President Obama has signaled that he will give the United States Commerce Department the authority over a proposed national cybersecurity measure that would involve giving each American a unique online identity. Other candidates mentioned previously to head up the new system have included the NSA and the Department of Homeland Security, but the announcement that the Commerce Department will take the job should please groups that have raised concerns over security agencies doing double duty in police and intelligence work.
Since King Obama is for it, naturally, I am suspicious of it. I am all for a “unique” ID for each person when it comes to purchasing items over the Internet, but not for general use of the Internet, and it should NEVER be used for voting over the Internet.
Having lived, albeit briefly, in a culture where my documentation could be demanded at any time at the whim of jack-booted thugs, I have an instinctive aversion to this scheme. Ø may love the “government option” at every turn, but only because he sees himself (or perhaps somebody(ies) who control his actions) at the apex pulling the puppet string , but Americans should never acquiesce in this. We don’t need George Orwell or any other writer to create a fictional society to illustrate this; we need only look to Russia, where even today, twenty years after the Communists were theoretically removed from power, one must carry a passport to move within the nation and register with the authorities if changing residence. These and other controls on the basic freedoms we enjoy as our rightful heritage are still the daily lot of the Russian public.
Further, as innocent a motivation as could be for this (and nothing Ø does IS innocent), how about our “protected” SSNs which were never to be used except to track our contributions to the government-mandated pension fund? Because these are used for so many other purposes today and so easily compromised, everyone reading this can expect to have their identity stolen at least once over the next five years.
So, by all means, let us give even more power over our personal lives to the all-powerful Federal bureaucracy because we know they will never abuse it nor allow it to be misappropriated. If anyone should be so naive as to buy into that bit of Ø’s BS, please contact me, as I have a beautiful oceanfront 4BR just East of Omaha which is available this week only for a very modest amount, cash only.