Just saw this today...

Link to article:

http://www.centralvalleybusinesstime...s/001/?ID=3926

"Coast Guard suggests driver's licenses for boaters
Here is an idea whose time may have come -- come, that is, for companies in any way involved in the manufacture of identification cards. U.S. Coast Guard Commandant Thad Allen last week suggested that state governments offer boating licenses as a method of controlling the worrisome threat from small craft. Although forty-four states require some kind of mandatory education before boaters can get on the water, only Alabama requires licenses. All told, America has 77 million recreational boaters, all of whom would presumably be issued photo and biometrics-based identification cards under Allen's proposal. No estimates as to cost were offered, but they would certainly be considerable.

Speaking at a meeting of the National Conference of State Legislatures, Allen noted that he expected resistance from state lawmakers, especially considering lingering animosity over the unfunded REAL-ID Act and concern that the requirement could hurt the sport tourism industry. There is also concern that the regulation might lead to forced uniformity of fishing and boating laws: while Maryland has no age restrictions on who can pilot a boat, neighboring Virginia sets fourteen as the minimum age. Penalties vary as well. A drunk boater in Florida has his motor vehicle driver's license suspended; but 39 states make no connection between the two activities.

Nevertheless, increasing worries about maritime attacks on critical infrastructure, especially ports and chemical plants, may force changes. "As good as we get at surveillance, as good as we get at patrolling and creating deterrence out there, sooner or later we're going to have to come to grips with the fact that we need to know to a greater certainty who are operating boats out there, what boats are out there," said Allen."

Oh, geez, here we go.......

Its going to be very tough to categorize what needs and does not need a license to operate.

Paddle powered
Electric powered
Internal Combustion powered
Sail/Wind powered

Weight
Displacement
Speed

Water(s) to be navigated

Who is going to regulate the whole thing?


I'd probably back it, as long as it was well structured.
(Which means our government would never be able to accomplish such.)

I'm noy so much against the licensing as I am against the reasoning. That shiit is not gonna stop Ahmed and his buddies from pulling a seaborne attck if they want to try.

Licensing is BS any way you want to justify it, but this is not gonna convince me ......

Wasn't he a member of OSO, former owner of Apache and in jail now??

Licencing the drivers of automobiles certainly has had no positive impact on driving skill.

All motor vehicle operators should be licenced the way aircraft pilots are. Maybe then the roads and waterways will become a bit safer.

and what will happen when you live in a state that does not require a license and then travel to a state that requires it?????

Griff if you travel to NH then you have to pass the course even if you do not live there from what I have been told.

Jon

well considering we are a free society, terrorism is by definition "to inflict terror" thereby causing the victims to not be able to go about there daily affairs as normal without fear, seeing as how we have "threat levels, our phone calls and emails searched without warrents or due process, we hold people against there will without charge or legal assitance, we routinely subject ourselves and our property to search and seizure (think about the last time you went to the airport) moneys that were supposed to be for road repairs, education, medical care, and just about everything else under the sun is being used to "fight terror" america's youth are being sent to foreign soils to fight and some get killed or injured in the name of the "war on terror" sounds like we are letting the terrorists win by giving up the things one by one that make this country great..its like the school bully hit us, so we wrap ourselves in 30 layers of pillows,kevlar, carbon fiber, chicken wire, steel plate..anything to keep from getting briused if he ever hits us again, meanwhile its getting hard to move wearing all this "protection", its a bulky cumbersome pain in the ass..when what we really need is a good pair of brass knuckles to split the bullies face open if he tries to hit us again, this giving him a ***** slap and hiding under the bed to protect ourselves **** isnt cutting it.