I'm not going to dick around for very long:
"Mass. IDs at odds with federal law; Federal agencies blocking entry, citing compliance" by Jessica Meyers | Globe Staff August 26, 2014
WASHINGTON — Susan Podziba couldn’t enter a federal building near Washington this month because her driver’s license revealed an unacceptable home state: Massachusetts.
Bay State residents can no longer use their driver’s licenses to get inside some government agencies because the state is one of nine that have not signed on to a federal law called REAL ID. If nothing changes, they will even lose the ability to display their licenses to board a plane.
The REAL ID measure presses states to verify citizenship and update security standards when they issue licenses. Congress intended the act to prevent terrorists who arrive in the country illegally from boarding planes.
Why would they bother? They can just pour over the southern border and be escorted to an AmeriKan city.
But officials in Massachusetts and elsewhere have balked at a program they contend costs millions, raises privacy concerns, and infringes on states’ rights.
So strange seeing Massachusetts cite state's rights.
States face no direct penalty other than the frustration of their citizens.
I'm not even blaming my state government here; this is from on high and is federal.
Some restrictions — such as the one that kept Podziba, a public policy mediator from Brookline, out of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration — began in late July.
“It was bizarre, and then I really felt embarrassed,” Podziba said. “It was like wow, I am a US citizen and suddenly my Massachusetts ID isn’t good enough?”
She ended up conducting the high-level meeting in a cafeteria outside the security gate.
Governor Deval Patrick’s office referred questions to the Massachusetts Department of Transportation. Cyndi Roy Gonzalez, an agency spokeswoman, said the state has applied for an extension to give it enough time to meet the law’s requirements.
“DHS is asking the states to do something radically different with their licensing systems,” she said. “We want to make sure we do it right and do it well.”
She did not elaborate on the delay.
Massachusetts, in order to comply with the law, must meet a list of benchmarks when issuing licenses that include checking a person’s legal status, retaining images, and establishing background checks for employees with access to sensitive information. The standards aim to prevent fraud and enhance safety.
They are your buddy.
Homeland Security, which delayed enforcement of the 2005 law for years, started a gradual implementation in April. The second phase began in July. Twenty states and the District of Columbia have received extensions, and 21 are considered compliant. Three additional states haven’t made the changes but offer a special license people can display.
That leaves residents from six states unable to enter restricted parts of federal buildings without another ID, such as a passport. They are: Massachusetts, Maine, Oklahoma, Alaska, Arizona, and Louisiana.
Since the latest phase took effect July 21, it remains unclear how many people the change has affected or how many federal facilities are strictly enforcing it. The law varies in its effect; tourists may still go to Smithsonian museums without ID and defendants can attend court proceedings.
Unless the state participates in the law, Massachusetts residents without other identification will find themselves banned from White House tours next year and commercial airplanes as soon as 2016.
“It’s an entirely foreseeable result of Massachusetts’ failure to comply with a federal law,” said Bruce Tarr, the state Senate minority leader.
Tarr, a Republican, said he received “very little response” from the Democratic Patrick administration. “The only thing you could speculate is that somehow compliance with REAL ID would thwart the administration’s attempt to give driver’s licenses to those who aren’t here legally.”
Is that why they have not complied?
The state’s Joint Committee on Transportation rejected a bill in June that would have granted driver’s licenses to undocumented residents.
Because it is a political loser, even here.
Patrick supports the issue on grounds that it increases the state’s ability to know the background of drivers, but opponents consider it a dangerous benefit for lawbreakers.
The 2005 federal law stems from recommendations by the 9/11 Commission. Several of the hijackers who commandeered planes in the attack used driver’s licenses to board.
Therefore, we must be inconvenienced because of that damnable lie and cover story.
Critics fault the federal government for creating a costly program that doesn’t achieve much.
That's the federal government all over.
“For any American citizen, they should find this whole program completely laughable and ridiculous,” Maine Secretary of State Matthew Dunlap said.
Even if it did make sense, he said, the state would need to spend millions on new technology and background checks for certain employees. The federal agency unveiled its enforcement plan in December, five years after the original deadline.
Maybe that's the point. Who gets the contract?
“The whole thing has been kind of a bit of a farce,” Dunlap said. “I don’t hold out an awful lot of confidence it will be implemented in a timely way and have any effect on border security or national security.”
Maine officials now advise residents to bring a passport when they visit federal buildings.
***********
Proponents warn that states failing to comply threatens the entire system.
Identity verification standards are “extremely common sense,” said Andrew Meehan, policy director of Coalition for a Secure Driver’s License, a Washington-based nonprofit. “For states to not be doing them really puts residents [and] driver’s license and ID card holders at risk.”
Civil rights groups worry about the opposite: requirements that punish those without other identification, such as senior citizens or the poor....
Never mind those illegals the government is accommodating.
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"Immigration shaping up as a leading election issue" by Erica Werner | Associated Press August 26, 2014
YORK, Pa. — As tens of thousands of Central American youngsters have crossed illegally into the United States, GOP Representative Scott Perry has suddenly seen immigration become a top concern for voters in his heavily rural district far from the US-Mexico border, eclipsing even President Obama’s health care law and the deficit.
Yeah, well, what that tells you is certain areas (foreign policy, the war machine, the underpinnings of the economy) are off limits. Thus we get this divisive issue as one of the top issues of the campaign.
‘‘I think people are very upset, and people have really been awakened to the immigration issue where they haven’t been before,’’ the first-term congressman from southeast Pennsylvania said in an interview at a bus leasing company, where he recently met with a group of small-business owners. ‘‘Right now at this current time, I would say immigration is the No. 1 issue on people’s minds.’’
It’s the same story around the country this summer as polls show the crisis of unaccompanied children at the border has made immigration a pivotal issue with November elections approaching.
My first thought was the Democrats will use it to steal some races, but wait.
Republican candidates in three contested Senate races have focused ads on the issue, and it has the potential to affect campaigns in unpredictable ways that hold risks for members of both parties and for Obama.
For now, Republicans such as Perry are able to boast that the House took action to address the border crisis before leaving Washington for its August recess, even though the Senate and Obama did not.
Republicans ‘‘demanded that we stay and pass a bill so we could show the American people ‘This is what we stand for,’’’ Perry told the business owners, referring to the House GOP’s legislation to spend $694 million on the border and make controversial policy changes to return the immigrants home more quickly, as well as end an Obama program that granted work permits to more than a half-million immigrants brought to the US illegally as children.
How the issue plays out over the fall depends both on what happens in South Texas, where border arrivals have declined in the summer heat but could rise again, and in Washington, where Obama is weighing extending deportation protections and work permits to millions more people already living in the United States illegally.
More dictatorship and the key component of the whole bill, the work visas, will be $ati$fied just as I said.
Such a move could upend the politics around immigration yet again, thrilling Latino voters who will be crucial for the 2016 presidential election.
Why are Latino voters considered monolithic? All those who legally went through the process are in favor of the loinbe-cutters?
But it could rile up Republican base voters, who are more likely to turn out this November and could make the difference in a handful of GOP-leaning states where vulnerable Democratic incumbents are trying to hold on.
Perry and other Republicans warn that Democrats would pay a steep price politically if Obama takes such a step.
‘‘I think there will be a backlash, not necessarily that people will automatically come to vote for Republicans, but like in so many elections they might just stay home because they’re disgusted,’’ Perry said.
Indeed, Senate Democrats seeking reelection in red states, including Arkansas’ Mark Pryor and North Carolina’s Kay Hagan, have cautioned Obama against proceeding unilaterally.
Polls show the southern border crisis has caused support for comprehensive immigration reform to dip while voters embrace calls for border security.
Related: Immigration Crisis Over
No coincidence that the issue soon faded from the news pages.
‘‘Want to know why there’s lawlessness on our border? Ask Senator Shaheen,’’ Republican Senate candidate Scott Brown asks in one ad against Democratic incumbent Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire. ‘‘She voted against border security twice, and for amnesty. It’s time for us to secure the border and enforce the law.’’
He already won the primary.
There is a risk in this strategy for Republican lawmakers such as Perry and Representative Joe Pitts, whose district borders Perry’s. They already are hearing from angry constituents who want Obama impeached, and executive action by the president would likely only increase such demands.
It's not just immigration, it's the IRS scandal, Benghazi cover-up, and a host of other actions (like the Bergdahl swap and so on) that are technically impeachable. The only problem is this is all show.
That’s an unwelcome prospect for most Republican officeholders who see impeachment as a political loser, since it would be certain to energize Democratic voters and likely turn off many mainstream Republicans.
What about what the Constitution and the oath they swore demands?
The chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, Representative Steve Israel of New York, said Republicans could end up in trouble if Obama’s moves on immigration increase calls for impeachment.
Somehow the DCCC being led by Israel seems appropriate.
‘‘The problem that Republicans have right now is that they have engineered a strategy to turn out their base voters in a midterm election and that may backfire against them as their base voters demand that House Republicans keep going farther and farther to the right,’’ Israel said.
The problem Democrats have is a referendum on an unpopular president who broke promises. Republicans just have to be there for "change."
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Related: More Than Twice as Many Americans “Strongly Disapprove” of Obama as
“Strongly Approve”
Not really a surprise when you read why.
Meanwhile, back home at the progressive ranch called Massachusetts:
"Mass. gubernatorial candidates jump into debate over Real ID" by Jessica Meyers | Globe Staff August 26, 2014
WASHINGTON — The state’s gubernatorial candidates on Tuesday blamed policy makers in both Washington and Massachusetts for a federal law that bans state residents from entering some federal buildings.
And some seized on the moment to attack each other.
Republican candidate Charlie Baker scolded Governor Deval Patrick’s administration for failing to meet a July deadline to follow the law, known as Real ID. The state is one of nine that have not received an extension or complied with security updates, such as verifying citizenship, when issuing driver’s licenses.
Baker also took aim at a Democratic rival, Attorney General Martha Coakley, who previously opposed the 2005 law on the grounds it would fail to increase safety, and would cost billions of dollars and boost the market for fake IDs.
“I don’t know why the attorney general doesn’t support this,” said Baker, who has pushed the state on the issue before. “I don’t know why it’s not common sense to say we should participate.”
A spokesman said Coakley accepts Real ID now that it has gone into effect. “The federal government has chosen to move forward with this law, and she believes Massachusetts should work to implement it so that people maintain access to federal facilities and comply with federal guidelines for air travel,” Brad Puffer said.
The comments followed a Globe article on Tuesday that examined the issue.
Massachusetts Department of Transportation officials said the agency has requested an extension to meet the requirements, which began to take effect in April. If Massachusetts does not comply, its citizens will need alternate identification to board a plane as soon as 2016.
Democrats expressed concern over the law and portrayed the state as the victim of an unfair mandate by Congress.
They sound like a conservative southern state on this.
“This is an example of a politically motivated move in Washington,” Democratic candidate Donald Berwick said, adding that he would fight the law and explore a compromise.
State treasurer and Democratic candidate Steve Grossman criticized Real ID as a “highly flawed law, based on its costs to our taxpayers, excessive administrative burdens, and potential interference with the privacy rights of our citizens.”
Supporters of Real ID argue that states that choose not to participate are enabling fraudulent licenses to proliferate.
States must check an individual’s legal status to comply with the law, a requirement that irked some candidates. Coakley said this month that she would create a new position in the governor’s office to help make it possible for undocumented residents to gain driver’s licenses, which she once opposed.
Flip-flop, flip-flop?
That doesn't look like a winning position from the chief law enforcement officer of the commonwealth, either.
Grossman said efforts to bring the state into compliance shouldn’t come at the expense of providing driver’s licenses “for all immigrants, regardless of their status, which, unlike Martha Coakley, I fully support because I believe it is a fundamental issue of public safety and fairness.”
Berwick insisted Massachusetts needs to grant licenses to undocumented residents in order to make the streets safer. Baker opposes such a move.
That mean they won't be driving drunk anymore?
The federal government “gave states a long time to get their plans together,” Baker said about Real ID’s phased enforcement. “Just seems to me that . . . taking a passport everywhere you go is not something people are going to want to do — nor should they.”
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Also see: Grossman Closing Gap Against Coakley
