IGM Freedom Vs. Security

Inter-Galactic Memo
To: All Personnel
Fr: W. Leavitt, Special Agent
Re: Privacy vs. security


Several states, with Oregon in the lead (no surprise there) are considering requiring the installation of GPS technology in all vehicles registered in the state. They want to track the mileage (not to mention destinations) of the vehicles in order to tax the drivers, based on miles traveled. It seems the tax revenue is down because people are driving less and purchasing cars that get better mileage, which lowers the tax collected on fuel as well. Should be a good thing, right? But not to tax-and-spend liberals. As a reward for their subjects—I mean citizens—doing all the right things, they want to add another tax. I confess, I’m not surprised. But there is an ancillary problem I find even more unsettling. Along with knowing each and every mile your car accrues, someone, somewhere will have the ability to know, and tell someone else, everywhere you go— if you live in Oregon, or one of the other states thinking about initiating the program. But c’mon, how likely is it that once a few sign on, every other state will say, “hey, good idea!”?
I will assume we all know about, or have, OnStar®, the mega-cool technology offered by GM. It knows where you are (if you’re in your car) and if you have a wreck—and will call you to see if you need help. It will tell you where the car is if you misplace it. It will unlock your car for you if you leave the keys in it.
But it will also turn the engine off and disable the ignition. Did you know that? Who would do that? Not GM. Think of the legal implications, not to mention trust issues. But the government would, for any number of reasons. And they could get a court order to force GM (or anyone else with the technology) to do pretty much anything.
Let’s play a game, shall we? Can anyone think of a situation where they might do that? Suspicion of drugs, or other crimes? What if you fit a Perps description? What if people were fleeing an area because of some kind of disaster, or better yet, impending or imagined disaster, like Godzilla attacking Newark, and the government didn’t want everybody leaving and clogging the roads so they remotely shut off every engine on the road (because they can identify every vehicle and where it is) even though you are on your way to visit your dying father who is in Hospice? Ha! Not so cute now, huh?
Or someone decides, based on an algorithm in some computer deep in the bowels of Central Traffic Control, that too many people are heading for Washington DC to do touristy things, and Senator Harry “Whorehouse” Reid doesn’t want to smell their ripe, unwashed selves, and they find themselves on the side of the road trying to talk to the car’s computer which is telling them, “hey, talk to Dingy Harry, we didn’t do it!”
It’s good to feel secure. I want my wife to have OnStar for all kinds of reasons (but she isn’t buying the argument that we need a Hummer 2 to get it). We have grandkids. What about car-jackings? Locked out, ran out of gas, leak in the radiator, two-year old manages to break his arm while securely strapped into his five-point car-seat—hey, it could happen; obviously you haven’t met Grahson Ender Leavitt.
But there is a line we all have to walk, with freedom on one side and security on the other. It is impossible to have all of both, or even most of both. It’s like the philosophical equivalent of Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle, which, as you know, says with mathematical certainty, that the more we know about the location of an electron, the less we can know about its spin. The more security we demand, the less freedom we possess, and vice-versa. Quite the conundrum, eh?
I suggest you all run out and read The Humanoids, by Jack Williamson. It’s an old sci-fi novel which is probably out of print, but you can find it. This very dilemma we’re talking about is the crux of the novel. What do we choose? What is most important to us? What is the inevitable conclusion of perfect security?
In all cases, the less government intrusion into our lives, the better. Read the founding fathers. This is the one and only thing they all agreed on. Even the ones who wanted a strong central government.
If your state starts making noise about taxing the miles you drive by putting GPS in your vehicle, run, do not walk, to the Legislature and start cracking heads together . . . figuratively, obviously.