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Is the U.S. still "the land of the free"?

Is the U.S. still "the land of the free"?

  • Yes, no doubt

    Votes: 19 35.8%
  • Kind of

    Votes: 16 30.2%
  • I don't know

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Not really

    Votes: 12 22.6%
  • No, not at all

    Votes: 5 9.4%
  • I don't care

    Votes: 1 1.9%

  • Total voters
    53
I never said prison is the only way to punish an individual but only talked about prison and life sentences. My argument is about the idea about time served and making sure to not violate their freedoms any further after that point. Its very clear, is it not?

your argument is based on the incorrect premise that jail time was the only punishment they receive. the punishment also includes things like loss of gun rights that continue after the incarceration portion of the punishment ended. voter



And they served their time for their crime. We already went over this.

the punishment involves more then the prison time.
 
I mostly agree we are still the land of the free. However I have a hard time saying it when I am forced to work for 3-4 months and give all the wages to the government. That really doesn't say "free" to me.
 
What kind of problem is the sediment causing others?
There are about 16 properties that are significantly affected due to sediment preventing access to the river via the creek. (Many other properties are affected but most don't know it yet.) Let me add another perverse detail, we and our neighbors were charged thousands for removal of sediment about 7 years ago, none of those charged were sources of sediment.
We just looked it up. The total that was charged and paid by the owners of our property was $7152.18.
 
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When I read the answers to this sort of question I can't help but rephrase it as, "Do white fairly well off men feel we are still the best nation in terms of individual freedom?"

Blacks, and women would say the good old days were not so good.


People living in the territories may have had more personal freedom but also little if any say in national issues.

Many cowtowns had severe firearm restrictions.

Big companies ran roughshod over the legal but immigrant citizens. Big City politics was as rigged as a carnie 3 card monty game.

Corporations may bemoan the EPA but I like clean water and no acid rain.

I certainly don't like the so-called Patriot Act, but our history is littered with Alien and Sedition Acts along with suspending basic rights.

I find the travel restriction to Cuba asinine.

So I figure you have to be very selective in the points you make for or against the argument we have lost some of our freedoms to be overall less free.
I've been pondering this post since I first saw it, and I have to say these are very good points, especially the first two sentences. To whites, things may seem more restrictive, to blacks, not so. Very good post.

Anyway, a lot of what I base the question on is the chipping away at our freedoms a small piece at a time. Not just federal or state governments, which is in our face all the time, but local city and county governments as well. Seems like every time I turn around my city is passing a new ordinance (or three). And these ordinances never give anything back, they always take something away.

For example, 5 years ago my city passed an ordinance outlawing parking on one side of the street in every new subdivision. The street widths haven't changed, just the restrictions. In a recent conversation with a councilman, he told me the city is drafting an ordinance to ban parking on one side of all existing residential streets in the city, the streets that weren't covered in the previous ordinance. Never mind that cars have parked just fine for the last 100+ years, no, this has only now become an issue.

In and of itself, the parking thing isn't huge, but it is a small piece of a larger problem, and that is simple things we've been able to do... things that really aren't harming anybody... are being taken away from us piece by piece. Maybe it's just me, but I find this to be a disturbing trend.

ETA: At what point do we consider everything pretty much done? When do we reach the point that it is a city's job to just maintain and stop with the new laws and restrictions?
 
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your argument is based on the incorrect premise that jail time was the only punishment they receive. the punishment also includes things like loss of gun rights that continue after the incarceration portion of the punishment ended. voter

I didn't notice that is where you were going, sorry. I admitted just as much in response to Phoenix.


the punishment involves more then the prison time.

Yet, only the prison time has to deal with the crime that was committed while anything after deals with preventing it from happening again. Is that not obvious?
 
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Part of it is private and part is public. I'm on the public part. The source sediment is on private property it's not clear yet where the creek becomes public.

Then you have no property rights to defend and your sole option is to lobby government for relief. Good luck.
 
Far too many folks on the libertarian right use the words LIBERTY and FREEDOM as hollow cliches designed as catch-alls to simply cover their asses while being as vague and unspecific as possible.
I disagree. I think that many libertarians use the words liberty and freedom to describe a condition in which a person's ownership rights in his own body and his legitimate material property are not invaded.

Authoritarians hate the concept of liberty, as their goal is to invade the property rights of others in order to impose their hegemony and rule over others. They denigrate liberty and those who wish to preserve it. The very idea of liberty is an obstacle to their plans to subjugate their fellow man.
 
People saying "no" or "kind of" have never traveled outside the U.S.

They have nothing to compare the U.S. to.
 
People saying "no" or "kind of" have never traveled outside the U.S.

They have nothing to compare the U.S. to.

I was in the Navy for 6 years. 4 of them aboard Aircraft Carriers. I done 2 med cruises and one year spent two months stateside. Trust me I have seen other countries. The fact that we are free-er then them doesn't make us the land of the free. It just makes us not as oppressed or oppressed differently. Would you work from January to April without pay as long as they paid you the rest of the year?
 
People saying "no" or "kind of" have never traveled outside the U.S.

They have nothing to compare the U.S. to.

Why does it matter - in comparison to other countries?

Isn't it a lack of knowledge per *our* nation's history and awareness of our changes?
 
People saying "no" or "kind of" have never traveled outside the U.S.

They have nothing to compare the U.S. to.

you made the same stupid straw man argument as Navy Pride. this thread doesn't ask if we are the best nation on Earth to live in, it is if we are actually the land of the free
 
And if I was on the private portion of the creek?

Then youvwould have a civil case and could sue the person violating your property for relief and restitution. If government is the polluter then you still can seek redress.
 
People saying "no" or "kind of" have never traveled outside the U.S.

They have nothing to compare the U.S. to.

Soke of us have lived in other countries where there are no molestations by government agents at airports. Where starting a business does bring in a host lf busybodies and extortionists with the force of law behind them. Where one can freely trade gooda without filling out piles of paperwork. Many countries have stricter laws than the US, but the enforcement is far less authoritarian.
 
It is a little odd to hear people speak of aircraft carriers and complaints of 3-4 months of taxes. Our nation isn't cheap to run. I suppose other nations lacking 13 battle carrier groups, the ability to deliver tons of bombs anywhere in the world, or field divisions of M1a battle tanks- they can be run on the cheap. For all some right wingers rant about no way the UN is EVER gonna tell us what we can and can't do...

If we had split into two nations in 1861, decided not to build huge fleets and large modern aircraft, opted to rely on a citizen army that remains mostly in reserve until Congress calls it up...

well then something like the UN just might be telling us exactly what to do.

My rural county spends a lot of money maintaining our gravel roads, a rural school bus system, extended emergency services, and sheriff dept. That's not cheap either.

So yes it is 'fun' to rant about taxes, who doesn't wish they were smaller but feeling free should mean a lot more than selfish reasons.

Someone attempted to hold up the Federal Register and our Tax code as proof of the unsustainable burden on the poor much downtrodden business class. However as a farmer I have absolutely no need to know the regulations on Big Pharma or coal mining. No need to read the daily speeches or special days for the congress man's constituent. What I need to know is ranching. And I have a gubment office all too willing to help me understand if there are any changes to the rules.

The tax code- again if I don't manage a mortgage house do I need to know their forms? Or a roofing company? How about a auto repair shop? No I don't I need to know a TINY fraction of the tax code, the part that applied to my type of agriculture.

Radcen-
I can relate a story of restricting parking in the streets surrounding Philly. The size of the street didn't change, the size of the city work trucks did. After a brutal snow and ice storm the cities couldn't plow the side streets because the big SUVs parked there took up too much room to allow the large city plows through. The smaller pick-up sized plows lacked the muscle to plow the ice and snow. Fire trucks and EMT 'buses' have grown as well.

If I may offer you an out from the 'burden' of so much interference-

Move out my way. I live 15 minutes from a bottle of milk or a newspaper, 30 minutes away from a hospital, no building codes (FYI the bank will kind of insist the house be up to code if they are going to loan on it), I can pee outside anytime I want. I have a 300 yard range, a pistol range and a feral hog feeder all in my front yard.

Just have to live out past everyone at the end of a dirt road knowing full well no way no how any help will get to you or your kids in time.

Not totally self reliant like Milton would have us all, but a tad more than the average 'Merican... and quite a lighter burden of regulation and services.
 
IMHO, we're in the land of "too free". People think they're entitled to a lot of things which are ridiculous. Listen to some of the stupid occupiers whining for free food and medical from the government. The word "freedom" is abused in this day and age.
 
People saying "no" or "kind of" have never traveled outside the U.S.

They have nothing to compare the U.S. to.

Economic Freedom Index

Pic-for-Econ-Index-article.jpg





You will note we are #10. For the record, I've been to Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain, Israel, Greece, Italy, the Philippines, Korea, Thailand, and I live in Japan. :)
 
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People saying "no" or "kind of" have never traveled outside the U.S.

They have nothing to compare the U.S. to.
I have been outside the US, fairly extensively, but I did not include comparisons to other countries in my reply. I read the question as being US-specific, and compared to the past in the US only, so I restricted my answer to that aspect only.
 
IMHO, we're in the land of "too free". People think they're entitled to a lot of things which are ridiculous. Listen to some of the stupid occupiers whining for free food and medical from the government. The word "freedom" is abused in this day and age.

Freedom doesn't include handouts from the government. In order to get that handout you have to take part of someone else's freedom away. Many people want to pound their chest and loudly proclaim they live in a free country but will whine like a child if someone tries to take away their freedom robbing handouts.
 
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