBI wants records kept of Web sites visited

c/o CLG>>CNet

WASHINGTON--The FBI is pressing Internet service providers to record which Web sites customers visit and retain those logs for two years, a requirement that law enforcement believes could help it in investigations of child pornography and other serious crimes.
FBI Director Robert Mueller supports storing Internet users' "origin and destination information," a bureau attorney said at a federal task force meeting on Thursday.

:::MORE HERE:::

A corporate identity challenge...

BTC- A letter to parent company for the idCheck product to follow.

Dear IDWatchdog,

My name is Sheila Dean and I'm an anti-National identity advocate, blogger and media activist. I have an identity challenge to present to you. I looked at your business and have some ideas about the direction of identity security. Data surveillance is an area of concern where corporations are involved.

I'm a staunch critic of data aggregates and believe most identity protection services as way to "own" the information given to their corporate machinery so they can go out of business and then sell all that information to someone else. Issue of identity "ownership" is certainly murky business. What's even less clear is if businesses like IDwatchdog will collude with Homeland Security and any other intelligence agency that makes intel demands on average citizens with or without a warrant based on National Security.

I'm interested in interviewing your corporate counsel to ask them exactly what you tell your customers about identity ownership. Who actually owns the rights to a Social Security number? Who owns your name? Is it you? Is it the State? Based on what we know about current identity conventions this area is expanding to body imaging and biometrics as potential IP when you travel and as you bank and go about your business.

You may be eventually interested in expanding your business R&D to include patenting the modern identity as a legal experiment. I recently threw down the volunteer gauntlet to prove the ability of the individual to patent their identity to therefore collect on theft damages, royalties and unlicensed use and distribution of restricted identity articles and images sold for profit to public-private entities.

If you're up to the challenge - I'd like to take this one step further with your advocacy team after considering your policy for working with national security agencies. We would have to clear that hurdle first. It would defeat the purpose of the inquiry if you're working with local or national intelligence data aggregates to get citizens to pay you to volunteer up their identity articles so you'll turn around and give the intimate details to DHS.

You've already really got a strike against you with your Law Enforcement advisor, Robert Fisak on board as a Homeland Security consultant.

Otherwise please contact me at your earliest convenience to discuss what's possible.

Sheila Dean

Licensing hammer to fall more gently

Guides will see leniency on the '6-Pack' rule, a year after

the Coast Guard law left some operators docked.

Most Minnesota fishing guides probably will get a break from the U.S. Coast Guard this summer, and will not have to be licensed -- even though some guides were dry-docked by the same federal agency last year.

An announcement is expected this month that inland Minnesota fishing guides and others who carry only a few passengers for hire on most federally "navigable" waters in the state will be given a licensing requirement postponement, Coast Guard Commander Mark Cunningham said Tuesday from St. Louis.

"I think you'll see a deadline to apply for a license, and a period of time to get a license,'' Cunningham said. "But I think you'll also see a generous grace period.''

Fishing guides throughout the state have worried since last summer when the St. Paul Coast Guard office began enforcing complex licensing requirements on Mississippi and St. Croix river guides, forcing some off the water in July.

GOOGLE IT: "collusion" +"NSA" = Privacy Concerns

BTC - Fox guarding henhouse? Sure thing. The corporations' idea of regarding privacy looks and sounds like this.

Google Seeks Help from Spy Agency on Hack Attacks, Raising Privacy Concerns

c/o ABA Journal

As malicious cyber attacks apparently are occurring more frequently and with more sophistication than ever before, a search engine giant has turned to a United States spy agency for help in dealing with a major suspected China-based hacking effort in December.

But the move by Google Inc. to work with the National Security Agency to address the claimed intrusion into its computer network--as well as those of some 30 other companies--has raised concerns about unwanted government knowledge of individual users' personal information, according to the New York Times.

"Google and NSA are entering into a secret agreement that could impact the privacy of millions of users of Google’s products and services around the world,” says executive director Marc Rotenberg of the Electronic Privacy Information Center. His Washington-based policy group sued the NSA today, seeking information about the agency’s role in cybersecurity-related surveillance.

The pact between Google and NSA was earlier reported by the Washington Post. The Post says the agreement, which is still being negotiated, calls for the NSA to help analyze what happened with the goal of successfully defending against future cyber attacks.

Senior counsel Greg Nojeim of the Center for Democracy & Technology tells the Post there is statutory authority for companies to share information with the United States government in order to protect their property rights.

According to the Times, the cooperative research and development agreement between Google and the NSA is authorized by the Federal Technology Transfer Act of 1986. It permits the government to enter into a written agreement to work with a private company on a specific project intended to promote the commercialization of government-developed technology.

Traffic camera privacy bill considered

c/o Maine News Updates

AUGUSTA — Privacy versus law enforcement concerns will be weighed when a bill comes up restricting uses of traffic surveillance cameras in Maine.

Sen. Dennis Damon's proposal would prohibit the use of such cameras to collect data that could be used to identify a vehicle or individual. The proposal adds automated license plate recognition systems to the list of regulated surveillance.

The South Portland Police Department last month became the first in the state to launch a license plate surveillance system, which uses cameras mounted on top of a cruiser to search for stolen vehicles and traffic violators.

The bill goes today before the Transportation Committee, which Damon co-chairs. The Trenton Democrat says its aim is to protect individuals' privacy.

An introduction to Sacred Activism with Andrew Harvey

An introduction to Sacred Activism with Andrew Harvey

ON THIS WEEKS WAKING UP ORWELL

Andrew Harvey will be joining us for a renewing and spiritual perspective as to "why" and "how" we can engage in American civics. Andrew Harvey is a renowned and distinguished mystical scholar, Rumi translator and explicator, poet, novelist, spiritual teacher and writer, and an architect of the concept of Sacred Activism.

OPEN SEASON ON IDENTITY PATENTING

By Sheila Dean

Can it be done? I want to patent my identity according to legal, private and corporate conventions. If it has never been done, I volunteer to be the first.

The public has their backs pushed against the wall. Corporate buzzards want to sell everything they can get from you - bones, muscle, cellular structures, blood, urine, fingerprints, DNA signatures, organs, eyeballs, semen, eggs, hair and hormones. They don't wait until your dead. They take it from your children as soon as the cord is cut between you and the baby. They won't even ask you if they can sell it or collect it in many cases. THEY - defined as health care and insurance corporations, telecomm companies, credit card barons, and Wall Street commodity thieves. The government is allowing corporations to define what a constitutional right is and who has legal license over aspects of your body, mind and intellectual property. In that pile is the conventionally defined identity. If they can get you to pay to do it to yourself even better for them - less overhead.

Let's do something. Lets patent who we are. Lets sue them out of existence for selling and stealing who we are and using us without our permission or consent. Drag them through the violent hells of civil court and get damages and royalty rewards. With the damages awarded to cities and communities in Class action level lawsuits lets pay the police and protectorates to take down all the cameras and excessive surveillance. Civil liberty PAC squads can buy the best Congressional legislative engines in D.C. to repeal the Homeland Security Act, the Patriot Act, the Real ID Act and somehow get Joe Biden to work in a "bipartisan" way to let it all happen via the Senate. Obama can pick a really cool tie when he signs it all for everyone in TV land.

If it doesn't happen exactly like that then I'll accept spawning millions of small businesses who will franchise a model to scrub persons private records from Lexis Nexus and any other business who legally can capitalize on private background checks without consent using State or federal resources. Don't like that idea? The royalty checks alone from the illegal sale and distribution of our identity articles should help boost the economy.

There are a lot more of us than them anyway.

TX Voter ID & REAL ID: Blame it on Chubbfest'09

5-11 Campaign for BTC

Lately, news is bubbling to the surface about federal ID as a way to supplant the political aims of Texas State leaders wishing to appear "tough on immigration".

Take this exerpt from the Kilgore News Herald:

http://www.kilgorenewsherald.com/news/2010-01-30/News/Merritt_talks_politics_with_Kilgore_Lions.html

Merritt has served three terms on the Border Committee and describes himself as a strong advocate on border security. “Recently the legislature has spent $100 million on border security and sent 200 more DPS officers to the border,” he said.

“I have supported the REAL I.D. program, which would make the Texas Drivers License a form of identification that would show the person’s immigration status,” said Rep. Merritt. “This bill has received a lot of push back. One reason is the cost of the program; it was originally estimated to cost $240 million but that cost is down now to $34 million for Texas. Other border states are not wanting to spend the money and they want the federal government to fund the program.”

Even now when a person goes to vote, a photo I.D. is not required and even if a drivers license is presented to vote, it does not yet confirm citizenship. “With the REAL I.D., and a required photo I.D. to vote, only citizens would be voting,” said Merritt.

Some Texans have varied ideas about what Real ID is and should be. What Real ID will never be is a way to shore up identity security and hamper illegal immigration. No matter how much Merritt and Wayne Christian yell it from the top of their lungs - it's all air and no earth.

While locals are taking more time to extract the truth from the lies, it is a duty to inform all who supported the anti-Real ID efforts in the past that Tommy Merritt intends to politically marry voter ID to Real ID so Voter ID has another lifetime next legislature. It's a foolhardy prospect because even federal administrators of Real ID, namely DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano, have no intentions of enforcing Real ID regulations due to 36 states nullifying the results. Civil liberty advocates are now more concerned about the fusion center intelligence hubs getting development monies from DHS appropriations bills.

Why should Texas pay a dime, much less $34 million, when there is no impetus or consequence to do anything from a federal mandate? Merritt, and others from TCCP's cadres, insist that it's a way to control immigration. Coyotes simply find other ways of defrauding the system using the black market for hacks. Texans continue to compete with black market labor. Real ID doesn't stop employers from preferring under the table labor and is a hidden reason why the "immigration cause" contributed to its nullification.

I would say that Voter ID and Real ID were successfully decoupled, in concept, last session due to significant holes in the Carter Baker Commission reports. Texans may pursue a voter ID if they like [GOOD LUCK!] - but Real ID may not be on the federal books to deliver. 2 bills to repeal and dispose of Real ID Act have been in the works for close to 7 months. The more recent of the two was directly derived from Rep. Carl Isett's resolution, HCR 180 (R-Lubbock).

If 'R's want voter ID, they can try again next session. However, Real ID probably won't be around to "save" anyone for very much longer.

BLAME IT ON CHUBBFEST '09

Voter I.D. became, by far, the bill killer of the '09 session - good and bad. In the end, the Voter ID bill died a separate humiliating death apart from the Real ID Act of Texas, as proposed by Merritt last session. Both HCR 50 (the Texas Sovereignty resolution) and HCR 180 ( the bill to ban Real ID from TX) didn't make it out of State Affairs due to complications from the Voter ID log jam.

Per, DPS and Governor Perry's run on $34 million in "forfeited Real Estate" to supplement the Texas angle on the National ID scheme - it's puzzling. One side of Perry yells " Sovereignty!" and "Secession!" and the other yells "federal and international money is on Texas roads and land!" Texas' current governor is tough to figure out. Especially when K-12 educators gave him credit for blocking the Real ID Act in Texas. It's always some weird surprise with Gov. Perry.

Texas can decide what this "means". For now Texas Republicans are sporting two divergently different narratives among the State legislature on national identity. After awhile I imagine no one will trust any of it.

U.S. Dystopian History: The Homeland Security Act

BTC - I feel it necessary to dust off a few old records that have been around only long enough to get ignored. In 2002, Jennifer VanBergen reported for TruthOut on the origins and problems with the Homeland Security Act for civil liberty.

One of particular interest is Title III of this law:

Title III concerns "Science and Technology in Support of Homeland Security." Section 304, according to The National Gulf War Resources Center, Inc., "grants the HHS secretary extraordinary powers to declare a health emergency simply based on a POTENTIAL threat. This means that a hypothetical threat analysis from intelligence agencies that failed to warn of Sept 11th could be used as a reason to suspend civil liberties and start mandatory smallpox vaccinations."

Homeland Security Act: The Rise of the American Police State

Editors Note: This a three-part series on the Homeland Security Act (HSA). Part 1 reviews the origins of the Act in the Hart-Rudman Commission and the Council on Foreign Relations. Part 2 discusses Cheney's plan for global dominance and how that relates to homeland security. Part 3 details some of the HSA provisions themselves and briefly discusses what worries civil libertarians.