4 ms·

this is much more “argument by free association” than anything i said. i simply said we should have a national ID. the current per-state system is a mess and la

this is much more “argument by free association” than anything i said. i simply said we should have a national ID. the current per-state system is a mess and laughable from the rest of the world

Spooky23 1y ago
The system is such that there are 6,000 jurisdictions issuing ~20,000 types of birth certificates in the United States. It's a bonkers system, and relying on these breadcrumbs for a fundamental right is awful. For 80% of people, national ID is a no brainer. The other 20% are the issue, and it's a problem that won't be solved in this framework of government in the US.
- whimsicalism 1y ago
  seems like we should hire 1k software engineers and assign 20 birth certificate types to schema standardize and ingest to each
  - Spooky23 1y ago
    We pretty much have those already. The long-term issue is that it's seen as a "states rights" issue and both the more extreme left and right wing political players are against ID for different reasons. With specific relevance to voting, what happens to the exceptions? 1% of the US population is 3.5M people. Birth certificate provenance and lack of procedure at birth is only one source of exception. Other examples: - elderly people who lose access to records - children whose parents fail to secure documents. - non-custodial parents who refuse to provide documents to their children - women whose names change from marriage/divorce - native americans whose tribal papers - minors who cannot get required identity documents because their social security card is lost and onerous to replace. (requires in-person appearance and takes 9-24 months) Voting is a fundamental right. You can establish with high certainty the identity of a individual using easy to obtain proofs. The number of non-citizens voting illegally is a tiny number. This whole controversy is about suppressing the votes of the poor and infirm, as denying their rights has a clear ROI to one of the political parties.

this is much more “argument by free association” than anything i said. i simply said we should have a national ID. the current per-state system is a mess and laughable from the rest of the world

Spooky23 1y ago

The system is such that there are 6,000 jurisdictions issuing ~20,000 types of birth certificates in the United States. It's a bonkers system, and relying on these breadcrumbs for a fundamental right is awful. For 80% of people, national ID is a no brainer. The other 20% are the issue, and it's a problem that won't be solved in this framework of government in the US.

whimsicalism 1y ago
seems like we should hire 1k software engineers and assign 20 birth certificate types to schema standardize and ingest to each
- Spooky23 1y ago
  We pretty much have those already. The long-term issue is that it's seen as a "states rights" issue and both the more extreme left and right wing political players are against ID for different reasons. With specific relevance to voting, what happens to the exceptions? 1% of the US population is 3.5M people. Birth certificate provenance and lack of procedure at birth is only one source of exception. Other examples: - elderly people who lose access to records - children whose parents fail to secure documents. - non-custodial parents who refuse to provide documents to their children - women whose names change from marriage/divorce - native americans whose tribal papers - minors who cannot get required identity documents because their social security card is lost and onerous to replace. (requires in-person appearance and takes 9-24 months) Voting is a fundamental right. You can establish with high certainty the identity of a individual using easy to obtain proofs. The number of non-citizens voting illegally is a tiny number. This whole controversy is about suppressing the votes of the poor and infirm, as denying their rights has a clear ROI to one of the political parties.