Your article on July 27 concerning Ron Paul and privacy protection was excellent. The problem isn't so much the Social Security Number or any other number, but what people could do with the number. It's a privacy issue.
By having a local UH ID number instead of the SSN on the ID, it could not be used by another to open an illegal checking account.
This actually happened to me when I lost my military dependent's ID, which also incorporates the SSN. The first time I realized that there was a problem was when a local bank wanted me to come to their office because of outstanding checks at their bank where I didn't have an account. To be brief, they treated me like a criminal and kept me there for hours while they tried to determine if I was me.
Next came a knock on my door by the FBI to determine why I was opening bank accounts all over the country! Well my physical location had not changed, but someone had stolen my identity. The Social Security Number on any ID card offers the same potential for damage.
On a larger scale, our privacy is being stolen by bureaucrats who want to profile and categorize you. It is not the job of the federal government to track you. Did you know Congress makes airlines profile passengers via an unfunded mandate? "Your papers please! Ah, Mr. Jones, I see you are going to Bermuda with your secretary; is your wife coming too?"
Educational databases are to be used by corporations to steer future employees into expected job slots (schools to work programs). Children's careers and futures are sorted at an early age. I suppose that's why the government wants you to have a SSN as a baby: so it can be a part of your school records. Seems this has an element of fascism to me.
Imagine the medical bureaucrats who also have databases on you, who could deny benefits (or raise prices) if you smoke, drink coffee and beer, eat beef or are an abuser of butter. There is no end of the mischief these bean counters could inflict on your privacy.
Personal information on the Internet is another area in which bureaucrats want unlimited access. You would think that an environmentally friendly, paperless society would be a cost-effective boon to humanity. It will not, if we cannot protect our e-mail with bulletproof encryption freely sold across the counter and hardware that is not sabotaged by government regulation, which can be accessed through an electronic back door. If it has
not occurred to you, without criminal penalties for trafficking in your private information without your consent, we are building Big Brother into this new information society.
Drew Parks, Libertarian congressional candidate
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