Friday, September 22, 2006

Someone is protesting too much

From The Washington Post:

The cost to consumers for helping to secure America became clearer yesterday as a coalition of state groups tallied the bill for implementing the Real ID Act and federal officials divulged the price that some of its workers must pay for new smart cards.

In a report released by the National Governors Association, the National Conference of State Legislatures and the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators, state motor vehicle officials estimated it would cost more than $11 billion over five years to implement the technology required by the Real ID
Act.


Under the law, states must start to re-enroll about 250 million holders of U.S. driver's licenses after May 2008. The states must train workers to verify copies of original birth certificates, Social Security cards, marriage certificates and various identification documents.

"The days of going to the DMV and getting your license on the same day are probably over," said David Quam, director of federal relations for the National Governors Association. "You'll have to take all your documents as if you were applying for the first time. What this comes down to is that more people will be in DMV offices spending more time to get an ID."

The Real ID Act was passed last year to protect against terrorist infiltration and crack down on illegal immigration. Without the new identification, citizens will be barred from airplanes, sections of airports, and military bases and other federal facilities, unless they have another form of federally issued identification, such as a passport.

I warn you now; get ready for a whole lot more bitching and moaning about how much this is going to cost and how difficult it will be to implement and how inconvenient it will be. The reason for all the complaints can be found in the fifth paragraph, “The Real ID Act was passed last year to protect against terrorist infiltration and crack down on illegal immigration.”

By all of their objections to any measure which will make it even one micron more difficult for an illegal alien, convicted felon or any other legally disqualified person, to vote the Democrats reveal what they must consider an essential part of their strategy to regain and then hold on to power – pack the voting booths with people who have not right to be there.

This tells us everything we need to know about what kind of people are leading the Democrat Party and about what kind of people the Party appeals to. That the Democrat Party is willing to be so overt in its intentions, to the point of seeming desperation, gives us a very large clue into how they view their electoral prospects, not just this November but further down the road as well.