On Tuesday, May 10, 2005, America became a true police state.
Your U.S. senators voted -- unanimously, with no discussion, and without
even reading the bill -- to create a national ID card.
The Real ID Act blackmails state governments into turning
their drivers licenses into a draconian tool of the federal homeland security
apparatus. If states refuse, their citizens lose such "privileges"
as being allowed to board an airplane, enter a federal building, or apply
for social security. President Bush is expected to sign the bill eagerly
on Thursday.
In three years -- by May 2008 -- this Stalin-style internal
passport will be an American reality. But your government will have more
control over you than Stalin ever dreamed in his most violent, vicious,
anti-freedom dreams. (See links to the text of the law and articles about
it at the bottom of this article.)
But that's only the beginning.
The creator of the Real ID Act, Rep. James Sensenbrenner,
smiles and tells us that his Real ID Act is all about "solving illegal
immigration" or "preventing terrorists from entering the country."
This is one of the biggest of the thousands of "Big Lies" we've
heard from the tyrants in Washington. The Real ID Act is about tracking
and controlling Americans. You. Me. Our children. Everybody.
In May 2008, barring a miracle, America as we once knew it
will be in ruins. It will be gone. And the rights of gun owners will be
among the first scheduled for destruction.
GUN OWNERS: PREPARE TO RESIST
Here's your future:
-
You walk into a gun store, fill out your 4473, and show
your government ID just as you now do. But instead of looking at your
license and taking down some information, the clerk runs the license (which
is likely to contain a radio-frequency ID chip) through a scanner. Your
purchase is instantly recorded in your state drivers license
registry. The federal government isn't currently allowed to keep a gun
registry. But no problem; the Real ID act gives them an open door into
your state records.
-
Complete information on every firearm you buy will be
instantly available to every police officer (and possibly every government
employee, store clerk, or computer hacker) you ever encounter. You'll
be an instant criminal suspect every time you deal with someone who has
access to the database.
-
Just as travelers are encouraged to get background checks
and give fingerprints to avoid some of the worst excesses of TSA screening,
gun owners will be encouraged to get background checks and give whatever
biometric ID the Department of Homeland Security requires. This will be
sold as a "benefit," ensuring you'll never again experience
an "instant-check" delay. In fact, Congress, the ATF, or the
FBI might even "mandate" 5-day or 15-day delays for anyone not
enrolled in the "Trusted Firearms Buyer" program.
-
The private purchase "loophole" will be closed,
so that all gun buyers must make trackable purchases. (The ultimate goal
is for every purchase of every kind to be trackable.)
-
Buying ammo? The store scans your national ID card and
-- bingo! -- your purchase is registered in the state database.
-
The federal government or state governments can now also
_effectively_ legislate limits on the amount or kind of ammunition you're
"allowed" to purchase. Try to buy more and the database instantly
rejects you.
-
The federal government or state governments can now also
_effectively_ legislate limits on the number of guns you may own. Try
to buy more, and the database rejects you.
-
Eventually -- after the federal government "discovers"
the obvious, that national ID won't stop either illegal immigration or
terrorism -- the old attack on "evil guns" will resume. When
they want your .50 BMG they'll know just where to find it (because the
Real ID act says your home address _must_ be revealed). When they want
your evil "scoped sniper rifle" (you know, the one you hunt
deer with), they'll know just how to get it. Ditto with you "Saturday
Night Special" or your "assault weapon."
-
If you don't surrender your guns, well, then the Department
of Homeland Security will cut off your driving "privilege,"
as well as your right to escape the growing police state via plane. You'll
be a prisoner in your own home, in your own country. Or you'll be forced
to function as an outlaw, operating and living a precarious existence
beneath the government radar.
PARANOID? OR PAYING ATTENTION?
You say these projections are ridiculous? That we're paranoid?
Well, frankly, if the Real ID Act doesn't make you paranoid,
you're not paying enough attention. We ask you to consider the long-term
impact of a few other acts of government.
In the 1930s, Congress promised us that our social security
numbers would never, absolutely never, be used for identification. Now,
they're the key to everything about us -- and without a social security
number you won't get a drivers license and you won't even be "allowed"
to drive after May 2008.
In 1913, Congress and the media swore to us that the brand-
new income tax would only affect the rich. Well, how rich do you feel after
paying 40 percent of your income (or more!) in taxes?
This is the way government works. They've even got a term
for it: mission creep. And there is no creepier mission than the mission
the federal government has currently set itself: to track everyone, everywhere,
and to control what we do.
We warned you in The State
vs. the People that this was coming. That book is still relevant, still
a good read, and still filled with information about what our future will
be like in this new American police state. (Sorry - it is currently out of print).
Be forewarned. Be aware.
REAL ID: IT'S THE LAW AND IT'S CRIMINAL
George Orwell was the first to describe totalitarianism as
a "boot stomping on the human face forever." But in Orwell's day
Americans would have had a hard time believing that the law -- the good
old, all-American legislature -- all those smiling senators and "representatives"
would be the ones to plant their iron heels in our faces. Back in those
innocent days, we imagined tyranny would come from outside.
Well, tyranny is here. And it's a gift from the very people
we so trustingly put into office.
Tyranny is THE LAW.
Is this a way to run a country? Tacking something as onerous
as national ID onto a must-pass bill and making it law without any debate?
What does this say about people the gun owners consider their friends? In
the House, where the bill containing the Real ID Act passed 368-58, only
three Republicans voted against it. Here's
the final roll-call vote so you can see how your own congressperson
voted.
In the Senate, not one person cared enough about freedom to
vote against it -- or even to demand that senators discuss it.
(The Real ID Act originally passed the House in February as
a standalone bill (H.R. 418) by a vote of 261-to-161. House leaders, realizing
national ID would have been in trouble in the Senate, then added it to a
must-pass military appropriations bill in a cynical ploy to make it almost
impossible to fight national ID.)
Turning America into a full-fledged police state was just
business as usual to your representatives. And, just as Adolf Hitler scrupulously
followed German law while committing his horrors, so your "representatives"
and the bureaucrats you face at the national-ID drivers license bureau will
also be following the law -- the Real ID law that allows them to enslave
you.
(To see what a real Bill of Rights leader would do, read the
novel Hope by Aaron Zelman
and L. Neil Smith)
WHAT NEXT?
We have two choices now: Resist or submit.
More than 600 organizations, from the American Civil Liberties
Union to the National Governors Association, opposed the bill. Even the
American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators (which loves national
ID and was largely responsible for an earlier attempt at such legislation
nine years ago) criticized it.
We can expect lawsuits against national ID, including at least
one suit led by state governments.
However, nearly all the opposition from state governments
focuses on one area: They're upset because the federal government didn't
offer them extra money to enslave us. If Congress bribes them with enough
millions and billions, they'll gladly sell our freedom.
Ultimately, real resistance is up to us, as individuals. There
are certain courses of action JPFO cannot recommend. But every freedom lover
should be pleased if all the people who had a hand in creating Real ID act
lost their jobs -- soon. And those individuals who truly value their (and
their children's) futures should seriously consider making national ID their
line in the sand.
We have already heard from many people saying they will drive
without a license rather than submit to a license that has become a Stalinist
control document. We just hope their resolve stays equally strong when they
face a world in which it's impossible to buy, sell, retire, travel -- or
buy a gun -- without national ID.
We ask you to remember men like Alexandr
Solzhenitzyn and Natan Sharansky.
Both stood up and boldly opposed a tyrannical regime in the Soviet Union.
Both risked their lives. Both suffered horribly for their resistance and
their protests. But eventually, they triumphed -- and the Soviet Union crumbled.
We are in need of such people, and such courage, today. We
cannot wait for someone else to stand up and show that kind of
integrity.
We must become the kind of people we admire if we are ever
again to live in a nation we can trust.
G-d help us if we fail.*
- The Liberty Crew
ABOUT THE REAL ID ACT
Text
of the law (this may change; you can also go to http://thomas.loc.gov
and search for H.R.1268, which is the act as it was incorporated into the
appropriations bill).
"No
Real Debate for Real ID"
"Last
Chance to Stop National ID" (written before Senate passage)
* We spell G-d this way because in Judaism it is considered
a sign of respect. We spell out the name of the Creator only in sacred settings.
