"Tamper-Proof" ID is Fantasy

The buzzword in the illegal immigration debate is “tamper-proof,” as in tamper proof ID cards for aliens. I just watched Tony Snow’s interview this morning with Steve Doocy on Fox and Friends, and Snow was out there front and center defending the proposed amnesty bill by touting the “tough” enforcement measures it allegedly contains. Perhaps some of the measures would be “tough” if the government had any track record whatsoever of enforcing past laws. However, the most outrageous falsehood that Snow, President Bush, and even the field of 2008 presidential candidates continue to perpetuate, aside from claiming the bill is not amnesty, is the notion of a “tamper-proof” government issued ID card.

Show me a “tamper-proof” ID card, and I can take you to a street corner in Los Angeles near MacArthur Park where the card can be taken, analyzed, dissected, and reproduced to near perfection in a matter of minutes. Governments have a poor history of making “tamper-proof” official documents, as evidenced by the phenomenally lucrative criminal market for counterfeit or forged Social Security Cards, passports (including the new ridiculously vulnerable RF chip encoded version), driver’s licenses, and even law enforcement credentials and badges. The simple truth is that there is no such thing as “tamper-proof,” whether one is referring to ID documents, ID cards, computer networks, or product packaging. Computer hackers, some of them mere teens testing their skills on a dare, have penetrated “secure” networks operated by the Defense Department and many other local, state, and federal agencies. Private corporations guarding priceless trade secrets have also learned by sad experience that their secure systems are anything but tamper proof. Credit card companies have spent millions of dollars attempting to make their cards as tamper-proof as possible, but with only mixed results.

Tony Snow told Steve Doocy moments ago that the proposed “tamper-proof” ID card for illegal aliens would allow the government to know who is currently here, because, according to Snow, anyone found without one would be “kicked out” of America. Let me see if I have this straight: The government that has never made any serious effort to deport illegal aliens it stumbles upon or are handed to it without proper documentation or ID will miraculously transform itself and “kick out” any illegal aliens found without the magic “tamper-proof” ID card after they are issued to amnesty recipients? It doesn’t take a math whiz to calculate that something in that equation is significantly flawed.

Americans should be suspicious of anyone who insists that something is tamper-proof, and even more skeptical of the pie-in-the-sky promise that any new form of ID card will eliminate the underground market for counterfeit official documents. Unfortunately, many 2008 presidential candidates have adopted the lingo of “tamper-proof” ID cards in their policy positions on illegal immigration, including Rudy Giuliani and Mitt Romney. To their credit, they advocate a “tamper-proof” ID card AFTER the borders have been secured and after illegal aliens currently here are given Z visa applications and sent back to their native country to await the granting of legal permission to enter the U.S. That is not the case when the White House champions “tamper-proof” ID cards. President Bush’s vision for immigration reform does not require anyone currently in America to leave, allowing all to remain in place, apply for the Z visa, and continue working and living in America.

As Romney pointed out strongly in the third GOP candidates’ debate, allowing any Z visa applicants to remain in the U.S. to await adjudication of their status gives them tremendous advantages over applicants from other countries who are waiting in their homeland, where they should be. Let’s face facts: immigration adjudication officers will be under enormous pressure to grant Z visas first to applicants already in America, and they will receive preferential treatment despite the illegality of their presence here. A law abiding foreign national who wants to become a U.S. citizen will be kept waiting for years, while foreign nationals who broke our laws by entering the U.S. without documentation will be rewarded with all the benefits of life in the U.S. throughout the entire application time line.

Consider the following whopper from Tony Snow, courtesy of World Net Daily. I preface the inclusion of Snow’s comment and my subsequent analysis with the disclaimer that I think Snow is a fantastic White House Press Secretary, tragically tasked with defending a terrible piece of legislation. Having made that point, note in Snow’s comment all of the violations for which illegal aliens would allegedly be deported under the proposed McCain-Kennedy-Bush amnesty bill:

Snow launched his response by denying that the plan is amnesty. "Right now a lot of times 'amnesty' is used as shorthand for saying, we don't like the bill," he said. "If you look up the dictionary definition of amnesty, it means total forgiveness of a crime.

"What you have here is a crime [entering the U.S. illegally] for which there was no punishment originally. Now what we're saying is everybody who came across the border, No. 1, you pay a thousand dollar fine. No. 2, you are on permanent probation. If you break the law, you're deported. If you do not maintain a job, you are deported. If you do not learn the English language, you're deported. If you do not subject yourself to a criminal background check, you're deported. If you do not have an ID that allows us to trace who you are, where you are, for whom you work, you are deported," he said.

This statement by Snow is astonishing in its scope and in its audacity. When someone has to pull out the dictionary to explain why a proposed bill is not amnesty, you can rest assured that he is in fact trying to conceal amnesty. The semantic hairsplitting involved in defining amnesty is disgustingly reminiscent of Bill Clinton’s legal obfuscations over the legal definition of “sex” in the Monica Lewinsky scandal. Trying to sound tough on illegal immigration after doing virtually nothing about it for 6 years is also less than impressive. Snow stated, “If you break the law, you’re deported.” That’s a good place to start, Tony. We have laws on the books that include deportation. Enforce them. The government has not enforced them in the past and claims that deporting illegal aliens already here is logistically impossible. If the government has not been deporting illegal aliens who have already broken our laws, why should anyone accept the claim that the government will suddenly grow sufficient spine to start deporting violators of the proposed bill?

There are certainly a lot of violations listed in Snow’s comment for which deportation is promised. Snow should be reminded that deportation has always been the prescribed punishment for illegal immigration but the government never writes the prescription and the medicine is never administered, hence the 12-20 million who have come here with impunity knowing that the government lacked the spine and/or stomach to deport anyone unless public outcry over a specific case made it unavoidable.

Even in those cases, most criminal deportees are back in the U.S. in a matter of weeks, free to commit further crimes or kill law enforcement officers (remember the slayer of L.A. County Sheriff’s Deputy David March). They return so easily because the borders are not secure. Note that I wrote “borders” rather than “border,” because there are enormous security problems associated with both our northern and southern borders. Instead of offering “tamper-proof” ID cards as a spoonful of sugar to help the amnesty medicine go down more smoothly, the government should strive for a “tamper-proof” border and “tamper-proof” deportation proceedings.

Technorati Tags:
Illegal Immigration, Amnesty, Tamper Proof Identification, Tony Snow, Deportation, Immigration Reform, Border Enforcement, Border Security

Recent Washington DC "Snow Jobs"

In honor of the first snowfall in Washington DC this winter, it seems appropriate to recognize recent DC “snow jobs” that recently blanketed the nation with a fine layer of obfuscation:

1. The John Warner, Susan Collins, and Norm Coleman “Snow Job” – Yesterday, these 3 illustrious (or is that blusterous?) Republican senators joined the Democrat chorus singing longingly for an end to President Bush’s attempt to liberate an oppressed people and help them along the path toward a stable representative democracy. According to these three, the President’s strategy for a surge of troops and renewed efforts to secure and hold Iraqi cities is flawed and doomed to failure.

They are simultaneously disappointed with the current situation, opposed to the idea of a troop increase, and politically petrified of casting senate votes to end the funding of the war and bring the troops home, as anti-war activists desire. What a quagmire these Republican ship jumpers find themselves in! What policy will achieve the goal of representative democracy for Iraqis and renewed American credibility as a formidable preserver of freedom? Victory! What is it Americans want to see, at least the half that place national security and America’s credibility over a desire to embarrass President Bush? Victory! To bluster about any other outcome being satisfactory is a “snow job” that must make Iraqis despair of ever achieving success and safety. Neither will occur unless America fights to win.

2. The Maxine Waters “American Money is too Precious to Give to Anyone but Americans Snow Job” -Radio host Jerry Doyle made a profound comparison during yesterday’s show. Doyle pointed out that Congresswoman Maxine Waters, D-CA, is co-sponsoring a resolution to gradually end funding for the Iraq War because America is allegedly not winning the war and thus it is a waste of taxpayer money. By that same logic, Doyle argued that the government should cut off federal funding of all gang task forces in Waters’ Los Angeles district, since millions of dollars have been spent to end the gang problem there but recent statistics indicate there are over 40,000 known gang members in Los Angeles, and those numbers are growing along with the violence and financial crimes they perpetrate.

If Waters favors pulling our troops out of Iraq because we cannot win there, and leaving the cities and nation for the terrorists to plunder, Doyle suggested, America should do the same with Los Angeles. The city will never solve the gang problem, so why try? Los Angeles residents should be forced to pull out and relocate (like Democrat suggestions for our troops to be “redeployed”). Thus the anti-gang strategy, like Waters alleges of Bush’s Iraq strategy, is a failure not worth further expenditure. Gangs that infiltrate and intimidate Los Angeles, like the terrorist thugs threatening Iraqi citizens, are not worth fighting. No expenditure of taxpayer money for programs that yield negative results can be justified in Waters’ opinion.

Instead of using the tired excuse of wasted taxpayer money to obscure her true objection to the war, Waters should propose a Congressional resolution declaring that Iraqi freedom from a murderous tyrannical dictator and an attempt to protect a fledgling democracy until it can sustain itself is unworthy of our national affluence and largesse. According to Waters’ previous statement to Congress, we should stop spending money to help a constitutional government in the Middle East and use it only to benefit our own people. She made the following Ameri-centric statement: “This conference report throws billions of dollars into the sands of Iraq, while at the same time this Administration and the Republican Congress call for drastic cuts to dozens of vital domestic programs. This is immoral and wrong. We should be investing in schools and health care for all Americans.”

I think all Americans would agree our schools are better and safer than those in Iraq and that the health care options available to Iraqis, where terrorists are detonating IEDs near hospitals, are a tad less comfortable than what we enjoy in America. Waters is very generous with precious American taxpayer money when she brings millions of dollars in federal funding to her pet causes in Los Angeles, such as failed public schools, failed gang task forces, and failed government welfare programs. Yet money to protect a democracy besieged by terrorists is too precious to share with non-Americans. Civil liberties, it seems, are only for Americans in Waters’ narrow vision of our world. For an avowed civil rights activist, that is quite a “snow job.”

3. The Tony Snow “Snow Job” – In a previous post this site railed against the Bush Administration’s decision to place the NSA domestic surveillance program under FISA court monitoring. Later that day on his radio program, Sean Hannity interviewed Tony Snow briefly about this decision and Snow responded in a very dismissive manner, as if Americans should not be concerned with this development. Snow assured listeners that the President would never give up any tools available to him in the Global War on Terror, and that the President continued to retain the power to legally authorize electronic surveillance of suspected terrorists in the US under exigent circumstances. The truly deep “snow job” came when Tony Snow denied that the FISA monitoring decision was a response to political pressure. According to Snow, the FISA situation was under review for two years and the administration was satisfied with the alleged reforms to speed and flexibility implemented by the FISA court review.

This begs the question, “what will the President do if the FISA court denies an application for surveillance but the President and his intelligence advisors are convinced the suspect must be monitored?” Unfortunately Sean Hannity did not ask this question. Instead he took Snow’s response at face value and then moved on to the upcoming State of the Union Address. If the President retains the power to legally authorize surveillance utilizing the NSA domestic surveillance program as Snow asserted, then why apply to FISA at all? If a FISA court denies an application for surveillance, the President can ignore that judgment and authorize it under his Constitutional powers as Commander in Chief, as Lincoln, Roosevelt, and other war time Presidents have done, only with less sophisticated surveillance methods.

If the FISA court judgment can be ignored under exigent circumstances, then ALL FISA court judgments are moot, since by definition, a war is an exigent circumstance and thus the President holds exclusive authority to approve monitoring of US citizens suspected of communicating with the enemy, which is the precise purpose of the NSA domestic surveillance program. Thus, if the President holds the legal power to authorize such programs, what motivations, other than political pressure, prompted this administration to reform and utilize the FISA courts which it has intentionally, legally, and justifiably circumvented since the Global War on Terror began? Snow’s dismissal of public concern over this decision signaled discomfort with the situation and a desire to move on to other issues in the interview. A “snow job” from Snow was understandable given the expected duties of his position, but it was disappointing nonetheless.


Technorati: Iraq War Global War On Terror NSA Bush Administration FISA Maxine Waters Tony Snow Sean Hannity John Warner Susan Collins Norm Coleman Jerry Doyle Los Angeles Gangs