Dear Fourth Amendment, It Was Nice Knowing You

Why not have the FBI swab our cheeks at birth, tattoo a federally-mandated bar code on our foreheads, and be done with it?

From the New York Times:

Law enforcement officials are vastly expanding their collection of DNA to include millions more people who have been arrested or detained but not yet convicted. The move, intended to help solve more crimes, is raising concerns about the privacy of petty offenders and people who are presumed innocent.

Until now, the federal government genetically tracked only convicts. But starting this month, the Federal Bureau of Investigation will join 15 states that collect DNA samples from those awaiting trial and will also collect DNA from detained immigrants — the vanguard of a growing class of genetic registrants. The F.B.I., with a DNA database of 6.7 million profiles, expects to accelerate its rate of growth from 80,000 new entries a year to 1.2 million by 2012 — a 17-fold increase.

Comments

[Phelps]

When we have socialist healthcare, they will swab your cheek at birth. They will just have the government doctor do it instead of the government agent.

[hermesten]

You don't have to wait for socialist healthcare, our fascist healthcare system has already taken care of it. And it takes blood, not saliva.

http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=s110-1858&tab=summary

S. 1858:
Newborn Screening Saves Lives Act of 2007

Signed into law on April 24, 2008 (and don't you love that Orwellian title?)

This law seeks to screen "all newborns" --to "save their lives" of course. It sets up a clearinghouse for the data. So, essentially, the DNA of all newborns is already being collected. It's only a matter of time until the FBI is searching this database --assuming it isn't already doing it on the sly, because when your sister, or other close relative, has a baby, they've essentially got your DNA too. They're already back linking to adults through DNA searches in both the US and UK.

The BS in the article is just the next step in the conditioning process. Of course, no one would object to taking convict DNA. So then, why not take the DNA of people who are just accused of something? They probably did it anyway. And immigrants of course. And then, what the fuck, why not just do everybody....we've already got a handy little database of newborn DNA.