The us is still one of the most free countries in the world and people literally risk death to come here. Our government is not even close to the imperialist Roman empire.
A closer comparison would be the EU and the fall of it (Brexit).
A closer comparison would be the EU and the fall of it (Brexit).
Diversity visa benefits those countries with small population. 50,000 lucky people from these countries get a visa.
After E-Verify in the states, things are not as easy as used to be. Large employers attract I-9 audits if they don't participate in E-Verify. So, illegal labor has shifted to small employers: restaurants, general contractors (in construction), janitorial services, etc.
Also, immigrants don’t come to the US for “freedom”. _Maybe_ in the past, but definitely not today. We move here because it’s where the opportunities are, or (in the case of many refugees) to escape violence.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_freedom_indices
--------
US: #16 Canada:#9 UK:#11 HK:#1
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_Freedom_of_the_World_...
US:#25/26 Canada:#6/7 UK:#14 Norway:#1
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democracy_Index
US:#33 Canada:#20 UK:#39 Norway:#1
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_the_Press_(report)
US:#10 Canada:#3 UK:#36 The Netherlands:#1
More people risk their lives to go to Turkey. That's not a valid metric.
> Our government is not even close to the imperialist Roman empire.
That's correct. We need to stop comparisons like that, the Roman empire or republic is nowhere near any of the current countries or organizations in 2019.
> A closer comparison would be the EU and the fall of it (Brexit).
EU is not even close to the imperialist Roman Empire either. I mean, the main comparison point between Rome and US is the amount of military forces it keeps abroad (which is not enough for the comparison to make sense IMO). EU doesn't really even have an army. It is pointless to compare both.
And Brexit has strengthen Europe for a generation at least: people proposing exiting from the EU have basically gone silent almost everywhere where they used to be audible. It used to be a policy that could be defended by moderate right or far left wings, no it is seen as a purely populist far-right strategy.
With the exception of speech (cool) and guns (meh), the US is not really particularly free by global standards. There is plenty of heavy handed regulation on the books. Think about all the onerous zoning rules, the regressive alcohol laws (what kind of "free" country doesn't let you buy beer in grocery stores in many states?), the food safety laws that ban kinder eggs and unpasteurized milk (which are legal in other countries).
And yet I thought HN has no appetite for rabid nationalism. Guess I was wrong because an exception seems to apply when it's Americans reveling in their own bizarre delusion and nauseating hypocrisy.
The fact that we don't want nationalistic flamewars on this site doesn't mean comments of that nature never appear here. Of course they do. That's why we keep having to say we don't want nationalistic flamewars.