Can Identity Really be Authenticated?

Laura Newland has a personal take on realID here. She says, " The REAL ID Act is about much more than identity theft. It is about the notion that identity is something that can be authenticated in the first place." A longer quote:

The REAL ID Act has passed, so let’s take its implications seriously because it is rooted in fear, the result of which is the codification of racial profiling that is shameful. Where is our response to this white vigilance against nonwhites? Where is our outrage? Why is it so easy to place our outrage in abstract legal conceptualizations of rights, such as privacy, but so difficult to place our outrage in our own experiences? Why do we continue denying the experiences of others? Where is our ethical vigilance against bigotry?