Tarrin Lupo

SAVANNAH, GEORGIA – Local pull-peddling bureaucrats are attempting to impose strict new  licensing requirements for bartenders and servers. Using yet another creative tax and fee scheme designed to squeeze every last cent out of small business owners as tax revenues dwindle, the city is seeking to implement a  “pour license” replicating a scheme successfully deployed throughout the rest of the state and the nation.

Under the guise of promoting public safety, the smarmy self-appointed liquor-czar is also looking to levy a new $35 background check fee for all current and future employees at the business owners expense, in order to investigate whether the potential employee is prone to or has had episodes of violent disorderly pouring of spirits in their past.

Source(s): LCL Report

Allison Bricker

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This past June 1st, the Federal government’s new mandatory passport rules went into effect for all Americans traveling to or from Mexico, Canada, Bermuda, and the Caribbean¹. Thanks in large part to heavy lobbying by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), the new passports and several state drivers licenses now include an embedded RFID chip incessantly broadcasting a unique identification number.²

Unfortunately and unbeknownst to many holders of the “state-of-the-art” mandatory government  documents, the unique identifier can be intercepted almost effortlessly by any third party without the holder’s knowledge or consent. The practice, known as skimming, raises the specter not only of identity theft, but also provides the skimmer with the ability to track individuals in real time, whether on the street, in their home, or at their workplace.

Privacy advocates including those in the embedded chip industry continue to sound the alarm over the relative ease in which the chip’s integrity may become compromised. Moreover, groups such as the ACLU point out that RFID originally gained commercial viability after its implementation for use in tracking cattle. They and other privacy advocates express concern over possible similar implications for individuals in the near future as the technology continues to miniaturize and tracking satellites become more sophisticated.³

However, the DHS is quick to counter complaints against the ubiquitous RFID system stating that:

“It [RFID] is not to identify people, but to verify that the identification document holds valid information about you.”⁴

Mary Ellen Callahan
Chief Privacy Officer
Department of Homeland Security

Nevertheless, the agency’s own draft report⁵ from 2006 indicates that RFID chips:

In fact to demonstrate the ease of which RFID chips are vulnerable to clandestine interception, white hat hacker, Scott Padget filmed himself this past February and posted his results onto YouTube. Using his laptop and for less than $250.00 in additional equipment, Mr. Padget captured the unique RFID broadcasts from several unwitting pedestrians on the streets of San Francisco all within about an hour.

Currently the states of Texas, Arizona, Vermont, New York, Washington, and Michigan already include RFID chips within newly issued drivers licenses, with DHS also continuing to lobby for further expansion of the chipped identification cards in to non-border states. At the forefront of this further expansion, sits SENATE BILL 1261 “Providing for Additional Security in States’ Identification Act of 2009″ (S.1261 PASS ID Act 09).

The Senate bill sponsored by Senator Daniel Akaka (D-HI) seeks to have the federal government reinsert many of the standards for drivers licenses which after public outcry, were removed from the REAL ID Act. Included among the Orwellian provisions, a digital facial recognition compatible photograph for use with both domestic and international databases such as the AAMVA and the United Nations International Civil Aviation Organization⁶ (IACO). S.1261 currently resides in the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee chaired by Senator Lieberman and which Senator Akaka is also a member.

Critics of S.1261 such as Mr. Mark Lerner of the “Stop REAL ID Coalition” fear that the ability to immediately surveil individuals and match their face to a name via a centralized database may be used to squash political dissent on a variety of issues from torture, the FEDERAL RESERVE, and/or our nation’s continuing interventionist foreign policy.

Source(s): ¹U.S. Department of State “Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative” • ² Department of Homeland Security “Enhanced Drivers Licenses: What Are They?” • ³ ACLU “Don’t Chip Our Rights Away” • ⁴ Associated Press “
Chips in official IDs raise privacy fears” by Todd Lewan, published July 12th, 2009 • ⁵ DHS “”The Use of RFID for Human Identification” (2006) • ⁶United Nations News Center

Allison Bricker

Not that many people ever enjoy getting their picture taken for their license; however regardless of your mood, smiling for your driver’s license picture is now prohibited according to the Indiana Bureau of Motor Vehicles.  In addition to a prohibition on smiling, the BMV is prohibiting glasses, scarves, and hats all to keep us safe from identity theft.

The new rules were put in place last month so that “facial recognition software” used in the pictures can better map your facial features, and help spot “fraudulent” license applications according to BMV officials. Indiana now joins 20 other states who are also using this facial recognition software, in order to help combat the evils of terrorism in a post 9/11 world.

Serfs can however, petition the bureaucrats working for the nanny state to leave headdresses on for religious purposes, and can also plead with the pull-peddlers at the BMV to have a non-photo license or identification card. Thus far however, the BMV states that they have experienced little resistance to implementing the new rules.

The new rules for drivers licenses also join the state department who implemented smiling guidelines for passports back in 2004. It is important that serfs not panic if they are confused in how to comply with these new measures for our own protection, Angela Aggeler, spokeswoman for the State Department’s Bureau of Consular Affairs, which handles travel-document guidelines says:

[When taking a [photo of a person applying for a passport] “The subject’s expression should be neutral (non-smiling) with both eyes open, and mouth closed.

A smile with a closed jaw is allowed but is not preferred,” according to the guidelines. … Smiling “distorts other facial features, for example your eyes, so you’re supposed to have a neutral expression. … The most neutral face is the most desirable standard for any type of identification.”

Source(s): Associated Press “Smiling frowned upon in visa photographs” • WTHR Channel 13 Indianapolis “Smiles restricted in BMV license photos”

Allison Bricker

With Election Day only one week away, voters in 3 states, Florida¹, California², and Arizona³ will again be voting on whether same sex couples should be allowed to “marry”. The debate regarding whom can marry is yet another example of politicians creating and fostering a wedge between Americans.

Marriage as an institution, is a purely religious ceremony conducted by a church to bless the union of two individuals under the eyes of that religion’s deity and theocratic dogma. Whereas, a “Marriage License” is merely a conglomeration of 1600+ legal benefits, liabilities, and tax designations, i.e. “CIVIL-RIGHTS” granted by a state.

Since CIVIL-RIGHTS are granted de jure (in law) they are subject to the “Equal Protection Clause” of the 14th Amendment to the United States Federal Constitution. Ergo, CIVIL-RIGHTS fall directly under the principle affirmed by Brown v. Board of Education⁴. Currently, states are maintaining two separate unequal civil institutions by allowing heterosexual couples to obtain a singular license containing the 1600+ legal designations via the courts, whilst requiring same-sex couples to piecemeal together the numerous legalities ad hoc. Thus what costs a heterosexual couple approximately $40.00 can cost thousands of dollars for same-sex couples in court costs and attorney’s fees.

The two very distinct paths in securing these civil rights quite laughably, does not even rise to the legal standard extolled under Plessy v. Ferguson⁵ which found that governments could only sustain separate civil institutions if they were of no difference in quality. The current structure is indeed separate, but is nowhere close to equal when contrasting the time, research, and monies spent by heterosexual couples against the time, research, and monies spent by same-sex couples.

Moreover, the state’s “marriage” license really has nothing to do whatsoever with sanctifying or blessing either union. As such, labeling the aforementioned a “marriage” license is nothing but an attempt by politicians to use the fear of “redefining [theocratic] marriage” as a wedge in order to secure their own slime ridden seats in public office.

It is far more accurate and unduly less divisive to call the license what it indeed is for both heterosexual and same-sex couples; a civil contract of partnership. Any arguement to the contrary regarding the accuracy of a marriage license would result in the government affirming a unique religious philosophy, thus breaching separation of church and state.

If an individual church wishes to refuse “sanctifying” a ceremony between same-sex couples then they, as a private institution are free to do so visa vi their inherent right to free association. Their action has no legal consequences whatsoever. The debate over the recognition of same-sex couples needs to be debated amongst the church itself and its congregation. Individual members of the congregation are free to form their own congregation in “protest”, interpreting the scriptures as more inclusive and less exclusive much in the same spirit of Martin Luther. Regardless, the debate over the sanctity of unions is best left to the four walls of a chapel, whilst the legality of said partnerships is best left confined within the four walls of a statehouse.

Additionally, governments previously acknowledged the necessity of legally securing partnerships whether by common law or same-sex. In the 19th century, “Boston Marriages”⁶ as they were called, secured the rights of women living with one another under the same roof, much in the same way today’s “marriage” contracts secure the ability of probate and fiduciary responsibility. It was not until the beginning of the 20th century when modern “marriage” licenses came into existence⁷ that Politicians first used the wedge of “traditional marriage” as a way to prevent interracial marriage. One would hope, that 100 years later we would not be fooled by the same ruse yet again.

However, until we call bullsh!t on these politicians carelessly throwing around the word “marriage”, they will continue to use the word solely as a tool to divide the people against one another.

Source(s): ¹Florida Marriage Protection Amendment, Proposition 2 • ²CALIFORNIA INITIATIVE to ELIMINATE RIGHT of SAME-SEX COUPLES TO MARRY, Proposition 8 • ³PROPOSING AN AMENDMENT TO THE CONSTITUTION OF ARIZONA; AMENDING THE CONSTITUTION OF ARIZONA BY ADDING ARTICLE XXX; RELATING TO MARRIAGE, Proposition 102 •⁴347 U.S. 483 BROWN ET AL. v. BOARD OF EDUCATION OF TOPEKA ET AL.APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE DISTRICT OF KANSAS. Argued December 9, 1952. Reargued December 8, 1953. Decided May 17, 1954. • ⁵ PLESSY v. FERGUSON, 163 U.S. 537 (1896) 163 U.S. 537 • ⁶ Psychology of Women Quarterly, Volume 18 Issue 4, Pages 627 – 641, Published Online: 28 Jul 2006 • ⁷ “Taking Marriage Private”, New York Times, Published: November 26, 2007