Oklahoma’s Tenth Amendment Resolution, Real ID/PASS ID, Biometric Identification and RFID
Understanding the implications.
Many Americans had deep misgivings about the Real ID Act on a gut level from the beginning, but the devil here is truly in the details. If you don’t exactly get how it all works, don’t feel lonely. It is a complicated issue. New technology plus a climate of fear and uncertainty obscures comprehension. Here is what I have learned.
News article;
–The Homeland Security Department’s plans for sharing biometric information internationally
— designed to counter the threat of terrorism — face resistance from domestic privacy advocates and European governments that follow stricter privacy laws that protect personal data.
Senior DHS officials speaking at a recent conference on biometrics and privacy policy outlined the ethical imperative for technical standards that would foster unrestricted biometric data sharing.
And while they say they recognize and agree with the need for privacy policy, threats of terrorism require governments and private companies to completely eliminate barriers to biometric data sharing.
Robert Mocny, acting program manager for the U.S. Visitor and Immigrant Status Indicator Technology program, sketched the outline of a Global Security Envelope of internationally shared biometric data that would permanently link individuals with their personal data held by governments and corporations.
http://www.gcn.com/print/26_03/43061-1.html
“Information sharing is appropriate around the world,”
and DHS plans to create a “Global Security Envelope of internationally
shared biometric data that would permanently link individuals with
biometric ID, personal information held by governments and corporations”——Robert Mocny
One thing we can do to protect our state from the many unconstitutional mandates being issued by the federal government is to tell our lawmakers that we fully expect them to protect the sovereignty of Oklahoma. They have indicated a renewal of fidelity and their solemn intent to defend our state’s sovereignty by virtue of majority vote and subsequent passage of the Tenth Amendment Resolution, HCR 1028, last session (2009).
Background
In 2008, the Tenth Amendment Resolution authored by Oklahoma State Representative Charles Key garnered an extraordinary amount of attention among small government advocates nationwide. The news of this resolution went viral on the internet but received no attention from the mass media. Here is one of many articles written about Oklahoma and this resolution by Walter E. Williams, a much respected conservative commentator.
Oklahomans are trying to recover some of their lost state sovereignty by House Joint Resolution 1089, introduced by State Rep. Charles Key.
[. . .] Federal usurpation goes beyond anything the Constitution’s framers would have imagined. James Madison, explaining the constitution, in Federalist Paper 45, said, “The powers delegated … to the federal government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite. The former will be exercised principally on external objects, [such] as war, peace, negotiation, and foreign commerce. … The powers reserved to the several States will extend to all the objects which, in the ordinary course of affairs, concern the lives, liberties, and properties of the people.” Thomas Jefferson emphasized that the states are not “subordinate” to the national government, but rather the two are “coordinate departments of one simple and integral whole. … The one is the domestic, the other the foreign branch of the same government.”
Walter E. Williams, Oklahoma Rebellion
Thursday, July 17, 2008
http://www.cnsnews.com/public/content/article.aspx?RsrcID=32534
The Tenth Amendment Resolution HJR passed the House with overwhelming support but was somehow lost in transit on its way to the Senate.
Resolutions often get no respect but this one should have; the states of this union are the precarious position of losing their rightful sovereignty.
Fortunately, in 2009, Oklahoma ultimately got their Tenth Amendment Resolution Passed. HJR 1003 was vetoed by Governor Brad Henry but another resolution; HCR 1028 (needing no signature from the governor) was quickly placed and passed.
Now we can see the value of a simple resolution.
All voluntary action begins with a resolution, a decision. Not a gnat is swatted without our resolve first to do so. Resolve is the step beyond identification that something is amiss as in “Houston, we have a problem”, and sets us a hairsbreadth away from doing something to rectify the situation.
Upon passage of this Resolution (HCR 1028) Oklahoma gained the moment of our common clarity. Captured and immortalized it in a formal fashion, HCR 1028 The Tenth Amendment Resolution is a declaration of resolve to us by our legislature that they will address what is plaguing our state. We are no longer bewildered, we are now resolved.
Here is the content of that resolution;
“The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”; and
WHEREAS, the Tenth Amendment defines the total scope of federal power as being that specifically granted by the Constitution of the United States and no more; and
WHEREAS, the scope of power defined by the Tenth Amendment means that the federal government was created by the states specifically to be an agent of the states; and
WHEREAS, today, in 2009, the states are demonstrably treated as agents of the federal government; and
WHEREAS, many federal laws are directly in violation of the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States; and
WHEREAS, the Tenth Amendment assures that we, the people of the United States of America and each sovereign state in the Union of States, now have, and have always had, rights the federal government may not usurp; and
WHEREAS, Article IV, Section 4 says, “The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government”, and the Ninth Amendment states that “The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people”; and
WHEREAS, the United States Supreme Court has ruled in New York v. United States, 112 S. Ct. 2408 (1992), that Congress may not simply commandeer the legislative and regulatory processes of the states; and
WHEREAS, a number of proposals from previous administrations and some now pending from the present administration and from Congress may further violate the Constitution of the United States.
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED BY THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE 1ST SESSION OF THE 52ND OKLAHOMA LEGISLATURE, THE SENATE CONCURRING THEREIN:
THAT the State of Oklahoma hereby claims sovereignty under the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States over all powers not otherwise enumerated and granted to the federal government by the Constitution of the United States.
THAT this serves as Notice and Demand to the federal government, as our agent, to cease and desist, effective immediately, mandates that are beyond the scope of these constitutionally delegated powers.
THAT all compulsory federal legislation which directs states to comply under threat of civil or criminal penalties or sanctions or requires states to pass legislation or lose federal funding be prohibited.
THAT a copy of this resolution be distributed to the President of the United States, the President of the United States Senate, the Speaker of the United States House of Representatives, the Speaker of the House and the President of the Senate of each state’s legislature of the United States of America, and each member of the Oklahoma Congressional Delegation.
We have their word by virtue of a formal agreement that was duly considered, weighted and passed. Now we must remind them of this and hold them to it!
We live in a Republic, not a Dictatorship
Centralization of power never favors individual rights.
When state and local governments lose the ability to make decisions over their jurisdiction we lose our influence over the lawmaking that will most directly impact your life.
It cannot be denied that we are suffering the effects of overzealous national legislating. The bailouts of irresponsible banks by the US government and the continuing effort to establish national healthcare, in spite of an unprecedented outcry from ordinary Americans, are recent example of how central government tends its own interests over ours.
The Real ID act is a widely understood example of the sort of policy abuse we need to stop.
REAL ID REBELLION
26 states over the past 2 years have passed resolutions and binding law denouncing and refusing to implement the REAL ID Act.
The fact that REAL ID was passed as an unfunded mandate is the least offensive of its many problems. It is the collection and sharing of biometric data, not only nationally but INTERNATIONALLY that it enables that make it untenable to a nation founded upon the precept of individual freedom.
Although Oklahoma has prohibited participation in the REAL ID in 2007 when we passed SB 464, the program of enrollment into a biometric system of identification, the collecting of our biometrics and sharing that information has continued unabated.
CNET News;
States say no (and yes) to Real ID before May deadline
March 4, 2008
A seemingly odd phenomenon is occurring among some U.S. states that have flatly rejected the Real ID Act.
Even though officials in these states have publicly assured privacy-conscious voters that they steadfastly oppose Real ID’s requirement of nationalized driver’s licenses and ID cards, these same politicians and bureaucrats are quietly asking the Bush administration for more time to comply with the law.
The latest example is Oklahoma. In our special report published last month, we listed five states that–at the time we wrote the articles–indicated that they would not comply with Real ID. Those were Maine, South Carolina, Montana, New Hampshire, and Oklahoma; residents of states that don’t comply will likely face hassles traveling on commercial flights or entering federal buildings starting May 11.
Oklahoma’s legislature had approved legislation saying that Real ID “is inimical to the security and well-being of the people of Oklahoma” and, therefore, “the state of Oklahoma shall not participate in the implementation of the Real ID Act. The Department of Public Safety is hereby directed not to implement the provisions of the Real ID Act…”
That seems pretty clear; in fact, it would be difficult to be any clearer.
But now we’ve learned that Oklahoma’s DMV has asked the U.S. Department of Homeland Security for an extension anyway. An official DHS map puts the state squarely in the will-comply-if-you-give-us-more-time category.
Capt. Chris West, an Oklahoma Department of Public Safety spokesman, told us this week:
There was a request for an extension on a deadline to a rule that would have (been) implemented in May of this year. We got an extension until the end of December 2009, so Oklahomans can still use the driver’s licenses that they have. And really that’s the extent to what I can answer.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-9885311-38.html
SB 464, opposing the implementation of Real ID in Oklahoma was enacted May 23, 2007.
This item was published on May 30, 2007
Better Face Recognition Software
http://www.itl.nist.gov/iad/News/FaceRecog2.htmlAt Carnegie Mellon, Ralph Gross says that among other efforts, he and his colleagues have been “involved with local DMVs in order to scan images for driver’s licenses.
It’s a growing trend. States using such technology include Massachusetts, Illinois, West Virginia, Wisconsin, Colorado, North and Southern Carolina, Oklahoma, North Dakota, Arkansas, and Mississippi.
Biometric identification systems are not national ID’s. They are international ID’s!
Under the REAL ID ACT, state drivers licenses’ must have a machine-readable strip that will contain personal information that could be accessed by foreign governments as well as private corporations. The biometric data and the other personal data would become part of a database accessible not only by state agencies, but by the federal government and foreign governments.
Why would our government want to do this?
to Mark Lerner nationally recognized biometric expert, cuts to the chase;
“With the issues facing the world; war, economic chaos, poverty, dwindling resources, population growth and so on our government and others want a system of control over people and resources. I ask everyone to consider there is only one reason our government is using standards (international) that call for global interoperability, the reason being control of the people.
Biometrics is the key because biometrics allow for both the long distance and short distance identification of people.”
By the way, a simple digital photo is all that is needed to gain your facial biometrics (facial recognition technology) you can be entered in this system of networked databases without your knowledge or consent
The DMV, for example, uses your digital snapshot taken for a state driver’s license in Oklahoma this way. CCTV, the surveillance cameras you see popping up everywhere also do the trick. It’s just a matter of converting the image with some software into biometric coding.
Despite being highly inaccurate, facial recognition is the biometric of e-Passport and REAL ID. Since facial recognition is used with common digital photos, collected by states and nations, PERMANENT biometric enrollment occurs as databases, containing personal-biometric-photo information, are linked. Database linking can occur without the individual’s knowledge. REAL ID requires states to link their databases, sharing personal-biometric information and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) boasts of a global personal-biometric sharing system
http://www.oksafe.com/files/documents/1/REAL_ID_Your_Body_is_Your_ID_7-13-08.pdf
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–In recent years U.S. manufacturers began utilizing RFIDs in a staggering array of products. Making use of the same technology that allows cars to sail through EZ Pass tolls, RFIDs are being stitched into clothing, sneakers, razors, books, boots, and just about everything else that a tiny tracking device can be attached on or in. The initial incentive is a highly practical one: “tagged” products can be readily tracked through the distribution gauntlet from factory to store shelf. Concealed like many extant antitheft devices, they will do nothing unless touched by a “reader signal,” which makes the RFID “reply” with its own unique signal – an electronic dialogue invisible to the person wearing it.
http://www.examiner.com/x-1051-Independent-Examiner~y2008m12d3-Freedom-Under-Surveillance-Part-I
RFID
RFID industry insiders say that within a short time the RFID readers will be refined enough to read passive RFID tags (such as the ones in identification documents and individual products) by low orbiting satellites that are deployed within 200 miles of the earth.
DHS report faults use of RFID for human identification
Says threat to privacy outweighs benefits
[. . . ]While the authors of the report acknowledge that RFID is useful for such tasks as inventory management, the report said that the technology, overall, is undesirable for processes connected with people. The benefits of its support for rapid communication over distances and its uses in security are outweighed by its risks to privacy, the report stated.
“Most difficult and troubling is the situation in which RFID is ostensibly used for tracking objects (medicine containers, for example), but can be in fact used for monitoring human behavior These types of uses are still being explored and remain difficult to predict. For these reasons, we recommend that RFID be disfavored for identifying and tracking human beings”
COMPUTER WORLD 2006
http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9000881/DHS_report_faults_use_of_RFID_for_human_identification
The Report further states;
In a visual ID-check environment, a person may be briefly identified but then forgotten, rendering them anonymous for practical purposes. In a radio ID-check environment, by contrast, a person’s entry into a particular area can easily be recorded and the information permanently stored and repeatedly shared. In this way, RFID may convert identification based security into an effective surveillance program of all people passing certain locations.
READ the REPORT
RFID and Biometric Identification is a Recipe for Human Control
Take your Biometric code
entered into a database that is networked with other databases along with a pinch of RFID technology and you now have yourself a human global ID and tracking system.
Just what could one do with one of those?
Imagine the possibilities….Please! Consider the possibilities
Our government is!
If
we permit these steps (Biometric collection, retention and sharing, the connecting of databases and RFID enabled documents) to be taken- then we have just handed over to others the ability to control us physically, financially and spiritually
It is my sincere belief that if we allow the elements of a national ID to be implemented our children will live in an America that vastly different than the one we live in now. It will be an America that was in no way resembles the country our founders envisioned.
If we allow this system to be imposed on us the America we will become will make a mockery of the principles that this country was founded up upon. Home of the brave? No. We are on our way to becoming the land of the watched and home of the terrified.
Once those databases are linked they will not be undone. Our federal government, private corporations and international bodies will then have the ability to separate us from buying, selling, traveling, working, receiving health care and a host of other of life’s necessities. Whether by malice, mistake or simply due to the inevitable glitches that are present even in the best of data management systems, our ability to secure our basic needs can be taken from us.
Trust the Government?
–In early 1995 more than 500 Internal Revenue Service agents were caught illegally snooping into the tax records of thousands of Americans — often friends and celebrities. The IRS claimed that its new privacy protection measures would protect against a recurrence. But earlier this year, scores of IRS agents were again caught illegally investigating taxpayers’ personal records. Source-the CATO Institute
Who’s Really Looking Out for You?
Essentially, your federally mandated Real ID or PASS ID card will be what grants you the ability to go about your necessary, daily life functions. Our Natural Rights are granted to us by virtue of birth by our Creator- Our rights to life, liberty, property . . .those are the un-a-lien-able (intrinsic, non-transferred)rights of every one of us since the moment we entered this world!
Will you allow anyone to wield the power to separate you from the essential rights you came into this world possessing as a human being? It is not hard to grasp the danger that such a system presents to a free people.
If you think that Real ID, tagging, tracking or the push for a National ID is in response to the threat of terrorism and 9-11, you are mistaken.
It is a reoccurring theme tackled by administration after administration. In fact, until the 9 11 attack, every time the issue of national ID systems has been raised, Congress or another authority said NO and usually tacked on more protective legislation to boot!
Ronald Reagan, famously responded “My God, that’s the mark of the beast.” when he was confronted with the idea of, not just a national ID, but the actual suggestion of tattooing a number on each American.
More from the CATO Institute below;
— The ID card is hardly a novel idea. The concept once surfaced in a Reagan cabinet meeting in 1981. Then-Attorney General William French Smith argued that a perfectly harmless ID card system would be necessary to reduce illegal immigration. A second cabinet member asked: why not tattoo a number on each American’s forearm? According to Martin Anderson, the White House domestic policy adviser at the time, Reagan blurted out “My god, that’s the mark of the beast.”, as Anderson wrote, “that was the end of the national identification card” during the Reagan years. H.R. 231 is proof that bad ideas never die in Washington; they just wait for another day. H.R. 231 was a bill propose in 1997 “To improve the integrity of the Social Security card and to provide for criminal penalties for fraud and related activity involving work authorization documents for purposes of the Immigration and Nationality Act.” http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=6086
Mark Lerner of the Constitutional Alliance made this statement when he recently addressed the Michigan House of Representatives;
“Lawmakers at the state and federal level have been assured American’s personal information was not being shared with foreign governments. Obviously information is being shared through aamva.net (American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators) There is also Robert Mocny’s, of DHS, comments about sharing information with Europe, Asia and corporations to create a global security envelope ”
http://www.gcn.com/print/26_03/43061-1.html
“Mocny sketched a federal plan to extend biometric data sharing to Asian and European
governments and corporations, so as to create a Global Security Envelope of identity management.”
Finally, an article in the Washington Post recently specifically addresses the collecting and potential sharing of American’s personal information with foreign governments. It is noteworthy that DHS posted their intentions in the Federal Register. It took a month for any media outlet to discover the positing in the Federal Register
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wpdyn/content/article/2008/08/19/AR2008081902811_2.html
Countries obligated to share data, U.S. official says
http://www.govexec.com/story_page.cfm?articleid=35574&ref=rellink
—Mocny said governments should work together to build “a global infrastructure” of technology and systems to share information while ensuring that privacy protections and ethical practices are in place. He said “it makes no sense” to build “separate and disparate systems that don’t talk to each other.”
If you feel overwhelmed by the myriad of issues facing us that threaten to destroy the founding principles of the United States, let me suggest a course of action that stands a chance to protect us against most of the worst of it.
Let your representatives know that you want our state to pass these bills;
HB 2810 the Sovereignty Protection Act by Rep. Charles Key
HB 2943 Biometric Driver License Religious Exemption Act by Rep. Sally Kern
HB 2569
Prohibiting RFID in Oklahoma drivers licenses by Rep. Paul Wesselhoft
The Tenth Amendment Resolution, HJR 1028 was passed last session after Gov Brad Henry vetoed HJR 1003 because he said it suggested, among other things, that Oklahoma should return federal tax dollars.
The Tenth Amendment Resolution was the first steps warning the federal government to respect our right to govern within the constitutionally guaranteed sphere of authority allotted to state governments.
HB 2810 the Sovereignty Protection Act has become known as “The Tenth with Teeth”
HB 2810 states; “In light of the continuing unconstitutional withholding of the benefits of the taxes, the State of Oklahoma hereby asserts its claim of sovereignty.”
Explanation of HB 2810
Right now we pay our federal taxes directly to the IRS and the federal government takes it and hold it over our heads to get the states to do the federal government’s bidding.
HB 2810 is designed to reverse that role.
If HB2810 passes then we will all send our federal taxes to the state government who will in turn pay them to the federal government for all of us.
If the federal government should do something that the state of Oklahoma believes is not in accordance with the constitution, (there is a procedure for doing this) then the state can delay or even withhold the funds.
It gives the state government some clout by which it can protect the sphere of authority that is rightfully ours in which to govern.
Putting TEETH into the TENTH!
Read the Bill HB 2810
http://tinyurl.com/OklahomaTenth
We The People will have to step up to the plate now and be willing to do whatever it takes to get their attention. This is too big of an issue to just to leave to chance. Our elected officials need our input. They may need more information and encouragement from us. Let’s do whatever it takes to stop this system from being imposed upon us including making personal visits, handwritten letters and phone calls, emails. Letters to the Editor call the media and ask them to cover this issue. Let’s be thinking of more creative ways of getting the message across too.
Call your representative and find out where he or she stands on the Tenth Amendment, Real ID and the PASS ID ACT, RFID tracking, biometric identification and personal information sharing.
These issues are not drawn on party lines. These are issues that if not properly countered will have untold adverse effect on the rights we all assume at birth. I am no Biblical scholar, but the implications of these national ID systems, in that respect, are unmistakable.
2/14/10
Kaye Beach
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AxXiom for Liberty 