In anticipation of the "Guv'ment ID Needed for Everything/Can't Get ID Without Already Having ID" state, I got government ID last month, before the regulations went into effect.

"When a place gets crowded enough to require ID's, social collapse is not far away. It is time to go elsewhere."

J.A. Terranson wrote:

Durbin was right. And he didn't even scratch the surface! Anyone who thinks this "Real ID Act" is about getting false ID out of the hands of "The Terrorists" is an idiot: they will simply print their own drivers licenses - this is about forcing the regular population to get used to intrastate passports. This act essentially forces you to have a passport for everyday things like banking, car purchases and certain repairs, checks, etc.

That's the point of course. The idea behind the laws is to make it very inconvenient to operate in society without some supposed proof of identity. A "problem" the government will then "solve" by issuing ID cards to everyone. Which will then be made compulsory. "Show me your papers, sir!" The British government is taking the same line, though isn't so far along the route as you are - laws going through Parliament right now. Interestingly they are blaming the US for the need to have them. They started by saying it was for terrorism (which is crap as we all know), then they said it was to prevent social security fraud (which is probably part of the reason they want them, but not a big enough deal to get voters behind it), then to prevent "ID theft" (does the opposite of course by introducing a single point of failure), then to stop illegal immigration (it won't of course, it'll just make illegal immigrants even more vulnerable to exploitation by employers or worse) & now and again there has been bleating about "protecting the children" (as if rapists are going to put "I am a predatory sex criminal" on their application form) But last week, they just blamed you. Oh they said, the Americans are demanding biometric ID from all visitors. So if you have a passport you will need it. As most British people have passports anyway, and it would be silly to have a passport that could be used anywhere but the USA, it'll save money to issue one single biometric ID for everybody... At the moment it looks as if the pass-card laws in the UK will fail. Well not fail on paper, because the spin doctors and PR merchants won't allow that to happen, but be watered down in the House of Lords so far that they won't have much effect. Of course that's still bad because the principle will still be there for some future government to exploit. They are desperately unpopular with the country at large - though sadly it seems to be the cost and inconvenience rather than the principle that people object to. The Conservatives are voting against mainly because that's what opposition parties do in British politics, but if they ever get back into power you can be sure they will adopt the plan with a few minor cosmetic changes so they can pretend it has been improved. More of their MPs support it than Labour do - but party discipline being what it is in Parliament its unlikely that more than the same 20-odd Labour MPs will vote against it in Parliament. And whenever a journalists asks a Cabinet Minister why they are spending 20 billions on flashy plastic cards (how many extra police could they employ for that money?) they say that they have to do it because the USA is making them do it. But its not our fault. Its all those nasty Americans. Don't blame me, Mummy. The bad man made me do it.