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Why You May Need A Passport To Travel WITHIN The US
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Consider going out and getting a passport just for the ID functionality of it.
Crazy yanks.
They still expire. And I honestly don't travel out of the country enough to justify paying the money for it. Already paying 30$ for the 5-year state ID, which is still good after it expires. It's just crazy difficult to get your own damn birth certificate here.
Edit: The reason it's difficult is because you basically have to have a State ID to get it, which makes it hard to replace your ID. They've gone to putting our pictures in a database, so the DMV just looks at you.
Where on the other hand, to get library services you just need a envelope with your name and address printed on it..
Actually, most of the airplane rules have very specific reasons for them. I know someone who works for TSA and they gave me the scoop. Unfortunately, I can't share the info, and you have no reason to trust me, the majority of the rules actually make quite a bit of sense once you hear the rationale. They're going after very specific things that, strange as it sounds, will be caught by these methods. Only allowing less the 4 oz. of liquid in a clear container actually keeps out a lot of things they're worried about (this includes mixing it with other people's 4 oz and all those other common "workarounds" that people mention).
Whether that level of retroactive security is warranted or effective is debateable, but the specific policies have specific reasons for them and are not at all arbitrary.
Oh, you're right, I did. The regular wait time was like 3 Martian years, or something, and I need to be prepared to travel within a month.
It is entirely arbitrary that they don't let me through with a clear bottle of water.
We did a presentation on the security of e-passports back in college. In doing so, we did research into the real ID. It basically adds more expensive security that can still be circumvented in time. Basically, the key to it all was a birth certificate. If you can get one of those, it leads to obtaining all other forms of identification. Makes sense that it would be difficult to get a new one.
It is also arbitrary that I can pass through with a 3 oz bottle of hair gel but not with a 6 oz bottle that visibly contains less than 1 oz of gel in it.
To be fair, do you want the average TSA screener doing math?
Ideally, your birth certificate would be binded to a DNA sample upon birth, but I'm against that kind of database, so I guess this is one of those "Have cake, eat it" decisions.
I mean hell, the only thing that makes a birth certificate "official" is that it's embossed. So if you could just forge a fairly birth certificate-y piece of paper (I have no idea if they're hospital specific or change over the years), then manually do the emboss (not difficult if you really want to do it).
And yet someone who knows what they're doing can probably get a gun on board. Sweet.
This is of course ignoring the fact that there's no way a plane is getting hijacked again.
The problem intrinsic in the system is the sheer quantity of people going through airports and the fact that being a screener isn't a great career attracting the world's top talent. Screw-ups are going to happen. From what I can tell, the systems they have in place are pretty good, but the screener has to be similarly good to recognize everything as it gets scanned.
Yeah. This.
The reason 9/11 worked? Up until that point, every time a plane was hijacked, it was landed somewhere, ransoms were demanded, everyone went home. Either that, or it got bombed.
So the people on the plane never knew that they were going to be flown into a building, except for 93.
Every attempted hijacking since then has been foiled by passengers gang-tackling the hijacker. Everybody knows the score now.
I think they're more worried about good ol' blowing up planes these days. Besides, even an attempted hijacking looks bad for the government, "why didn't you stop this while also getting me to my plane in less than 40 seconds?"
I have lots of problems with the TSA, Homeland Security, and the whole bit, but I don't envy their jobs.
Too dangerous.
In Europe it's like 95% probably. Everyone I knew had one.
Where are you going?
How long will you be there?
Well, in North America, there's like, what 2 countries? (Maybe 3 if Mexico is considered part of NA. I never remember.) And neither of those 2 countries used to require you to have a passport to move around between them. So, it's not exactly a surprise.
Mexico is, yeah. But I dont think they used to require one either.
O_o Maybe Jersey isn't stuck up the arse about this stuff. I hope we're not on RealID...
The only thing about this that annoys me is the cost and the extra hassle it'll put one getting through a damn airport.
NNID: Hakkekage
As opposed to the rigid internal passport controls of the EU?
I have no idea what the regs are in the EU. All I know is you don't even need a passport if your not leaving the continent (of NA). At least, you didn't used to.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schengen_Agreement
That aside it is still the law here to carry some form of ID with you everywhere. If you can not ID yourself for whatever reason that is a 50 euros fine (about 70 dollars). They do accept driver's license for it but not everyone here drives a car. And if you go on a plane you still need some form of ID, either an ID card or a passport.
Because it's a waste of money.
More big brother, more bureaucracy. Won't increase safety.
Not that it excuses the moron rule, but what's the difference between a clear bottle of water and a clear bottle of liquid? Answer: jack shit. They don't know what's in the container; it could conceivably be anything that wouldn't eat through the walls or be detectable right away by a weird smell.
The reason for the liquids thing is NOT a secret, so please stop with the "You have to trust me on this". They're worried about someone mixing two liquid items into an explosive. Nothing to do with hijacking. i.e. its a knee-jerk bullshit issue. Especially given the policy has so many holes in it you can drive a truck through it. You can bring juice, milk, etc for kids...so, ok, they bribe a kid into coming with, hide the explosives in THAT, boom. You can bring medical items (including KY...). Same thing.
Everything except the 3.4 oz liquid and the bag size limit is just even WORSE BS.
EDIT: Yeah. Not-secret. Here:
http://www.tsa.gov/press/where_we_stand/liquids_refined.shtm
In the European countries in which you are required to carry a form of id by law, then everyone is issued with a national id card, as far as I'm aware, so not having a driver's licence is hardly going to oblige people to apply for a passport to fill an id requirement vacancy. Car ownership rates are lower in some parts of Europe than in the US, but not significantly so in the 2 countries that I can think of that do not require that one carries a form of id, ie UK and Ireland. And I'm pretty sure you need some form of id for a domestic flight in the US, too, but I'm subject to correction on that, I haven't been over in a couple of years.
So I'm thinking that the discrepancy in uptake rates is down to something else.
I could go the, fascist paper-needing slippery slope distopia, but I won't because it would take a lot more than this to ever reach that point.
It's been proven that it's only being used to generated revenue and that the police very much so target our (sizable) immigrant population with it excessively. The politicians do nothing when confronted with this data, determined "wait out the full time to review the law". It was sold to the public as anti-terrorism law.
Educate me, D&D.