Interesting replies, thanks. I’m going to have to do a bit of an ‘edit-for-sanity’, as the size is bordering on unmanageable for Ol’ Slo-Fingers here
sundaymorningstaple wrote:What does 'people' have to do with anything once a government gets into office. Sadly, especially in the US flavour, the people are being trampled on by a 'victim' president. US Policies are one of the reasons why I've been out of the country for 30 years (both sides of the aisle).
A thought provoking point, it suggests a cynical chameleon like manifesto-creep. Elected on one platform, but when in power, actually doing something different. This happened at the last UK election (re: one major issue), where the present government promised a referendum on membership of the EU (which the majority of people wish to exit). Of course now there are ‘higher priorities’, and they’re promising to hold one in 2017 – which presumes that they’ll get re-elected and form the next government. Lol, they ‘take the people for fools’.
‘Victim president’... hehehe, I’ll have to consider that further but I get the drift...
x9200 wrote:For me it's comparable in that sense that having my every step recorded is equally if not more abusive than disrupting my walk or whatever I was doing, by a police check. Recording is like gathering evidence for the crime that not happened "just in case". You can think about examples where you just were in a wrong place and wrong time and got recorded to become a subject to interrogation.
I can see there is a fine line on the matter. As you describe it, it could be considered reminiscent of ‘Stasi Germany’, or Cuba. Re: your latter point, innocent people already got pulled in for questioning, in pre-CCTV days, if they were seen in the WP+WT, or if a crime fitted their known profile. Hence the expression ‘The Usual Suspects’
http://i1.ytimg.com/vi/tjwXBkooYaI/movi ... v=50fcf849
JR8 previously wrote: <'If there was one section of society, or race, much more liable to be checked like this, how would you feel about it? (as happened in the UK with police 'Stop and Search' powers).'>
x9200 wrote:Why do you think this happens here?
I didn’t know that it does.
x9200 wrote:Probably everything from thsi is recorded but I don't really get why you insist it has to be all some Orwellian-racist plot.
Come now, I’m not trying to suggest (never mind insist upon) any of that

. They record the race-profile of stop and search subjects in the UK. There have been protest marches against the high-frequency of S+S’s one particular race is subject to (i.e. this ethnic group know the official recorded statistics/by race). Well that is in a country where race is a pretty benign matter; whereas here it seems be a permanent hot-topic, hence my semi-flippant point.
x9200 wrote:In my country such checks are normal and you can read in the newspapers pretty regularly on criminals or under Interpol/EU wanted list caught this way. Its a part of reality and people are happy if their area has visible presence of police.
Interesting. In the UK, the criminals tend to get caught by ‘Intelligence-led policing’ (that said we have the advantage of being an island). People where I’m from are also happy to see the [very] occasional officer out on the street, or even in their neighbourhood, but it’s a rare thing... maybe once or twice a year? I remember I was quite startled to see a PC walking up my street last time I was back home. So, on one hand happy to see them, but on the flip-side for me, and most people, would be extremely unhappy for them to stop and (attempt to) ID me, or question me, etc.
x9200 wrote:Complaining about some really infrequent checks
I’m not complaining, I’m trying to join-the-dots, between ...
- having to carry ID at all times in this country*
- the reason for this
- vs the very high cost of getting a lost ID card replaced
- why that ID card is so expensive
- if it’s valuable to ‘undesirables’, then why not simply increase the cards security. I.e. it implies the current card is a security risk in itself, due to it's potential value to 'bad people'. It gets circular thereafter: You're making people carry ID every day, some of which will get lost and fall into the hands of the wrong people. This wouldn't happen if people didn't have to carry ID on them 24/7.
* I previously asked if tourists have to carry ID/passports on them as well, and don’t recall now if anyone knew or replied. Logic would suggest they would have to. But I wonder if there an entry on the STB website reminding visitors to carry their passports at all times? [Side-thought: If this were the case, I expect quite some number get lost or stolen.
'Nightmare: Tourists trapped in SG on stop-over whilst trying to get their passports re-issued'. Further-side-thought: What other countries require you to have to carry ID at all times? – IIRC I’ve only experienced one, Bolivia].