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View original postThe Index of Economic Freedom, from the Heritage Foundation, puts the US in 10th place.

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View original postThe World Press Freedom Index, from, Reporters Without Boarders, puts the US in 32nd place.

View original postYeah, because the media's opinion is notoriously relevant to most American Conservatives Incidentally many of those countries have prominent public TV/radio/papers/etc which generally lowers my belief in their freedom of the press, and not very many outlets. But I wouldn't claim the US has the freest press, anything but, yet I'd also point out that we have a very free press considering the pressures we are under not to, which many of those others don't have. Iceland, for instance, does not have hundreds of thousands of soldiers and spies out there vulnerable to exposure, research facilities others nations would murder to get a look inside, and all the other luxuries afforded countries on the second or third tier of power and influence.

Not what I said, that's way too simplistic an attitude too. I am not a big believer in security at the price of freedom, however it is also absurd not to recognize one occasionally has to trade freedom in one thing for freedom in another. Were that not the case we'd have a lot more functional anarchist states as opposed to none. One also has to remember that much of the US's military, intelligence, and economic might by its very existence buys a lot of freedom for non-Americans too, without them having to engage in those trade-offs. Say what you want about Iraq, there's a marked decrease in rape rooms and torture chambers there.

View original postHuh. You're right, I must not have looked closely enough. It would appear that there are, in fact, two categories in which the United States outscores New Zealand: "guns" and "limited government." As you say, the data is probably disputable.

Correct, but the two essentially tie in equal weighting, 713 NZ vs 707 US, in most categories an approximate tie occurs and odds are those could be widened, decreased, or flipped depending on analysis method that derived them. What's more pertinent is the big gaps, which is really only present on guns. NZ makes up medium-gap areas on some of the more weak criteria, like 'freedom from inflation', which frankly is a real weird one to have when the US currency is the international one and is often encouraged by other countries to inflate its own currency, kind of unfair standard, as a lot of these are, New Zealand is never going to be accused of toppling the planetary economy by failing to take a given fiscal policy, the US will.

View original postThat is a perfectly fair and valid viewpoint. Everyone is entitled to an opinion, after all. MY point was that Anonymous said, without qualifications, that "the US remains the "most free" developed country in the world." I disagreed and posted to that effect. (Kinda like you calling me out on "every study" ) The evidence, such as it is, appears to support me.

To the contrary, A2k is a conservative, and though if I recall correctly he breaks with the right on gay marriage and abortion, one notes that neither of those were measured. As I said above, by the standards of an American conservative the US is indeed #1, he very definitely is pro-gun and business freedom, so in all probability this American primacy is entirely justified on his own metric without needing to even factor in nationalism. None of us will disagree that those listed metrics do not deserve extra or lesser weight, and its likely to be decidedly subjective.

A big aspect of that subjectivity also comes from the flaw in removing nationalism as a valid item. As mentioned, these things either lack or take a stance, embedded into their data, on gay rights or abortion or many other things. One missing is, for lack of a better words, "Contributions to Global Freedom", and well they might, since who ranks #1 on that isn't even debatable in any context in which the used parameters in those studies has a trace of validity. But when nationalism is frowned on then a person has no justification for ignoring the state of freedom elsewhere. When it comes to the cause of promoting freedom a lot of nations have been decidedly stingy with their blood and gold. Ironically often the same places that decrying nationalism is popular.

I'm not saying you're wrong to disagree with him, just that you're wrong to say he is. This entire debate is like who as the best house, any rating system is going to be very subjective about ranking outside of cases where it serves no purpose, like comparing a shack to a mansion. Is twice the square footage as good as twice the lawn? Are 3 bathrooms as good as a 3 car garage? Most might say freedom isn't like that but of course it is. Which is more important, the ability to wear the color orange or the ability to cheaply buy a fresh one in the store in January? Is a nation that bans gambling but allows homosexuality and routinely ignores home poker games to be rated lower than one in which gambling and homosexuality are legal but the government makes minimal efforts to stop hate crimes against gays? These list are, as I said, pointless feel-good exercises either for those wishing to bang on their own country or tout it. They mean little and achieve less.