I wrote here last week about the limping DHS grant-making process for the REAL ID Act. (Summary: Good money after bad.)

Unsurprisingly, ID card maker Digimarc is touting the spending going to “its” states in a press release. I wrote about the plans of biometric technology company L‑1 to acquire Digimarc’s ID card business in a recent TechKnowledge entitled “L‑1: The Technology Company in Your Pocket.” (Digimarc recently received a higher offer for its ID card business from a French conglomerate. The appetite for national ID systems is certainly higher in old Europe and elsewhere around the globe than in the United States.)

Late Friday, DHS Assistant Secretary for Policy Stewart Baker posted on DHS’ “Leadership Journal” blog about the grants. Late Friday is the time of the week when releases are least likely to get uptake — are DHS web staff trying to suppress Baker? You’d expect to see something like this on Friday morning, or the night before grants are announced.

Anyway, in his blog post, Baker tries to inflate the money available for REAL ID, claiming that this $80 million is really more like $511 million. It’s not. And if it were, it still would be only 3% of the $17 billion cost of implementing REAL ID.

Of course, Baker claims that the costs of implementing REAL ID are lower now, but that’s only because DHS assumed away much participation in the program. I suppose France could have defeated Germany buy building only 27% of the Maginot line, but it’s doubtful. That’s what a national ID card is — a Maginot line that’s easy to avoid. Baker wants us to believe that a bad security system which is also incomplete is therefore … somehow … good.

Baker’s post, like the rest of DHS’ recent efforts, is a tired effort to prop up REAL ID. He tries to skip past the issues, saying “The arguments for having secure identification speak for themselves.” They don’t, and Baker hasn’t spoken for them either.

DHS’ institutional support for REAL ID grows more and more anemic with each passing day. Witness the thoroughly lame effort of the Department to revive it by banning “willful” refusal to show ID at airports. I now find myself in the position of trying to draw attention to the corpse of REAL ID — I do so because government programs like this have to be really dead before they’re truly dead.

Giving away grants that nobody wants. Defending what can’t be defended. I would be tired too. Congress can make everyone’s life better by rescinding these grants and repealing the REAL ID Act.