Sweetness. The current CAP membership card looks like something you have to spend five boxtops for -- kind of makes it difficult to look like you know what you're doing (assuming, of course, that you do) when you have to flash that sucker at the gate. Of course, the new ones are intended for senior members only, so cadets should get theirs...oh...never. Ish.
Who's willing to bet money that the SM's will be shelling out their own cash for it, though?
EDIT: Upon closer inspection of the pic, it appears it's got some funky smart-card-like stuff on it, such as the shiny ICC to the right of the bar code. It'd be kind of handy to have that info around in the event of an emergency, but it strikes me as kind of cost intensive, given that we don't currently have a system to collect that type of stuff. Probably just a prototypical thing (or in imitation of the Common Access card on the right), but interesting all the same.
Heh. "Auxiliarist." Is that even a word?
FURTHER EDIT: While we're batting around improbable ideas for the new ID card, how about an embedded RFID tag? They're currently navel-gazing about whether to embed RFID in new passports (just for the record, I'm not in favor -- if I want a target painted on my back, I'll do it myself in an aesthetically pleasing way, dammit) and Homeland Security already has 'em, so why not us?
TANGENT: The government's defense in the Wired article is that it's not RFID, it's a "contactless chip." Well, hell, why didn't you say so? Doublespeak makes it all soo much better. I shall go and stand in the subcutaneous tagging line like a good girl now.
The difference, they say, between contactless chips and the much-maligned RFID tag is that the reader has to be within a few inches to detect the signal. Great. So the kidnappers have to sneak up on me now to tell whether I'm an American (besides the zinc oxide on the nose and the "Let's Roll!" t-shirt, I mean). Another victory for American ingenuity.
EDIT EDIT: The Air Force nuked this proposal without comment. I was right about the SM's shelling out, though, so nyah.
