Government-Issued Foil

I had to renew my passport finally, and evidently the age of Electronic Passports came while I wasn't paying attention (Wikipedia tells me it was 5 years ago now). I imagine that there was a big privacy brouhaha about the introduction of little chips that contain government database information on the passport holder.

And I'm trying to imagine the meeting that all of the State Department folks had about getting the privacy people to shut up, because apparently "But, NINE ELEVEN!!!" wasn't doing enough of a job of that anymore... And I'm picturing that maybe after about two weeks of sitting there, eating crappy generic take-out sandwiches and mediocre chinese that had been brought in...maybe that's when somebody threw up his hands and implored "why don't we just give everybody a piece of foil to wrap it in?! Can I go home now?! I'm not sure that my children remember who I am."

And I think that's exactly how it went, because now, when you apply for a passport card, you are issued a little foil sleeve to store it in.