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Saturday, October 06, 2012

It Depends What The Definition Of "All" Is.

It still says, “legal tender, for all debts, public and private” – but it’s becoming clear the powers-that-be would much prefer you used something else.
Besides cash money, that is.
Increasingly, they are insisting.
A few weeks ago, for example, the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that a motorist on a toll road who tries to pay the toll with cash may be physically detained – and forced to submit to an an interrogation. (PDF of the ruling is available here.)
Last year, Florida residents Joel, Deborah and Robert Chandler were driving on the Florida Turnpike – hilariously named The Less Stressway – when they came upon a toll both, operated by private contractor Faneuil, Inc. for the state of Florida. They attempted to pay the toll with legal tender – cash. A $50 bill. Faneuil, Inc. really wants people to use “SunPass” electronic transponders and has eliminated cash toll lanes on a section of the Parkway between the Exit 1 and Exit 47 interchanges in Miami-Dade County. This happened to be the stretch of road on which the Chandlers were driving that day. They did not have the electronic “Sun Pass” transponder – perhaps because, like many motorists, they don’t like the idea of a government-issued (or corporate issued) electronic transmitter in their vehicle – which can track their vehicle. The transponders make it easy to monitor where a car goes, when it goes – and how quickly it goes. Reasonably, many people – including the Chandlers – prefer not to be so monitored.
So, they tried to pay the toll with cash.

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3 comments:

Anonymous said...

I wonder if they use credit cards at home.

Anonymous said...

And the government is doing the same thing with the Obama phones these people get - they know where they are at all times and these idiots just keep on voting for him.

Anonymous said...

Sometimes when paying a toll with a big bill, a 50 or 100, they would write down my tag number if it was found that the bill was a counterfeit later on. Then there would be a course of action for them to take in tracking down of the one passing such.

It may be inconvenient but is a general practice.

Sounds like someone who has an overinflated opinion of themselves and their value of their time.

Which as they have been shown, is not true.