

Updated Schedule for U.S. Biometric Passports 224
SRain315 writes "The story from the Chicago Times via Yahoo! give more details about biometric information to be added to U.S. passports. Trial run this fall, full production next year. Slashdot covered this last year."
fp (Score:3, Funny)
won't work (Score:4, Insightful)
The goal is to prevent known terrorists from entering the country and to make the use of stolen passports virtually impossible.
this is useless, all it does is prevent existing known terrorists from trying to enter, not that they would be stupid enough to try anyways.
Re:won't work (Score:3, Insightful)
It doesn't even do that. Plenty of illegals come in without passports.
Re:won't work (Score:2)
Perfect? No. Better than the current standard? By a long shot.
Re:prove it (Score:5, Insightful)
People in 1933 Germany were quite happy to put up with Hitler's new policies, and give up "some" of their civil rights, for a variety of perfectly valid reasons too...
Do you realize the government is taking the constitution apart slowly but surely?
Re:prove it (Score:2, Insightful)
This is a popular opinion expressed in non-offensive and appropriate way.
Dont mod people down just because you do not agree with them.
Re:prove it (Score:2)
I recently picked up Triumph of the Will [imdb.com] on DVD. I would recommend it for viewing by any citizen of the modern world. There are many parts that gave me an ominous feeling of deja vu. It was also the source of the quote in my sig.
Re:prove it (Score:2)
I don't suppose you'd care to enlighten us on which of your rights is infringed by this?
Re:prove it (Score:3, Insightful)
With a single sentence you have exemplified both Godwin's law [faqs.org] and Arthur Schopenhauer's thirty-second strategem [coolhaus.de]. Readers can draw their own conlcusions about this conjunction of well-documented forms of noxious and invalid rhetoric with "+5 in
Re:prove it (Score:5, Informative)
The 1st Amendment [slashdot.org]
The 4th Amendment [bobbarr.org]
Re:prove it (Score:3, Insightful)
The 2nd Too (Score:2)
If the people cant rise up and take control back, the goverment has a free ride.
Re:prove it (Score:2)
Re:prove it (Score:5, Insightful)
Time to feed the trolls (Score:3, Insightful)
I rest my case.
Re:Time to feed the trolls (Score:2)
Re:prove it (Score:4, Interesting)
All these draconian 'security' measures are not needed because barbarians are at America's gates, but that American policies around the world are creating tensions that are easist to address via terrorism.
"Extra scrutiny" has never been shown to add true security. And the US government has been taking apart the US Constitution since the US Civil War. Consider the War Powers Act for one. The printing of a fiat currency for another. Censorship. Affirmative Action (aka 'reverse discrimination') which is strictly against the principles of the Constitution -- social engineering is ineffective and people, especially when considering generations: time and societies are not algebraic equations; you can't take away from Jim in 1850 and give Joe a handout in 2004 and make up for it. All it does is create a class of people who feel as though society owes them something, which it most surely does not. Clearly the Constitution never allowed for this; if it did, it would have included "inequalty" as its key premise. This does exist because the US government does indeed pervert the US Constituion.
Bastiat wrote of 'legal plunder' which is how the State works. In fact he wrote that the State was 'that great fiction by which everyone tries to live at the expense of everyone else.' Whenever the State gives itself authority that the indiviuals making up that State do not have, it begins to live above the power that created it and by definition must oppress the creating power. That is the mechanism through which principles of civil rights are lost, which is quite different than judging such by contravening current laws. Laws flow from principles, not the other way.
Re:prove it (Score:2)
In fact, three times that I know of has Executive order authority been used to redefine liberty (see EO 13083, et al). Yes, you read it right. Americans now enjoy liberties at the behest of the US Government. I'm pretty sure that the US Constitutional f
Yeah... (Score:4, Insightful)
The goal is to prevent known terrorists from entering the country and to make the use of stolen passports virtually impossible.
I'm sure that works well when the first-timers are suicide bombers that are traveling one way one time only... after all, the high-ups like bin Laden and Ayman Al-Zawahiri fly back and forth out of Laguardia all the time, right?
Re:Yeah... (Score:5, Funny)
"In Soviet America, Passport stamps You!"
Re:Yeah... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Yeah... (Score:5, Interesting)
The parent got modded funny for the Soviet Russia joke; but he should be getting modded Insightful for pointing out the real reason from these new passports.
Like me expand a bit on his insight: these biometric passports are the thin edge -- a proof of concept, if you will -- of mandatory National ID cards.
Indeed, Homeland Security will point out stories, like the one posted above about the 88 illegal immigrants taking a domestic flight from California to New Jersey and the general ability if illegals to bypass our borders, as evidence that we will need a "fool-proof" way of ascertaining identity not only at the borders but inside the United States.
And since the biometric passport will by then have been, however reluctantly, accepted, the government will apply the same technology to National ID cards.
Of course, a National ID card is only useful if it's checked, so expect to see uniformed men asking you to present it: "Your papers, Citizen!". This will also have the useful -- for the government -- side effect of getting the citizenry used to seeing and docilely taking orders from uniformed "security" officers; you can already see that happening in airports and government buildings, where we've all learned to shut-up and passively follow orders from any guy with three days of training and a badge, on penalty of delay, harassment or arrest.
(This acclimation to the presence of soldiers as quasi law-enforcement, incidentally, is one of the requirements Army War College grad Charles Dunlap posits for "The Origins of the American Military Coup of 2012" [metafilter.com], co-winner in 1992 of the of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff 1991-92 Strategy Essay Competition -- in other words, it's not a fringe tin-foil hat screed.)
Expect also that the government will quickly thereafter require presentation of the National ID for transactions that "terra'ists use", like banking or buying plane and train tickets, similar to the "Know Your Customer" requirements of the "Patriot" Act. A little way down the road, expect that the government will expanded the "significant economic activity" to encompass all credit card purchases -- and perhaps using the fig leaf of "preventing (economic) identity theft", will require your National ID Card be presented for all credit card purchases.
At that point, you'll either have to present you National ID Card several times a day, or remove yourself from "the grid" entirely. I can think of few ways better to suppress dissent than letting anyone contemplating it know that their movements can be tracked with this sort of granularity: "why did you use the ATM machine a block from the People Against Surveillance meeting, Citizen? are you a member of this anti-Patriotic organization"?
Now, some will accuse me of wearing my tin-foil hat too tight: I'll refer them to the subpoenaing of protest groups' membership records (dropped only after unfavorable publicity) [why-war.com], the CAPPS II Airline screening and the subpoenaing of women's medical records of their abortions (this link from BusinessWeek, of all places [businessweek.com], the FBI investigation of Freedom of Information act requests [dailytexanonline.com], and the Federal prosecution -- even after state charges were thrown out of court -- of peaceful protestors against Bush [mercurynews.com]. And there are, unfortunately, many many more examples of the current administration supressing dissent -- in fact, if you're reading this, please reply with links to more of these cases.
Re:Yeah... (Score:2)
I am a bit terse, and hoped that to those paying attention, my two lines would convey what you so clearly and explicitly delineate.
Anyway - you have the debatable distinction of "friend" status.
Re:Yeah... (Score:2, Insightful)
MOD PARENT
Re:Yeah... (Score:2)
by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 15, @12:23PM (#9162597) Unfortunately, the ones you want kept out will be free to travel. The ones you might want - certain musicians, authors scholars and poets - will be restricted.
Re:Yeah... (Score:3, Interesting)
Yes, yes. I should take off my tinfoil hat. Here's a novel idea: maybe you should consider whether I'm the one with the tinfoil hat, or you're the one with blinders?
I will take off my tinfoil hat when I have a president that was clearly voted into office and not one who's appointment via a set of judges is questionable, at best. I will take off my tinfoil hat when I live in a country that doesn't preemptively attack sovereign nations in a sorry display of blatant imperialism. I will take off my tinfoil hat
War Passporting? (Score:5, Interesting)
I hope that these passports will come with some kind of jacket of material that can stop the radio transmissions or whatever -- sorry, I'm not much of a geek to know the intricate details of that kind of thing. I really don't think that such protection should be limited to those "in the know" about such things -- all American citizens traveling abroad should be given an information packet about the dangers of leaving that sort of data exposed to anyone and everyone in the country you're visiting.
You don't get it. (Score:5, Informative)
There are cryptographic protocols that are well known and widely implemented to make sure that your smart card won't even talk to anything but an authorized system. There is no way that somebody can just go out and buy an ISO 14443 reader and war drive your pocket. They need the proper keys to talk to the card and if they don't have them they are out of luck.
Re:You don't get it. (Score:2)
To which I reply... millions of dollars have been invested in all sorts of great smart card technology, and DirecTV is still facing an uphill battle.
Sure, if you are trying to protect a limited number of expensive smart cards, which are read by a limited number of readers, then perhaps you got something. Even Di
Re:You don't get it. (Score:2)
I don't know what the readers have to do with this. The keys don't have to live in the readers, they can be in a hardware security module in a server in a physically secure facility.
You are correct in that they could be some security breakthrough in before the cards expire, but unless it involv
Re:You don't get it. (Score:2)
"Questions of privacy also had to be addressed because the chips will use radio frequency identification technology to transmit data. Without protection, the technology theoretically might allow people--identity thieves, for example, or intelligence agents other than immigration officials--to electronically and surreptitiously determine the identity of a passport holder."
The biometric
Re:You don't get it. (Score:2)
You are also assuming that a pin or some other user authentication wouldn't be needed to gain access to the information.
So you do raise valid concerns but they can be addressed.
Re:You don't get it. (Score:4, Informative)
If the system is properly implemented then no human eyes will ever see the keys. They are locked in the hardware and can't get out. I am not talking about a pin to unlock the data on your card, though the cards could implement that as well. I am talking about card master keys, encryption keys, MAC keys, and key encryption keys using techniques such as Open Platform secure messaging.
I am talking about using tamper reactive hardware like an IBM 4785 on the back end and putting unique keys on all the cards. This isn't that complicated but nobody on /. understands it and they all bitch about things that understanding it would resolve and I am sick of it.
I'll turn off rant mode now...
Re:You don't get it. (Score:5, Interesting)
Okay, well let's imagine for a moment that we don't think anyone involved in the implementation of smartcards understands these ideas either.
It's not that strange. After all, secure voting protocols exist, but they're completely unknown amongst the people who build voting machines for government use. Why should we imagine that smartcard contractors are any less ignorant of secure protocols?
Re:You don't get it. (Score:2)
Re:You don't get it. (Score:2)
Re:You don't get it. (Score:2, Interesting)
You appear to be a mite irritated by the notion t
Re:You don't get it. (Score:2)
Also the system really isn't that complex. This sort of thing is standard practice.
Re:You don't get it. No, I do, but I don't care... (Score:2)
Your issue is a different one. You are saying that someone who does have the keys is going to try to talk to the car
Re:You don't get it. (Score:2)
How hard the passports will be to tamper with or forge is a different questions. This will depend on the hardware used, and the design and implementation of the security system. A well designed system will have data on it signed by a key that is not present on the card, so even if you hack your own card you won't be able to put valid data on it since you won't h
Re:You don't get it. (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:You don't get it. (Score:2)
I don't know of any studies on how easy it is to jam an ISO 14443 system. It would be interesting to know. If the cards were dual-interface and had contacts as well then you could simply use the contacts as a backup.
Re:You don't get it. (Score:2)
I am taking a leap in assuming biometric ID cards can be similarly jammed, maybe even disabled if enough energy is directed at them
I doubt it would be difficult at all to conduct this sort of denial-of-service attack. You could burn out the chip (more likely, the antenna couplings or the antenna itself, but, whatever) by beaming enough power at it, though that might require levels near those found inside a microwave oven. It would be interesting to know what the minimum levels are.
OTOH, it would re
Re:You don't get it. (Score:2)
If someone starts jamming airports frequently you could put he reader in a cage and make people throw their cards into the cage.
Re:You don't get it. (Score:2)
If the antenna goes but not the chip and it has contacts then it will still work in contact mode.
Yep. Makes sense, actually.
It might be possible though to power the card through the antenna in such a way as to make the card not function in either mode while it is in range of the signal.
That would be interesting to know.
If someone starts jamming airports frequently you could put he reader in a cage and make people throw their cards into the cage.
You could. More likely you'd track down the jamm
Re:Actually, contactless capabilities are in... (Score:2)
I'm surprised... (Score:3, Funny)
Terrorists? I don't think so... (Score:5, Insightful)
Do they really think this is going to be effective against terrorists? Or is this just another way of saying to the public, "Look, we're doing something! And it's intrusive to your privacy so it must really work!"
How many "known" terrorists enter the US? How many of those enter on stolen passports? As far as I know, all of the Sept. 11 terrorists were: a) unknown as terrorists and b) here on valid passports and visas. This kind of program would have had no effect on preventing them from entering.
On the other hand, many people do enter the US on forged documents, particularly people from poorer countries who come here illegally, looking for work. I could see how this kind of biometric ID could help identify such illegal immigrants, if that were the goal. But I just wish people would stop trying to tie everything in to the "war on terrorism" - it distracts from the real problems that this kind of technology might be useful for.
Re:Terrorists? I don't think so... (Score:2)
I'm afraid it's even worse than you think. I'm afraid it's rather "We always wanted to do something that's intrusive to your privacy, but we were afraid of the public outrage... but now, thank's to 9-11 we can do all we ever wanted plus more if we just label it as a couterterrorist measure". In
Re:Terrorists? I don't think so... (Score:3, Informative)
that is actually not correct. 3 or 4 of them were known terrorists (to CIA) but there were no shared database (that exists now) to cross-check and identify those individuals at the border.
Another group within 19 were here on expired / invalid visas.
Re:Terrorists? I don't think so... (Score:2)
Getting into the U.S. (Score:2)
Re:Terrorists? I don't think so... (Score:2)
At least two of the 9/11 hijackers where known terrorists and known members of Al Quaeda and entered the U.S. semi legally. The CIA knew when they entered the U.S. they just neglected to tell the FBI so they weren't followed and quickly disappeared. If they had been tailed 9/11 probably wouldn't ha
Re: this post analyzed. (Score:2)
Except that thanks to the RFID chip any government agent with a portable reader can instantly ID you any time you carry one of these passports unless you take measures to block the RF signal which most people wont.
Its probably a CIA agents wet dream to walk in to a bar or airport in a hot spot in the world and in the space of about a minute ID everyone in the place with one of these passports. Using a wireless link to the central database they will ins
Is this any more secure? (Score:5, Insightful)
"As the system is envisioned, Americans still will be able to mail their passport photographs to the State Department. The department will encode them into the passport chips and add them to a database."
So, you never even get personally face scanned. They put information into the chip that lets a face scanner automatically check if your face looks like the picture on the passport... which is exactly what the humans sitting at the desk do anyways under the current system. What is this adding to our security?
Besides buzzwords.
Re:Is this any more secure? (Score:2)
It's not about security. This biometrics thing achieves 3 goals:
1) A high-profile "look how much we do to ensure your safety" effect
2) Save money by firing flesh-and-blood security guards
3) Make several biometrics hardware maker's execs extremely wealthy
Re:Is this any more secure? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Is this any more secure? (Score:3, Insightful)
The only way this system provides anything that's not utterly pointless is if an image of the person presenting the passport is compared to the information embedded in the passport.
But of course even that is of little value unless the customs agent is removed from the picture and the entire pr
Similar to UK ID cards (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Similar to UK ID cards (Score:2)
You mean, David Blunkett wants to introduce ID cards. Nobody else does.
"I'd be interested to know if the Americans have taken on board problems that the UK trial encountered early on. These included contact lenses, I believe, as well as long fringes disrupting measurements between significant facial features."
The UK problems are deeper than that, and not merely related to biometric technicalities (you know how many million pe
Re:Similar to UK ID cards (Score:2)
On a semi-related note, the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators, which is some quasi-non profit group (email for more on that) for DMV administrators for all of North America, has rejected biometrics for driver's licenses and state ID cards...at least, for now.
Why? They want reliable 1 to 300 million matching. I think they feel that anything below that would be too subject to cr
Mexico (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Mexico (Score:5, Insightful)
Do like many Mexicans do: take the short route across the Rio Grande, it only takes 30 minutes and they don't require you to be scanned...
Seriously thought, this police-state "security" with borders as tight as a prostitute's legs amounts to installing a steel door on a camping tent.
Re:Mexico (Score:2)
The list at the top of this page [state.gov]
Chip? With software of course? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Chip? With software of course? (Score:2)
Re:Chip? With software of course? (Score:2)
"Everything checks out, oh... sir, YES SIR! Welcome SIR! Enjoy your stay, General Protection-Fault, SIR!"
Quick, renew your passport! (Score:4, Insightful)
Thankfully, passports are good for 10 years from their issuance, and hopefully by then they'll have the most serious bugs worked out.
Re:Quick, renew your passport! (Score:3, Insightful)
Boy, are you naive.
Here in New Zealand the government sold us "lifetime" drivers licenses that were good for up to 40 years or so, according to the expiry date clearly printed on them and depending on your age.
This was an iron clad contract between the government and drivers insomuch as:
1. An offer was made (to provide a lifetime drivers license)
2. The offer was accepted (by all those drivers who signed the forms and agreed to drive legall
Re:Quick, renew your passport! (Score:2)
This happened some time go and the government of the day *was* voted out of power -- but the new incoming government did nothing to remedy the situation -- when it comes to such things they seldom do.
And don't get me started on the intelligence of the average voter.
At the risk of being labeled elitist, I have to say that the average IQ of many western nations appears to be falli
Re:Quick, renew your passport! (Score:2)
My passport has a photo of my face on it. (Score:3)
Re:My passport has a photo of my face on it. (Score:2)
Perhaps in your case, but in mine it could just as easily be considered a weapon of terror
Privacy vs freedom. (Score:5, Interesting)
Think of this utopia: The government is honest, never abuses info collected about the people, allows you to do mostly anything that doesn't mean serious harm to others, doesn't steal from you, that respects you and provides you with all basic necessities a good government should.
Now would you really mind having a lot of data about yourself collected, then analysed for potential abuses of the system, then discarded when none, or some not important enough are found? While knowing that whoever actually tries to ruin your life will be caught and stopped just the same you would be if you actually meant some serious harm?
Collecting personal data by itself is harmless. It's how it may be abused is bad. And it's sad people have strong reasons not to trust the government enough to willingly provide it with their personal data.
Re:Privacy vs freedom. (Score:3, Interesting)
Now would you really mind having a lot of data about yourself collected, then analysed for potential abuses of the system, then discarded when none, or some not important enough are found? While knowing that whoever actually tries t
Re:Privacy vs freedom. (Score:2)
The problem we in the USA have is the our government is already openly corrupted by corporate lobbying (bribes), and
Re:Privacy vs freedom. (Score:3, Insightful)
Yes, actually. The US gov't (and Canada and EU for that matter) have shown a shocking willingness to criminalize reasonable behavior at the behest of campaign-donating big money corporations. Just look at the Skylarov case.
When the bar for criminal behavior can drop from 'robbed a bank' to 'possession of a prohibited organism' t
Re:Privacy vs freedom. (Score:5, Insightful)
Ok, I'm thinking of your utopia. I'll even make it a better utopia: I'll posit that no business try to hack into the government databases for personal gain. And I'll go so far as to pretend that no government employee with access ever abuses that access for personal reasons. [copwatch.org]
Now, imagine that your utopia is The Netherlands. And imagine it's not May 15, 2004, but May 15, 1940 -- one day after The Netherlands surrendered to Nazi Germany. Note that in surrendering, The Netherlands legally turned over government control to the Nazis. Presumably that would included your database -- if the Nazis hadn't simply seized it outright.
Your utopian database contains the details of all residents, anyone who might join the Resistance, and all the Jews -- including Otto and Edith Frank and their daughters Margot and Anne.
The Frank family managed to hide from the Nazis for two years; how long do you think they'd manage in your "utopia".
Now some will say that there's little chance of Nazi invasions these day, so we should feel safe with "utopian" databases. But it doesn't take a foreign invasion to radically change a government: sometimes it just takes an election, of an Anzar or a Berlusconi or a Blair & Blunkett team or a Bush or a Howard -- or a former war criminal like Waldheim.
Remember COINTELPRO [wikipedia.org]?
Re:Privacy vs freedom. (Score:5, Insightful)
Many of the people that are afraid of intrusive government are political dissidents who object to the actions of the people currently in power. These "security" measures usually start out aimed at foreign enemies and criminals and nearly inevitably end up being using to punish political dissidents who are vocal opponents of the people in power.
For example, there are strong indications that the Bush administration is already using their no fly list to punish antiwar activists and political dissidents. A bunch of agencies can add your name to this list at their whim. There is no protocol to find out why your name was added to the list, or legal process to get your name taken off it. There are people that are guilty of nothing more than vocal opposition to the current regime that are being turned away at the airport or being subjected to detainment and intrusive searches thanks to this list. It slows down an antiwar activist if they have to drive cross country to a protest to voice their first amendment rights. Taken to the next level, as it is in full blown police states, the same list will be checked at train and bus stations and then at check points on the highway. At that point you stop traveling. At that point its to late to realize where all these intrusive measures you thought were so benign were leading.
http://www.counterpunch.org/cassel08062003.html
http://www.wired.com/news/print/0,1294,58386,00.
You just can't trust a benevolent government because they often turn malevolent and you may not know it until its too late. The U.S. has had its share of malevolent abusers of information in Richard Nixon and J. Edgar Hoover who used their knowledge to attack and destroy political opponents. Hoover in particular went to great lengths to destroy Martin Luther King because he was advocating equal rights for blacks and was opposing the U.S. war in Vietnam. He also apparently neglected to return a call from Hoover and no one was allowed to no answer when Hoover called. King was no criminal but Hoover treated him like one.
You simply can never trust people who have power. As the saying goes it corrupts. The people who get it want to keep it and will often do anything to that end, reference Richard Nixon, 1972. The people that have power also want to inflict pain and discomfort on anyone who opposes how they are using their power.
If the people in power decide to launch a stupid war, get a lot of people killed, and people start objecting to it, they people in power can abuse all these databases to make life hard for their political opponents and dissidents.
Nit-picking (Score:2, Informative)
This is from the Chicago Tribune.
But, what do I know. I only live there. :)
Re:Nit-picking (Score:2)
Tin foil hat are now obsolete! (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Tin foil hat are now obsolete! (Score:2)
EU Database (Score:4, Interesting)
Americans will have no control over what is done with this data. It will be retained forever, and shared within the EU as the EU sees fit.
Eventually, everyone everywhere that has a passport will be stored in every country's passport database, as the billions of international travellers criss cross the globe.
This will not happen if the Biometric passport effort fails. In the article, the spokesperson from one of the companies set to make billions out of shearing the western population talks about there not being "showstoppers". There are showstoppers. Ask any Australian about their sucessful fight against ID cards.
We can have a more secure passport without a centralized database [theregister.co.uk]. The problem is that the governments WANT centralized passport databases for the purposes of control. This biometric push has nothing to do with making passports that cannot be forged.
But you know this!
Re:EU Database (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:EU Database (Score:2)
I think you crossed EU and US.
It is mainly what happens to EU citizens when entering the US.
And unlike the EU the US is very silent about what happens to the data and how long it is going to be retained.
The EU takes privacy (still) a lot more serioius than the US does.
Re:EU Database (Score:2)
Wow. Ok lets do it step by step:
American goes to Germany.
Presents her passport.
Passport is scanned
Data checked against EU shit-list
Record of crosing created in EU Database.
If record already exists, add crossing details to record.
If record does not exist, create new record.
This is what will happen if biometric passports are unleashed. The EU is already well advanced in its plans to build its centralized database of all biometric identifiers; do you really believe that they w
Re:EU Database (Score:2)
Th
Ah, but the EU has Data Protection laws (Score:2)
Unfortunately, EU citizens will have no right as data collected by the US when they visit. It is a point of considerable consternation that the data sharing deal is going ahead when the data protection situatio
Re:EU Database (Score:2)
AMERICANS entering the EU will have their passport scanned ONCE. Then, that record of entry will be stored on the EU passport control system.
Of course, inter governmental data sharing agreements will ensure that every government on earth will have not only the personal details that I mention above, but a complete record of every time you have crossed a national border, anywhere on earth.
The EU and the USA have already agreed this week to share passenger data between themselvs, passport
Re:EU Database (Score:2)
We're all 'smart' people here (Score:2)
destruction of civil liberties
won't work
swiss cheese borders
invasion of privacy
blahblahblah
Ok...maybe all those are valid comments.
But what will work, short term (20 years or so)?
The obvious long term solution is to elevate the human condition so that these guys won't want to blow things up. But that will take decades/centuries, if ever.
Face it...there are large groups around the world that wish to blow things and civilians up for various political, religious, and jus
Re:We're all 'smart' people here (Score:2)
You said it yourself --> Better living conditions for everybody.
And yes, that won't happen, and no removing Bush won't make that happen. Live with it. The US has one big ugly bulls eye on on her ass and if the US doesn't change the tone in the
Re:We're all 'smart' people here (Score:3, Informative)
Bombs found on a railroad track in France. US foreign policy? No
Explosion near a police station in Athens. US foreign policy? No.
OBL stated he wanted the US military out of Saudi Arabia. We were there at the behest of the Saudi govt.
They want to reverse 500-800 years of history, and restore Moslem rule in Spain. If not, hey...let's blow something up.
Blow up a hotel in Bali.
Gas a train in Japan.
Fertilizer bombs in London.
It's far more than the cu
Re:We're all 'smart' people here (Score:3, Insightful)
Actually the Saudi Government wanted the US troops out as well. For quite some time.
Because of the bombs in Madrid? As far as I remember there was never anybody really claimning responsiblity, it all seems to be speculation and even that claimed it was because of Spains involvement
Can make things worse (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Can make things worse (Score:2)
These ID's really are hard to forge though the use of the RFID chip is particularly scary since
Leeloo Dallas...Multipass (Score:3, Interesting)
The rest of us? (Score:2)
When are they going to extend ( force upon ) this to actual citizens?
Won't all the Bush voters see this as the "mark?" (Score:2)
Or will it just silently be slid into place with little reporting, and then be too late?