At 10:02 AM 8/1/96 -0700, tcmay@got.net (Timothy C. May) wrote:
Question (a la "Wired"): "When will the United States introduce an internal passport?" May: "2005, but they won't call it that."
Stewart: "Last week, but they didn't call it that." According to Alaska Airlines, the FAA's policy as of last week has switched to a mandatory policy that if you don't produce government-issued photo-id, you can't get on the plane; the previous policy had been more flexible. The folks stamped my ticket "Documents Verified" - looks suspiciously similar to "Papers In Order". (Which they actually weren't, on my return trip; I handed her my work ID in the same plastic carrier as my train pass, and handed her the credit card I'd bought the tickets with explaining that I wasn't on government business and asking when had the policy changed and commenting. And the nice Rent-A-Xray-Technician who asked if I minded if he searched my computer bag was totally confused when I said "Yes, of course I mind.") You can still travel in a car if someone else is driving, and you can still get on a train without identification, but without papers you can't fly or drive, and you can't ride a horse on the freeway except in the back of a horse trailer. Driver's licenses were the beginning of a long downhill trend. I wonder if they'll still accept an American passport; the country has obviously been taken over by Pod People while we weren't looking.... # Thanks; Bill # Bill Stewart, +1-415-442-2215 stewarts@ix.netcom.com # <A HREF="http://idiom.com/~wcs"> Defuse Authority!